To be successful in life you’ve got to take risks, big risks.  You’ve got to try things that might not work.  You’ve got to chase dreams that might not be fulfilled.

The people who live the greatest lives are not the ones who never fail.  They’re the people who learn from their failures, get back up, and try again.

Take a look at this video featuring the some of the greatest “failures” of all time.

My first attempt at starting OurChurch.Com failed. After a year, I was broke and had to get another job. While working that full time job, we changed business models, and essentially restarted the company.  It took 2 1/2 long years of hard work before the business grew to the point where I could leave that job and do OurChurch.Com full-time again.  We’re not Google or anything, but now we have 8 people on staff and serve more than 14,000 users and clients.

Not that I’ve got this one down or anything. I still struggle with the fear of failure and the temptation to play it safe on a regular basis.

But I want to encourage you…

Don’t let past failures keep you down!

Don’t let the fear of failure keep you from pursuing your dreams!

Do you have a story to tell from your own life of bouncing back from failure?  What dream are you holding back on because you’ve been afraid it might fail?

Earlier this week, Brian Dodd published a good post titled Leaders, It’s Time To Take Out The Trash.  In it he writes about how Coach Ed Orgeron evaluates defensive linemen. One of the things he looks at is “Does he keep his feet?”  “Thing I don’t like is I keep seeing him going to the ground.  He’s gotta be able to stay out of the trash.”

Brian to continues his post by listing some of the ways he’s seen leaders “going to the ground” and unable “to stay out of the trash” including.

• The majority of your day is spent dealing with high-maintenance people rather than your leaders and top producers.
• People keep coming to you with complaints.  They are bringing you THEIR garbage.
• Your day is spent putting out fires rather than advancing the organization’s mission and vision.
• You spend time on the maintenance of people rather than investing in them.

I can certainly relate. To borrow from another football analogy, when faced with these situations it feels like we’re stuck on defense.

I don’t think there’s anything more frustrating in football than when the opposing team methodically drives down the field time and time again.  The defense keeps getting pushed back.  They just can’t seem to get a turnover or stop them on 3rd down.

As leaders we are motivated by the hope of progress.  It’s what gets us out of bed in the morning.  So it’s frustrating to expend energy on things in which the best case scenario is not to lose ground.

In fact, if you’re frustrated in your leadership roles these days, take a moment to compare how much time you’re spending on defense to how much time you’re spending on offense.  Chances are your frustration is at least in part because you can’t get your defense off the field.

If you are spending most of your time on defense…

It’s time to go on offense!

How?

Start Attacking the Underlying Problems

Each of the situations cited above is a symptom of a larger problem.  Instead of sitting back and repeatedly dealing with the symptoms, figure out the underlying causes and make strategic changes to address them.

Don’t resign yourself to spending most of your time dealing with high-maintenance people, talk to them about the things that make them high-maintenance.  Work together to find a solution.  Let them know that if they don’t do their part to lower their maintenance level, that they’re not going to be able to continue in their current role.

Don’t resign yourself to constantly putting out fires, ask your team, “How can we reduce the number of fires?” And “How can I empower you to put them out on your own?”

But I don’t have time to…

The challenging part about attacking underlying problems is that it takes time and energy.  It takes time and energy to address the issue.  It takes time and energy to implement solutions.  It takes time before the solutions begin to work.  It means putting in extra time and effort to do this at the very time we feel frustrated and perhaps overwhelmed from dealing with too many fires, difficult people, etc.

But it’s the only way to get your defense off the field.

Good leadership demands that you get back on offense.

What’s got you playing defense these days?  What underlying problems do you need to start attacking today?

Sometimes we can be our own worst critic. We say things to ourselves we would never dare say to another human being….

• I’m so stupid.
• There’s no way I can do that.
• How can I be such an idiot?
• I’m gonna blow it again.

Self-talk is a huge deal.  That voice inside our head largely determines how we’re going to respond to the challenges of the day.

Do you want to face them with confidence and enthusiasm?

If so, try talking to yourself like this 3 year old girl.

What are you telling yourself today?

If you missed the previous posts in this series about time/task management, let me quickly bring you up to speed.

Level 1: To-do list

A to-do list is helpful because it keeps you on track, prevents tasks from slipping through the cracks and frees your mind from having to remember tasks.  But it’s less than ideal and can lead to frustration, anxiety, and misplaced priorities. See 4 Reasons to Dump Your To-Do List & Replace It with Something Better

Level 2: Daily priorities list

The next level of task/time management is to create a list of priorities each day.  By having a list that only includes that day’s tasks, it reduces stress and frustration.  Prioritizing tasks helps to prevent us from getting distracted by busy work and stay focused on what’s most important.  See Simple Step Beats To-Do List for Managing Time and Tasks

Creating a daily priorities list is a big step forward from just using a to-do list, but it still falls short.  For example:

• Some tasks, like meetings, have to be done at a specific time regardless of how important they are.
• Some tasks, like running errands, can’t be done during certain times (like while at work) regardless of how important they are.
• Some tasks, like checking & responding to email and phone calls, should be done at least a few times a day regardless of how important you consider that to be.
• You may perform better at certain tasks at certain times of the day.  For example, you may find that your best blog writing is done first thing in the morning even though writing blog posts isn’t your top priority for the day.  Or you may have some tasks you can do while kids are around and others you have to do when things are quiet.

So, the next step in task/time management…

Level 3: Schedule each day

After you’ve created your daily priorities list, get out your calendar.  Start at the top of your priorities list and put each task on your calendar for the day.

Pretty simple, right?

What will this do for you?

• It puts everything in one place.
• It keeps you focused on your highest priorities while still enabling you to do them at the time of day that works best for you.
• It gives you a more realistic idea of what you can accomplish in a day.  If your priorities list has 20 things on it, but only 10 fit on your calendar, you now know that 10 tasks is more realistic. That’s a good reality check.  It will also prevent you from getting frustrated when you only get 10 tasks done.

I find there’s a huge difference in my productivity between the days that I schedule vs those that I just wing it with a to-do list or daily priorities list.  But I’ll admit that even though I know that I’m still not always disciplined enough to do it.

Do you schedule your priorities each day?  Why or why not?

If you manage your time and tasks with a to-do list, do you struggle with any of these “symptoms?”

• Do you feel overwhelmed because your to-do list is so long?
• Do you get frustrated because after a long hard day when you look at your list, its not much shorter than it was at the beginning of the day?
• Do you feel like you never get enough time for the really important things because you spend most of your time reacting and responding to urgent but less important things like phone calls, email, requests for help from other people?
• Do you find yourself gravitating towards the quick but less important tasks on your just so you can get the satisfaction of crossing things off your list?
• Do you waste a lot of time reviewing your list and trying to decide what you should do next?

If you do, that’s because of the deficiencies of the to-do list system we discussed in Monday’s post, 4 Reasons to Dump Your To-Do List & Replace It with Something Better.

If you’re using a to-do list, stepping up to the next level of time/task management is relatively quick and easy and can eliminate many of the “symptoms” described above.

Create a Daily Priorities List

First thing each morning (or even the night before), take your big, overwhelming to-do list and from it create a new list that includes only the tasks you want to accomplish that day and list the tasks in order of importance.

Put away the big to-do list for the rest of the day.  Keep your new list of priorities in front of you.  Start at the top of the list and work your way down.  Simple, right?

What will this do for you?

• You’re less likely to feel overwhelmed, because your daily priorities list is shorter and more manageable.
• You won’t worry about or get distracted by tasks you’ll do on future days, because those tasks aren’t staring you in the face all day.
• You’re less likely to get off track doing less important tasks, because your tasks are prioritized.
• You can instantly see and evaluate your day’s progress, because you’re only looking at that day’s priorities.

While I believe creating a daily priorities list is a much better time/task management system than a do-do list, it can be improved upon as well. I’ll get to that in the next post in this series.  But if you’re currently using a to-do list, don’t let that stop you from giving a daily priorities list a shot.

Discussion

If you use a to-do list, can you identify which of the “symptoms’ described above can you identify with?  Are you willing to give creating a daily list of priorities a shot?

If you already create a daily priorities list, are you experiencing these benefits?

Lots of people use to-do lists to manage their time.  There are at least 3 benefits I can think of to using one:

1. It keeps you on track.
2. It prevents tasks from slipping through the cracks.
3. It frees your mind from having to try to remember things.

A to-do list is what I call a Level 1 time management system.  It’s better than nothing, but it has a number of deficiencies.

1) It doesn’t differentiate higher priority tasks from lower priority tasks. As a result it’s easy to get caught up it the trap of doing less important tasks just to get the warm fuzzy feeling of crossing things off the list.  It’s also easy to slip into the habit of doing the tasks we enjoy and never getting to the ones we don’t.

2) It doesn’t tell you what needs to be done today.

3) It’s hard to see & evaluate progress. If your list includes dozens of tasks you’d like to accomplish this week, this month, or this year, your list could be as long as your arm.  If that’s the case, even on a good day you barely make a dent in your list (especially if tasks are constantly being added to it), which can be very frustrating, particularly if you’re an achiever.

4) It’s not holistic. If your to-do list includes everything you want to do as a spouse, a parent, a homeowner, a volunteer, an employee/business owner, and so on, chances are you’ll naturally gravitate towards tasks for some roles and neglect tasks for other roles.  A to-do list doesn’t help you live a balanced life.

There are a number of systems that overcome these deficiencies and can help us better manage our time and tasks.  I’ll talk more about them in future posts in this series.

Do you use a to-do list?  If so, how does it help you?  Where does it fall short?

Last month, my wife, Jennifer, and I had the opportunity to spend a week together without kids in Savannah, Charleston, and the North Carolina Outer Banks.  While driving along the Outer Banks one day, we passed through the town of Rodanthe and saw the house that was featured in the 2008 movie Nights in Rodanthe, staring Richard Gere and Diane Lane.

Neither of us had seen the movie, so a couple of days ago we rented it.

If you’re a romantic, you’ll probably hate the ending, as you probably do of all Nicholas Sparks stories.  But it’s good story about love and personal transformation.

There’s a touching scene at the end of the movie when Diane Lane’s character, Adrienne, is tenderly talking with her teenage daughter, Amanda, and she says:

“There’s another kind of love, Amanda. One that gives you the courage to be better than you are, not less than you are. One that makes you feel that anything is possible. I want you to know that you could have that. I want you to hold out for it.”

Wow!

You know, I think she’s right.

Chances are there are some people in your life that you love but feel like you have to be a certain way with them to really be accepted.  So, you conform to their expectations.  Maybe it’s the expectations of a friend, or your parents, or your significant other.  But the end result is by conforming you’ve become less than you were meant to be.

Sometimes those expectation are not even real.  Sometimes they’re assumptions.  Sometimes we conform to who we think we ought to be. Usually it’s out of fear.  Fear that we’ll disappoint someone.  That they’ll leave.  Maybe we’ve made assumptions about God’s expectations for us.

Or maybe you’re the one placing the expectations on others, trying to control who they are.  Maybe you get upset with your friends, your spouse, your kids when who they are or what they do messes with how you envisioned your live.

Are you forcing your kids towards the career, interests and personality you want them to have because you think that’s best for them? Or do you love them enough to make them feel like anything is possible?

Do you love your wife as long as she cares for the kids and supports your career?  Or does your love enable her to pursue her God-given dreams as well?

Is there someone close to you for whom you’re always conforming or feeling like you’re walking on eggshells around them?  Maybe it’s time for a conversation.

Do the people you love have the courage to be better than they are? Do they feel like anything is possible?  If not, maybe you need to do some soul searching.  Maybe you need to let go of some fear and control.  Maybe you need to release them and really love them.

There is another kind of love.  I want you to hold out for it.  From others and from yourself.

Named by TIME magazine as one of the “25 Most Influential Evangelicals in America,” Bishop Thomas Dexter (T.D.) Jakes is an entrepreneur, global advocate, philanthropist, and pastor of The Potter’s House. Located in Dallas, Texas, this multiracial, non-denominational congregation has more than 30,000 members. Known for his service to both the church and the global community, he’s led initiatives to combat domestic violence, homelessness, poverty, and AIDS. A prolific writer, Bishop Jakes has authored more than 30 books, including two New York Times best-sellers. A past and popular Summit speaker, he will close our 2010 gathering with a powerful and moving reminder of the greatness of God.

Notes

• People don’t do everything because of dollars and sense, they do it because of passion.
• Church leadership is unique. People don’t’ come to follow you, they come to follow Jesus.
• They came to follow Him and they got you.
• It’s a real step down from Jesus to you.
• You cannot make passionate people if you’re not passionate yourself.
• People get tired of following an imitation.
• People follow people who move, take action, and take risk.
• Part of leadership is to make sure the lamp in your group, your church does not go out.
• Anointing from the head, to the beard, to the skirt. Make sure it’s not diluted or polluted.
• Challenge people without overwhelming them.
• Gift analysis is important.
• When God gives you people to work with that’s assets, they’re right from his treasure chest.
• You have to make sure that people deliver on the promises you make.
• Pray that the Holy Spirit gets the message across to people even when you don’t.
• God will make up the difference.
• People are ignited by passion.
• Passion is more than emotionalism.
• Passion is the fuel that makes the engine go.
• Put people to work doing things that make them jump out of bed.
• 2 different kids of leaders: builders and bankers.
• Banking the fire made it burn all night without burning out.
• Builders are people who you can give next to nothing and they can make something out of nothing. Joseph was a builder. He was building in prison.
• If your a builder you need a banker, someone who can manage and sustain.
• The problem is most people get people like themselves around themselves.
• If you only have people around you who do what you do, they compete with you instead of complete you.
• When Jesus began his ministry he didn’t pick one rabbi. He didn’t pick anyone who did what he did.
• Don’t make confidants out of the people you work with.
• Confidants are people who are for you no matter what.
• If you have 2-3 confidants in a lifetime you are blessed.
• Constituents are not people who are for you, they are people who are for what you are for.
• Don’t try to hold people to tightly who are meant to come and go.
• Some people are like the King James Version, they came to pass.
• Comrades they are against what you’re against.  You put them in the fight.
• Like Peter, you gotta keep at least one ear-cutter.
• If you don’t learn how to use comrades to fight for you, they will fight against you.
• If you try to make comrades grazing in the pasture when they should be howling on the mountain, it will bring trouble to your team.
• Most leaders find it difficult to be transparent enough to let people know them and read them.
• Nobody has to be impassioned when you’re in a battle, you have to encourage them when they’re along the way.
• Sometimes when you encourage people they leave with your courage.
• Sometimes I think I need a me. (to encourage me)
• When you’re tired and running low, you have God who gives strength.
• When my heart is overwhelmed I go to the rock who is higher than me.

Said to be the most studied CEO of the 20th century, Jack Welch began his 41-year career with the General Electric Company in 1960, and in 1981 became the company’s eighth chairman and CEO. Fortune named him “manager of the century,” and the Financial Times named him one of the three most admired business leaders in the world. He teaches at MIT’s Sloan School of Management and recently launched the Jack Welch Management Institute at Chancellor University, offering advanced management degrees online. A prolific business writer, he authored the internationally best-selling autobiography, Jack: Straight from the Gut and also wrote The Welch Way, a widely read BusinessWeek column.

Notes

• Bill: when I think of Jack Welch I think of 4 words authenticity, energy, candor, differentiation
• Authenticity
  • Have to be yourself.
  • People want to know you’re a person they can count on.
  • In business people take on a persona that is not themselves. They think they have to be a certain way.
• Did you look for authenticity when hiring?
  • Sure, but you don’t always see it.
• Energy
  • You’ve got to energize the people around you.
  • If you’re full of energy and jumping around, it doesn’t help anyone.
• How do you energize people?
  • Engage them.
  • Tell the story, so others will join you.
  • Not hyping them.
  • It’s basically getting them to feel the vision.
  • The job of a leader is to draw out the people around you who are starter than you.
  • The crazy thing about insecure people is they hire dopes.
  • Finished the day asking what people got out of the day.
• Candor
  • We fought desperately to really get what people are thinking on the table.
  • Less bureaucracy, less meetings, just say what you think.
• Differentiation
  • At GE there was a ranking of staff as the 20%, the vital 70%, then there was the bottom 10%.
  • Some people say that’s a heartless way to differentiate people and treat them differently.
  • Do you think sports teams differentiate?  Do you think the teams with the best players usually win?
  • You have to have a real appraisal system (candor) to differentiate.
  • It’s critical that the people who work for you know where you stand.
  • In every organization, everyone knows who rates where.
  • Most organizations spend too much time focusing on the lowest 10%.
  • You’ve got to get out of the bottom 10% or move on.
• What are the A players like?
  • Good values, good people…
  • They have a gene that says I love to see people grow. I love to reward people.  They get a kick out of giving a bonus and seeing their people promoted.  They celebrate their people. They have generosity.
  • Insecure people hide their best people.
  • A players don’t have envy.
• Describe B players?
  • Hard working but maybe not as gifted.
  • The top of the 70 and the bottom of the 70 was a world of difference.
  • You run the risk of losing the 21-26 percentile.
  • You have to say, “this is a snapshot in time. You’ll have a chance to move up. Here’s how.”
  • Here’s what I like about what you’re doing. Here’s what you can do to improve.
  • Don’t write a new appraisal, write over the old one.
• What characterizes the bottom 10%
  • Not a team player, low energy, acidic, pain in the arm.
  • Nothing is worse than negative energy.
  • They’re disruptors, antagonizors.
• Could you have built GE without paying big salaries and bonuses?
  • I wouldn’t have wanted to.
  • People choose to work in the church.
• What’s your biggest failure?
  • In the early stages when people thought I was tearing things apart, I should have moved more quickly.
  • Part of your job as a leader is to help people become more confident.
• Speak about finding a successor and making the transition.
  • Started 8 years before he was going to retire. Had 22 candidates.
  • 8 years later got down to 3 and they were all the long-shots
  • Jay Leno/Conan O’Brien fiasco was caused by making the choice 5 years in advance when people change.
  • I don’t think you ever know how someone is going to behave at the next level.
  • Need a rigorous process, involve a lot of people.
• Celebrations
  • The hardest thing we could get to happen was to get managers to celebrate small victories.
• Jack was in the hospital for 104 days, got a staph infection from a shot.
• Jack sent Bill an email saying “toss one north for me” (an ask for prayer). Did the time in the hospital open you up to things of God?
  • I love this church.
  • Bill: I sense an openness to the next step in the journey. Jack: yes.
• Bill: I think the next phase of your life will be your most impactful.
• Bill: Never, ever, ever give up on somebody. Everyone of you has people in your life that you know great things would happen through them if God got ahold of them. We’re here to keep praying and probing and contacting people to see what God might be up to.

Acknowledged as one of today’s most dynamic serial entrepreneurs, Blake Mycoskie launched five successful companies before the age of 30. He is best known as the founder and “chief shoe giver” of TOMS shoes, a for-profit company with a unique social enterprise model that has drawn tremendous media attention. Providing a new pair of shoes to a child in need for every pair sold, they have distributed more than 400,000 pairs of shoes to children around the world to date. Darren Whitehead, teaching pastor at Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, Illinois, will interview Mycoskie on leading organizations with a cause and navigating the start-up phase of an organization.

Notes

• Why did you get into the shoe business?
  • I wasn’t trying to get into the shoe business. I was on vacation in Argentina, saw some volunteers doing a shoe drive. Thought it was unsustainable. Didn’t want to start a charity, wanted to start a business.
  • For every pair of shoes bought, they give away a pair.
• The word “give” is on just about every wall in the offices of TOMS. Why?
  • It feels good to give.
  • What I’ve learned is that giving not only feels good but it’s a good business strategy.
  • In a NYC airport, had never seen anyone wearing TOMS. Saw a girl wearing a pair, asked her about the shoes. Pulled Blake aside and told him all about TOMS.
  • If we focus on giving, our customers are going to do the marketing for us.
  • Have given away more than 600,000 pairs of shoes.
• What distinctive are a part of the TOMS culture?
  • We involve all our staff in the giving.
  • For every employee that’s been with the company at least 2 years they pay for a trip for them to do a shoe drop.
  • Not everyone can do a 1-for-1 strategy, but every company can incorporate giving and service.
• Why didn’t you just start a non-profit?
  • Invested money gained from sale of previous business into TOMS.
  • By doing TOMS as a for-profit, it has enabled it to be sustainable and grow.
• One Day Without Shoes
  • Video – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vlz3QKHJBac
  • First year 250,000 people participated.
  • Doesn’t cost anything to take off shoes, but enabled people to have conversations.
  • Didn’t spend a dollar to advertise, but had some amazing partners.
• What happened when you came up with the idea for TOMS?
  • Not a big deal when I had the idea.
  • Became big to me 6 months later when I did that first shoe drop.
  • Woman came up to him and told him that her 3 kids had been sharing 1 pair of shoes.
• TOMS has captured the attention of young people. Why?
  • Young people want to have a voice and want to do something that matters.  Can’t always afford to do something big, but they’re going to buy a pair of shoes.
  • We make it very easy for them to act.
  • It becomes a part of their identity.
• What have you learned about the importance of strategic partnerships?
  • Very blessed.
  • Not just corporate partners, but churches as well.
  • The reason why the ATT thing worked is because we gave them an authentic story that worked. I’m never in the office.  Their technology enabled me to do what I was doing.
• How important is asking people to accomplish your goal?
  • People really enjoy it because then they get to be a part of your vision and your journey.
  • You can’t be bashful if you want to make change.
• What part has your faith played in TOMS
  • Give your first fruits
  • They stayed true to that principle and didn’t deviate for the 1-for-1 principle even when they were losing money.
• What would you say to other young leaders?
  • Come work for us!
  • We need fantastic leaders to help us get from here to there.
  • Thought as a freshman in college that he would be a successful entrepreneur so that then he can give back when he’s retired.  But it’s never too early to start giving.
• How can churches get involved?
  • Go barefoot on One Day Without Shoes – April 5, 2011