Overwhelmed, frustrated, or stuck in the middle of a big transition, change or project? Are you:

- Going through a big work or life transition, and having a much harder time than you expected with it?

- Creatively blocked on a big goal or project? (And all the while, the clock is ticking away, the costs of that block growing higher and higher each day)?

If so, “The Fresh Eyes Process” may be perfect for you.

I’m piloting “The Fresh Eyes Process” program as a seven-week series of webinar-based classes. 

I’m looking for a small group of people who are ready to break free of barriers and blocks, ready for a great flow of action and results. If that sounds like you, join me in the pilot program.

“The Fresh Eyes Process” is perfect for you if: 

- You’ve had it with the barriers and blocks that have been holding you back

- You’re tired of the frustration, wasted time and money, and lost opportunities that these problems are creating for you

- You’re ready to take current challenges and goals head on, to look at them with fresh eyes, and to try a fresh approach for reaching your goals

- You like the idea of being part of a pilot group where you’re a bit of an adventurer, and your feedback is especially valued

- You want the opportunity to take the class at a reduced rate, available only to pilot program participants

I created “The Fresh Eyes Process” based on readers’ feedback about prior programs and mentoring, as well as a book I wrote, Fresh Eyes: See a Moment. Take a Moment. Give a Moment.

I still get accolades about various training and mentoring programs I’ve created and led for clients over the years.

And the Fresh Eyes book is bringing lots of accolades, as well. Here’s just some of what readers have shared with me about it:

- “I LOVE this book!”?
- “It’s like yoga on paper!”
- “This would be so helpful for people in transition, any transition.”

And one reader, for whom the book came at just the right time in her life, and that of her family, said:

- “This book changed my life.”

When I heard that, I was touched, for starters, and very thankful that I had shared the information when, as as I had.

And then I realized I’d heard this from readers, as well:

- “You have to create a program with this!”

Finally, I decided it was time.

That feedback is why I created this program, and in this way.

It’s why I’m sharing “The Fresh Eyes Process” program opportunity with you now.

If you join me in this pilot program, here’s what you’ll receive and experience:

- Seven weeks of webinar-based classes, one every Wednesday, prerecorded so you can listen to it at your own convenience

- Homework each week, and feedback on it, to help you apply the program content to your work and life (and while doing the homework is optional, it’s highly recommended)

- A copy of my book, Fresh Eyes: See a Moment. Take a Moment. Give a Moment.

- One 30-minute one-on-one mentoring call during the seven-week pilot

- The opportunity to purchase additional mentoring sessions, if desired, at the pilot program participant price

I’m offering “The Fresh Eyes Process” at a pilot program rate of $497 for the people who are ready to help me give the program a good initial workout.

Click here to go to the page where you can sign up, if you’re interested.

And if you know others who may benefit from ”The Fresh Eyes Process,” please share this opportunity with them, as well.

I look forward to working with you in the program, if “The Fresh Eyes Process” is right for you to move through a transition more easily, and beyond barriers and blocks that are now holding you back.

Let’s get you the results you’re so eager to have now.

The finish line.

When you read those words, what do you think? And what do you feel?

Do you imagine, or recall, experiences of:

- Soaring across a finish line?

- Struggling to cross it?

- Missing a finish line altogether, despite your best intentions and most dedicated preparation?

If you’re like most people, your experience with finish lines – and goal achievement – covers the full range from exuberance to missing the mark at times.

Goal-setting and goal achievement is, of course, on the minds of many people now, as the year begins.

If you’re setting goals for this year, try these steps:

1. Think back on your greatest achievements.

Recall what helped you see your way through to achieve them. Was it:

– Setting a clear vision of what you wanted to achieve?

– Seeking customer feedback, whoever the customers were for your work at the time, and letting that guide you forward?

– Following a thread of promising results, wherever they led?

– Concentrating on team or individual development so you’d be well-prepared for a future challenge?

– Did you use some other approach or strategy? If so, what was it?

2. Based on what you discover, what does it tell you about what may work best for goal-setting now?

– Do you need to create a clear vision of your goal, or a strong “felt sense” of achieving what you want now, and next?

–  Do you need to seek customer feedback to guide goal-setting?

–  Do you need to focus on what’s working well and use that to guide you to what’s best for you in the months ahead?

–  Or do you need to concentrate on developing skills or those of a team you lead so that you’re primed for a bigger goal in the future?

–  Is there yet another strategy that would guide you best as you prepare to achieve well in 2012?

Speaking for myself, when I do this exercise, I follow several approaches.

First, I create or refresh the vision that guides my work over several years.

Then I look at what worked well the prior year, and what I need to improve.

I use that information to set aggressive, yet grounded goals for the year ahead.

Next, I create a few annual performance measures to monitor and manage progress.

Finally, when it works best, I convert those annual measures into monthly and weekly measures. I use these to focus and produce steady progress.

These more frequent measures provide me almost instant feedback so I know if I’m on pace, and on-track to meet my goals, or if I must adjust my processes, resources, or perhaps the goals, themselves.

If you found this post valuable, share it with friends and colleagues who can use this information, too. You’ll also like the free weekly newsletter I publish. Sign up for the newsletter here.

Failure – well, partial failure – on a recent vacation activity reminded me what NOT to do when training someone.

In this case, I was a trainee.

Here was the situation:

A group of six of us had gathered on the beautiful Oregon coast, traveling from five different locations throughout the US to share the Christmas holiday.

Our daughter and her boyfriend, the most knowledgeable about Oregon, had looked for activities we might all like, in addition to enjoying each others’ company, cooking together, exploration of the beautiful area, and long beach walks.

Anne and John suggested crabbing which is, essentially, going out in a boat in waterproof clothes to catch your own seafood dinner.

Were we open to the idea?

We were.

The adventure, if nothing else, sounded like fun.

The day of crabbing arrived.

We donned our waterproof gear of boots, gloves, and warm, water-resistant clothes.

We paid for our boat, bait and other fees and bought our permits.

We listened quietly and earnestly as one of the owners of the crabbing company explained the process we would be following, what to look for, and which crabs were illegal to catch, and so had to be thrown back.

The lessons were simple, and we were sure we understood them. The woman training us seemed to be sure we were ready, too.

Her husband led us out to the boat we would use, and helped us get launched, providing lessons there on using this particular boat.

We headed out to the open water, a bit nervous but ready for the fun work ahead.

Soon, with patience, practice, purposeful experimentation, positive attitudes and a little friendly competition, we started to catch cioppino-bound crabs.

We filled every minute we had and headed back to port, buoyant, cold, tired, a bit wet despite our waterproof clothes, and feeling somewhat lucky and happy about our five-crab catch.

We also felt good about our teamwork and the process we’d “mastered” as much as we could in the few hours’  learning and experimentation we’d had for the task.

We sized up the afternoon’s work as a relative success.

Or so we thought.

Here’s the problem:

As we took off our gear, the owners of the crabbing company started getting crabby, and then accusatory with us about some unexpected holes in the nets.

We’d noticed one, too, as we worked, and wondered how it had happened, but tried to adapt by tying knots from a few of the seemingly chewed through ends of the cording.

We had followed their training to the letter, and reiterated that to these angry people, as they drove away future business in their process of defending their nets.

They blamed, accused, and turned what had been a fun adventure into, frankly, a baffling and maddening one.

I quickly tired of their accusatory tone, and replied, “We don’t know what you’re talking about. REALLY! We DO NOT UNDERSTAND what you’re talking about!”

Nothing they described as having happened to the nets on our watch, and none of the ill intent they attributed to us had been true.

Trying to make heads or tails out of this unexpected situation, I added, “Those things you’re describing make NO sense. Why would we do something to let the crabs OUT of the net? It was our goal to CATCH them.”

Part of me wondered if part of the way this duo increased their short-term profits (thinking nothing of the probable long-term effect) was to charge each boat an additional $40 for a net, after the fact.

And as I write this, I still wonder about that.

And in a negative sense, it was amazing to be reminded what a major impact a bad attitude from one or two people can have on a group, and how it can come close to ruining a otherwise-great experience…unless you actively counteract the effect.

I was also amazed that the owners of the company were not taking any responsibility for the training they provided.

As the experience wrapped up and we drove off with our crabs and distasteful memories of those crabby owners, we STILL didn’t understand what went wrong with the adventure of the nets.

We DO know a few things, however:

- We were glad to have shared the good part of the adventure.

- We were glad we’d caught enough crab for dinner, since we’d invested time, effort and money in the process.

- We would go crabbing again…just not through that company.

Here, then, are a few recommendations, if you train other people, in anything, for any reason:

1. Mistake-proof the process as much as you can. Teach the mistake-proofed process.

2. Help the learners understand the big picture, goals and process they will be using.

3. Provide the significant details that can ensure success and cause failure, if you know the things that may happen with novices at the helm.

4. Provide visual aids that learners can easily refer to as they work, if need be.

5. If you see the learners doing something wrong, correct them during the process.

Don’t wait until after the fact to inform them they did something wrong, and worst of all, to do it in an accusatory manner. That’s essentially lying in wait, hoping they’ll fail so you can be “right.”

However, if they fail at the process, and you see it happen…whether you trained them on those details or not…but do nothing to correct it, the fault is yours. You have the power to prevent a problem that they, who are less experienced, may not even be able to see yet.

6. Assume good intentions on the part of the people you’re training.

It makes no logical sense that someone would want to spend their time, energy, and money, if that is also involved, doing things wrong.

7. Take responsibility for your training design, detail, and effectiveness.

8. If you think you’re training effectively, and you want to make sure you are, you’ll ask learners for their feedback, as well as objectively assessing their successful application of your training attempts.

If you found this post valuable, share it with friends and colleagues who can use this information, too. You’ll also like the free weekly newsletter I publish. Sign up for the newsletter here.

An end-of-year, or end-of-project, assessment can be as simple as this:

- Did you meet your goals, or beat them?

- Or did you miss them?

- Why, and how?

That’s all you REALLY need to know to understand if you’ve been successful, right?

Not so fast.

Real success means much more than just “hitting your numbers” by the end of the year, or the end of a project.

Success that’s worth more than its weight in gold prepares you for the future, too.

Real success makes you:

- More confident because of what you’ve experienced (or survived).

- More able to repeat or improve on successes and challenges from the past.

- More skilled in seeing problems that may occur before they happen and so, more able to prevent or minimize them if they do.

- More able to dream big and do big because you trust yourself. You know now that you can experiment and adapt your way through unexpected events and challenges.

Set aside some time before the year ends to understand what you think and feel about the year that’s ending, as well as the year that’s about to begin.

Consider these questions, for starters:

1. What were your 2011 goals?

2. Did you meet them or miss them?

3. Why and how?

4. What have you learned this year that can help you in the year ahead?

5. What are your goals for 2012?

Make sure they’re written as SMART goals: specific, measurable, appropriately aggressive yet attainable, relevant and time-bound.

6. How do you want to be different at the end 2012? For example, what:

- Actions do you need to take?

- Knowledge and skills do you need to acquire

- Beliefs do you need to have or change?

- Habits do you need to drop or improve?

- How can you make these changes most easily?

7. What’s your biggest fear about the year ahead? What can you do to prevent or minimize the impact of it, if it does happen?

8. If you were to REALLY “wow!” yourself by the end of 2012, what would have happened? How?

9. What assumptions are you making about your 2012 goals, and the process of reaching them? How can you test or challenge these assumptions, and change them if it turns out you’re wrong?

10. What support do you need for the year ahead? How can you get it most  effectively and easily?

If you found this post valuable, share it with friends and colleagues who can use this information, too. You’ll also like the free weekly newsletter I publish. Sign up for the newsletter here.

“I’m afraid of what I don’t know,” the CEO of the rapidly growing company said to me.

“And I’m afraid of what I can’t see.”

He feared dire circumstances could wipe out his thriving company.

This CEO was worried enough that he longed for an early warning system…if there were a way to create one.

So I did. It was like solving a high-risk puzzle, or providing an action-oriented dashboard that would guide them through improvements, gradually.

And then we made sure the decision-making and prioritization framework would serve his company.

Do you, too, long for a sense of command in otherwise challenging and unpredictable circumstances?

Do you ever wish for an early warning system such as this CEO had?

If so, here are the basic steps we used to create this busy company’s early warning system:

– Start with your fears

We called this the “edge of cliff” analysis, and started with the CEO’s greatest fears.

He had lived with heavy but ambiguous worry for some time.

He hadn’t yet articulated his fears clearly, so that he could turn them into something positive and actionable.

– Turn them into scenarios

We considered his worst-case scenarios and the probable consequences of each for his clients and company.

We also considered best-case scenarios (they are so much more fun to think about…and we needed those for a bit of relief).

And then we considered what would happen if the best were even better, and the worst were even worse than we imagined.

This stretched our sense of what the early warning system needed to accommodate, and flag for preventative, or adaptive action.

–  Make your early warning system goal clear

Identify what you want your early warning system to do for you.

Then consider who will use the information, and what they will do with it.

Check in with the future users of the information to see what they need to make the information readily usable, and actionable.

– Gather external information

I had to find a proxy for customer satisfaction and frustrations, in lieu of talking directly to customers.

I looked to see what promises were made or implied to customers through the company’s marketing and advertising materials.

This told me what processes inside the company had to work flawlessly, under all different circumstances, no matter what was happening outside the company.

– Synthesize

Working with the leadership team, I verified and clarified which processes had to be top-notch in order for them to continue to thrive.

We mapped this to the most likely scenarios they might face, and identified which processes put them at highest risk, if they were not strengthened and improved.

– Organize and communicate

We organized and simplified the work, making it easy to understand and use.

We had no interest in creating a system that just looked good on paper. We wanted one that would be successful in real life and real business.

We then trained people, helping them see what valuable part they played in making the early warning system work successfully.

The early warning system turned out to be a combination of crystal ball, fire drill, and strategic change management system all rolled into one.

If you need an early warning system, and would like guidance and support as you do so, let me know. 

If enough people are interested, I’ll create a class to teach and guide you through the process.

If you found this post valuable, share it with friends and colleagues who can use this information, too. You’ll also like the free weekly newsletter I publish. Sign up for the newsletter here.

As year-end looms and you work to meet the year’s final goals, here are two of many possible scenarios:

You’re:

- Good for the finish line.

You have the right time, money, energy, attention, skills and other resources you need to get the job done.

- Hoping miracles are real…because you need one now.

In this case, resources may be limited, or poorly aligned with your goals.

Priorities may be unclear, or absent.

Skills, knowledge and experience available to get the job done may be less than what you now know are necessary to be successful in the way the year has worked out.

If you’re in that hoping-for-a-miracle situation, well, remember that you’re not alone.

Many people and teams are discovering the same thing at this point in the year, like it or not.

Sometimes circumstances and priorities in life get all tangled up. And when a deadline is looming – like year-end – the situation only seems worse.

You can improve next year’s plans.

You can improve next year’s implementation.

For now, focus on doing the best you can in the situation you have.

What, then, can you do to untangle the knot and get as much done as possible, as well as possible, before the end of the year is here?

Here are a few ways to tighten your focus and increase your chances of success:

1. Remember – or get clear about – what your goal is.

2. Recall who you’re doing your work for, and what they consider success to be.

3. Get out your map (or, more likely, project plan) leading you to to the finish line.

4. See if it still makes sense, and if not, adjust it so it will work in present circumstances.

5. Figure out where you are on that map or project plan.

6. See and take the next most natural, most obvious step.

7. Repeat as needed.

And all of that is easy to say…but sometimes hard to do.

Wires can just get crossed, and the primary target lost in the confusion, disarray or shuffle.

When that happens find ways to go back to square one to review and recharge, renewing your strong sense of your target, purpose and path there.

Let extraneous things fall away.

Focus your attention, resources and energy on what’s most important.

Here are just a few simple things that may help you regain perspective:

- Take a drive.

Sometimes when you see your office, home or city in the rear view mirror, perspective “magically” returns. Distance and movement away from present circumstances can bring much-needed perspective.

- Take a walk.

The same perspective-gaining principle applies here, except that you’re getting the big picture from nature, and immersion in it, even briefly.

- Review your vision.

If you have a vision of your desired outcome – in whatever form you recorded and saved it – review that.

Pre-experience it, and imagine achieving it, in great detail.

- Listen to satisfied customers.

Remind yourself why you do the work you do.

Review reminders of the great work you’ve done for customers in the past, and are doing in the present.

Listen to or read customer testimonials and review customer feedback.

In easy but effective ways, remind yourself once again why you do the work you do, for the people you serve through it.

If you found this post valuable, share it with friends and colleagues who can use this information, too. You’ll also like the free weekly newsletter I publish. Sign up for the newsletter here.

“I have feedback for you.”

When you hear those words, what do you think?

And what do you feel?

Your reaction may be similar to what many other people report: the idea of giving or receiving feedback makes you cringe.

If you’re a manager:

Providing feedback, including annual performance reviews, may be one part of your job that you’d love to skip.

Yet providing high-quality feedback is essential for your team’s and individual employees’ success.

If you’re an employee:

Receiving feedback, if it’s poorly provided, may make you feel smaller, less able, somehow diminished.

On the other hand, if feedback is well-done, you feel stronger, more capable and more likely to make the requested improvements.

With feedback there is – at least, in many people’s minds – the possibility that there will be tension and conflict.

Just remember that compliments are feedback, too.

Watch out for these five ways feedback can go off-track the next time you’re giving feedback, of almost any kind:

1. Feedback is not clear or specific enough to be understood or actionable

One colleague reported that when she lost her job during a round of layoffs at her high-tech company, it was not at all clear what had just happened.

She wasn’t sure whether her manager was telling her about THE layoffs, or HER layoff.

2. Feedback is focused on the person sending the message rather than the person receiving it

Nervousness or fear of possible conflict can play a big part in this.

If you’re a manager or leader, your job WILL include providing regular and timely feedback.

Get used to it, and learn to provide it well.

Plan and practice.

3. Feedback is not connected to the “big picture” or overall goals

All too often, when I hear about clients, colleagues, family and friends receiving feedback, I hear their frustration with changes that seem small, focused on matters of personal style and opinion.

I’d love to pull their managers aside and advise them to explain the context of the feedback, and the change they would like to have made, and why it is important.

A manager can and should describe, for example, how the change links to the organization’s long-term goals and priorities.

In addition, the person receiving the feedback should be clear about how the change supports his or her personal objectives.

4. There’s not enough time provided for good feedback

Important discussions take time, especially when changes are involved.

Make the time, and take the time to do the job well.

5. There’s no coaching or mentoring, just a “gotcha” style of feedback

“Gotcha” feedback is all too common, in all types of human relationships.

Make sure you’re not guilty of it.

Provide positive feedback along with information you’re providing about improvements you want the person to make.

Make feedback easy to take, and easy to use for good results.

Leave the person whole, feeling positive about his or her ability to successfully make the changes that are ahead.

If you found this post valuable, share it with friends and colleagues who can use this information, too. You’ll also like the free weekly newsletter I publish. Sign up for the newsletter here.

We’re human. All of us.

(You, too).

And sometimes we find we can’t do it all, after all.

So how do you ask for help?

Maybe the thing we should focus on is why you don’t.

It’s easy to think these things if you’re the leader of a company or team:

–You have to have all the answers.

–You’re supposed to be done learning.

–You’re being watched and being judged.

And on that last count?

You probably are, if we’re honest.

Yet the surprising thing is that your team would rather you took the time to get the help, or to learn to delegate well…or to learn whatever leadership skills you may lack that are holding them back.

Why do people have a hard time asking for help?

Here are just a few possibilities:

- They’re angry that they need it.

- They’re embarrassed that they need it.

- They don’t see or admit it.

- They don’t see, or admit how they’re hurting others with their insistence that they don’t need to grow or change.

There are other reasons, too.

How do you ask for help, or to change, and then receive that well?

It’s really a matter of learning to let go, being clear about the goal – which should be directly tied to what’s important to your customers – and being flexible in how you meet it.

And humility helps, too.

Here are a few other guidelines if it’s hard for you to delegate, which is just one of the skills that many people need to learn and practice:

1. Define the customer-focused goal or target.

2. Make it clear what the boundaries are for this work, and how it fits into the whole.

3. Envision the situation working. If you can’t imagine that it will, the odds are, it won’t, or you may find ways to mess it up, “proving” that it doesn’t work (strangely, but, yes, seriously).

4. Figure out the communication flow and follow-up mechanisms, including how and when you’ll check in, and what measures or other indicators you’ll use as the basis of communication about progress and status as the work proceeds.

5. Know what information and contact you need while the work is underway to feel comfortable, or as comfortable as you’re going to be, letting go.

6. Be clear about who’s going to do what. It’s easy for two people to be waiting for the other to finish the same thing…each thinking it’s the other’s job. In that case, deadlines are missed, among other things. Or it’s possible for two people to be doing the same work, each thinking it’s their job, so the work is duplicated. Spell it out, then play it out.

7. Be clear about work and quality standards, and what they’re based on. These standards should in some way be directly tied to what’s important to your customers.

8. Be honest about the things you’re concerned about, as the work begins, and as it proceeds. And those things you least want to talk about? Talk about them. These discussions could be essential to success, if you do, or directly lead to failure, if you don’t.

When your fears see the light of day, you may realize they’re nothing to worry about.

And if they are worry-worthy, well, the sooner you get to work checking them out, and changing, the better.

Keep in mind your overall goal, and the customers for it, as you consider what help may lead you to succeed even more.

Sometimes your own short-term comfort is what you most have to let go as you reach for change, and then stretch and grow.

Change just feels different…temporarily.

If you found this post valuable, share it with friends and colleagues who can use this information, too. You’ll also like the free weekly newsletter I publish. Sign up for the newsletter here.

Good communication lies at the heart of success in everything.

Well, everything, that is, that involves two or more people.

Let’s use a non-work example for a moment.

Think about two people taking a vacation together.

You can imagine the many possibilities of this trip if it’s planned and taken without good communication.

Tickets can be left behind, planes and trains can be missed, double hotel reservations can be made and prepaid, and much more.

Such a trip has the potential of being a disastrously memorable experience.

However, with good communication, that vacation can become a wonderful journey, one that’s fondly recalled lifelong.

Good communication does not just happen.

Communication requires planning, coordination, checking in to make sure that it’s working, and acknowledging – perhaps even celebrating – success when it happens.

If you need to improve communication at work, consider what needs to be improved in each of these steps of an effective communication process:

 PLAN FOR SUCCESS 

1. Remember, first, what your communication goal really is. 

Communication that works well is:

– Customer-focused

– Easy to use

– Engaging

– Effective

– Enough, but not too much

2. Be prepared for your communication to be complete. 

Good communication conveys several things about a shared effort or experience.

Be prepared to provide the following information:

– What is happening

– Why it is important

– Who is involved

– When it is happening

– How the work or event will occur

3. Know your audience.

If you don’t know who they are, or don’t know much about them, find out.

It makes a big difference in what you communicate, and how you do so.

4. Know what people need to do with the information. 

If people receiving and using the information need to be aware of something, they may need less detailed information than if they need to take action on it.

5. Communicate in the way that your audience will receive the information most easily.

Some audiences are web-, e-mail-, or text-based in their communications.

Others need face-to-face communication for messages to be received most easily.

Some communications require a group process for the information to be fully absorbed, and actionable.

6. Plan how you will check to make sure communication is getting through. 

Many managers send important information, but don’t check to make sure that it was received.

Especially if communication involves very important information, it’s essential to make sure the information was received correctly.

This can involve questionnaires, interviews, observations, or in other ways, discovering that the message did, or didn’t get through.

Plan accordingly.

CHECK…THEN CORRECT, IF NEED BE

7. Check to see if your communication is getting through.

Don’t assume.

Check.

Also, consider that one-time communication is often inadequate.

For example, if you’re communicating about a major change or significant action that must be taken, one guideline is that you need to communicate it seven times, in seven different ways for the information to get through to everyone who needs to use it.

Just think about that: seven times, in seven different ways.

Knowing that, you won’t be surprised if you have to repeat a message, or send it in a new way to make sure that it actually gets through.

8. Correct the communication that hasn’t yet been effective.

Improve or correct communication that didn’t work, or didn’t work as well as it needed to in order for the correct or desired actions to be taken by people involved.

PAUSE TO CELEBRATE WHEN IT WORKS

9. Pause and notice that the communication worked, when it does.

Also, acknowledge the people who were involved in making the process successful.

10. Review and reflect so that you can repeat success. 

If this was an especially big communication effort, or an especially important one, take some time to review what worked and why.

Pay attention, as well, to what didn’t work, and why that happened.

Record the information so you can use it again.

There’s no need to reinvent a process that works. And there’s no need to repeat a process that didn’t.

Good communication is not effortless. Often, it’s not easy.

That’s why communication, when it works, is often worthy of quite a celebration.

If you found this post valuable, share it with friends and colleagues who can use this information, too. You’ll also like the free weekly newsletter I publish. Sign up for the newsletter here.

Laurel sitting can creep up on people, companies, and teams.

It’s the condition of resting on one’s laurels – accolades, awards, training, experience – of the past instead of keeping them current, fresh.

Here, for example, is how one coach described it:

“We rested on last year’s laurels. Other teams came right at us and we did not respond to that.”
Wayne Cafferty

Laurel snatching can happen, too, when you least expect it.

That’s when you’re not as ready for the current round of competition as your competition is.

Unless you stay competitive, a little bit hungry, and willing and able to do the work it takes to succeed again and again, you can quickly be surpassed.

Other companies may swoop in with a great new idea, superbly executed, better than your latest idea was.

The thing it may be easy to forget is that, no matter how successful you and your company have been, other people, companies, and teams want success just as much as you do.

They may even want it more.

And if their employees are learning and improving faster than yours are, working better as a team than yours are, they’re likely to be very effective competitors.

Sometimes, what you wanted in the past just doesn’t thrill you anymore.

In that case, you may find you’re ready to walk away from laurels of the past, in search of something new, more interesting, more challenging.

Things can happen that dictate that laurels of the past will stay just that.

Sometimes the opportunity to continue to compete the way you want to just comes to an end.

Some companies take their success for granted, and let it slip away.

It almost seems as if they privately believe, “We’ve got this. It’s ours. And we’ve earned the right not to try very hard anymore.”

Others lose their competitive edge when they’re not paying attention to customers’ changing wants and needs.

The market moves on, while they don’t.

If you recognize that laurel sitting, or the potential loss of past laurels is affecting your company or team, there are things you can do.

Here are just a few ways to increase your focus, intensity, and drive for whatever goals you have now:

- Take the time to refresh and remember times when you felt fully engaged, fully alive in some job, team role, or work project.

Notice what’s common about those experiences.

Bring that intensity and strong engagement back into your work and challenges now, as much as you can.

- Remember what your dreams once were. Now look at what your current dreams are. 

Notice how your dreams have changed – if they have.

Let these aspirations serve as a guide for actions, decisions, and focus now.

- Brainstorm at least ten ways to turn today’s dreams into fact and experience.

Consider what it would really take to turn your dreams into reality, in a large or small way.

Start taking action that takes you closer to achievement of your current dreams.

- Live more fully in the present.

- Learn to look with clear eyes at the facts of your current situation.

Use those facts – about yourself, your current resources, skills and abilities, as well as about the market you’re competing in – to fuel change if you don’t like what you see.

- Take the time to appreciate the good things you have now. Fully revel in that.

- Appreciate, then let go of the past.

- Create a future that is more compelling by starting to step into it.

If you’re moving a new direction, start to move into it gradually, through experimentation. “Beta test” the possibilities of this new direction, and build up new skills and resources steadily.

- Remember the joy (yes, joy) of learning, trying, testing and mastering new skills.

No matter how hard the pursuit seems when you’re in the thick of it, excellence and mastery feels good when you achieve it.

Laurels of the past can become the incentive for laurels still ahead.

Enjoy your journey, whatever it is, from successes of the past, to new ones, still ahead.

If you found this post valuable, share it with friends and colleagues who can use this information, too. You’ll also like the free weekly newsletter I publish. Sign up for the newsletter here.