Genius Developer

Recipe For A Successful Business - Values

2011-06-29T07:54:00.009-04:00

“The very essence of leadership is that you have a vision. You can’t blow an uncertain trumpet.” – Former President of The University of Notre Dame

A powerful vision provides inspiration, challenge, and purpose. It gives meaning to your work and purpose to your business. Your business gives you a place where you can satisfy your need to achieve. Everyone’s life needs a purpose, something important to strive for. One way to add both meaning and context to your vision is to establish values. Clearly defined values simplify decision making. They also help ensure consistency as well as ethical and behavioral congruency.

Value is a word that describes what each of us searches for in many different places. We look for value in what we purchase. We look for value in what we do, and for value in our relationships. Most of us would like to believe that there would have been some value to our life and to our accomplishments. In today’s global and ever-changing business environment, values should play an important role in structuring, planning, and operating your business. Direction is provided in part by vision, which creates excitement, commitment, and purpose. Achievement and excitement must be tempered, however, by values lest people pursue goals without consideration for the ethics of other people. Values represent the core priorities in the organization’s culture including what drives individuals and how they truly act in an organization. Therefore, another key element of a successful planning process is the organization’s value statement. Throughout the life of the business, decisions must be made. Core values of the organization will lay the foundation and provide the framework for all decisions.

An organization’s values create a foundation for integrity and they define the important truths that guide your actions. They will serve as a guidepost for all those in the organization who through their individual efforts will collectively achieve the organizational goals. Values are principles or standards by which we do business and are to be non-negotiable. As you think about crystallizing your values, consider what you know to be right as well as how you want to be known by others.

If the primary function of your business is to attract and maintain customers in order to generate long-term profits or financial viability, then issues such as meeting client or customer expectations, delivering quality service, etc., must be included in the values statement. Your values should take into consideration the importance you place upon each stakeholder in your business. By definition, a stakeholder is anyone who has the power to exert influence on your organization. It may be an individual, a group, or another organization. For example, your stakeholders could include your customers, your employees and their families, your stockholders, the community, licensing and regulatory agencies, or suppliers.

Some examples of value statements are:

Improving the quality of life through technology and innovation.
The company exists to alleviate pain and disease.
To be regarded by our customers as easy to deal with and as a provider of high-quality, reliable products and services.
Our first concern is for our customer, our second concern is for our employees, our third concern is for our management, our fourth concern is for our community, and our fifth concern is for our stockholders.

There are many companies in the media over the last several years that clearly operated and made decisions with no values and we are all aware of how it impacted people’s lives. However, there are a lot of companies who have well defined values and make decisions with those values ever present.

Go to http://www.chick-fil-a.com/#closedonsundays and learn why Chick-fil-A is closed on Sunday and why they believe it is part of their recipe for success.

Check out http://www.tylenol.com/page2.jhtml?id=tylenol/news/subp_tylenol_recall_1.inc and learn why McNeil Consumer Healthcare initiated the recent voluntary recall of all their children and infant liquid products.

What value statement is your business defined by?

The Value of a Coaching Relationship

2011-06-17T08:48:00.002-04:00

Sometimes people confuse coaches with traditional consultants. Unconsciously, people ask coaches to give advice. The role of a coach is not to provide answers or solutions. It is to help you develop the potential that lies within yourself, so that you increase your capability to overcome all obstacles and achieve all of your goals.

Sometimes people expect coaches to serve as mentors. They want their coach to go before them and show them the way. However, the coach’s role is not to lead you. Rather it is to help you discover for yourself where you are today and where you want to be in the future. Once you chart your own course, your coach will accompany you on the journey and provide ongoing support, guidance, and encouragement.

Coaching relationships vary considerably. One of the advantages of individual coaching is that it can be tailored to the needs of the personality and the person being coached. Nevertheless, all effective coaching relationships have some common characteristics.

Effective coaching is focused. The coach will be focused on you and your goals. The spotlight will be on results not on extraneous issues. Coaching is not therapy. Your past will only be relevant when it affects your future goals. The coach will be committed to helping you get where you want to go, rather than helping you understand where you’ve been.

The purpose of coaching is not to create potential, as you possess all of the potential you need, but rather to reveal and release it. In the safety and confidentiality of the coaching environment, you will uncover your deepest desires, identify your strengths, and unmask constraints that prevent you from moving forward. Only then will you be better able to take the right actions necessary to achieve your goals.

The coaching relationship creates a safe space for you to mentally expand. Because safety and trust are established, creativity is unlocked, possibilities are discovered, and momentum is initiated. The coach will transparently offer you the benefits of their unique style, skills, life experiences, intuitive sense, and other strengths. Because the coaching sessions will be authentic, they will flow effortlessly and create great value.

Coaching will address and impact your whole life. You will achieve the greatest satisfaction when your personal life and your professional life are in balance and in harmony. The coaching relationship is about listening and responding, not advising or fixing. When you immerse yourself in the coaching experience, creative energy is released and transformation is the results. The pace may seem slow at first, but results come fast. And the results last because they are created on a strong foundation. Coaching will not simply help you solve challenges and accomplish goals, it will transform the way you solve and accomplish them. It will not simply improve your life—it will transform the way you live.

Success is the continual achievement of your own predetermined goals, stabilized by balance, and purified by belief.

With a coach’s support, you will set goals in harmony with your values and beliefs and in alignment with your purpose. There is no quick and easy way to learn how to ride a bike. Similarly, coaching is not a quick fix—it’s a process. As you move ahead with your life, testing and measuring, trying and failing, and trying and succeeding, perhaps a coach should be in your corner offering encouragement and support as you discover on your own the solutions to any challenges that confront you.

The Coaching Relationship

2011-05-30T23:31:00.003-04:00

Sometimes people confuse coaches with traditional consultants. Unconsciously, people ask coaches to give advice. The role of a coach is not to provide answers or solutions. It is to help you develop the potential that lies within yourself, so that you increase your capability to overcome all obstacles and achieve all of your goals.

Sometimes people expect coaches to serve as mentors. They want their coach to go before them and show them the way. However, the coach’s role is not to lead you. Rather it is to help you discover for yourself where you are today and where you want to be in the future. Once you chart your own course, your coach will accompany you on the journey and provide ongoing support, guidance, and encouragement.

Coaching relationships vary considerably. One of the advantages of individual coaching is that it can be tailored to the needs of the personality and the person being coached. Nevertheless, all effective coaching relationships have some common characteristics.

Effective coaching is focused. The coach will be focused on you and your goals. The spotlight will be on results not on extraneous issues. Coaching is not therapy. Your past will only be relevant when it affects your future goals. The coach will be committed to helping you get where you want to go, rather than helping you understand where you’ve been.

The purpose of coaching is not to create potential, as you possess all of the potential you need, but rather to reveal and release it. In the safety and confidentiality of the coaching environment, you will uncover your deepest desires, identify your strengths, and unmask constraints that prevent you from moving forward. Only then will you be better able to take the right actions necessary to achieve your goals.

The coaching relationship creates a safe space for you to mentally expand. Because safety and trust are established, creativity is unlocked, possibilities are discovered, and momentum is initiated. The coach will transparently offer you the benefits of their unique style, skills, life experiences, intuitive sense, and other strengths. Because the coaching sessions will be authentic, they will flow effortlessly and create great value.

Coaching will address and impact your whole life. You will achieve the greatest satisfaction when your personal life and your professional life are in balance and in harmony. The coaching relationship is about listening and responding, not advising or fixing. When you immerse yourself in the coaching experience, creative energy is released and transformation is the results. The pace may seem slow at first, but results come fast. And the results last because they are created on a strong foundation. Coaching will not simply help you solve challenges and accomplish goals, it will transform the way you solve and accomplish them. It will not simply improve your life—it will transform the way you live.

Success is the continual achievement of your own predetermined goals, stabilized by balance, and purified by belief. With a coach’s support, you will set goals in harmony with your values and beliefs and in alignment with your purpose. There is no quick and easy way to learn how to ride a bike. Similarly, coaching is not a quick fix—it’s a process. As you move ahead with your life, testing and measuring, trying and failing, and trying and succeeding, perhaps a coach should be in your corner offering encouragement and support as you discover on your own the solutions to any challenges that confront you.