Get Personal in Business: Have Fewer Problems, Make More Money

This is a reprint of a post from 2011 that is more true today than when I first wrote it. Enjoy it's simplicity, and appropriateness. I repost it because of what I recently read in Ken Blanchard's 2010 offering, Lead With Luv. 

My Dad used to say that Business is Business, and Personal is Personal. I think he was advising me not to mix my personal life with my professional life. It sounded like good advice, at the time, but the longer I live, the less realistic, practical and productive it actually is.

We could have much better, faster growing, more profitable businesses if we changed the way we approach business and people.

Sometimes we want “Business” to be “Business.”

There’s another business saying Dad used, and I hear even today:

“Don’t take this personally. It is a business decision.”

The only time Dad ever said this was in situations where someone was getting axed, fired, laid-off, removed or replaced. It could be employee or a vendor.

Dad has no exclusive use of the term. Last December, just two days before Christmas, a friend of mine heard similar words. “This is not about you, Bill. It’s a business decision. We wish you all the best.” Then he was handed his walking papers.

“It’s not about you, Bill.” What a ridiculous statement. Of course it is about Bill. Why else is he at the meeting? Tell that to his family.

Sometimes we want “Business” to be “Personal.”

We use an entirely different choice of words when we are courting a client, or new employee.We say things like:

• “We care about you.”
• “Your success matters to us.”
• “We want to be your partner, not a vendor.”
• “You can trust us. You can count on us. We have your back.”

These are unmistakably personal words. Some are even terms of endearment of sorts.

So, we see that:

• Business is personal when doing something pleasant. Otherwise, it is business.
• It is personal when we’re giving; it is business when we’re taking.
• It is personal when we’re helping; it is business when we’re hurting.

Flip Wilson’s character, said, “The Devil made me do it.” We say, “The Business made me do it.”

We want to take personal responsibility and get credit for the pleasant things we do. But we want no responsibility or blame for those that are unpleasant. We blame “the business.”

I have a shocking observation based on my 30+ years doing business:

All business is personal. Every business is personal. Everyday, all the time.

Think about it. Every activity, every decision, every system, every process, every procedure, every innovation, every creation, every interaction, every sale, every buy, every complaint, every problem, every solution, every idea, every interaction, every communication, every error, every misunderstanding, every lawsuit, every mishap, every success, every failure, all without exception are the result of personal involvement somewhere.

There’s nothing that happens in any business that doesn’t have a personal involvement. Everything in business is done by, for, at, or with people.

Example from The Bailey Building and Loan Association

It’s a Wonderful Life depicts the story of George Bailey, a man whose life is inextricably connected to his family’s business, The Bailey Building and Loan. The personal/business connection is made obvious in each of the business situations presented in the movie.

• George saves drugstore: Mr. Gower, the druggist, has received a telegram with news that his son had died in combat. (personal) He is so upset that he mis-fills a prescription with poison. (personal) George sees the telegram and realizes Mr. Gower’s mistake. He saves him from certain ruin risking his job (personal) by not delivering the inappropriately filled prescription. (Personal)
• George rescues his business from 1st run on the bank: George witnesses a “run on the bank” and steps in, canceling his honeymoon. The “run” is caused because his customers heard something and reacted by demanding their deposits in cash. (personal) George’s intervention (personal) convinces them to take only what they need, (personal) thus keeping the bank whole for another day.
• Uncle Billy’s mistake, and Mr. Potter’s choice creates a problem: The bank is in its worst situation when Uncle Billy mistakenly leaves a deposit in a newspaper at Potter’s. (personal.) Potter knows what happened, and he keeps the money and calls the bake examiners. (personal)
• Mary Bailey, intervenes to save George and the Building and Loan. George is in dire straights, drunk and looking for a way out when his wife gets word of the situation and takes a course of action. (personal) She calls the bank customers and some of George’s friends and asks for their help. They overwhelmingly come to his aid with their savings and other significant contributions. (personal)
• The Bank Examiner changes his mind. The bank examiner, seeing the generosity of the community and support of friends, and caught up in the spirit of the moment, tears up the subpoena, and sings with the others. (personal)

Business is Personal

It is inarguable. Business is personal.

In fact, a business can only work as well as its people work. The success of an enterprise is directly related and proportional to how well that workforce works together and with the marketplace and the community. 

People! People! Everywhere!

If business leaders could realize just how personal business really is, they would prioritize an optimized workforce.  It would cause companies to run better, to grow faster and to make more money.

CJ Coolidge is a popular speaker about real productivity in the workplace. 
CJ is the author of Sell More - Work Less- Have More Fun: The Success Secrets of a Dysfunctional Salesman who Sole $B and Made $M Working Part Time. Watch for his new book, The People Driven Business: Unleash your People, Transform your Company.

Visit CJ online at www.coolspeaks.com.

Beware of The Seven Last Words of an Organization

"We've never done it that way before."

Following is my review of Gordon Morrison's latest book, Breaking the Time Barrier. This book may present the most important breakthrough to enhance the efficient development of software in the history of the industry.



The seven last words of the organization: "We've never done it that way before." Embrace them and you'll stifle innovation, creativity and sustained profitability.

What kind of company would self impose limits, ignoring possibilities simply saying, "We've never done it that way before?" My experience with thousands of companies proves that the practice is so common as to make it a proverb. To add insult to injury, the very companies that maintain the practice would deny they do it.

The result is something I call "Hidden Inefficiency Virus," or Business HIV. This is the practice of embracing inefficiencies as unavoidable conditions within a process or a business, and then building expectations which anticipate and accept them. And counter to logical expectations, the practice is nowhere more evident and profit robbing than in the engineering of software. The industry most outwardly committed to creating efficiencies and innovation is its own worse enemy.

Gordon Morrison should know. He's been developing software and systems for years. Frustrated with the amount of time and programming energy needed to constantly fix hyper-complex programs, Gordon traced the problem back to its origin, the "spaghetti codes," the non-sequential code writing methodology used by software engineers since the beginning. Then, simply including a logical temporal element to that mess, he is able to untangle the gnarled lines of spaghetti code, making software easier to trace, debug, validate and reuse. Then he published his invention in Breaking the Time Barrier.

Not only does his COSA process reduce the time to develop and maintain software by as much as 50%, but it maximizes the value of the very individuals responsible for writing it by enabling them to focus on improved applications rather than on internal operational minutia of existing products.

Breaking the Time Barrier is short, to the point, and loaded with examples and illustrations of all kinds, perfect for the advanced engineers to which it is intended. For the non engineer, such as I, the book offers a unique and original philosophical landscape which can lead to new and necessary solutions for overworked and under productive people in today's hyper-dynamic and accelerating world. We all need that.

There is no logical reason for a software producer to resist the elimination of the "HIV" in their business. There is no logical reason a CEO would resist the elimination of "HIV" by failing to embrace outsourcing, either. Well, no reason except, "We've never done it that way before." And that, my friends, is illogical.


CJ is a popular keynote speaker, and a regular contributor to HRTools.
Fine his book, The Squaredime Letters. The feedback has been phenomenal. If you want to get your head around the real forces behind our current recession, you must read this book. Check out some content on Amazon.

The Future of Employment: Maximizing the Value of Employer and Employee

(This is the 6th and final installment in a series of articles about the problems associated with government's attempts to ignore free market principles in a free market world ecomony.)

The solution for all the economic and social woes we face will naturally occur with the improved understanding of value.

The World of Employment Will be Enhanced by Understanding Value.

Let me describe an entirely new relationship between a business owner and the employee which will raise everyone’s standard of living, and reduce the gap between the "haves" and the "have nots." As I have said, everything revolves around the understanding of value. Value can no longer be associated with time, with products of services as ends in themselves. Value must be aligned with the realized ability of a product or service to improve the life conditions for the buyer.

Value for an employee must be seen in the same way. An employee, recognizing the responsibility to provide value as the foundation for determining a worthy wage, must realize, then appropriately communicate, how his participation does just that.

The Employee Approach to Job Search will be Changed. Earnings will be Improved.

Employees will no longer be interested in merely trading time for money. They will be more concerned that their companies, and their company’s customer, are able to be positively and recognizably impacted by what they do. "Getting a job," as though an employee is taking something from someone, will be replaced by rendering a service, as though an employee intends to make a real and recognizable contribution on his company and on the company's customers.

The Employer Approach to Recruiting will be Changed. Earnings will be Improved.

Employers will stop recruiting for positions, too. Instead, they will be communicating their vision and mission, their reason to exist, and will be seeking good people who can align themselves to the completion of those missions.

Employers will not be looking for people to put in positions, so much as looking to discover the impact of having a particular person at work to fulfill the company's mission, and to serve its customers. Employers and employees alike will not want to exchange money for things done, so much as for measurable impact of the things done. This will automatically raise the earnings for an employee’s service as he or she is able to raise the profitability of the employer. Job security will be of little concern.

Great employees who make contributions to the profitability of their employers will be desirable everywhere. Once an employee knows his best contributions, and is able to produce them confidently wherever he is placed, he will have confidence enough to know that will eliminate his fear of serving where there is a mission to be fulfilled.

The More You're Worth, The More You'll be Paid. The Greater Your Impact, The Greater Your Compensation.

Once value is understood in the mainstream of our economies and our lives, it will start to make no difference what any other person is paid. It will be understood that one's pay will be less than the contribution made. Whether you are Roger Clemens, Lebron James, Bill Gates, or John Doe, once you understand how to look for and deliver value, you will begin to earn in accordance with the value you provide, and to your heart's desire.

This is the key to a better future. It is the solution to most every economic and social problem. It is the only way that our long and well developed capitalism can endure. It is the best way to correct perceived income inequality.

We may not remember that there is no "free lunch," but remember we must, if we are to survive.

CJ Coolidge is a regular contributor to HRTools.coms.
You can now get your own copy of his groundbreaking book, The Squaredime Letters.
You can vist CJ online at www.cjcoolidge.com.