9g Leadership Newsletter
It's All About Acceleration!
September 2006 - Vol 2, Issue 3
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Do you smell it? Fall is in the air. Now is the time we look back at what we have accomplished so far this year and take stock in those areas that are important to us. We still have 3 more months to finish up, or maybe just get started! Take a look at your goals. How are you doing? Did you spend more time with the family? Have you started working with a mentor? How many people did you recognize for a job well done? This last quarter has been a busy one for 9g Enterprises. We started the nation wide Membership Survey for Chambers culminating at the ACCE convention. Bob Vosburgh gave an overall synopsis of the results to the Chamber Execs and shared that nearly 15,000 members took the survey with around 25,000 comments. We continue to work with a diverse group of great organizations including chambers of commerce, medical groups, manufacturing firms, government entities and many more. Thank you for letting us be part of your world. The last quarter of 2006 will be our busiest to date. We look forward to working with all of our new friends and hearing from all of you we’ve worked with over the years. Have a great 4th Quarter!

We, at 9gs, have had the great fortune to present, facilitate, breakout and interact with over 1,100 Chambers of Commerce. As we’ve evolved and started doing more Chamber board retreats, we identified the need for a solid membership survey. Frankly, we were surprised at the number of Chambers who were NOT asking their members for input before heading into their annual strategic planning/board retreat.

This summer we offered the survey, at no cost, to hundreds of Chambers across the country. We were delighted at the response! Nearly 15,000 members completed the survey, for over 200 Chambers of Commerce, in 44 states. The comments, which numbered in the tens of thousands, were consistent, validating and, at times, entertaining.
Previous articles have dealt with using Coaching as a part of your Leadership toolbox and the 9gs six step coaching method. The natural question for many new to the coaching process is “How do you make that happen, what is the mechanism for getting your people into a coaching environment?” There are several ways to achieve the goal but perhaps the best is through performance and career counseling.
I am always amazed by the discussions I have when talking to groups about Balance. As part of our 9G Enterprises Advanced Leadership Program, we offer a three hour workshop where we discuss personal issues that affect our working lives. And most small business owners and business executives continually place their personal lives at or near the top of the list when discussing issues that affect their performance on the job. And leaders are always quick to point out that issues that they deal with in the office are very often grounded in problems at home.
Communication, like the body’s central nervous system, carries the signals to command the muscle movements of your organization and return the sensory response of what has happened. Every aspect of effectiveness moves through your communication system; and lack of effectiveness is generally due to the failure of your communication system to carry the necessary signals to the extremities or provide feedback on the desired action. Have you tried to walk when your leg is asleep? It’s tough going at best—and you could end up on your face!
Have you ever found yourself engaged in an argument or disagreement and asking yourself “How did I get into this? All I said was”? Conflict is often caused simply by a poor or careless choice of words. One word that often leads to unintended conflict is the word “but”. It sometimes conveys a hidden meaning; what is it? That’s right, it’s a great big eraser that says every word prior to this doesn’t really matter compared with what I’m about to say. We don’t even necessarily mean it when we are saying “but”, however that is what the other party often hears. Consider the statement:
Ken Blanchard states in his book, Raving Fans, that you can tell how much an organization cares about its customers, externally and internally, by how clean the restrooms are. How do yours stack up? One of the most private places for most all people is often also the most neglected. What message does that send your guests, visitors, customers and employees?
In the post-Enron world of the early-21st century, integrity, and its cousin ethics, are words that get plenty of air time and even more lip-service. They’re tossed around carelessly, but the deeper, more difficult, dialogue on what integrity is and why it matters is critically absent.

Your own definition of integrity may involve nuances different from the CEO across town. But, ultimately, the quality of integrity is based on strong values. It is the most-cited response to survey questions of what employees want in a boss. This top-ranking transcends generations and cultures. Universally, people want to work for someone they can trust....
We often talk about ethics for leadership, but we rarely talk about how to promote that same level of ethics throughout our organizations. Certainly, it starts with us, but we have to look beyond ourselves to foster ethical behavior throughout the organization. We need to look at prospective associates and employees before we make them part of our organization and continue to focus on ethics and reward ethical behavior after they are aboard. Once aboard, we need to continue to reinforce the positive and punish the negative.
Who’s going to lead the charge? Why, the person in charge, of course. That’s why we pay them the big bucks.

Does the same thing apply when we substitute “change” for “charge”. Who’s going to lead the change? The person in charge is going to be responsible for making the necessary changes, but is this person going to be the change leader?
Having served in the military for 33 years, you can imagine that I’ve worked for a lot of different leaders (we call them leaders in the military as opposed to managers – you can’t manage people to serve their country, but you can lead them to it). I’ve seen just about every different leadership style there is, and although there are many variations, they all seem to fall around two central themes to various degrees - micromanagement or not. Let’s look at them both in a little more detail, and you decide which is more appropriate for you...
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It's All About Acceleration,
The 9gs Team
9g Enterprises, Inc.

phone: 940-748-2600