Although the Snowy Mountains of Australia are not as high as mountains in other countries, they are incredibly beautiful and not for the inexperienced.  My 16 year old son, Luca, decided last year that for his Duke of Ed Award that he wanted to summit all of the 15 highest peaks in Australia.  As we believe that the youth of today need challenges that stretch them to new heights (pardon the pun!), we fully supported his quest.

In my younger days I had spent many years as an Adventure Guide leading trips across the US, Australia, Europe and Vietnam.  Throwing on a very heavy pack that included extra food, clothing and supplies for clients that I was taking into the bush was something I did with ease.  However, that was quite a few years ago (actually numerous decades ago!)

Watching my son summit the 15 highest peaks was wonderful.  Helping him to look at the topo map and identify the best route forward and then talking about some of the decisions he made afterward (including a bit of bush bashing!), allowed us to create a wonderful shared experience that we will not forget any time soon.

I am often amazed watching how much the youth of today want to learn and experience new things.  I notice this all the time in many client workplaces I visit to help leaders get higher engaged performance from their people.  Once a leader has something that they can teach—and knows how to share it with  the younger generation of staff, magic things happen.

Watching the newly created energy that can be created and the momentum that follows is invigorating.  I recently observed this when working with a call centre in how the leaders took the time to help stretch and teach the newer staff, including sharing some of the mistakes that they made when they started.  The interesting thing I also noticed was how the vibe or culture lifted to a higher level of performance afterward.

So I ask you, what are you doing to inspire and teach your newer staff? Or when was the last time you actively learned something new?  I may be able to help you and your team climb to new heights, email me and I would love to share a few ideas.

Remember many staff are looking to their leaders to help set the vision and empower them at the start of the year.

We are about to head into a new year (gotta love the time between Christmas & New Year!)  I always enjoy the beginning as it is a great time to reflect on the past year as well as start thinking (& dreaming) about what you want to do over the next 12 months. I have a little ritual at this time of year, I go back through my photos and my calendar and take a look at what I have been up to.  I also update my personal financial snapshot to look at our financials and assets/liabilities.  After this I start looking at the next 12 months.

So what are your goals for 2023?  Will you just go through the motions as in the past, or are you going to take the time to identify what you want to achieve at work and at home?  Have you taken the time to write them out and commit them to paper?  I find that a few random thoughts and ideas in the mind is not the same as writing them down and publishing them as a way to ensure that you take action toward them.

This is even more important if you are a manager or leader of a team.  This is the time to get your people together and work with them to clearly identify the goals and the activities that collectively you will take to achieve these goals.  So what are you doing with your team to empower and engage them in the goals for the year?

Map Your Goals for 2023:

1. You at Home.  Be careful not to get sucked into the world of work and forget the things that are important to you at home.  Schedule time to attend your children’s school activities, even during the day (everyone can get 1-2 hours off of work, just plan ahead).  Identify the touch-points and time that you are going to spend with your partner or significant others to make sure that work does not consume all of your time.
2. Your Work Goals.  Start by identifying what activity you need to focus on this year to help you achieve the outcomes you want.  Capture the 3-5 work goals you want to accomplish and then identify the Critical Path that you need to take to reach these goals.  Make sure that you identify a goal that will stretch you to the next level.
3. Team Goals.  If you are in a position of leadership with other people, identify what it is that you are going to do to empower, stretch and develop them.  Share this with them and commit time and energy to making sure it happens.  Ideally you would have a planning session with your people that allows them to get actively involved in identifying the goals or the activities that need to be taken to achieve these goals.  Given how quickly the world is changing, this is an important process to use on a regular basis to keep them focused and motivated.

When you look at people you know that have achieved great things throughout the year, the majority of them did not just “get lucky.”  They had a number of goals and worked a plan to achieve these goals.  I have found a direct correlation between writing goals and achieving them.  There seems to be something that occurs when we commit our goals onto paper and use this as a reminder of the things we want to do.

For centuries Native people around the world had to prioritise what was important for them to survive. Many of them followed a Sacred Order, sequence followed to ensure survival in any given environment.

If you look around our world today, many of us are having a more difficult time to identify what is important in our lives and how to prioritise where we put our energy and focus into.  Even some of the research is showing how many people are feeling unfulfilled or a bit lost and start to question what is important.

We can however learn from the ancient wisdom that was passed down from these native people. Here are 3 strategies to help us get our priorities right.

Strategy #1: Track the Signs

To get back on path and ensure that you are doing the things that matter, you need to be aware of what you are currently putting your time and energy into. This is more than just taking a minute to look up from your computer screen and think about your ‘to do’ task list for the day. It is about taking an objective view of what you have been actually doing and checking to see if it is right or not.

Start tracking your past behaviour and where you have been spending your time. Think of yourself and an ancient tracker that is reviewing the ‘footprints’ that have been left behind. What would all of your tracks and activities show about where you invested your time and energy? Would these ‘prints’ show your spending time on the things that are important to you? With the people that are important to you? Or would it show that you have been too busy on other things? By tracking the signs you can look objectively around your current activity—and what you may need to start changing to getting you back on path.

Strategy #2: Seek the Wisdom of Elders

As we get older we gain more experience and insights into different situations, which often allows us to be more understanding or gain wisdom. Unfortunately our western society often does not value the wisdom and insights of the older generation.

Native people had a deep respect for their elders because of the vast array of knowledge they held and would often seek them out when faced with a major decision. We should do this more often. You should identify a number of elders that you respect and admire for their wisdom that could provide you with advice and guidance to help you get your priorities right. Often, they will allow you to see the things you don’t and help you get back on path after a 10-minute conversation.

 Strategy #3: Listen to Your Inner Vision 

Inner vision is the voice that comes from deep within our soul that communicates to us on a deeper level. It is not just a trivial voice in our head, it is our intuition, a gut feeling or a sixth sense that we can use to help us do the right thing.

Think back to a time when you knew something deep inside to be true. You may not have had the facts or evidence but you knew it to be correct and this came into reality.  As human beings were a wired to be guided by this, we may just need to retrain ourselves and start listing to our inner vision, which will show us what is important to us.

It is easy to get distracted and mix up what is important to us, however by using these simple strategies you can help get your priorities right.

One of the biggest workplace challenges is finding time to complete your work and attend meetings.  With the increase in digital technology, email and video meetings you’d expect that the number of meetings have decreased. Unfortunately research shows the opposite with a recent Harvard Business Review article showing that many executives are spending 23 hours per week in meetings, with 65% of managers saying that these meetings kept them from completing their work.

Most finance executives know the importance of having a meeting agenda that is created before the meeting to help ensure everyone knows the purpose of the meeting and the relevant meeting logistics such as timing, location and who will be in attendance.  One of the biggest challenges when it comes to meetings is identifying the true purpose of the meeting and selecting the correct meeting process to follow to enable you to achieve the outcomes desired.

Selecting the wrong type of meeting will result in a waste of time that will often frustrate most of the attendees.  The key is selecting the right type of meeting—especially when it comes to critical financial trends, challenges and decisions.  There are four types of meetings, and each of them has a different purpose and process:  Reporting/Check-in, Problem-Solving, Decision-Making, and Strategy-Development.

Reporting/Check-in Meeting

Reporting meetings are one of the most common meeting formats.  They often start with managers providing an update on their department.  They can be useful if the format is tight and those doing the reporting are clear and organised in what they communicate. Mike Azbell, former VP & Financial Controller for the Kimberly-Clark Corporation found taking financial data from over 175 countries with 100 manufacturing locations needed to be done accurately and within tight timeframes.  Together with his team, he did not run a typical boring meeting, instead they would have a 15 minute working meeting at the beginning and end of each day. 

To keep these meetings on track, ideally they follow a three step process.  Step 1:  Communicate Results/KPI’s, Step 2:  Share immediate plan or activity to be taken and Step 3:  Identify any issues or assistance needed (which would occur in a separate problem-solving meeting).  To streamline time, they also used visual management systems and dashboards showing current performance and next steps.

Problem-Solving Meeting

Problem-solving meetings  are held to bring together a team of people to share ideas for solving a particular problem or challenge.  These meetings involve more than just someone asking for assistance with something and are effective as long as everyone stays focused on the problem.

There are many ways to run a problem-solving meeting, but there are five common steps that can hack any problem-solving meeting.  Step 1:  Identify the problem, Step 2: Identify possible solutions, Step 3: Discuss and rank solutions, Step 4: Agree on a solution and Step 5:  Identify who will take what action by when.  Although these are often common sense, in many meetings some of these steps are missed, leading to further complications.

Decision-Making Meeting

Decision-making meetings take place after the facts and figures about a particular issue have been circulated and people have had time to understand and identify the decision they are being asked to make.  To be successful, it needs to be clear what the topic is that a decision has to be made about and every team member has to communicate whether they agree or disagree with a potential decision.

For senior executives and finance directors, this method is often used when passing corporation bylaws, which require a formal decision-making meeting with minutes recorded for compliance and legal requirements.

Strategy-Development Meeting

These are usually complex types of meetings because they involve the setting of a company or department’s future direction, as well as the strategy or initiatives required to achieve these desired objectives.  Because of this complexity, these meetings are usually held over several days and many executives dread attending them.  If there is no efficient process in place the meeting can turn into a massive talkfest with those who are the loudest getting their ideas pushed forward.  

A great strategy development methodology is Compression Planning^®™ which uses visual storyboards and index cards which allows everyone to contribute ideas that are captured on cards.  These ideas are pinned to the boards and then voted on by the group.  It also uses timed topic exploration using a timer and often a neutral facilitator to keep the group on track. What normally takes 4-5 days of strategic planning can be condensed into 1-2 days using Compression Planning^®™. For those that are tech-savvy, the Miro online program can allow people to share ideas on virtual cards and organise them in a similar methodology.

Everyone knows that meetings are important, the challenge is selecting the right type of meeting and the right meeting process to ensure that your finance meeting does not fall into the ‘waste of time’ category.  Given the importance that financials have on the success of most businesses, CFO’s will need to lead the charge in running meetings that work.

Do you ever find yourself drifting off during the work day? Losing your focus during certain hours of the workday?

If so here are 3 great hacks that can help you stay focused and productive.

Hack #1 Work on Challenging Tasks During Peak Energy Times

We have all had a task or project that we had to complete, but procrastinated starting it. One of the common patterns that people fall into is that they just do not feel like they have the energy or mindset to work on this challenging task. One key technique or hack you can use is to prioritise tasks that require more thought or focus to times when energy is working in your favour. As human beings we have different metabolisms where our energy is highest–and it is easier to focus. These natural energy peaks can be early morning, mid morning, middle of the day, early afternoon, later afternoon or evening. One hack to being more focused at work is to prioritise tasks that are more challenging during your peak energy time. This makes it easier to start, easier to think and easier to complete the things that we procrastinate.

Hack #2 Control Technology & How You Use It

Have you ever just quickly checked your Facebook page and got distracted looking at posts and realised you just lost 20 minutes of time? Yes, me too. One of the challenges of smartphones and digital technology is that we can easily become distracted from something that we need to focus on at work. This can be the automatic notification of the next email that has arrived in our inbox to the vibration of our phone from the last voicemail message. Every time we get distracted by this technology, we are losing valuable time and focus. Control your digital technology by turning off those notifications and reducing the number of times you check your email and social media. 

Hack #3: Send Emails that Are Easy for Others to Action

For most of us we need to send emails as part of our role. The challenge is that many of us have not been trained on how to write an email that is easy to read and easy for others to follow. When you type an email make sure that it is not just a bunch of words that look bland and force the recipient to take the time to read everything. How can you do this? By adding visual texture to your emails. Use bold, bullets and headers to make it easier for people to read–and understand your message. If you want to focus even further, you can put in the subject line one of the five outcomes that we are trying to achieve by sending the email which includes: FYI, Need Information, Decision, Action to Take or Meeting required. By focusing on these hacks you can make it easier for them to take action.

 If you’d like further Leadership Hacks, for yourself or your team, I’d be happy to give you a hand.