Part I of this message focused on giving and covered the timeless truth that it is better to give than receive.  Part II of this message will address the aspect of Receiving as a key aspect to help build and strength our character.

We all enjoy receiving a thoughtful gift from loved ones during the holidays or other special occasions.  We may feel a slight sense of concern and express “you really did not have to do that”, but we all have little to no struggle in receiving a gift around these special events.  However, like many aspects of building and strengthening our character, I want to address an area where many of us struggle and that is in Receiving help from someone who is genuinely wanting to give some assistance.

In my learnings from the observations of others, research on the subject, and reflecting on my personal choices through the years, there is a tendency for many of us to resist receiving help, even when we clearly need it, and we choose to continue struggling on our own in trying to complete the task or address the situation.

In the workplace, it is quite common to observe individuals struggling to complete a task or key deliverable and when the offer from others to help comes around, the response is usually, “thanks, but I have this one covered.”  I can recall having the same response myself even though I was really struggling to complete a task.  In a work situation, many times we do not want to appear that we don’t have the skills to deliver on a task.  In addition, we have the desire to demonstrate we can handle a tough assignment.  Regardless of the reason, refusing help when needed puts us in an extremely stressful situation that has unintended consequences that go beyond the specific project.

It is not just the workplace where this “go it alone” decision persists.  We see the same choices on the home front when struggles occur with raising children, holding a marriage together, or dealing with aging parents.   When these problems are clearly visible to others and the offer to help comes from a genuinely caring, wise, and experienced individual, we respond with something like, “things are ok, we are just working through a tough time right now…thanks for thinking of us, but it will be ok.”  Given the painful statistics on the challenges in our homes today, too many of us continue to make choices that isolate ourselves instead of bringing together the help we need to effectively deal with the problems we all experience in the home.

There are just two comments I wanted to make on the aspect of receiving help as we look to build and strengthen our character:

1. Receiving help is not a sign of weakness.  It is a sign of wisdom and strength.  Wise individuals understand that they don’t know everything and could learn a great deal from the experience of others.  Genuinely strong and secure individuals are comfortable knowing the value of shared experience and don’t feel a need to prove themselves by going alone in working through a difficult situation.
2. Receiving help is a powerful way to enable another individual to experience the joy of giving.  We deny a blessing others will receive when we deny their genuine offer to help when we really need it.  There is a powerful emotional bond that is built when we help others in need and we deny that blessing to someone when we refuse their help and we choose to go it alone.

Our world continues to grow in complexity, uncertainty, and intensity.  The challenges to sustainable achievement in the marketplace and the home are becoming more and more difficult.  We should all begin to find comfort in receiving help from others as we continue to build and strengthen our character as Character Creates Opportunity® to build strong relationships and effectively deal with the challenges in our world.

What thoughts do you have on the challenges of receiving help from others?   Please share a comment below. 

The holiday season brings about some great opportunities to build and strength our character;  With overcrowded shopping malls, homes packed with friends and family that may stay a bit too long, and the work project that keeps nagging at us during our “time off.”  I am sure writing about “patience” may be relevant, but might also turn readers off during this “merry” season.   So with that assumption, I would like to address the aspects of something just as relevant during the holiday season, Giving and Receiving.  Part I of this message will cover Giving and Part II will be about Receiving.

In our early developmental years, our culture creates an unbalanced perception about how great it is to receive gifts.  Advertisements tempt us with how happy we will be with the next gadget, some new clothes, and that dream vacation.  As young children, many of us made a Christmas wish list, had the chance to tell Santa in the mall what we wanted, and were thoroughly prepared when loving grandparents asked, “What do you want for Christmas?”    

Through personal experience, many of us have grown in our understanding of giving and realize that it is truly better to give than to receive.  To see the excitement in a child’s eye or the loving embrace of a family member who received a most needed gift demonstrates to all of us how wonderful it is to give.  Beyond just gifts during the holidays, the opportunity to give our time, effort, and money to a worthy cause fills us we a great sense of personal warmth and fulfillment.   By giving to others and to causes we believe in, we fill a very deep emotional need we all have to belong to something beyond ourselves.  The mere act of giving builds a strong emotional bond between us and the recipient or the cause.

Moving from the home front to the workplace, the same reality exists.  In giving assistance to others delivering on a key project, to give recognition to co-workers, and to provide support to a customer that goes beyond some contractual obligation has the same positive personal return that giving does in our personal life.

As we work to build and strengthen our character, I want to encourage all of us to look for opportunities to give, and then “do the right thing” and take action.  In addition, we should start as early as we can with children and young adults to consistently show them the value of giving instead of receiving.  The earlier we all learn the timeless truth that it is better to give than to receive, the greater impact we can have as we journey through life. 

Becoming more proactive in giving, in all areas of our lives, is an important aspect of building and strengthening character and our Character Creates Opportunity® to build strong relationships, grow a business, and sustain a high-level of accomplishment.

What ways have you found helpful to reinforce that it is better to give than receive? Please share a comment below.

“someday never comes” – John Fogerty, lead singer for Credence Clearwater Revival

For many reading this blog, the rhythm from that song and the music of CCR brings back a few memories of their youth (others maybe saying, “Who in the world is John Fogerty and CCR?”).  As we continue to build and strengthen our character, an important topic to address is the need to take action today, rather than putting things off.

Let’s face it, we all know the basics of things we should do to strengthen important relationships, improve our health, expand our thinking, or be better positioned to grow in our career.  Many times, our excuse for not doing these things is that it is just not the “right time” to take action.  “I will go back to school once the kids get a little older”…”I will forgive once the sting of the betrayal subsides a little more”…”I will reach out to that family member once I get through this busy time at work”…”I will get back to exercising in the springtime”.  As we have all experienced, many times that “right time” never comes about or when it does, we have a host of other obstacles and “someday never comes.” In the worst of scenarios, that individual or opportunity is gone forever and we missed the opportunity completely.

An important aspect of building and strengthening our character is the simple act of taking action to continue moving forward in what we know in our heart is the right direction.  Today’s message is not about dropping everything and pursuing that big bold idea that has been weighing on your soul (if that fits you, great, but that is not the intent of this message).  Today’s message is more about taking a few small steps forward on what we know is needed. 

I know I should reach out to a friend who is on my mind…just start it with a quick email or text.  I know I should take the first step to mend a troubled family relationship…just pick up the phone and say hello without an agenda.  For that desire to exercise, don’t buy expensive equipment or a new gym membership, just start walking around the block and literally take it one step at a time.

Some of our biggest opportunities to build and strengthen our character involve taking action in our relationships with others.  We all have a tendency to avoid the difficult conversations to repair a troubled relationship.  It is never easy and the emotional pain from prior struggles remains with us and makes it even harder to re-engage.  I would just like to reinforce that relationships with others will always be intertwined with every endeavor of life.  Relationships are worth the effort and it is our character that will create opportunity to improve the relationship.

I will leave you with one easy step that has helped me out in the past.  Try writing a letter.  Yes, an old fashioned hand-written letter.  Nobody gets these anymore and I can almost guarantee that an individual in a very troubled relationship will still open a letter and read it in the quiet of his/her own time.  Keep it short with a focus on care and concern versus justifying or blaming.  Let the letter be a first step to softening defenses and perhaps open a door to reconnect and a path to restoration.  If nothing else, you can be at peace knowing you took some action to ensure “someday” finally came. 

I will be a little bold and take it one step further and much closer to home.  Many times the letter does not even need a stamp as the relationship we need to restore is within our home.

Taking action, when we know it is needed, is an important aspect of building and strengthening character and our Character Creates Opportunity® to build strong relationships.

What ways have you found to reconnect with a challenging relationship?  Please share a comment below.

As we continue to build and strengthen our character, an important topic to address is the opportunity we have to recognize the efforts of those around us.

For many people in a position of leadership in an organization or business, this time of year is filled with opportunities, both formal and informal, to recognize the efforts of our teams and individuals for the past year.  There is a great deal of time and planning that leaders put in to written recognition, formal year-end reviews, year-end awards, etc. to ensure the efforts of the team and specific individuals do not go unnoticed.  Leaders typically work hard at understanding the unique ways that employees like to receive recognition and what type of awards have significant meaning to the individuals.  These recognition efforts are a critical part of building a strong sense of commitment and engagement from team members. 

As a business leader, I could always count on allocating a fair amount of time and effort into completing year-end reviews and year-end recognition ceremonies as it was such a valuable time to express appreciation and strengthen the team after a long, hard year and begin the preparation for another year ahead.  In today’s challenging economic environment, providing recognition for employees and teams who are facing aggressive competitors, significant pricing pressures, and other difficult situations, the recognition from leaders becomes even more critical to sustaining the health of an organization.

An important principle that we can anchor our efforts to build and strengthen our character during this time of year is gratefulness.  This is an important time for leaders to demonstrate through spoken and written words and specific actions, how grateful they are for the efforts of their teams over the prior year.  In my own experience, these were great times to re-engage with team members and reflect on sacrifices and express appreciation when the flow of the business was slowing down a bit and you could more readily enjoy the moment.    

However, I can also relate to (any maybe you can too) how that smooth and effective recognition plan is executed in the office, gets trampled at home with the craziness of the holidays, traffic in the malls, those last minute gifts, and visits with friends and family.  It is an all too common occurrence that we let the “busyness” of our home life put us in a position where we miss the opportunity to express gratefulness to those we care about most.  After discussions with a number of people, I can see that I am not alone in this reality.

Faced again with the sobering reminder that no accomplishment in the workplace could ever compensate for a failure at home, it is important that we set time aside during the holidays to express gratefulness to the individuals closest to us.  I am sure many leaders can specifically cite what type of recognition individuals on their work teams desire…one likes recognition in front of peers, another just wants money, while another would prefer recognition to be sent up the chain of command.   However, do we as parents, brothers/sisters, children, husbands/wives, know what specific ways our family members feel loved and appreciated?  Is it a nice note or word of encouragement, a special gift, a warm embrace, or just some one on one time?  I would encourage all of us to better understand the specific ways our loved ones feel appreciated so we can have a greater impact in our efforts to express our gratefulness. 

From experience, if we just “wing it,” we can be “way off” on this topic about how others like to be appreciated.  So, we should do our homework and ask, or find an interesting way to discover the ways our family members feel loved and appreciated.   There are a number of resources we can use and one I have found to be very helpful is Gary Chapman’s New York Times Best Seller, The Five Love Languages.  When you and those closest to you take this fun quiz, the answers may surprise you.  Either way, you will have the knowledge to be able to maximize your efforts to express your gratefulness to those closest to you as we close out another year.

Expressing gratefulness is an important aspect of building and strengthening character and our Character Creates Opportunity® to build strong relationships.

What ways have you found to express gratefulness to those around you?  Please share a comment below.

As we continue to build and strengthen our character, an important aspect is to acknowledge the importance of time in the choices we make.  There are two areas of time that we will review in today’s blog.

(1)    Time is an essential and limited resource.

“All my possessions for a moment of time.” Queen Elizabeth on her deathbed in 1603.

If we have lived long enough, we have all experienced the clarity that comes with an end of life experience for someone we love and respect.  We have no desire to call our stock broker, check our smartphone for a work email, the latest sports score, or any news on Facebook.  In those closing moments, the priorities of life get simple and clear.  We remain focused on family, friends, and shared experiences with those we love.

As we continue to build and strengthen our character, our gift of time will be used wisely when we make the most effective choices on how we spend it.  There are plenty of time management tools available to assist in guiding our choices (I particularly like The Eisenhower Method developed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower that was then popularized by Stephen Covey in his book, First Things First). “What is important is seldom urgent and what is urgent is seldom important” is a common phrase used in discussions about setting priorities.  We should use whatever tool or technique is helpful, but the principle is to create greater capacity for important activities by intentionally working to minimize or eliminate unimportant activities.

When we make more effective choices, we can maximize our gift of time.  In the process, we will continue to build and strengthen our character when we spend time on those activities that are important, but not urgent.  Things like developing short and long term goals, making specific plans to achieve those goals, spending time with loved ones, exercise, rest, etc. are all important ways to spend our time, but are often not urgent in our day to day mix of activities.  Spending our time jumping from one urgent issue to the next, then attempting to “catch our breath” in various activities like watching television or surfing of the internet, will bring about moments of weakness in our character and will result in us making poor choices in the way we treat others and strain the relationships of those we care about most.  We own the choice of how we spend our time and our Character Creates Opportunity® to maximize the gift of time.

(2)    Time is a great counselor.

Wisdom comes with time, experience, and learning.   School-age problems that seemed insurmountable as teenagers seem so trivial in our adult years.  “Make or break” challenges in the early years of marriage seem minor as the decades of married life pass.  Early struggles in parenting seem to become manageable as younger children pass through those same stages where we lost our patience with the first born of the family.

However, the reality is that some feel-good “secret tip for successful relationships” from a so-called expert cannot quickly dissipate that horrible feeling in our stomach or anxiousness in our mind when a relationship is recently strained. It is quite often that only the passage of time affords us the best perspective and insight into handling the problem in a more caring and understanding way.  Through the passage of time, we can develop greater patience, improved understanding, and appreciation for other points of view.

We can make effective choices to build and strengthen our character and gain wisdom faster by ensuring we remain teachable, choosing to learn from our experiences, and observe and learn from others.  In addition, when we make the critical choice to not quit on difficult relationships, we enable time to act as a great counselor in healing a strained relationship.

Time is a precious gift.  Our Character Creates Opportunity® to make effective choices in using it wisely.

My comments last week were around the opportunity we have to show people that they “matter” by just being a better listener and giving someone our full and undivided attention.  When we focus on listening to others we send the signal that they matter and we meet them at a clear point of need.  I received a few emails and phone calls about last week’s post and I wanted to follow-up with some additional information.

As we enter the holiday season and most likely visiting with family, I thought it would be helpful to share another opportunity to build and strengthen our character by providing support and encouragement to those closest to us during these upcoming holiday gatherings.

In preparation for a meeting with a potential client, I was reviewing information about some specific actions organizations can take to sustain a high level of engagement and motivation among its workforce.  The information reinforced some learnings I had from leading teams over the years.  However, the real insight was not in reminding me of actions to take to maintain employee engagement, the real insight was in what employees do in response to the programs.

Throughout my career, we instituted a variety of reward and recognition programs to keep teams engaged and motivated to deliver results.  Many of the programs involved some perks like company-wide recognition ceremonies, cash bonuses, trips to warm destinations, gifts of various kinds, etc.  After receiving the awards, I was always surprised to find the one common thread through almost all employees who received some type of special recognition.  Many called to tell a spouse or close friend about the award which amounted to something like a “high-five” moment of celebration.  However, the common response that just about everyone had, regardless of whether they were 25 or 45, was that they all “called home” to tell their mother or father about the award.  These calls amounted to much more than a “high-five” moment of celebration and the reason behind the call goes much deeper.

In my research on human behavior and my experience with numerous award winners, there has always been a consistent theme that individuals desire to turn to those who gave them the “gift of a good start”¹ and tell them that it paid off and they “turned out ok.”  Many times, awards are the catalyst for an individual to make that call and meet that need.  This need to show the person who gave us our start does not end with the 5 year old who gets a gold star on his drawing and proudly displays it to mom and dad.  There is a strong desire for adults, both young and old, to reconnect with parents who were their original source of character and in some way describe that they “turned out ok.”  However, the truth is that without some specific reason or proactive step, most remain silent and the need goes unfulfilled.

With this finding so clear in our human psychology, I would recommend that this holiday season, amidst all the food, shopping, and football, that we, as parents of grown children or young adults, exercise some empathy, not wait for some special occasion, and proactively tell them that they “turned out ok” and they are demonstrating the “right stuff” to make it in this world.  The reality is that they probably need to hear it as our world is short on encouraging comments and they may never build up the courage to bring it to our attention.  Even if they are falling short in a few areas (as we all do), find some positives and tell them.  We all feel better when we hear something like that from a loved one.

Our Character Creates Opportunity® to build and strengthen relationships through our decision to empathize with others and take action to meet their needs.

Do you have a comment about “calling home?”  If you would like to leave a comment, please do so below.

1 – “gift of a good start.”  General Colin Powell. TED Talk, January 2013.

One of the strongest human needs, after the basics of food, clothing, and shelter, is the realization that we actually matter to someone or some cause.  The need to matter is one of the reasons the theme song from the 1980s hit TV series Cheers can still be recalled by so many people.  A place where “everybody knows your name” clearly touched on the need for all of us to be in a place where we mattered and people appreciated our presence.

A key area to strengthen our character and have a positive impact on others is to meet this basic human need of people to feel they matter.

In the workplace, there are many ways we demonstrate that people matter like reward and recognition programs, group announcements, and one on one meetings.  On the home front, there are many times we make family members feel they matter through birthdays, anniversaries, graduations, and awards for doing well in sports or academics.  All of these opportunities are very helpful to meet that basic human need of people to feel they matter.

We invest a significant amount of time and effort in putting together these more formal opportunities to show people they matter.  However, we often overlook the most valuable, consistently available opportunity to demonstrate that someone really matters.  The opportunity comes when we build and strengthen our character through our decision to listen to others.  Listening, with the intent of truly understanding another person, is an immediate, fairly simple way to show someone they matter.

So what gets in our way?  There are often two major obstacles that we need to overcome as we build and strengthen our character to listen and demonstrate to people that they matter.

(1) We need to control our desire to quickly respond, make our point, show how much we know, or organize our “brilliant” response.   We need to overcome the desire to respond and focus purely on listening to the other person.  As the saying goes, “people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. “  Focusing first on listening and not responding can go a long way in showing people that they matter and that you care about them.

(2) In today’s “always on” world on instant communication, we need to be mindful of the negative impact the sound of an incoming email, text, alert, and phone message have on our ability to be in the moment listening to someone else.  How many times have we glanced down at our smartphone or been distracted by the “buzz” when talking to our spouse, our children, a coworker, an employee, or a customer?  That action immediately sends a signal that the other person does not matter as much as the incoming text, email, or Facebook update.

In my own personal experience, I am extremely vigilant when sitting with a customer to either silence my phone or shut it off completely to ensure the customer knows I am “all in” with the deal being discussed and focused on listening first. However, I hate to admit it, how many times I let the buzz of a text message or email distract me from a conversation with my wife, my children, or close friend.  The obvious misalignment in my actions, and maybe yours too, calls for a strong reinforcement of the fact that no human accomplishment like closing the “big deal”, landing that big promotion, or accomplishing some great personal goal, will ever compensate for a failure at home.  Our failure to overcome the two major obstacles above, especially at home with those we love, amounts to small fractures in the foundation of our families which can cause major challenges down the road.  When we focus on listening to others we send the signal that they matter and we meet them at a clear point of need.

Our Character Creates Opportunity® to build and strengthen relationships through our personal decision to listen with the intent to understand.

What has helped you become a better listener?  If you would like to leave a comment, please do so below.

Harvest Time Partners Foundation and the Character Council of Western New York have partnered on a college scholarship program to reinforce the importance of character.  Please see the link for a recent update in the Buffalo News.

Buffalo News Character Scholarship