In today’s busy world with bad news seemingly around every corner, it’s difficult to “keep on keeping on.” Two important men from history offered this advice:

“There are many ways of going forward, but only one way of standing still.” — Franklin D. Roosevelt

“You do what you can for as long as you can, and when you finally can’t, you do the next best thing. You back up but you don’t give up.” — Gen. Chuck Yeager

Basically, President Roosevelt realized that people can easily become paralyzed with fear which results in no progress toward their goals. His advice, though simple and obvious, tells us to get moving doing something, anything, to change our current, stagnant situation.

For example, many people today are out of work and cannot find jobs. Initially, they looked for a job with energy and optimism, but after weeks with no success, they’ve given up or “they’re standing still.” There are many ways of “going forward,” in this case, looking for a job. However, the individuals must take action to let employers, friends or acquaintances know they are in the job market. With effort, lots of effort, people can find jobs.

On the other hand, General Yeager’s advice is for those times when all of our efforts seem to get us nowhere. No matter what we do, our forward progress is stalled or nonexistent. In those situations, taking a step backward, or what we perceive to be backward, actually helps us make progress toward our goals.

Continuing with our job theme, many people search for a new position with the same or better salary and benefits as the one they left, either voluntarily or involuntarily. With high unemployment numbers, the economic laws of supply and demand come into play. In other words, with many people vying for the same positions, employers know they can get good resources even if they reduce their salary and benefit offers.

Using General Yeager’s advice, the job hunter needs to consider either taking less pay and benefits for a similar job or taking a position with fewer responsibilities in addition to less pay. Either case represents a step backward, yet they both offer positions from which one can begin to grow and advance with a new opportunity.

Ah, but I can hear your thoughts. You’re thinking, “Those suggestions are not easy.” You are correct, but then again, if anyone ever promised that life would always be easy, they made an empty promise.

You must take action to make progress. That action is not always easy, and it’s not always what you want to do, but action will win in the end.

In the meantime, another quote by President Franklin D. Roosevelt fits our lives in today’s world, “When you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on.”

Have you heard the saying, “The devil’s in the details?” What does it mean?

Basically, it means that you need to pay attention to the details of your work or anything you undertake to insure you don’t lose – your job, your business or your personal relationships – by forgetting small, yet important, elements.

“But,” you’re thinking, “time does not always allow for paying attention to the details in today’s busy world.”

To a certain degree, that is true. Plus, perfectionism can be too costly in both effort and time.

In reality, each situation must be reviewed to determine which is more important doing something quickly or being particular about the individual details.

For example, you are working on a proposal to a client for your products and services. To get the total costs for your customer, you need to contact several of your suppliers to obtain current and accurate prices for the different pieces your customer needs. You decide to guess at your suppliers’ costs in building your proposal.

There are several potential outcomes to this guess. One is you could be right. Another is that you could be low, win the business and then have to absorb the additional cost. The third is you could be high and lose the business entirely.

In another example, you need a lawyer’s assistance with a legal issue. The lawyer’s fees are $450 per hour plus $350 per hour for paralegal work. If you win, the court may award legal fees, but until that occurs, the legal fees are your responsibility. The more detail you provide and the more you provide in a logical order to your lawyer, the less cost you will have to pay and the better prepared your lawyer will be in arguing your case.

In another example, you are working on a presentation to your team. You’ve developed the majority of the information, but a few more details would make it perfect. Those few details could take several hours to find and include. Ask yourself, will those details add sufficient value to justify the hours that you could spend productively on other tasks?

In summary, you need to judge each situation to determine if the details are important. In some cases, the lack of details can cost you money or business opportunities that you cannot afford to lose. On the other hand, adding details to a project that does not gain value from them costs you in time and effort better applied elsewhere.

It’s up to you to decide when the “devil’s in the details.” For each situation, determine where your efforts should be applied to minimize cost and maximize value.

Many years ago, a distant family member asked why I went to college and why I worked long hours for a corporation when salaried employees did not receive payment for working long hours. Being young, I tried to explain to him the need for education and a strong work ethic in the working world. See, he was the type to have many get rich quick ideas but no capital – monetary or skills – to take his ideas to fruition.

This quote by Nido Qubein summarizes what I attempted to tell him, “Training teaches people to follow prescriptions. Education teaches people to make choices.”

This family member easily learned tasks for which “training” provided the skills. However, he would not apply himself to gain the “education” necessary to implement his ideas into businesses and income. Many of his ideas could have provided him with a comfortable, if not rich, standard of living had he just taken the time and effort for the education to implement them.

Perhaps his “get rich quick” expectations prevented him from taking the time to get educated. Generally, “training” can be completed quickly in order to perform specific tasks in a defined and efficient set of steps. He quickly learned tasks but then would become just as quickly disenchanted by the boredom of repetition and the lack of advancement opportunities into higher earning positions.

The necessary “education” requires coursework in a variety of subjects depending on the area of interest, and it takes time to accomplish. Education can be formal in that you take courses from an accredited college or university either in person or via distance learning on the internet. But, education can also be self-taught with reading books and material in your areas of interest along with performing research to gain the knowledge you lack. But, in both cases, education takes effort and time to build the skills for making the right choices.

With today’s technology, educating yourself, either formally or informally, can easily be accomplished in your home. With a variety of flexible options, you can take classes on your schedule and not in a physical classroom. Of course, for formal education, there will be certain criteria such as deadlines for completing the work and participation in team projects in certain courses. 

If your desire to “make choices” rather than “follow prescriptions” is strong enough, the time can found to build your education. Yes, with today’s economic challenges, cost can be an issue as well. As Benjamin Franklin said, “”If a man empties his purse into his head, no man can take it away from him. An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.”

Or, put another way, obstacles and opportunities.

Have you heard the saying, “when a door closes somewhere a window opens?”

Og Mandino similarly stated in more eloquent terms, “Victory comes only after many struggles and countless defeats…. Each rebuff is an opportunity to move forward; turn away from them, avoid them, and you throw away your future.”

People face many challenges in today’s world including difficulties in keeping or finding a job to economic hardship and personal strife. In any situation, the opportunity exists to learn new skills and grow in different directions.

For today, let’s focus on the challenges of a job that has changed over the years into a less satisfying position.

You still have a job, but due to cutbacks and changes within your company, your tasks have changed to include functions you don’t want to do. If you find the situation intolerable, you must decide if you can easily find another position that will be more satisfying. If jobs in your field of expertise are not readily available and your economic resources are such that you need to have an income, your best course of action is staying in your current role until the job market opens for your skills. In the meantime, you do have alternatives to help you cope with an unsatisfying position, but they are not simple or easy.

First, you have an opportunity to make your current situation acceptable by communicating with your management. Remember, it is not wise to tell your management you hate what you are doing or being too aggressive in stating your dissatisfaction. Instead, the better action includes cooperatively working with your supervisor and your co-workers to readjust assignments.

Spend time determining what you like and dislike about your tasks. Next, do the same discovery process with your co-workers, either formally in meetings or informally in break-time chats. You will likely find that others like to do tasks you don’t with you preferring to do things they don’t appreciate doing. Of course, some tasks will be hated by all and could be assigned to everyone on a rotational basis.

After determining everyone’s likes and dislikes, develop an alternative for assignments to discuss with your supervisor. Schedule a meeting to discuss with your manager and present your suggestions focusing on the positive benefits to the customers, the company and the team.  

But, what if you are a team of one? Your job now includes tasks from a variety of other positions that no longer exist. Some of your more enjoyable responsibilities have either been automated, deselected or assigned elsewhere. Now, you have difficulty motivating yourself to perform the remaining tasks.  

Similar to the example above, spend time thinking about what your responsibilities include from the customers’ and company’s perspective. Perhaps some of your tasks could either be done more simply or be increased (becoming more interesting to you) to increase value to your company and your customers. You can constructively discuss your responsibilities with your manager. Again, focus on the benefits to the customers and company for any changes you suggest.

Now, what if you’re thinking, these alternatives do not work for my situation. You do have an alternative, but it is even more difficult. You need to change your attitude. Make a game of finding the positives in every situation – they may be miniscule, but they do exist. And, look for ways to learn more skills and capabilities. 

In coping with struggles and defeats in a turbulent job market, remember what Charles Swindoll said, “I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. And so it is with you… we are in charge of our Attitudes.”  

All of your trials and tribulations could open into a huge new window of opportunity soon.

The Nike slogan, “Just Do It,” fits so many different situations.

Do you encounter problems that you need to solve but you just don’t want to take the effort? Perhaps it’s a task that you just don’t enjoy. Or, solving the problem could take skills that you just don’t have. On the other hand, the problem could be critical, or semi-critical, and you don’t have the time to wait for someone else to fix the issue or the money to hire expert resources.

In paraphrasing the motivational pundits, they claim, “If you don’t want to do something but the alternatives are slim to none, just begin the effort and you will feel like doing it.”

In a particular example, computer issues can be challenging especially in today’s world where our computers and access to the internet are critical for our livelihoods. But, in small companies with just a few personnel or in companies without dedicated Information Technology (IT) support, computer problems cripple or stop productivity.

And, isn’t it interesting that many IT problems require that you access the internet to find solutions? What happens when lack of internet access is your problem? Maybe your service provider’s system is down or perhaps your computer’s operating system or peripheral equipment is the problem.

In any case, the computer problem needs to be solved, and even if you are not an expert with computers, you need to take a deep breath and just begin. Neither procrastination nor complaints solve the problem – “Just Do It.”

First, if possible, you need to set up dueling computers. One computer – a healthy one – needs to have access to the internet for research and software downloads. The healthy computer should to be set up near the problematic computer to make researching the issues easier.

Sometimes, though, when there are multiple, potential issues and your service provider cannot tell you if they have an outage in your area, the solution process can be trial and error. Through logic and process of elimination, you must work through the potential problem areas one at a time in searching for the solution.

Unfortunately, sometimes the challenge includes multiple problems. For example, an electrical storm can damage your service provider’s service, AND it can damage your hardware as well.

But, what behaves like a local hardware problem could be an operating system issue. This can be difficult to determine. The issue becomes easier to address when the service provider’s system comes back online.

In your thoughts you’re wondering, “Why would I want to do this?”

We mentioned the issues of time and money. There are other problems that can have a longer and much more negative impact to you and your business. When you allow people outside your resources to work with your all-important computer, the danger exists for information to be copied and later stolen. This stolen information could lead to identity theft, intellectual property theft or both depending what is on your computer.

Though painful and time consuming when you would prefer to work on more productive tasks, fixing problems can be growth opportunities, and once solved, you will feel a sense of satisfaction in your accomplishment.

“Just Do It.” And, afterwards, you’ve gained bragging rights!

In his book, Work Like You’re Showing Off!, Joe Calloway explains, “Showing off is about squeezing maximum fun out of any situation, and having the brains, guts and creativity to not only make lemonade when life throws you lemons, but also make lemon meringue pie, a lemon cake with festive lemon icing rosettes, and a lemon ‘watch this’ soufflé.”

In today’s world where jobs and careers can easily disappear at any time, isn’t that great advice?

How do you respond when life hands you lemons?

The people of Galveston, TX made the most of their bad situation.

In September 2008, Hurricane Ike destroyed a large part of Galveston Island. Most of the island was covered by a tidal surge. Many homes were destroyed, and due to local development laws, several beach front properties cannot be rebuilt.

But, perhaps more disturbing, many of the island’s trees were either uprooted by the waves or killed by the salt water saturation. The people of Galveston took great pride in their big, beautiful trees that provided both cool shade and visual interest to their neighborhoods.

After the island’s inhabitants took care of their most critical issues, they took some time to accept what Hurricane Ike had done to their island. Next, they, along with sculpture artists, made both whimsical and touching sculptures out of the broken and damaged-beyond-recovery remains of their once magnificent trees. (A virtual tour of some of the sculptures can be found on www.galveston.com.)

Many people saw their homes and livelihoods destroyed by Hurricane Ike, yet the people of the island quickly began recovery. Not only did they recover, they made beauty out of the destruction.

What about you? How do you approach setbacks – either trivial or large?

Some people choose to whine and blame everyone else for their problems. Yes, sometimes other circumstances or other people’s decisions adversely impact your life. But, if you can’t change the outcome, what good does it do to complain constantly?

People need to relieve stress, and complaining, at least initially, can be cathartic. After a while, though, complaints not only fall on deaf ears, family and friends who previously listened will start avoiding a persistent whiner.

Your best alternative is first to change what you can, your attitude, for the better. Next, begin working on those lemons. Decide what you can do to make lemonade, or a mile high lemon meringue pie or some other outstanding product.

Many times the new alternatives are, at best, much better than what you had before. Or, sometimes they can be beautiful alternatives – not better – just different and beautiful (think of Galveston’s sculptures.)

Take action with your lemons – small or large – starting today.

Some people need to be in control and think that only they can do the tasks properly. Other people cannot say no and frequently find themselves with too much to do – personally, professionally or both. Still more people just have too much to do.

This quote provides wise advice in these days of too much to do:

“Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is a nobler art of leaving things undone. The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of nonessentials.” — Lin Yutang

To those highly organized people who manage their tasks and get everything done, we congratulate you. For everyone else, it’s time to step back and determine your priorities.

Take a look at your long term goals and your short term tasks. Your short term list should be prioritized to meet immediate needs but also with your long term direction in mind.

For each item on both your personal and work related to-do lists, identify:

1. What must be completed quickly, else dire consequences will occur
   1. This could be a work task that left undone could mean loss of income either from a missed sale of your products or services or from a job loss – you got fired. From a personal perspective, it could be that you miss your child’s major event and irrevocably damage your relationship with your family.
2. What needs to be done soon to satisfy promises you made – either stated or implied
   1. You promised your customer you would research their problem and provide feedback to them by the end of the day (or week). Or, you’ve visited your mom in her special care home every Thursday evening for the last six months, now she expects to see you without fail.
3. What can be delegated to someone else, or get someone to help you do in less time
   1. You’ve been working with someone on an ongoing task. They may not be quite ready to do the whole thing solo, but give them the benefit of the doubt and let them show you how they perform. As for the grass that needs mowing, help some young person learn responsibility by hiring them to cut it. If this is beyond your means, barter a fair trade with them.
4. What is good to do but takes time and does not add value
   1. Quiz yourself. Does edging the lawn every week really add value? Or, do those mirrors need to be polished quite as frequently? Some things we do can be done less frequently or not at all. For example, online shopping when you really don’t need anything eats into your time for more valuable efforts.
5. What should be done to help you improve your health, your skills, your finances or your relationships
   1. Don’t forget that your advancement is important. Make sure you prioritize yourself into your short term tasks. Allow time for health matters such as exercise and eating right. Include time for advancing your skills either as self-study or formal courses. Keep an eye on your finances and work to improve them. Of most importance, prioritize your time to maintain your relationships with family and friends.

The ultimate goal, of course, is to achieve a well-balanced and productive life. You can accomplish more of what is important to you by taking control of your task lists rather than letting them dictate to you.

On that note, let’s end with a thought-provoking quote by John Greenleaf Whittier, “For all sad words of tongue and pen, the saddest are these, ‘It might have been’.”

Make sure the non-essentials don’t interfere with what is important. Regrets can be depressing.

“A hundred years from now, no one will remember that you worked excessive hours for this corporation. In the bigger scheme, the work is just not that important.” – Coaching from a boss during a time when work was tense from 7am to midnight with no outside life – result equaled excessive stress.

In today’s economic situation, many businesses, small and large, are cutting resources and not hiring new people anytime in the near future. The reduction in staff results in removing some tasks that are borderline unnecessary and other tasks that are not producing sufficient income to justify their continuation.

But, unfortunately, the cut in resources does not equivalently match the cut in tasks. Many times, the many tasks remain that must be absorbed by fewer people who are already over-burdened with their own task lists. People begin working 14, 16 and 18 hour days, maybe even some all-nighters. In some cases, their work changes such that they are even required to be always available around the clock, yet their work status and compensation does not change.

At a time when jobs are scarce, people fear saying “no” to their management when too many tasks have them working long hours. Sadly, an “I’m overworked” discussion can be interpreted by management as coming from someone who is not supportive of the direction of the business and is not willing to put forth the necessary additional effort.   Frequently, disengaged management arrives at these conclusions far away from the actual efforts of their overworked staffs and without ever seeing the hours spent or the toll on the remaining resources of the overwork.

True, today’s economic situation is scary. Plus, it is difficult to find jobs. But, are those reasons sufficient to become so overwhelmed that you have no life with family and friends? Will it really matter in a hundred years?

Don’t misunderstand. Tough times call for extra effort on everyone’s part. Working a few extra hours on a consistent basis can be expected for the short term. But, management, who uses tough economic times to justify continued cuts while over-burdening remaining staff with very long hours, causes damage to the business and to people’s lives.

If you are working consistently long and excessive hours, you need to weigh your individual situation to determine if you can continue in that environment while relationships with family and friends suffer. And, you need to decide if it is time to search for alternatives that will satisfy your need to support yourself and your need to have a work/life balance.

This quote by Mark Twain puts a slightly different spin on the issue: “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do.  So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore.  Dream.  Discover.”

If you stay mired in the stress and overwork too long, you can forget that other opportunities exist. And, they do. They may be difficult to find or difficult to create for yourself, but they do exist.

Take a look at what you are doing today. Do you enjoy your work? Are you satisfied with your contributions and your income for those efforts? Are you growing in knowledge and skills? Do you have a balance between work and play? Is your stress level acceptable or continually increasing?

Sometimes making no change is the right choice even if you are not entirely satisfied with what you are doing. Other times, the right decision means making significant changes in your life.

Only you can look out for yourself. Only you can decide what you need to do.

“Dream, explore, discover” and enjoy your work along with a balance between your work, your family and your friends.

Have you ever stopped to observe how nature works together?

Crows, those dastardly black demons of the sky, know how working together can achieve more than each crow could achieve individually.

This morning in a cacophony of sound, a group, fifty or so, joined to torment a pair of hawks. Together the crows screamed and chased the hawks from treetop to treetop.

As a bird of prey, a hawk is bigger, has sharper talons and a pointed beak for tearing the flesh of its food. But a single hawk, or in this case a pair, is no match for a group of fifty or more crows working together.

As a species, crows learn quickly. They solve problems and use tools to perform tasks. But, they team together for mobbing other birds in their territory such as hawks and owls. They also team together to hunt for food. In one particular example, the crows coordinate with each other to distract another hunter, such as a river otter, from its prey in order to steal its food.

How is it that crows have learned what many people do not or cannot? And, no, the lesson is not stealing, it’s working together.

“Working together, ordinary people can perform extraordinary feats. They can push things that come into their hands a little higher up, a little further on towards the heights of excellence.” — Source Unknown 

Sure, it’s easy to see that you need several people to push a heavy object a little higher up, but if you think of your goals or your company’s goals as heavy objects, then getting several people to help lift those goals to the next level makes sense.

Sometimes when you struggle with a problem and it seems as if you’ve exhausted every possible solution, all it takes is another person’s viewpoint to find the solution. Many times, the solution seems obvious once it is identified. You were just too close to and too frustrated with the problem to see the answer without help.

What if you approached your larger and longer term goals (problems needing a solution) in the same way?

Perhaps you struggle with figuring out how you can improve your circumstances in your life or in your business. You dream about future goals and can visualize yourself living in that reality, but all of the tactics you tried have not advanced you toward your dreams. You know there is a way to achieve your desires, but you cannot determine the next steps.

For us independent types, the hardest task of all is asking for help. Never fear, many people are willing to help. Some freely offer their assistance while others require a price to be paid.

But, before you ask for help, perform research to determine the best sources for assistance. Because, let’s face it, some of those people willing to provide assistance, some free and some paid, do not have the right skills and experience to help you achieve success.

Too, the best source to work together with you could easily be among your family and friends. All you have to do is ask.

These two quotes appear to be at odds with each other.

“Giving yourself permission to lose guarantees a loss.” Pat Riley, NBA Champion Player and Coach (won one time as a player, six times as a coach and was Coach of the Year three times)

“You must accept that you might fail; then, if you do your best and still don’t win, at least you can be satisfied that you’ve tried. If you don’t accept failure as a possibility, you don’t set high goals, you don’t branch out, you don’t try – you don’t take the risk.” — Rosalynn Carter, Former First Lady

Though the tone differs between the quotes – one is touchy-feely and the other hardnosed – the overall intent of each message focuses on striving for success.

First, Coach Riley’s comment originates from the attitude and outlook of himself and his team prior to a game. If they arrive in the locker room and decide, singularly or as a team, that tonight’s game is not important and “it’s ok to lose,” they’ve lost the will to fight and win. In other words, they will not play their best. Even if the other team is a weaker team but they arrive at the arena with the burning desire to beat the better team, they will.

As Coach Riley knows, many people lose the mental game before they ever approach the challenge. It’s a case of self-fulfilling prophesy. You can make what you expect to happen, happen, by not giving your best effort to overcome any obstacles and setbacks.

On the other hand, the First Lady’s quote seems to advise the opposite to Coach Riley – that you should give yourself permission to fail. But, read it again. She does not give “permission” to fail, instead, she says that failure is acceptable. In essence, failure should not make you be discouraged or embarrassed if you set your goals high and applied your best effort toward those goals.

Basically, people should extend their reach beyond their comfort zone and learn new skills. Since you cannot win all of the time, your stretch goals and effort will result in some failures along the way. But, failure is acceptable if you learn, grow and continue to strive.

The next time you take those mental vacations into your dreams, think about the stretch objectives you need to achieve to make those dreams a reality. Then, think like a winner, visualize those dreams as reality and begin taking action toward success.

Remember, you can’t win your dreams if you never start, and you can’t win if you begin by thinking that you will fail.