December 2020 - www.andwin.net

December 26, 2020

This week, I was reminded of the old holiday tale about exactly why Christmas Trees aren’t perfect. The gist of it is like this: Christmas trees end up becoming all misshapen and generally imperfect in the giving to others. In giving shelter to deer. In providing nesting material to birds. And so on. The story changes our thinking about perfection and love. If there is a moral to the story, it goes something like this: Just because something is not perfect does not make it any less worthy of love.

And that’s the point for the week.

I’m good with that. No one who walks through the door of this place is or ever will be perfect. Nothing we ever do will ever be judged as perfect. And that’s OK. Because perfection shouldn’t be the goal.

Perfection shouldn’t be goal because it’s an impossible standard. Perfection shouldn’t be the goal because we can’t write down what it looks like. Perfection shouldn’t be the goal because it takes far too long to achieve and is universally regarded as the enemy of progress. But maybe above all, perfection can’t the goal because it is alienating and gets in the way of love.

We live in a world that immediately rejects that which doesn’t meet the standard – for appearance, for hipness, for group-think, for lack of likes or followers, as somehow undeserving of anything but disdain. Forget love, we are being conditioned to not even “like” things that don’t fit the conventional wisdom or popular culture. It’s gotten so bad that we now worry about being cancelled ourselves, if we don’t join the cancel culture in throwing over that which we dislike, disagree with, have a distaste for, are afraid of, or don’t like the looks of.

But that’s not the way that the world should work.

Just because something isn’t perfect doesn’t make it any less worthy of love. Just because something is disagreeable to us doesn’t make it any less worthy of love. Just because someone doesn’t share our views doesn’t make them any less worthy of love. Just because someone believes in a different thing or God than us doesn’t make them any less worthy of love.

One of my rules for life is to simply Love the One You’re Looking At. It doesn’t have strings attached or qualifiers. It doesn’t depend on anything. It’s not conditional. It firmly rejects the notion that anyone is less worthy of love. It’s simple. If you are looking at them, love them.

When it happens, everything in life is better. Here, at home, and in our communities. More gets done. Less time is wasted on crap that doesn’t matter, and in one year won’t even be remembered. Greater bonds of trust are formed. And the force and speed with which things are accomplished begins to multiply each time hate is given over for love. Eventually, with nothing left to divide them, these teams become invincible, unstoppable forces not only for their own good, but for the greater good.

Because they chose to love the imperfect that is all of us. Because they chose to love the one they were looking at.

So abide by Rule #2.

And win.

To purchase a copy of Phillip’s book, The Not So Subtle Art of Caring: Letters on Leadership, from John Hunt Publishing, London, please follow this LINK.

To learn more about the author, please click HERE

This week I was treated to a conversation regarding the wisdom of using sales per square foot as a key performance metric in the truck service business. The purveyor of the notion posited that if shops could simply produce more per bit of floor space, they’d have it licked. As brilliantly obvious as it sounds, there’s just one problem with the cement productivity theory. Just as I’ve never seen a spreadsheet produce one dollar of gross profit, I’ve likewise never seen concrete come to life and produce anything. It’s the living, breathing people who walk around on cement that actually make things.

And that’s the point for the week.

Much of what’s wrong with American business today is that leaders are measuring the wrong things. Everything that happens everywhere in any business anywhere in America happens because of people. Period. Successful leaders connect the dots between the human behaviors that deliver desired results then measure them and reward excellence.

Output per square foot is a useless measurement. Output per person? Now you’re getting warmer.

When success is tied directly to human behaviors which can be taught, measured, and rewarded nearly anything is possible – because the human desire to succeed is limited only by its own imagination.

Concrete can’t think for itself, act for itself, cheer itself on, or develop trust centered relationships with other hunks of cement.

Only people can do these things.

When people understand what they are being asked to do, how to do it, why they are being asked to do it and, most importantly, that their lives will improve when they do it, amazing things start happening. Organizational goals start getting smashed. Bonds of trust between people form then strengthen. And business cycles and other adversity which once could have been significant setbacks become minor irritants as the organization races forward with speed and force.

So measure people things, not stupid things.

And win.

To purchase a copy of Phillip’s book, The Not So Subtle Art of Caring: Letters on Leadership, from John Hunt Publishing, London, please follow this LINK.

To learn more about the author, please click HERE