In December I read Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen. I generally enjoyed the book and felt that learned a lot about personal management and organization. The author went to some trouble to present the principles and even techniques in such a way as to be timeless as technology and tools evolve.

There is one concept in particular that I feel has made a significant impact in my life that I would like to share with you today.

The author suggests that traditional stress is much more than a byproduct of having a lot to do. It is a byproduct of worrying that you will forget to do something. Therefore, a good management system in which you have absolute confidence is a significant factor in reducing stress.

Specifically, stress is often generated when we are constantly remembering everything we need to do. These “open loops” are constantly coming to mind because our mental system is also concerned that we may forget. If we have an effective system, that we believe in, where we can record/input every open loop as it comes to mind, then these things will stop coming to mind or at very least the anxiety that we associate with them will go away. The stress goes away because we know we won’t forget because it has been recorded in our management system.

In the last several weeks since reading this book I have worked hard to make sure that every time I think of anything that I should do our need to do, I input it into my task list software. I use an internet based system that has a corresponding app for my phone which makes it ready to access and input anywhere.

Of course the idea of recording all of your thoughts isn’t a new concept of personal management and leadership. However, it was only after hearing how this directly reduces stress and worry did it really sink in to me. The last few weeks I have experienced far less concern since I have confidence that I will not forget anything that needs doing.

Hope the idea can work for you too!

At my organization we are planning a new year workshop to help the sales team plan for 2012. Its important to help your team and your department focus on whats important. No matter how many books you have read or how many seminars you have been to; we all need reminders and time to “sharpen the saw.”

The outline below is an adaptation of Stephen R. Covey’s 7 Habits of Highly Effective People as it may apply to media sales. Use this outline and adapt it for your industry and business.

Habit 1: Be Proactive: Principles of Personal Vision

1. The first step in creating strong income is pro-activity.
2. Create a lifestyle that helps you meet new leads. Make calling on new leads a top priority.
3. Identifying potential conflicts or issues that will slow you down and addressing them with potential solutions to management.
4. Take accountability for your results. You are the factor of your success or failure.

Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind: Principles of Personal Leadership

1. Deciding early on what your objectives are. What do you truly wish to accomplish in your job?
2. Creating a mission statement that reflects your goals as a sales professional.
3. Beginning each event, activity, or meeting knowing what you want to get out of it.
4. Foreseeing possible problems with retention, discouragement, accounting, traffic, etc.
5. Taking the proper steps to prepare to be an effective sales person and marketing consultant.

Habit 3: Put First Things First: Principles of Personal Management

1. Understanding the four quadrants of effective production and knowing how to apply that to our business. Focusing on Revenue Producing Activities!
2. Creating habits of time management and effective planning.
3. Reserving time for all your roles in life, so as not to neglect anything.
4. Setting time aside each week for Prospecting, Service, and Production, and Education/Training.

Habit 4: Think Win/Win: Principles of Interpersonal Leadership

1. Commit yourself to Win/Win or no deal. Agree to sell clients who you need as clients and who need your stations.
2. You must listen first. Discover who the client is and what problems they have in their business. Look for the solutions in your stations.
3. Each part of the media buying experience has to be a new win. Show the client how accounting, production, and reporting is a win for them.
4. Train the client to respect your time and learn to respect theirs.
5. Understand how to create win win situations with other departments in the company.

Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood

1. Seek to understand the situation of each client. Find out what they want out of the advertising and what has brought them far enough to listen to you.
2. Practice active listening skills. Truly listen to your clients and your team members to best understand their desires.
3. Continue building a relationship with your clients to develop trust and credibility through listening to, and understanding them.
4. Only when the client trusts you and believes you understand them, and have their best interests in mind, will they follow you.

Habit 6: Synergize Principles of Creative Communication

1. Create environments of synergy with traffic, production, promotion, and accounting.
2. Practice habits 4 & 5 in making synergistic moments happen.
3. Synergize with each client individually to get full buy in.
4. Seek out potential synergistic activities, such as creative meetings, brainstorming sessions, etc.
5. Understand the unique abilities/responsibilities that each of our departments have, and think of how best to utilize them.
6. Seek out the very best training in the industry and in your company from the top leaders.

Habit 7 Sharpen the Saw: Principles of Balanced Self-Renewal

1. Set aside Monthly, Weekly, and Daily planning and evaluation sessions.
2. Renew your commitments and covenants in all aspects of life through sincere evaluation.
3. Evaluate the best and less effective practices that you have been using in prospecting, retaining, and up selling your clients.
4. Review this and other handouts and notes that will increase your effectiveness in prospecting, retaining, and up selling your clients.

Its the time of year when I start thinking about my goals for the upcoming year. In 2011 I set a goal to read 50 new books and I’m on track to hit my goal. I’ve learned that this goal has caused me to rush through books and get much less from the content than I otherwise would. In looking forward into 2012 I wanted to set a goal to get much more value from far fewer books.

As it will be the year 2012 and there are 12 months in the year it seemed fitting to me to reach exactly 12 books, one each month. As I spent the last two weeks contemplating how I would get absolute maximum value from 12 books, two things occured to me. First that my best strategy would be to start/join a book group that would all read the same books together. This allows for great discussion and insight which increases growth dramatically. The second thing that occured to me is that the best leader of such a book group would be the authors of each of the books we read.

In order to convince significant authors to take the time (without any compensation) to guide a month long discussion about their book I realized that we would need a significant enough group of people in the book club so as to offer the author high exposure and potential for book sells. Thus the goal was refined to find 12,000 other people to read 12 books with me, being lead by the author of each of the 12 books.

I spent last week talking to key friends of mine who I know share my passion for reading business and personal development books. They helped me refine the plans and strategies and they helped me make the first contact with some great authors who have awesome books that we would like to read.

So far we have two great authors committed, including Bruce H Jackson the author of “Finding Your Flow;” and Erik Qualman the author of “Socialnomics” who is realeasing a new book next month.

If you want to change your life in 2012 you need to get involved. If you don’t want to pass on the amazing opportunity to be lead in 12 book discussions by the authors themselves you need to get involved. Visit www.12booksin2012.com and sign up now. Spread the word. Remember that the level of value that each of us will recieve as part of the book group will depend both on the total amount of discussion and the leadership and genius of each author. In other words, SPREAD THE WORD! Utilize Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, your email and more to tell everyone you know about this once in a lifetime opportunity!

If you have direct contact with or access to authors whom you feel would have a lot to offer to our group please don’t hesitate to contact me!

Jacob S Paulsen

I’ll never forget an old manager of mine who once told me “What can be measured, can be improved.” I have always felt strongly about the importance of keeping track of results in order to improve. In high school I charted all of my race times for Cross Country and Track and Field into a spreadsheet for 4 years. I used charts to measure my improvement over time during a season and to closely compare improvement on the same tracks or courses. I know I was a freak back then, but this methodical nature has paid me back 10 fold.

If you have ever read any book about goal setting you know that goals must be written down. They must be specific and measurable. If you can’t track it you can’t achieve it. My sales team understand the importance of this. Every day when they come into my office they see a list of all of my personal and business 2011 goals written on my wall. Next to each goal is either a check-mark or a % of completion. On Mondays or Fridays I update each of my reports (mostly in Excel) to illustrate progress or regression.

Keeping track of the numbers is the very last thing that anyone wants to do. Its time consuming, boring, and hard to justify when a pile of urgent tasks cover your desk and email inbox. Never forget the long term necessity and importance of keeping track of the numbers. Numbers are an important part of every aspect of every business. If you are in advertising you need to keep track of your response in correlation with your advertising spend. If you are in sales you need to keep track of each activity in your sales cycle to track what is effective and what is not, in addition to defining when you are trending high or low in activity. If you are a web programmer, keep track of which activities take the most time so that you can accuratly manage your boss’s or client’s expectations.

Being methodical about watching the numbers will impress your superiors and your boss. If you are the boss then you know that a large part of your day needs to be engaged in analyzing the numbers. Without a range of measurement you will never be able to make wise decisions to increase productivity or return on investment.

What parts of your business are you measuring well or poorly? Are your tracking methods effective and consistent? Where does your data come from and are you taking the time to read it?

I couldn’t tell you if the following rituals lead people to be successful or if successful people tend to develop these rituals. Either way, I think adapting these rituals into your own lifestyle will only push you forward and make you stronger and better prepared to reach your own goals.

Top Ten Rituals of the Very Successful

1. Early to Rise. Some people (including myself) claim to just not be morning people but I see this as a habit of almost every successful person I know. There is just something to be said about getting up early that perhaps makes it easier to build in some of the other rituals I’m about to mention.
2. Exercise. Successful people tend to understand that their most valuable asset is their own body. They keep it in the best shape possible so as to allow themselves to be effective in every other aspect in life.
3. Lifelong Student. Successful people may or may not be college graduates but they are all students. Every successful person I know has a system of learning. Some read or listen to books, others attend educational events and seminars.
4. Regular Planning. Not every successful person I know is organized but they all have a systematic and regular approach to planning. They understand that without a plan they can’t really achieve anything. Successful people make planning a regular practice.
5. Goal Setting. This couldn’t be any more obvious. Becoming successful requires setting goals and achieving them. These people set goals all of the time and they revise their goals as often as is appropriate.
6. Record Keeping. Successful people know that only those things that are measured can be improved. These people make a habit out of writing things down and keeping records. They have journals, photo albums, and files/piles of information. It may not always be the most organized method but they keep records of almost everything.
7. Works in strengths and works on weaknesses. The most successful people I know have discovered their greatest strengths and put them to work in a rewarding environment. That isn’t to say they don’t try to improve their weaknesses, but their greatest focus is on playing to their strengths.
8. Integrity. Lets face it. Long term success can only come to those that are fully honest with themselves and everyone around them. Successful people don’t compromise their character for any short term reward.
9. Lives in abundance. The most successful people believe that there is enough pie for everyone. They want others to succeed and are always looking for ways to give back and support others.
10. Networkers. Successful people are often as successful as they are because they have build such strong and trusting relationships with such a large group of other people. Not to suggest that its about who they know, but more so about who they are and how their character has led to a high quantity and quality of relationships.

What other habits or rituals have you noticed among successful people?

Avatars & Gravatar

Quick Tip for my readers today about gravatar. When you comment on other people’s blogs you may wonder how you can get your picture to show up next to your comment; as it does in the case of many others.

Within blogs on blogspot.com those images come from each individual’s Google profile since blogger is owned by Google and is part of the Google account system.

Outside of Blogger you need to get a Gravatar. Gravatar.com is the home of Globally Recognized Avatars. You setup a free account, upload your image, and decide what email addresses to associate that image with. Most web platforms (including WordPress) work with Gravatar.com to display images.

Want to test it? Go setup your account right now and then come back here to this post and leave a comment below. As long as you use an email address below that is associated with your Gravatar account your image will be displayed!

Jacob S Paulsen

A wonderful author and friend of mine has published a new book which gives great insight and inspiration to leaders and business people everywhere. “Pot of Gold: Business Book Nuggets for Leadership, Work and Career” by John Eckberg is a collection of business book excerpts. John has had an amazing life interviewing business success stories across the country. When I first spoke to John he was working as a business columnist at a newspaper in the mid west. He autographed my copy of his first book “The Success Effect” which contains wonderful interviews with entrepreneurs and leaders such as Donald Trump and Deepak Chopra. I enjoyed it greatly and John gave me the opportunity to preview a draft of the upcoming Pot of Gold book that he was working on at the time. The insights are powerful and it represents a unique collection of inspirational thoughts.

I recently also found that John has been able to release an iPhone app which gives you access to that same content found in the book. The app is very affordable and the user interface is user friendly. I like to added feature which allows you to add your own quotes that you may pick up as you go through the day.

Links:

Download the e-Book: Pot of Gold: Business Book Nuggets for Leadership, Work and Career

Download on Kindle: Pot of Gold: Business Book Nuggets for Leadership, Work and Career

Download the App on iTunes: Success by John Eckberg – iCrysta

Thank you John for continuing to inspire others toward greatness!

Jacob S Paulsen

What Does 4 Laps Have to do With Goal Setting?

In high school I learned about goal setting when I ran distance races in track and field. My favorite was the mile (technically 1600 meter) race. A standard American track is 400 meters around which makes the 1600 meter race exactly 4 laps. There is a distinct mental and physical pattern that changes during the course of those laps around the track. Over the years I have come to realize that the same pattern applies to any difficult goal or challenge in life. Not all undertakings include 4 laps around a track but if you generally divide any goal or challenge in 4 equal parts (quarters) then you can apply the pattern below accordingly. Understanding the flow of thought and attitude of the four quarters/laps will help you better prepare for success.

The first lap: In the first lap of the race your body is running on adrenaline in addition to the physical reservoir of strength. Things are just beginning and you still have a clear picture of the end of the task in your mind. You can still clearly see the prize that will await you if you succeed. The crowd is very active in this first quarter as they watch you establish yourself into a position and a pace. You can see the cheerleaders and hear the shouts of encouragement. Toward the latter part of that first lap your training and preparation start to take control. You settle in and now, having your bearings you fix your eyes forward.

The second lap: In the second lap things begin to push you beyond comfort. The crowd and spectators aren’t paying as much attention and their cheers are less enthusiastic. That clear picture of the prize at the end of the race begins to blur and your mind starts to wonder to other things. You think of the pain and of other non consequential things. Your pace begins to falter some but you still move forward with strength (as the adrenaline has faded).

The third lap: Pain and struggles. You are only half way done and you begin to entertain thoughts that you may not be able to win. Deep down you know that your training has prepared you to see this to the finish but the doubt about your ability to achieve the great result you originally hoped for is changing your actions. You hurt and without any conscious thought you are slowing down to avoid crossing the threshold of a discomfort that your mind tells you that you cannot endure until the end.

The final and fourth lap: You hear the cheers from the spectators. You wonder if they have been there all along despite you only hearing them now. The cheers and the general realization that you are almost done wake you out of a sleep. Even your top levels of consciousness are willing to endure the greater pains in order to make a final attempt at the best results possible. As you enter the final stretch the prize is clearest in your mind and you put everything out on the line to achieve it. Your body finds the last of what is left of adrenaline and gives you an extra edge of resources. You finish.

However you want to apply the lessons learned in the four laps you must remember that races are won in the 2nd and 3rd lap. Your ability to remain “awake” in the middle of the challenge, keeping your mind’s eye fixed on the final goal will bring you to achieve or to fail.

I follow the writings of a philosopher named Tom Morris. He is the author of several great books and he writes occasionally for the Huffington Post. His wisdom is bread to my soul and this is an example of a short story of wisdom he recently shared.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tom-morris/the-oasis-within_b_819491.html

Jacob Paulsen

This year I plan to read 50 new books. Last year I read less than 20 new books. In order to hit my goal this year I have had to take a hard look at the way I am using my time and consider other strategies to increase my reading time.

I decided on four strategies designed to facilitate the goal. You may wonder if they are working and I can tell you they are. As of February 19th I’ve finished 13 new books.

1. Learn to speed read. I took an abbreviated speed reading course in junior high. 15 years later I decided to recall the general idea and strategy. I’ve been working hard on the technique and its really paying off. I think there are a large number of courses available online or perhaps at a school in your area. You could even read a book about speed reading such as Breakthrough Rapid Reading

2. Listen to audio books. This is generally a well known strategy. I no longer listen to music. In the car you may have an auxiliary input for your smartphone/MP3 player. If not you could purchase a cassette adapter or FM transmitter. The other wonderful thing about audio books is their availability. Many people associate a cost with audio book programs but your local library has audio books available to you as part of your membership. You can use your computer to import the discs to your MP3 player and off you go. If you want a quick downloadable solution try Audible and Get A Free Audiobook Download with a 14 Day Trial. Choose from over 85,000 Titles.

3. Read several books at any given time. If you, like many people find yourself getting bored with a book you may set it down without any great desire to finish it in a hurry. Decide to have several books on the night stand at once. Perhaps different genres of books will help you feel more engaged. I am generally reading a religious, business, and fiction book at any given time.

4. Listen to books when you workout. Since exercise is also a big part of my new years resolutions, and makes up part of a healthy lifestyle I find this an easy way to hit two birds with one stone. Most people are accustomed to either listening to music or watching TV during their workout. I would challenge you to try listening to a book. In addition to helping you read more this year you may also find that a good book will also encourage you to workout more this year. I know it sounds weird but give it a try.

Jacob S Paulsen

2011 Reading Challenge

Jacob has

read 13 books toward his goal of 50 books.

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13 of 50 (26%)

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