Most people get into a comfortable career situation and it becomes easy for them to maintain the status quo. As time goes on, and they get caught in a tunnel of everyday activity, it becomes increasingly difficult to change. They become blinded to the vast opportunity that the world has to offer. Indeed, they come to believe the Three Lies of Career Limitation:

Security
Lie: My company may not offer me the opportunity to make terrific money or to control my own destiny, but it is a safe and secure place to work. While my performance is not recognized as outstanding, I can count on having a job to come to every single day.

Truth: The only security you will ever have is confidence in your talent, skills, and knowledge. If you are secure and self-aware, you will always be in demand. Even the most tenured and highest performing employee in a company faces the risk of being fired. The minute a company’s profits evaporate, so do the jobs. As we have seen in the cases of Enron, WorldCom, and others, profits can evaporate for a number of reasons that are outside of your control. Security only comes from controlling your own destiny.

Benefits
Lie: I’ll never get the (fill in the blank - pay, benefits, time off, tuition reimbursement, free meals) that I have here.

Truth: You can always do better. Outstanding athletes always find a team owner that will pay them more money than did their previous team. You have talent. There is a market for your talent. You simply need to identify your value and your market.

Loyalty
Lie: The company has been good to me all these years. I owe it to them to stay.

Truth: You don’t owe anyone anything. Your company is getting a lopsided return on their investment in you. It’s guaranteed that you have the potential to generate a minimum of ten times your salary in productivity for your company. If you are not currently doing so, someone is probably going to come and speak with you shortly.

Filed under: Career Limiting Behavior
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Your personal brand is the way others – your colleagues, your supervisors, and your customers – perceive you. Creating a personal branding message and marketing it is the mechanism by which you manage yourself and your career. Branding is not about you; it’s entirely about your customers. The experience they have when they interact with you – whether via email, the telephone, or in person – forms an impression and creates an expectation in their mind. You want that interaction to be a positive one that leads to future interactions and referrals.

Your goal in personal branding is to get your target market to see you as the preferred choice. As you devise a specific strategy for creating a personal brand, you should differentiate yourself from your competition; position your focused message to your target customers; develop consistent, focused marketing efforts; project credibility; strike an emotional chord; and create strong loyalty.

Filed under: Career Intensity - Q&A
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• A Degree of Respect for Online MBAs
  A good way to get an MBA
  (tags: education)
• 10 Tips To Explode Your Sales
  Good tips to drive new business
  (tags: sales selling)
• My golden rule
  Select a quote per day and really think about it.
  (tags: tips)
• Burning Desire; 8 Steps to Getting It.
  Ignite it in you
  (tags: motivation)
• Do It Now
  Read this now and get going
  (tags: productivity howto)

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Career Journal has an article out that says that higher level jobs in companies are getting tougher to come by. The article uses the figure of 200 to 1 to describe the number of applicants for every available position.

The higher you progress up the career ladder the more difficult it becomes to change jobs. People who know themselves, create value and demonstrate value are always in high demand. This is a process of continuous career improvement that can help you jump to the top of the list of 200.

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Outcome-driven thinking is the process of approaching every interaction with a desired result in mind. Successful people have an idea of what they want from each meeting, each phone call, and each e-mail. By engaging in outcome-driven thinking, you will double your productivity – which will bring you closer to attaining your goals – because you won’t perform time-wasting activities, you’ll prioritize your activities, and you’ll make better decisions.

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Last week we discussed the notion of becoming famous to 15 people. Guerilla Consulting posted an interesting article awhile ago that highlighted the law of 250 and its use as a personal sales and marketing tool.

The law of 250 states that everyone knows at least 250 other people. These 250 people probably know 250 people of their own, etc. The idea is to establish your name recognition and reputation (your personal brand) with your 250 people and make sure they understand the value you provide. Once you have done that you will begin to receive referrals from people within your network and even from those beyond your network into the secondary networks that you have penetrated.

This process works. I know many people who have discovered new business opportunities and even received job offers by mining their personal networks. This does take significant effort. Keeping up with your contacts (other than at weddings and funerals) is difficult and time consuming work.

Sending periodic cards, newsletters or even a quick e-mail is a great way to remind people who you are and the value you can provide. Your goal is to be the “top of mind” reference for your contacts in your area of expertise. For example: If you are an accountant and someone in your network has a tax question, you should be the first person they call.

Everyone is busy and I’m not encouraging you to be a nuisance. Simply make occasional contact and keep your personal brand fresh in the minds of those you know.

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• Man on a Mission
  Good Mission Statement Tips
  (tags: mission success entrepreneurship)
• Simplicity Blog
  Keep it simple - this site can help
  (tags: simplicity)
• Marketing to Women Online
  Focused marketing advice from a pro
  (tags: marketing)
• Media Guerrilla
  An insider’s look at media tech
  (tags: media weblogs technology)
• The Leader-Follower
  An interesting leadership blog
  (tags: leadership)

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Money Magazine has three ideas for your career in 2006.  They are

1. Don’t ask for a big raise. Money says that increases will be modest in 2006. 
2. Get a better gig. Money says these fields will be in high demand for 2006 and beyond: Retirement Planning, Healthcare, Auditing.  Money says that you should get a job in one of these fields.
3. Get an M.B.A.  

That’s really ground-breaking stuff.  Now that you’ve read it, throw it all away. 

The truth is that if you create value and can demonstrate that value to others then you do not need to worry about external forces acting upon your career.  You need to be aggressive, but you control your destiny.

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Over the years, I have found that top performers – whether they were entrepreneurs, company executives, superstars of the academic world, or emerging leaders in business and public service – share four common qualities that draw opportunity toward them: they take calculated risks; they create a positive environment for themselves and everyone around them; they work hard at making things simple; and they expend the majority of their effort on the few tasks that will reap the most benefit. People with Career Intensity don’t rely on luck; rather, they recognize opportunities whether others see obstacles. They are well prepared and, when the moment is right, they strike with the force of a giant.

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Have you ever had a moment when you wished for a second chance at a decision, when you clearly recognized that you had acted irrationally? Virtually everyone has had 20/20 hindsight at some point in their lives and has longed for the opportunity to revisit a critical decision. The failure to think strategically – to see a clear path through the mental haze that surrounds a decision – when faced with a career-related or life-changing choice can mean the difference between rousing success and dismal failure. If you aspire to greatness, the process of strategic thinking must become second nature to you. By examining the implications of your choices and analyzing the options available to you before you make decisions, you will develop a competitive advantage in business and in life.

In its highest form, strategic thinking is a distinct perspective that helps you break down complicated processes into easily manageable pieces that can be arranged to present a clear set of alternatives.

A super-achiever brings intensity to his thinking process. He is intellectually curious and aggressive. In his individual cycle of continuous improvement he thinks like a well run company – strategically.

Posts under this topic will help you identify ways to improve your strategic thinking and apply it toward your career.

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• How Stressful is Your Workplace?
  Think about this post the next time you evaluate your employment situation.
  (tags: business career)
• Why Your Boss is Programmed to be a Dictator
  Interesting thoughts on the person in charge
  (tags: boss work job)
• CCH Business Owner’s Toolkit
  Pack this in your bag when you go out on your own
  (tags: entrepreneur smallbusiness advice)

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Goal setting is the process of building a roadmap for success. I’ve found that highly successful people are relentless in the pursuit of their goals. When talking about their goals, top performers describe the need to take a single step – no matter how small – each day toward achieving their dreams.

The most effective paradigm for the goal setting process is a three-tiered methodology that I call the 3-9-27 Pyramid. The first tier consists of long-term goals that I call Overarching Goals. The timeframe for these goals should be no longer than ten years out. The next tier of goals is medium-term, meaning that they should be achievable within one year. I call these Contributory Goals, since each of the goals at this level should contribute toward one of the goals on the top tier. You should have no more than three sub-goals for each long-term goal. If you have three long-term goals, this gives you a total of nine goals in the middle tier. The final tier is comprised of weekly short-term goals, which I call Action Items. There should be no more than three supporting goals for each of the nine medium-term goals that you set. The idea is to make certain that you are taking action as frequently as possible to achieve your overall plan for the long term. Every weekly goal contributes to completion of a medium-term goal, which in turn supports the achievement of a long-term goal. This will give you a maximum total of 27 short-term goals each week.

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• One Mom’s thoughts on self promotion
  How a mom uses My Space for self promotion
  (tags: publicity)
• Why Start Your Own Business?
  Good reasons to go out on your own
  (tags: entrepreneurship)
• Top Job Sites
  Want to know who gets the best job listings?
  (tags: job headhunter)
• The Perfect Labor Storm
  Understand the macro economic picture
  (tags: economy labor)
• 2005 Most Powerful Women
  Here are some names you should know
  (tags: power)

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A brand is the perception of a product or service in the mind of the consumer. Believe it or not, we all have our own personal brands. Each of our “target audiences” has a perception of us. Sometimes this perception is exactly what we want it to be and sometimes, it is dramatically different.

Companies take great care, and spend millions upon millions of dollars, to influence the perception of their target audience. They conduct sophisticated research studies and test and retest all forms of marketing communications. They craft exactly the right message and precisely select the correct medium to reach a specific audience in the appropriate way.

Does all of this care and dedication make a difference? Absolutely.

We often subscribe to the point of view the marketing professionals want us to believe. In many cases we have no choice. We are bombarded by all types of marketing communications about a product or service. Television commercials, billboards, direct mail brochures, radio ads, magazine and newspaper ads, product placement, celebrity endorsements and sports sponsorships assault us almost every moment of every day. Aggressive public relations professionals are pitching stories right now that will shape tomorrows news. Buzz marketing companies are working over your friends and relatives to get them to recommend their products and service to you. It is no wonder that most kids can name 20 different types of candy but they can’t name five Presidents of the United States. The candy gets better press.

So what does all of this have to do with you and your mission to develop a career of continuous improvement? Well, it has everything to do with it. You need to start managing yourself and your career as a brand. You need to begin to take into consideration the perception of your target audience. You need to make certain that your target audience sees you exactly the way you want them to.

When you look in the mirror you need to like who you are. Most other people are not fortunate enough to benefit from your “inner beauty and greatness”. They make decisions based upon what they see, hear and feel when they interact with you. You deserve to be positioned in the best light.

Mastering how to do this is the difficult part.

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Strategic thinking is the process whereby you examine the implications of your choices and analyze the options available to you before making a decision. In its highest form, strategic thinking is a distinct perspective that helps you break down complicated processes into easily manageable pieces that can be arranged to present a clear set of alternatives. Engaging in strategic thinking gives you a competitive advantage in business and in life. Five factors that influence strategic thinking are time, control, experience, the unknown, and outcome finality.

The actual process of strategic thinking can be learned. When faced with a problem to solve, you must first disassociate yourself from your emotions, much like a surgeon or firefighter temporarily separates himself from the emotion of a life-or-death situation. Then, you must define what specific outcome you desire. Third, you need to acknowledge your gut instincts about the situation, after which you should research the root cause of the problem. The goal is to get to the most basic level of the desired outcome so that you can take as few steps as possible in order to achieve your goal. Having done that, you can work backwards and look for patterns in the factors that contribute to the root problem. From there, you can generate alternatives for solving the problem, assess the risks involved in each, and then select the best solution. Even after coming up with a solution, though, you should always plan for contingencies. Making plans for worst-case scenarios will allow you to deal with any unexpected problems that arise.

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• Ten Steps for Boosting Your Creativity
  Unleash your creative energy
  (tags: creativity)
• An Argument for Small Business Blogging
  This article tells you why you need a blog
  (tags: business communications)
• 6 Don’ts for the End of Your Presentation
  Avoid these unhappy endings
  (tags: presentation)
• How to deal with bad bosses, problem supervisors and difficult managers
  Good stuff for everyone stuck with a bad boss
  (tags: boss)

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Every time you are in front of another person you have the opportunity to win them over.  The more you prepare for these opportunities – both big and small, the more likely you will be to win.

The people you come into contact with each day can advance your career.  They offer opportunities to climb the corporate ladder or to start your own business. There is a good post today on SoHo Savvy about The Art of War in business. 

Preparation is an essential component for success in your career.  Prepare for every encounter!

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Money is a means to an end. It helps us live the type of life we want.

We are guaranteed nothing in life. We must work and plan as though we will be around for an indefinite period of time and we must make the most of every waking moment we have. Money helps us do this.

Money is a scoreboard. It helps measure our current success relative to our past successes and our goals. I believe it is dangerous and unproductive to use money as a means of comparison between two people.  I do believe it can be a great motivational tool for an individual to benchmark his or her own success. I think money works well for goal setting, achievement measurement and motivation. I don’t think it makes the world go around and I don’t think it can buy anything that is truly important.

When I think about money and personal belongings, I start by imaging the kind of life I want to live and how I want to live it. What material items are truly necessary and what would be nice to have?  I then plan my financial future by taking steps to acquire those things.

I believe that how I go about acquiring those things is as important as getting the result.  It sounds cliché but it really is about the journey and not the destination.  The path I take to get to the end result is just as important as the actual goal. The means is more important than the end.

There are two qualities that I require in making money (or making a living if you prefer that terminology). The first is that I need to have fun doing it. I must really enjoy going to work everyday. The second is that I have to learn something from the process. Learning is growing and the minute I stop growing I believe I start dying and I don’t want that to happen.

Seth Godin has an interesting post on this in his blog.

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The mindset of a career champion is noticeably different than the thinking of the rank and file. Top performers focus on providing value in every interaction. They realize that they are only effective if they face and defeat their fears. They are highly self-aware and know their strengths and weaknesses. Super-achievers recognize opportunities and pursue them aggressively. They channel their passion into an emotional competitive advantage that makes them unstoppable.

To develop Career Intensity, you first need to change your mindset. You must understand that you have the ability to impact every experience you have, and then take responsibility to shape your destiny. Then, you need to recognize and overcome the irrational fears that may have kept you in your current position. Perhaps you have a fear of the unknown, a fear of failure, a fear of commitment – or even a fear of success. You must see these fears for what they are – irrational thoughts that keep you from achieving your dreams. Once you conquer your fears, you must harness your imagination and consciously shape your thoughts and behaviors to move you closer toward your goals.

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If you want to stand out from the crowd you need to show your creativity in making an impression on a prospective employer.  Instead of resumes here are some ideas:

Print a personal brochure.  Include a photo, some client testimonials, former supervisor quotes on your performance and any awards you may have won.  Does it sound like you are selling something?  If so you’re starting to get the picture.

Create a personal website.  Include all of your vital employment information.  You can even start a blog or a podcast.  Believe me – people notice a well designed personal website.

Write an article in a trade journal.  Include a copy of the article in a mailing with your personal brochure.  This will get you lots of attention and it will showcase you creativity and initiative.

Your are your most important product.  Stop thinking about the traditional way of getting a job and start selling yourself!

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The key to being an Intrepreneur or an Entrepreneur is to become a value creator for your company or customers. To become a value creator, you must be committed to what I call the Cycle of Continuous Improvement. This involves dedicating yourself to discovering ideas and strategies that you can use to improve your career, implementing them, and then marketing yourself to the world in a way that helps people understand that you are different from your peers in that you generate value that will benefit them. The trick is not to do this once, but to do it in a perpetual cycle – a Cycle of Continuous Improvement. Throughout this process, you need to mimic strategies used by successful companies and manage your career the same way a company manages its position in the market.

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• Bootstrapping: The Secret to Entrepreneurial Success
  Tips for Entrepreneurs
  (tags: entrepreneurship career business)
• 10 Tips for Successful Public Speaking
  Public speaking Basics
  (tags: presentation speaking tips)
• Decision Making Techniques
  A different way to approach decisions
  (tags: thinking brainstorming)
• Surviving a day job with your creativity intact
  How to keep you focus when you really want to be somewhere else.
  (tags: lifehacks productivity creativity)
• Radical tactics to reduce the complexity, costs, and clutter of your life
  Many tips on keeping it simple.
  (tags: simplicity life organization)

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One of the quickest ways to get you career to take off is to be first at something. Duct Tape Marketing has a post up about this topic.  Here’s the money quote

“The media loves firsts and so does the market. First to market is news!” 

First, best or different.  That’s the key to marketing your personal value.

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An Entrepreneur is the value creator for her customers. Her high level of confidence in herself and her team affords her a high risk tolerance. The Entrepreneur is never as successful as she could be. She views the future as unfulfilled potential. She often has a strong sense of urgency that allows her to get started before actually thinking through the consequences of her actions. This drive also propels her to work long hours, which could potentially lead to burnout or health risks. Balance is critical for the Entrepreneur. In addition, brand positioning is often missing from the arsenal of the Entrepreneur. Because she generally has a laser focus on the operational aspects of her business, she often neglects the process of positioning herself and her products and services. The Entrepreneur often develops relationships with her customers. An important challenge for the Entrepreneur lies in identifying her high value customers and converting them into advocates.

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Instead of being famous for fifteen minutes, strive to be famous to fifteen people.

This is a great line and an even better concept.  Think about it:  If 14 of those people tell 2 other people about you, your constituency has tripled.  If the 15th person tells 50 people you are now famous to a plane load of people with all kinds of opportunity. 

This is the primary principal behind word of mouth marketing.  Everyone shares their experiences with others but a small percentage of people share experiences exponentially.  There is a great deal of research in the field about this topic.

Three things that come to mind:

How many opportunities will come from that network of new people?
What type of story about us are they likely to repeat?
Are you prepared to leverage your new found “fame” to advance your career?

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Life Beyond Code points us to some take-away points from a speech by Don Schmincke.  The talk was on organizational strategy but I think there’s some applicability to our careers as well.  Here are Mr. Schmincke’s points and my take on their applicability to the personal strategic landscape:

1. Where is the battlefield? - Defining the markets and deciding what we do and what we don’t do.

In the world of personal strategy we define the battlefield by assessing our passion and what value we can provide to our organization and our customers.

2. Who is our enemy? - Deciding who we are competing against.

In planning our future our first enemy is the status quo.  We must continually improve.  Our second enemy is fear.  We must always test our tolerance for risk and overcome irrational fears – such as the fear of success. Finally we must face the enemy of our friends and relatives who may try to discourage us from chasing our dreams.

3. How do we win?  - How do we get our customers to choose us and not our competition?

In planning our future we must set goals so that we can measure success.  Each time we achieve one of our goals we win. 

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The Millionaire Blog has a tip on accomplishing your goals.  The advice in the post comes from Christy Geiger, a strategic planning coach and the owner of Synergy Strategies. 

Christy’s five steps are:

Evaluate. What do I really want? Where am I headed? What am I doing now?

Get Real. What is really important that will impact and support your long term goals the best? What is not important? What is distracting me? What is not really supporting my long term goal?

Plan. What do I need to do to accomplish my goal? What are the KEY action steps? How will I do this? What schedule or strategy will keep me focused?

Focus. Who do you need to be and what structures do you need to have to accomplish this (mindset, attitude, accountability)?

Monitor/Evaluate. Am I doing little, unimportant things? Am I procrastinating? What is working/ what is not? How could I streamline what I am doing?

Most people overlook goal setting and they wind up in a rut – for a very long time.

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The Intrepreneur understands the value he creates within his company; he often develops new ways to improve the value of his company’s business. He should keep a watchful eye on the market value of his ideas and balance it with his risk tolerance. At some point, he may have an idea or a creative solution with significant market potential that outweighs the risk associated with starting a new business. An Intrepreneur should always be aware of how he is perceived within his organization. He needs to be careful not to fall into the position of being perceived as a Management Maverick. He must also work to develop strong advocates and take advantage of his knowledge that the social network in an organization is always more powerful than any form of formal communication. Similarly, he needs to continue to hone his influence and persuasion skills to make certain that his ideas are always at the top of the list for his internal and external clients.

Filed under: Career Intensity - The Book
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Curt Rosengren at Occupational Adventure says that you know more than you think.  I agree. Here’s the money quote from his post:

“The road to our own answers is paved with insights about who we are, what we do, and why.

Finding “the answer” is often a process of excavation. It’s seldom a brilliant moment of clarity. Life changing epiphanies are few and far between. It is, unglamorous as it may seem, a process of getting to know yourself, getting to know the often-unconscious assumptions that have guided your decisions up to now, and aligning your ongoing decisions with who you are at the core.”

I call this process of self discovery a “personal situational analysis”.

Look deeply at yourself and what makes you special.  Determine how you can create value for others with what you have inside you. Then demonstrate that value every chance you get.  That’s the secret to career intensity. 

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• Top 10 Most Practical Blogs for Entrepreneurs
  Bookmark these blogs.
  (tags: entrepreneurship blogs business)
• Ten Things You Can Do Today to Jump-start Success
  A daily dose of motivation.
  (tags: success business motivation)
• Work/Life Balance
  Nice idea, tough to do
• Fast track yourself
  Bren’s great article on taking the fast track
  (tags: business career promotion)
• Leonardo da Vinci: Qualities of a Genius and How to Think Productively
  Think like a genius
  (tags: thinking genius productivity work)

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As you put together a strategic plan for your career you need to understand where you want to go. You don’t necessarily need to know how to get there, but you need to understand where you passion lies and put in motion a plan to follow that passion.

Harvey Mackay’s weekly column provides a great example of the need for a sense of purpose. Harvey writes:

Leaders have a “sense of purpose.”

They think in terms of goals . . . There isn’t a college football coach with a greater sense of purpose than Lou Holtz. He proved it at Notre Dame, Arkansas and a host of other universities. Did you know that Lou once coached the New York Jets? He left the job after only eight months. Why? Because, as Lou told me, he came to the job “without a clear sense of purpose…Absent a focus of my own, I couldn’t give one to the team. I was embarrassed by my inability to provide them with proper leadership. So I left.” Few leaders are as honest.

Before you take on your next challenge think about what you hope to gain from the experience. Then ask yourself two questions:

If the answer to either of these questions is “no” then this is not the right opportunity for you.

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The Management Maverick has a tendency to move forward and implement solutions without the support of her internal and external customers. Occasionally, this results in a huge success. More often than not, though, she creates an undesirable issue for the company – either internally or externally. As a result, she is often perceived as a rogue and has a limited career future.

Filed under: Career Intensity - Q&A
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Most of the successful people I have met over the years describe their pursuit of their goals as an obsession. They state clearly that they began to make things happen in their lives when they focused solely on the achievement of their goals, often to the detriment of everything else in their lives.

I am not advocating that you take an unhealthy approach toward goal achievement. I’m not telling you to avoid your family and friends and only concentrate on the goals you have outlined for yourself. What I am saying is that in order to really make things happen in your life – to achieve your goals and make your dreams come true – you need to spend as much time as possible working toward those goals.

The question then becomes: How can I align my daily actives with the goals I have set for myself? This question is particularly perplexing when we are faced with goals that may be set for a significant time period in the future. Time and distance can often distort our perception of reality. In other words, because a goal is set so far out into the future we may have a difficult time believing that it is relevant to what we are doing today.

I often compare this perception of goals to the feeling of traveling in an airplane. When we are at 20,000 feet and we look out of the window of an airplane we see the buildings of a city. Those buildings appear very small and almost look like tiny little toys. Our brains have a difficult time comprehending the fact that those buildings are actually several hundred feet tall and may contain thousands of people. As the plane descends and we get closer and closer to the ground, we begin to grasp the size of those buildings. We also begin to realize the magnitude of what has just happened. We have, in fact, just traveled at significant distance in a short time at an altitude that would make a bird nervous. Our minds have a difficult time comprehending things that are not local and in perspective.

Think about some steps you can take today to bring you closer to your long term goals. The journey of a million miles begins with one small step.

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• Why smart people defend bad ideas
  Is this you?
  (tags: productivity smart)
• The 25 most difficult interview questions
  This is an oldie but a must read if you heading out for a job interview
  (tags: interview job search)
• Working Smart: How to Sell Your Boss
  A must read if you have a boss
  (tags: boss selling career management sales)
• Ignite the Two Fires of Employee Motivation
  A scientific approach to motivation.
  (tags: motivation productivity)
• 25 Words That Can Hurt Your Résumé
  Shape up your resume.
  (tags: interview resume)
• Self Promotion - Finding Your Theme
  Self promotion strategy
  (tags: promotion)

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The Coyote has an interesting post on Serendipity and Insight. Here is the money quote:

“When you’re too attentive to the claims of what you ought to think or do — because it’s management orthodoxy, like annual budgets and mission statements; or demanded by trying to be professional and dignified; or based on some preprogrammed mental tape — you not only suck the joy and fun out of life. You saddle yourself and your business with a great deal of useless baggage.”

We’ve all heard the expression “don’t bring your personal problems to work”. You can replace that with “don’t bring irrelevant issues to this task”.

Performers have a saying that has a great deal of relevance in this discussion. A good performer must be “in the room” when delivering a performance. This means that she must be mentally focused on the task at hand and nothing else. A good performer literally becomes the character they are portraying during that performance. They think of nothing else. They are focused on the audience’s perception of them as that character.

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A Workplace Warrior often has the perception of job security, primarily because there are so many people in his position. While he provides essential services to his organization, the Workplace Warrior is not creating much individual value. In truth, when his company seeks ways to cut back expenses through workforce reduction or outsourcing, the Workplace Warrior will feel the brunt of these efforts. With a little training and development, the Workplace Warrior is replaceable.

Filed under: Career Intensity - Q&A
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This post over at SoHo Savvy describes how leadership development programs can be a competitive advantage for the employer. They should be your competitive advantage as well.

If you currently work for an employer who offers you a tuition reimbursement benefit, you need to take advantage of it. Each year you should max it out. Use it to improve your skills and knowledge in an area that will help make you more valuable.

Creating value and demonstrating value are two of the best things you can do to get ahead in your career.

Filed under: Learning
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Bren over at Slacker Manager points us to a free e-book on motivation by Richard Denny. It’s called The Ten Laws of Motivation.
Here are Denny’s Laws:

Check out the e-book. It’s a quick read and it’s free.

Filed under: Motivation
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• The 10 Secrets of a Master Networker
  Sit at Yoda’s Feet and Learn
  (tags: entrepreneurship networking)

Filed under: Links
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Sometimes, your superiors instill in you a mindset that is set in stone. You sit through performance review after performance review and hear feedback that tells you that you need to improve in a certain area. This immediately translates into a perception that you are deficient in that area and that area is critical to your success in moving into the next position. You are wrong to accept this feedback as gospel.

There are four reasons why the feedback you receive on your performance review isn’t the best way to judge your overall value:

Performance review feedback is subjective. A performance review reflects the opinion of one person. Although some companies use a 360-degree feedback tool that includes feedback from peers and subordinates under the guise of objectivity, this just offers subjectivity in greater volume. In many cases, performance reviews are a popularity contest.

Guidelines often prevent true value assessment. Your supervisor has specific guidelines that she has to follow when she completes your review. Her feedback will be confined to, or at least influenced by, the company’s guidelines. Helpful individual feedback can be restricted by the rules in place for completing the process.

The company sets the success criteria. You are evaluated based upon a conglomeration of criteria that may not exist in any one person. If your company has put thought into the development of its performance management system, it has probably developed specific criteria to evaluate individual performance. This criterion is often based upon qualities that exist in their best performers or in a cross-section of these individuals. No one may be able to become the super-employee who receives the highest performance evaluation.

True measurement is rare. Very few companies have true measures of individual performance that are helpful in assessing value. Companies that rely on individual sales performance to drive growth may have some degree of measurement in place. What they do with that measurement is another story. It is difficult to find an organization that associates “hard” metrics with individual performance evaluation. When you do find a company that does so, it often accepts the numbers at face value. It does not look at the supporting factors that influence individual performance. You become the number you produce.

Filed under: Performance Evaluation
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Most often we acknowledge a gift or a gesture from someone else with a note of thanks. Tradition dictates that this be a handwritten note card. It is a rare occasion when we receive a handwritten note for no reason. It certainly grabs the recipient’s attention.

Imagine the impact a dentist could make on his patients if he sent them a card (that he wrote himself) after a visit. Do you think people would be surprised if an accountant scribbled a couple of sentences on some nice stationary after he met with a client? I think a real estate agent could close more deals if she sent a note to each couple she met at an open house.

At a minimum this practice can set you apart from the rest of the pack. Who knows it might just pay off with some additional business.

For more on this practice please see these posts:

Proof of the Power of the Hand Written Note

Great way to reach aspirational contacts

Filed under: Networking
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What is the Career Intensity Matrix?

The Career Intensity Matrix is a tool that was developed to help people visualize the four categories into which most people in today’s workforce fall. These categories are Workplace Warriors, Management Mavericks, Intrepreneurs, and Entrepreneurs. Because today’s business world places a premium on the performance of the individual, a person’s ability to create value for their customer is paramount. Therefore, the vertical axis of the Career Intensity Matrix is a measurement of value creation. The horizontal axis of the Matrix represents the level of risk tolerance with which an individual is comfortable. In the Matrix, the Workplace Warrior occupies the lower left quadrant; this nine-to-fiver creates little individual value and has a low tolerance for risk. The Management Maverick occupies the lower right quadrant; although he embraces risk, he creates little value for his customer. The Intrepreneur, who occupies the upper left quadrant, feels more comfortable in a low-risk corporate environment, but creates tremendous individual value for the companies in which he works. The Entrepreneur, who occupies the upper right quadrant, has a high tolerance for risk – expressed through starting her own company – and creates enormous value for her customers. All super-achievers are either Intrepreneurs or Entrepreneurs. In Career Intensity, I’ve outlined the strategies and tactics that will catapult you from being a Workplace Warrior or a Management Maverick into becoming an Intrepreneur or an Entrepreneur.

Filed under: Career Intensity - Q&A
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• The Three C’s of Personal Branding
  Thoughts on the care and feeding of your personal brand.
  (tags: branding)
• The Tyranny of Email
  Hot to make e-mail more efficient.
  (tags: productivity e-mail)
• Getting Back To Work: A Personal Productivity Toolkit
  Thoughts on how to beat procrastination.
  (tags: productivity procrastination)
• How to Start a Startup
  Interesting tips on starting your business.
  (tags: entrepreneurship)
• Success and Motivation - You only have to be right once!
  Mark Cuban’s post on motivation
  (tags: entrepreneurship)
• Work vs. Progress
  Make sure your making some headway.
  (tags: productivity work)
• The Power of Play at Work
  Have more fun at work.
  (tags: productivity fun work)

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Here’s some advanced praise for the book and the blog. It comes from Ron McDaniel at Buzzoodle.

“Blogging works, and it is habitual. So much so that once you have one you need more. Here is some info about Blog #2 from David Lorenzo.

If you have not checked out Career Intensity yet, please do. I have read an advanced copy of this book and it is excellent for those people that want to build a career instead of just work a job.

One chapter is on how to build buzz on yourself. How can I not like that.”

Thanks for the kind words, Ron.

Filed under: Career Intensity - The Book
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The opinion of your customers, coworkers and your boss is reality in their eyes. The impression you make is important. The small things can affect the overall impression people have of you. Let me give you a business example:

You are taking a trip and you are going to fly on an airplane. You board the plane and as you are taking your seat you notice a coffee stain on the seat next to you. You immediately wonder about the care of the aircraft. You think to yourself “if they can’t take the time to clean up a small coffee stain, are they taking the time to check on the safety of the aircraft”.

People make these kinds of judgments about others every day. If your hair is a mess or if you dress inappropriately, there is a chance you will make a poor impression on our customers when you meet with them.

Impressions count. Do not take a chance. Always keep the perception of the other side in mind.

Filed under: Personal Branding
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Over the course of my 20 years in business, I have taken my experience and education and applied it to help create a climate of continuous improvement in the projects in which I was involved. During that time, I learned about the determining factors of success in many different industries. As a result, I helped many of these businesses develop processes of continuous improvement that would ensure continued success for the future. I began to recognize that companies had strategies and continuous improvement models that helped them chart a path toward success, but that there was no such model for individuals. I began to focus on the ways in which the factors of business success were applicable to individuals. I also carefully studied the characteristics and traits that those who are highly successful share. I learned to view the world through the eyes of executives, customers, and employees in some of the world’s best-run organizations. As a result, I formulated the personal strategies of Career Intensity.

Filed under: Career Intensity - Q&A
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Making a good impression is critical when you have to present your ideas to others. As an up-and-coming manager in a corporate setting or as an entrepreneur, you will need to be concise and convincing when you are making a presentation.

Carmine Gallo of BusinessWeek details four things not to do while making your pitch. His four presentation sins are:

Fidgeting – I agree that this is annoying. A speaker who is jingling change in his pocket or twirling his pen in his hand is distracting. If you’re guilty of this, simply make a conscious effort to link your hand movements with your words. Be careful not to look mechanical. You want it to appear that you have a natural flow and congruance to your movements.

Standing rigedly in place – Good speakers move around. You don’t have to pace like a caged animal. Mr. Gallo offers a tip to move to the extreme ends of the speaking area from time to time. I would be a little more conservative and say that you should always be in the visable area of about 2/3 of your audience.

Movement does a couple of things for your talk. It helps keep people interested. If your moving and you make eye contact as you do so, people will feel more engaged. It also helps combat the anxiousness you may initially feel when you begin your talk. A little movement will make your more comfortable with your surroundings and this will subsconsciously acclimate you to the room.

Putting your hands in your pockets – Just don’t do this. Pretend that your pockets are sewn up. If you have to, put a small piece of clear tape over the slit in your pocket when you rehearse. This will help you break this happit.

Lack of hand gestures – Hand gestures are great if they are syncronized with the verbal points that you are trying to make in your talk. A good rule for hand gestures is no sudden movements. Move deliberately but don’t flail around like a fish out of water.

These four areas are just a few of the things you can do to make your presentations more engaging. Keep in mind that your audience knows that you are human. Most of them have probably had some type of speaking experience. As long as you prepare in advance and you make a genuine effort, they will forgive small idosyncracies as you work to improve..

Filed under: Presentation Tips
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• CrossRoads Newsletter and Career Development Center
  What to ask on an interview.
  (tags: interview jobs business)
• The Five-Step Plan for Creating Personal Mission Statements
  Good tips to help focus your career.
  (tags: goals)
• How To Be Confident At Any Age » by Yaro Starak
  Interesting article on confidence
  (tags: confidence attitude)
• What Is Your Career?
  Steve Pavlina’s thoughts on Career Choices
  (tags: career)

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John Jantsch at Duct Tape Marketing has a great post about using your voice mail to help differentiate yourself. Why not use your voice mail as an opportunity to make an impression on the caller?

Recite a poem. Sing a song. Leave the sports scores from the previous day. Do something…anything (professional) to make an emotional impression on the mind of your caller.

Being different is what it’s all about.

Filed under: First, Best or Different
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Seth has an interesting take on door-to-door sales in a post on his blog today. My grandfather made his living selling office products by going door-to-door and by making cold calls on the telephone. He made a good living and he was well respected in his community.

Today people do a lot of research before they buy just about anything. Everyone has a huge amount of information at their fingertips. We can do a quick search of the Internet and find the benefits and features of any product or service. In a few minutes we can compare several providers and determine who provides the best value. Door-to-door salespeople or cold call telemarketers are not needed anymore and in some cases, they are treated with distain.

My point: You need to be different in order to stand out from the rest of the pack. Seth would say that you have to be remarkable. Presenting benefits and features is not remarkable. If you want to make it in this day and age as a door-to-door salesperson you better be a fantastically charismatic person and make people want to establish a relationship with you.

In any sale, you are the product. Be different – be remarkable.

Filed under: First, Best or Different
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Here is a post I found over at BusinessBits. Posting your personal drinking habits on a publicly viewable site is not only a mistake it is career limiting behavior.

Filed under: Career Limiting Behavior