For this final FGC blog, I thought I would just briefly write about my list of operating principles. They are on my mind right now, as I plan my transition into my new job.

The list, as it appears below has evolved since the first version, which I created nearly six years ago.  The idea came from The David Allen Company. A few things have been added and the wording of several principles have changed as my experience deepens, and I reframe them to fit the context. When I was working the Specialty Coffee Association of America, it was “members” rather than “clients,” the word used until today,  or “customers,” as it reads now.

For me, maintaining this list is similar to having written values as a company. During the rush and tumble of work life, we are pulled in many directions by competing priorities and commitments. This list serves as a touchstone. Whenever I feel overwhelmed or uncertain, I usually find that I am not aligned with one or more of my operating principles.  During a time of change, like I am experiencing now, I refer to them several times a day. They don’t tell me what to do next, but they do remind me of how to go about doing whatever is next.

I am unbelievably excited about the next chapter in my coffee career, in large part, because Batdrof & Bronson is a company whose approach to business is aligned with my personal operating principles. 

Mike's Operating Principles

-Honor commitments to such a degree that those to whom promises are made feel highly valued.

-Exceed expectations for quality and service.

-Demonstrate audacity without arrogance.

-Be known for integrity and fostering a culture of accountability.

-Bring energy and thoughtfulness to managing the workload.

-Practice servant leadership as a manager.

-Be assertive and diplomatic participant in project management and planning the growth of the company.

-Be an example to customers of productivity, efficient teamwork, and sound business practices.

-Engage in ongoing and open communication within the company and with customers.

-Question, learn, and teach, teach, teach.

-Recognize that vital relationships and sincere connections are at the heart of every success.

-Regularly invite feedback and demonstrate listening.

-Initiate change with grace, and accept change gracefully.

-Guard fiercely the confidentiality of the company and customers and honor that confidentiality at all times, without compromise.

Today, Peet’s Coffee & Tea announced it would acquire Diedrich Coffee for something in the neighborhood of $212 million in cash and paper.  So ends the long and, in recent years, sometimes sad specialty coffee saga that was Diedrich’s Coffee, as Peet’s begins yet another chapter in its own epic tale. The Diedrich brand, and those that it obtained/retained over the years—Coffee  People and portions of Gloria Jeans—may survive, but the company, Diedrich Coffee, will be no more.

Both companies were specialty coffee pioneers. Alfred Peet began roasting coffee at a retail location in Berkeley, California in 1966, Carl Diedrich out of a storefront in Costa Mesa, California, in 1972, on a roaster he built himself . Like the original Starbucks in Seattle’s Public Market, the first Peet’s and Diedrich stores had little or no seating and the only reason they brewed coffee at all was so you could sample their product. These were “bean stores,” now a nearly extinct coffee retail concept.

Don Holly, now Director of Quality for Green Mountain Coffee,  walked into Carl Diedrich’s coffee store in 1979 and tasted his first cup of coffee, launching his own 30 year love affair with great coffee, from bloom to brew. When Diedrich died in August 2001, Holly wrote:

His roasting style was also very personal.  He believed that each coffee needed and deserved its own development method.  His manner of roasting the Yemen even involved a technique where he would just crack the door open slightly after first crack so that the range of development was broadened within the roast, as the first coffee to spill out would be light, with the last part of the batch well into second crack. 

He had five or six estate coffees that he offered, and a couple of blends.  His signature blend was the Wiener Melange, a blend of several roasts that is still memorable for me as a symphony of flavors that was complex and harmonized.  It was the first coffee I ever drank. It inspired me to inquire if Carl needed any help with his business, which led to my 13 year association with he and his family, and the company that we grew, Diedrich Coffee and Diedrich Coffee Roasters.

By the early 80’s, Carl had also developed a business building coffee roasters. Eventually, his son Stephen took over the manufacturing business and his son Martin, along with Holly, began growing the retail business, opening stores in Orange County.

Don Holly once told me that they should have stopped at three stores. Years later I mentioned this to Martin Diedrich and, after a pensive pause, he said that Don probably had it about right.

When the company took on outside investors and entered an aggressive growth phase in the mid-1990’s, Holly left to help run the Specialty Coffee Association of America. Martin remained with the company that bore his family name until 2004, when he left to “return to his roots as an independent coffeehouse operator.” Within view of the storefront where his father began roasting coffee 30 years earlier, Martin and his wife Karen started Kean Coffee, a roaster retailer. They now have two coffeehouses and a great reputation in the local community as well as within the coffee industry.

For Diedrich, the 10 years from 1994, when Don Holly left, to 2004, when Martin departed, were characterized by a steep rise and fall, and a slow but steady recovery. There was a time of great ambition as the company went public and publically stated they were gunning for Starbucks. When Carl Diedrich dies in 2001, the company stock was trading for pennies.

Despite near constant changes in management, Diedrich has managed to rebuild a business by focusing on wholesale, diversified distribution, and, perhaps ironically and definitely poetically, the manufacturing of K-Cup coffee packets for use with brewers marketed by Keurig Inc,  a wholly-owned subsidiary of Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc, where Don Holly is quality czar.

As the specialty coffee industry matures we have experienced several years now of consolidation. Following Farmer Bros. acquisition of Coffee Bean International in 2007, not much surprises me anymore.  Green Mountain has purchased Tully’s and created a partnership with Caribou, and everyone seems to be the better for it. And now, assuming they keep it, Peet’s will operate a K-Cup manufacturing business, perhaps making them associated, if not closely associated, with Green Mountain Coffee Roasters.

What conclusions to draw? I see two things.

First, in terms of the very focused, high-quality driven coffee roasters, this creates new opportunities for differentiation and niche exploitation. Both Green Mountain and Peet’s still roast some amazing coffees that any specialty roaster would be proud to label. They are not about to lay down and surrender their high-end business, but they are giants, at least in specialty industry terms, and there is plenty of room to run around their feet.

Second, what damage they do inflict will be primarily in the traditional coffee and convenience sectors. Who is going to do a better job of maintaining relative quality while working in the value-driven market niches than Green Mountain and Peets?

So, for all my friends who lie awake at night reparsing flavor distinctions from that day’s production cupping, this is merely interesting news from a historical perspective. But if your business card has green on it, or maybe even a little pink and orange, it’s not your imagination. Those are footsteps you hear behind you.

Not long ago I received an email from a client asking me if he should renew his ownership of various website addresses, all of which were either  iterations if his company’s name or different domain extensions. Five years ago, I probably would have advised him to renew his ownership. Ten years ago I probably would have advised him to buy even more domain names.  But a few months ago, I told him to let his claim on the extra domain names expire. 

I think I was right, and I think I would have been right five and ten years ago. Domain names, once a critical component of brand architecture, have lost a significant degree of relevance. The Millennial Generation (Generation Next) does not type in or necessarily even read URL addresses. They click on links.

The relevance and credibility of any given link is established by the context or “community” in which it is found and its source, not the words contained within the URL.  

In response to character limits in text messaging and social networking providers like Twitter and Facebook, there are dozens  of URL shortening services online. Over 60% of URL’s posted in Twitter messages are “shrunk” down to a meaningless series of characters. There are arguments for and against this practices, but it works, as long as we are in the fluid online world.

In the offline world, we still use business cards and company stationary and purchase advertising. When Facebook offered users the opportunity to claim personalized URL extensions for their Facebook pages (e.g. www.facebook.com/aboutferguson) people clamored for their little chunk of URL real estate because the world of “fixed” documents still exists offline, where you cannot click on a link.  We still need to provide pointers to our locations in space and time, in the real word and online. The specific words within a URL are increasingly irrelevant, but still useful, though perhaps only in terms of efficiencies.

The ideas around what is fixed and what is fluid are changing even in the hard-copy world.  The lines are getting blurry. Even the classic example of “fixed” documents, books,  are becoming fluid-like with the advent of Print On Demand technologies. And now that we all carry computers in our pocket, the practical if not psychological need for paper is dwindling. We may never see the prophesied paperless society, but I’m willing to bet that in 10 years, “beaming” a business card will be more commonplace that handing one over.

The point is not the pace of technological change nor the ruthlessness of fluidity when it comes to framing information.  The point is how we respond. Are we questioning our operational and communication assumptions daily?

Are logos still sacred cows that should not be updated more than once every ten years, or can they be dynamic identifiers that can be adjusted frequently for context? What’s the point of having only one  tag line or slogan if it’s only relevant to twenty percent of your target market, and only relevant to them twenty percent of the time?

Do you frame the information on your packaging the same as you do in your printed marketing material, and in your marketing material the same as you do on your website, on your website the same as you do in your blogs, in your blogs the same as you do on your Facebook fan page, and there the same as you do when using Twitter?  Traditional branding discipline would say yes;  and, perhaps those principles are still relevant, but I suspect their relevancy now finds its home within the narrowly defined boundaries of context.

The operations people don’t escape either. It’s fine if you still ask about where the volume price break is on a  print run as long as you’re also calculating out the relevancy lifespan of the document. What is the true cost of that four cent brochure when it becomes irrelevant in three months? What is the true cost of using a brochure when your competitor is beaming “Bluetooth brochures” to everyone in the exhibit hall?

The answers are truly not as important as asking the questions. Questioning our assumption is where the rigor is required because the answers…the answers will always be fluid.

Infrastructure. Great word and a critical aspect of any system.  The systems that move ideas, information, and outcomes through your office are just as important as the systems that move products through the manufacturing process. We would do well to think as much about our personal workflow infrastructure as manufacturers do thinking about the infrastructure in their production plant.

Last week I noticed I had a project that kept getting bumped back, or “deferred” within my system for organizing my work. This can happen for many good reasons. Generally, a project or action gets deferred because I’m waiting for something or someone. The scope of the project or an assessment of resources required can change, causing adjustments to the timeline. If it is a shared project, I could be waiting for someone else to complete their portion. In this case, I wasn’t waiting for anything or anyone but me.

Whenever I encounter hesitation in any system, my own workflow especially, I want to understand the reason, and not always in order to fix it. Sometimes the system is self-correcting, or even self-preserving. The reason the horse won’t move is because there is a mountain lion on the trail up ahead. Many times, the cause for the delay or incomplete processing appears, from a  distance, to be completely unrelated.

I understood that I was procrastinating on my project, but I didn’t understand why. It was a project I enjoyed working on and which I was more than competent to complete successfully. So, I had to break the project down into small parts and put it back together again.

When I did this I discovered that my planning was incomplete. I had been focused on the valuable outcome of the project and neglected to considered the workflow infrastructure required to get it done. There was a component to the project that required some items and information to be moved to a new space while remaining readily accessible. In my workflow system, this is essentially “reference material,” those things that are needed too often to be archived or stored, but not often enough to be considered active.

While I had listed as a action item the fact that things needed to be moved, I had not thought much about the fact that the space to which I wanted to move them was not prepared. In my mind, I dismissed this as obvious, as something I need not include in my list of actions. This often happens, I think, when it comes to the mundane infrastructure of organizing our work.

Of course, stuff had to be moved someplace and that someplace needed to be able to accommodate the stuff. It’s not that I didn’t understand, or forgot, that space needed to be created. The problem was that I did not include clearing the space as a commitment, or action item, in my planning because it felt too obvious.

But the commitment still existed in my head and because the final step in the project could not be completed, I was not taking the first step.

At this point, you’re probably thinking I wasted half a day figuring out I had to add an action to a project and put it at the top of the list. I should explain that the entire process described above took only a few minutes. But it reminded me of the times I have sat with someone in their office as they finally acknowledge that no, the stacks and stacks of paper on their desk do not represent a system and no, they don’t really know where everything is.

A conversation about clearing their desk becomes a conversation about how full their filing cabinets are, which becomes a conversation about how packed the storage closet is, which becomes a conversation about what types of documents can be thrown out and when.

And on it goes. If they don’t kill me first, we eventually end up with a list of actions that, when complete, will result in their desk being cleared. But clearing their desk is near the end of the list, not at the top. If we simply list “clear my desk,” it will never get done because on some level we know that the file drawers are full and there is no more room in the storage closet. We may even start clearing the desk, but the first time we cannot file a piece of paper because the drawer is too full, we stop. The paper goes back on our desk and we feel defeated and resolve to make the best of things as they are.

If you're feeling like a project is stuck, inventory your personal work flow infrastructure for blockage and then keep moving upstream, adding the steps necessary for removal of impediments  to your action plan.

www.freshgroundconsulting.com

Great leaders have learned to understand, appreciate, and manage a variety of work-styles. They may not articulate their understanding the same way an organizational psychologist would, but on some level they have firmly grasped the concept that different people contribute different strengths and styles to running an operation and getting things done. More importantly, they understand their own strengths and weaknesses.

One of our operating principles at Fresh Ground Consulting is to bring energy and thoughtfulness to managing our workload. This idea emerged from encountering many different situations throughout my career that benefited by achieving a better balance between thought and action.

Ernest Hemingway famously advised that one should never confuse movement with action. I have always been suspicious of a lot of movement, in myself as well as other. Movement makes me feel like things are getting done when, perhaps, very little is being accomplished. As a leader, seeing a lot of movement in your organization can also feel like progress is being made when it’s really just a lot of running in circles.

Effective leaders stay out of the movement trap by looking behind the curtain and asking probing questions and actually listening to the answers. The questions they ask all the time are simple: “What is getting done? What’s next?” So, the people who work for them learn that looking busy is not enough.

Allowing movement to be mistaken for action is not sustainable and highly inefficient. The failed process will crash regularly, forcing real action into the system, but because the system is then in crisis, the people in the organization will not be operating at optimal effectiveness and, what's worse, success will feel random, untraceable.

Some of the “fastest” companies I have ever worked with, organizations that accomplished a stunning amount of quality work, have also been the quietest and least frenetic.

As a manager, when I meet with staff I want to understand what they are doing, not so I can micro-manager how they do it, but so I can fulfill my responsibility as a manager to see that things are actually being accomplished. For most of my career, I have managed managers, so I try to pay very close attention to how they track not only their own projects, but the projects and progress of those they supervise. They learn quickly that I like to see things written down and by our third meeting they have usually compiled an impressive to-do list, which they display proudly to demonstrate how busy they are.

A simple to-do list is better than no list at all, so I reinforce the behavior while communicating that it is an incomplete tool unless they can answer the question that is at the heart David Allen's Getting Things Done (GTD) approach: “What’s the next action?”

Managing our personal workload and the collective workload of an organization requires a variety of styles, but also balance between thought and action, between energizers and incubators. If you’re not sure where the balance point is in your organization, and if you suspect a lot of movement without momentum, it might be time to revisit the concept of “Management By Wandering Around” and spend a day in other people’s offices asking them what is getting done and what happens next.

www.freshgroundconsulting.com

Our days are generally full of words. We listen. We read. If you’re reading this now, I can’t help but be grateful that among all the words competing for your eyes and ears right now, you’ve chosen these words.

Think, for a moment, about all the words coming at you from so many sources all day long.

Still there?

The phrase, “information overload” has been in use for a long time and now seems old fashioned and almost trite, as if that simple description can no longer capture the daily flash flood that is the data stream.

Like most people, I play “Where’s Waldo,” searching for bits and pieces or narrow veins of meaningful information in the flood. I have a tool box full of various types of filters to help me.

For leaders, the amount of information inflow is plainly absurd. Without filters, the systems they oversee would collapse. Not only do they need filters at the tactical level, such as systems for dealing with email, snail mail, news, reports, etc., they need filters at the strategic level.

The most commonly cited strategic “filter” in this regard is, at the same time, one of the least utilized in practice: “Actions speak louder than words.”

This idea, that accountability be attached to intent, has been echoed in various ways in proverbs and by leaders of all kinds since ancient times. But my favorite iteration in terms of management comes from a man whose actions have always been of greater value than his words, Warren Buffett, who said, “The best judgment we can make about managerial competence does not depend on what people say, but simply what the record says.”

Whenever I assist an organization with strategic planning, this is the most challenging aspect of the process. I must remain very active in facilitating the process or the planning group will spend too much time articulating the larger elements of the plan and not enough time on assigning metrics and accountability, without which, the plan is just words.

The logic of planning dictates that these tactical elements be applied after the larger strategies have been established. Without vigilance within the planning, real metrics and accountability will be short changed in terms of the degree of thoughtful consideration they are given, compared to mission, vision, goals, etc.

The symptoms of a “mostly words” plan are apparent. Whenever I see a plan with a lot of “TBD” where metrics and accountability should be, I know the planning group did not receive outside facilitation, or everyone, including the facilitator, became infatuated with creating strategies. Another symptom is seeing the same person named over and over as the “owner” of various initiatives. This often happens when the leader of a group assumes responsibility for facilitating the planning process. As the time allotted for planning winds down, he will assign himself and/or some of his key people as owners out of expedience. This is worse than leaving them blank.

Our days are filled with words and more words, and so much of the time we struggle to attach meaning to them. Your planning process should rise above the flood waters by including meaningful details, complete metrics for measuring success, and tactical ownership at all levels of the organization.

www.freshgroundconsulting.com

Leadership scholar, Warren Bennis, said that leaders are rarely the smartest person in a group, that they are more curators than creators. He said leaders “are appreciators of talent and nurturers of talent and they have the ability to recognize valuable ideas.”

I have worked with business leaders who have a near prescient ability to recognize emerging talent. They are always surrounded by bright, passionate, committed people who produce results. Their companies often have a reputation for innovation, as the leader anticipates trends as well as she anticipates talent. The working environment is high-energy, fast-paced, and always full of fresh new challenges.

Too often, this workplace is also full of fresh new faces as well because the person leading the company can recognize talent, but can’t get out of its way. She “turns and burns” her best employees at such a constant pace that other companies see her as a recruiting agency and training center.

Leaders like this tend to run their company in perpetual start-up mode and experience rapid but ultimately limited growth. It’s not enough to recognize talent. The most successful leaders also nurture talent. A talent nurturing leader is as easy to recognize as one who burns talent out. Here are just a few of the things I look for in an organization where talent is allowed to mature.

All organizations have turn-over, but in those where the leadership recognizes talent and allows it to flourish, the turn-over will be lower than the industry average, especially among key positions. When one company has produced a very large and talented pool of former employees, it’s not a sign of health. When talent is truly nurtured, it will be allowed to mature and will not be viewed as a threat.

The best business leaders do not necessarily shun the spotlight, but they do insist on sharing it. When I ask a senior executive to tell me about his company, I listen carefully to how he interprets that question. How much time does he spend talking about the accomplishments of the people who work for him, and how much time does he spend talking about “his” accomplishments, his ideas, and his vision. And one must listen beyond the language. Many entrepreneurs are in the habit of saying “my company,” but if you listen, they are actually talking about and giving credit to their team. On the other hand, some mangers are practiced at using “we,” when they clearly mean “me.”

Sharing the credit tends to occur naturally in an environment of shared responsibility. Key people are given real responsibility and authority, and the freedom to use their best judgment. Their authority is not taken away arbitrarily and they do not have to guess when they are and are not expected to use their own judgment.

In the same way that a company changes as it grows, no one leadership approach works throughout the life of an organization. The single-minded, hard-charging, fly-by-the-seat entrepreneur that is necessary to shepherd a company through start-up, gives way to a leader who extends his reach and influence through others, allowing the company to grow. This transition can occur with the same person at the helm, but they must be able to both recognize talent, and allow it to flourish, perhaps to a degree that is personally uncomfortable.

www.freshgroundconsulting.com

We are currently working on website content for two clients at Fresh Ground Consulting. Whenever I am writing content I am looking for the story behind the list of facts I must communicate. The who, what, when, where, and how are usually necessary information and easily discovered. The element that is rarely provided in the source material is why anyone should care.

I believe that one of the tests of effective content is whether or not it responds well to the question, “So what?” When I complete the first draft of anything, I ask myself, “So what?” If I haven’t answered that question on the page, it’s time to start rewriting.

One of our clients is creating something that, on the surface, would appear to be nothing new. He had asked a copywriter to create content for his website, but he wasn’t happy with the result. The writing was solid enough, but something was missing.

After meeting with the client for over an hour, I understood what it was. The content was missing him, the person behind the vision. Without him, it seemed like something we’ve all seen before. Once we began to include the personality behind the vision, there was a reason to be interested.

Although a lack of uniqueness was a symptom in this case, uniqueness alone is rarely the answer. If the answer to the question, “So what?” is, “Because it’s unique,” that is not truly compelling. It might be interesting and briefly grab my attention, but it won’t keep me engaged unless there is something behind it.

How many “great” commercials have you seen where 15 seconds after seeing the commercial you could not remember the product? You could remember the images or the story or the jokes, but you had to strain to remember the product.

I recently relearned this lesson when I started this blog. I created clever (in my own mind) titles for each entry, but after I had written blog entries for a few weeks, I looked back at the titles and realized that none of them answered the question, So what? None of my titles told the potential reader anything about the subject of the blog or what insight they might gain from reading it. So I rewrote them (see right-hand column).

A clever or unusual title might attract a few people curious to know what I could possibly be talking about, but there are more people willing to click a link when they think they might gain some useful insight.

Our other content client has many unique aspects about his business, but they are simply a list of facts, like the hours of operations, until we frame them as characters in the story of why you should care.

Despite what you might read in books that teach you how to write “words that sell,” this is not accomplished by including certain words in all the copy on your website, words designed to cause mass hypnosis among readers so they buy, buy, buy whatever you sell, sell, sell. These are useful tactics if you’re engaged in direct marketing or its online equivalents, and if there is a page on your website where you ask for the sale, it doesn’t hurt to use some words that push in that direction.

The bulk of your website, especially the pages most likely to be viewed initially by a visitor, should engage the reader in your story and make them want to be a part of that story.

www.freshgroundconsulting.com

Some managers are great in a crisis. They’re so good in a crisis that they create them. They procrastinate in order to experience a time crunch or a chaotic environment. They over-look details during planning so they will have to think fast on their feet to solve the resulting problems during execution. They enjoy the rescue because it’s fun, they get to be creative, they don’t have to follow an established process, and they feel like they work better under pressure and with the rush of adrenaline.

In a crisis, the expectations change to “just fix it, don’t let it get worse.” In team sports, the clutch player, the one who sinks a thirty-footer at the buzzer for a win, gets more immediate praise than the player who just methodically scores point after point all through the game.

This type of manager is often a perfectionist with a great imagination. When things are running smoothly, he thinks there is no excuse for not performing to perfection, and he imagines vividly what anything less than perfect will look like. Of course, his prophecy is fulfilled, but once in the throes of crisis he is no longer distracted by all that can go wrong. Something has already gone wrong and he actually relaxes into focusing on the rescue because he has no other options.

Managing from crisis to crisis can become addicting and is a difficult habit to break. To move away from this cycle, managers usually need objective and regular feedback as they become self-aware of the patterns. While the process is different for everyone, the key is redirecting the energy that is wasted on imagining what less than perfect looks like into developing systems and routines for every day, redirecting imagining energy with positive activity.

The question that managers who are addicted to chaos or crisis ask themselves, consciously or not , is, “If I’m not fixing something or rescuing something then what do I do?” The answer is simple. As a manager, their job is to manage to get things done without entering crisis.

Creating systems and routines for managing our daily workload, if we commit to them, can create a healthy and productive sense of urgency and immediacy and regular positive feedback. Real crisis, even self-inflicted, is inevitable and everyone gets a “crisis fix” from time to time. Getting organized also even outs your workload and decreases the tendency to work in spurts, but it is not easy. Exercise accomplishes the same thing for your body and evens out the adrenaline flow.

There is always the chance that the constant chaos in your workplace is beyond your control, but in my experience it is unlikely. Even if the culture in your organization is one of ongoing crisis, by stepping out of the tornado and methodically putting points on the board by first organizing your own workspace and work flow, you will make a greater contribution to those who choose to keep flying about in the wind.

www.freshgroundconsulting.com

Our tag-line at Fresh Ground Consulting, “What Happens Next,” is an attempt to capture the seemingly diverse nature of the services we provide. At the same time, everything we do revolves around a fundamental function that is as critical to the life of a business as breathing is to the life of an individual: creativity.

I find that strategic planning requires just as much creativity as developing content for a website or providing communications consulting or assisting a company founder define his changing role in a growing company. The question, “What happens next?” is an unending, if unspoken, question that helps fuel the creative process. The difference in my mind among the various types of assistance we offer at FGC is only in how the paint is applied to the canvas. It’s all painting to me.

If you are a leader at any level, you’re an artist whether you admit it or not. Your ability to imagine is as critical to your operational success as is your ability to execute. You may think of what you do as problem solving, but it is no less creative than the act of design or the process of writing. Here are just two of my ideas on keeping your creativity active.

NEVER STOP LEARNING. You don’t need to develop a variety of passions, but you should develop a variety of interests. Maintaining even a mild interest in a variety of subjects will keep your creativity ready and accessible.

The industry I am most familiar with is coffee. As an industry and as a product, coffee is endlessly fascinating, and it is difficult to learn everything there is to know in a lifetime. For this reason, some coffee professionals develop a near singular focus in their learning on coffee and subjects close to coffee. I think this is a mistake. You should always be learning about something new, and the further it is “off the beaten path” of your primary areas of concern, the better.

I once read a book on tying knots, though I had very few practical applications for what I learned. And yet, I believe that reading that book improved my problem solving skills.

DO SOMETHING DIFFERENT. I believe that creativity emerges from switching gears and changing one’s focus as much as it does from relentless pursuit. I believe there is no shorter path to burn-out, career burn-out or project burn- out, than feeling like your imagination is not needed or not available to you. Do something different. It can be as simple as taking a walk. One of my favorite ways to switch gears and take a break while still feeling productive is to organize, purge a drawer of files, clean out my desk.

I have used this approach with an entire project team. When it became clear that we were hitting a wall in terms of problem solving on a project, I scheduled a day of organizing the storage room. Yeah, there was some whining about it, but by the end of the day, we all felt good about accomplishing something, and the next day we solved several nagging issues on our larger project in quick order (admittedly, this could have been out of fear of being assigned “clean-up duty” again, but it resulted in the desired outcome in any case). Note, I banned all discussion of the stalled project while we worked on the storage room.

On a more immediate level, during a very openly creative process, it can be helpful to not only do something different, but also a little off-the-wall. In brainstorming meetings, I have had everyone switch seats, I have had everyone stand up, and I have had everyone remain silent for two minutes. Sometimes, when I am writing and I feel blocked, I might look at a magazine upside down and backwards. The important thing to remember is to only do these things when you sense the creativity or energy dropping. If you attempt one of these tactics while the energy is flowing well, you’ll stall it.

As important as creativity is, it will forever be only part of the story. And creativity in and of itself should never be mistaken for innovation. Management theorist and “creativity skeptic”, Theodore Levitt, wrote that “Creativity is thinking new things. Innovations is doing new things.”

www.freshgroundconsulting.com

My favorite explanation of the introvert versus extrovert is that an introvert, after spending time in a room full of people, will feel tired. An extrovert will feel energized. Conversely, introverts tend to be more energized when working alone, while extroverts experience a decrease in energy.

Like all theories that divide us into two groups, it is best not to be dogmatic or generalize too much. Introverts can certainly exhibit extroverted behavior, and extroverts can work at solitary jobs. Personality tests, such as the well known Myers-Briggs, usually score introversion and extroversion on a sliding scale, meaning you could be a very introverted extrovert, or a extroverted introvert.

In fact, that is what I am, a extroverted introvert. While I do feel more energized while working alone, like I am as I write this, I have always held professional positions that required me to spend a lot of time in rooms full of people. Two things that I am very passionate about, writing and leadership/management, also reveal that I am a “borderline extrovert.”

Researchers tell us that the majority of people, perhaps 70%, are extroverts, and it is likely that the percentage is even higher among those in leadership and management positions. As someone who has been one of the 3 out of 10 introverted leaders out there, I have a few ideas on how to be effective as a leader if you are an introvert. For everyone else, I have some thoughts on how to work with an introvert.

Over the years I have been drawn toward coaching and mentoring relationships with introverted managers, because I believe they have a great deal to offer, but are too often overlooked. The following is one of the key recommendations I make for introverted managers.

FACILITATE RATHER THAN GENERATE – Some activities, like brainstorming sessions, require high energy. An extroverted manager might assume the role of cheerleader and participate enthusiastically in an energetic and vocal exchange. The introverted manager can ensure that the energy is captured and focused by tracking ideas on a white board. He remains in a leadership role by owning the larger outcomes and taking responsibility for keeping the activity on task and moving forward.

In the same way that sitting back and letting his team run with the ball may be a challenge for the extrovert, the introvert, even as facilitator, still needs to get the ball rolling in the first place.

If you supervise an introvert, invite them to lead by facilitating. Extroverts can be great at getting everyone excited but they sometimes forget to map the path forward. They get everyone running, but in several directions. While extroverts can be good at motivating groups as they feed off the energy of an “audience,” introverts are often more adept at motivating people one-on-one, a necessity on small teams, where each individual owns a critical elements of a project.

The people you supervise can be motivated in several different ways. The enthusiastic, visionary pep talk is certainly one of them. But people are also motivated by knowing there is a plan, a direction, a goal. Introverts are very often good planners. They are generally good listeners and can quickly read where someone is in terms of their understanding and commitment.

Although most managers are extroverts, I believe that introverts bring an important balance to any leadership team. But they need, “permission” to assume leadership roles, and those who supervise them need to take the time to understand their work styles. Their unique value is well worth the effort.

www.freshgroundconsulting.com

In 2004, inspired (yet again) by the work of David Allen, I created a list of operating principles, touchstones for how I would work. It’s not a simple list. It is quite a challenging set of ideals and I revisit them often, not only as a tool for navigating my business, but as coaching cues for clients.

One of these principles came to mind recently while I was meeting with a potential client. As is often the case, especially as a consulting relationship is just beginning, both the relationship and the work that needed to be done remained somewhat undefined.

When you hire a consultant it should be because you have a real need. Sometimes the need is very clearly felt but not very clearly seen. This can be a delicate moment, when the independent needs of the client and the independent needs of the consultant must fuse into the much sought after “mutually beneficial relationship.”

As I listened to my potential client outline the work ahead, I began to discern some significant gaps in his approach, gaps that would work against the success of his project. This was not a matter of style, it was a matter of substance. I needed to help him reframe the project, to change his focus.

One of our principles at Fresh Ground Consulting is to “Initiate change with grace, and accept change gracefully.” This is the most recent addition to the list. The idea behind it was suggested to me by a barista at a coffee company who was tired of being the last person to find out about significant changes that affected how he did his job. It was worse than that. He often found out about the changes via their implementation, meaning there was no communication before the changes simply happened right in front of him. He said this made him feel like a piece of furniture.

Although arbitrary and abrupt changes inside a company inspired the principle, I often keep it in mind when I am attempting to change someone’s mind, or when they are trying to change mine.

As his potential consultant, I felt my client’s success was dependent on a change of mind and so I had a responsibility to change his mind. I had do so gracefully.

The dictionary definition of “grace” speaks of seemingly effortless beauty, a sense that things are pleasing and proper in proportion, form, and movement. I find this definition helpful and I believe that even in times of crisis, when change is racing against the clock, it can be done with great grace, as speed and grace are not exclusive of one another.

Every leader and manager has to initiate difficult and unpopular change from time to time, and there are times when the responsibility must rest on her shoulders alone, and implementation is not negotiable. I believe that acting gracefully is always an option. Grace does not mean a lack of fervor or urgency. It means the fervor and urgency are in proper proportion to the circumstances. From this perspective, even the sergeant initiating a change of plan and barking out orders on the battlefield can do so gracefully.

I believe that my ability to suggest a re-framing of the project and suggest some changes with grace is what turned my potential client into a new client. I gathered all of the scattered elements of the work he had outlined, reflecting back what I understood them to be so he would know I had listened and to ensure I knew his intention. Then I put all the pieces together so he could see what was missing. But before we talked about what was missing, we talked about the strength of what wasn’t missing. Finally, I backed the project up to a starting place he had not considered, moved it back in time so we could gather the missing pieces.

Change is never ending, from changing our mind to changes in our corporate culture, and much of it is inevitable. Indira Gandhi, in recognizing the inevitability of change, added that “it is up to us to control its content and direction.” Form and movement? Sounds like the definition of grace to me.

www.freshgroundconsulting.com