Why do I do what I do?

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Why do I do what I do?

In tonight’s blog, guest writer Ryszard Chciuk asks a question I think we have all wondered at one time or another: Why do I do what I do? 

Contributing to someone’s improvement and understanding is the reason I do what I do.

Who said that? If you don’t know yet, please keep on reading.

This article is about the meaning of one’s live.

Jim Collins said in Good to Great: … it is impossible to have a great life unless it is a meaningful life. And it is very difficult to have a meaningful life without meaningful work.

Victor Frankl in Man’s Search for Meaning (over 12 million copies sold) says: … striving to find a meaning in one’s life is the primary motivational force in man. Victor Frankl also claims that Man … is able to live and even to die for the sake of his ideals and values! He also said: There is nothing in the world, I venture to say, that would so effectively help one to survive even the worst conditions as the knowledge that there is a meaning in one’s life. It has been said by a man who survived three years in four German concentration camps, including Auschwitz.

In that book Victor Frankl reminded results of several public opinion polls:  The results showed that 89 percent of the people polled admit that man needs something for the sake of which to live, around 60 percent of the people polled conceded that there was something, or someone, in their own lives for whose sake they were even ready to die. In the statistical survey of 8 thousand students of 48 colleges, conducted by social scientists from Johns Hopkins University, students were asked what they considered “very-important” to them now. 16 percent of the students checked “making a lot of money”; 78 percent said their first goal was “finding a purpose and meaning to my life.”

The polls were made some time ago, but my experience tells me the latest results would be much worse. I mean there are much more students and adults interested in earning more money and fewer people searching for the meaning of their lives. Using Frankl’s words: they are caught in that situation which I have called the “existential vacuum”. For such a man No instinct tells him what he has to do, and no tradition tells him what he ought to do; sometimes he does not even know what he wishes to do. Instead, he either wishes to do what other people do (conformism) or he does what other people wish him to do (totalitarianism).

To complete this long introduction, I will remind only one sentence from Friedrich Nietzsche: He who has a why to live can bear with almost any how.

A company does not have its brain (at least at the beginning of the 21st century), so it can not suffer from the existential vacuum. The feeling of meaninglessness is not painful for a company. But no organization exists without the brains of its employees and managers. If you, as their leader, are aware that a significant part of your staff is searching for the meaning of their lives or suffering from the existential vacuum, you should help them. I do not expect you will create an internal department of logotherapy. Nevertheless, why you could not extend the medical healthcare package and allow some of your people to visit a logotherapist?

Anyway, I believe the person searching for the meaning of his life will be inspired by the mission of the team he is a part of, and adopt it as a kind of response to his problem. And those who already have a sense of meaning will find that working for you helps them to fulfill their life mission.

My life mission is to leave the world when it is a little bit better than it was before I arrived here. Does it sound general, audacious, pompous? Not for me, but as a manager, I made my mission’s definition more specific. I utilized over twenty years of experience collected during my service for the construction company. In that time, as a machine user and an internal service provider I believed I had learned the basic expectations of all machines’ users:

  • The machine is ready to work always when it is needed
  • The cost of operation is the lowest possible

When I got a chance to attend the creation of a new dealership for Volvo CE, I expressed my new after-sales department mission as follows:

  • We provide machine users with the highest machine availability at the lowest cost of operation,
  • by delivering service works exceeding customers’ expectations,
  • and keeping profitability on the level assuring steady development of the service department and securing financial liquidity of our dealership in a downturn in the economy.

That mission statement became a basic foundation for defining our department’s vision and the main principles (values).

The life mission has to be adapted to the changing conditions, so since I got retired, I feel personally obliged not to spoil our planet to a higher degree than the average homo sapiens does. It comprises also sharing my experience in the construction industry with my successors. I would like them to avoid my mistakes. This is the reason to write posts for the Learning Without Scars blog and to publish articles on my blog dedicated to construction machine users and their closest collaborators – after-sales departments personnel (only in Polish – note: and they are all excellent).

I owe you a response to the question I started my blog post with. This is Ron Slee answer to the most important question a human being has to ask himself: why do I do what I do? Helping students of The Learning Without Scars to succeed is his, and his company mission, his WHY.

Dear reader, what is your mission, what is your WHY, have you already found the meaning for your life?

As Ron says, the time for your answer is now.

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Equipment Data and the Digital Dealership

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Equipment Data and the Digital Dealership

Tonight, to accompany the podcast released on this subject today, guest blogger Mets Kramer continues to educate us on all the digital aspects of our business with a look at equipment data and the Digital Dealership.

When I started Strategic Evolutions in 2017, it was based on two things.   First, I wanted to help smaller dealers do a better job and grow their business. Second, I wanted to show people how to use information to do exactly that.   One of my first engagements was to speak at the Associated Equipment Distributors on the topic “A Granular, Data Driven Approach to Strategic Sales”.  The focus of my presentation was the value and importance of using information, specifically customer equipment data, to drive dealership activities.

Customers work with you, the dealer, for one reason: they own equipment. (And let’s not forget, it’s also because you’re great people!)

Numerous people in the industry have pointed out the value of customer equipment information.   Most frequently, and in the topic of my presentations, the customer equipment information provides a clear indication of future sales opportunities.   Our industry is focused on equipment with a predictable life cycle.  If you’re a dealer representing any OEM, you should be using this information by now, to drive potential sales opportunities and providing your sales reps with new leads.  Furthermore, by analyzing and predicting the replacement time of a machine, it’s the easiest way to make sure low volume customer aren’t lost to competitors.  Think about the customer with only a few machines, who doesn’t engage with the dealership frequently. These types of customers are often lost because they didn’t connect on time. However, if they had used a CRM system to notify the sales rep to reach out at the right time, we could have prevented this loss.  How do you get this information?  Either through the sales team or by digitally engaging with the customer.

Equipment information is just as valuable in aftersales at the dealership. We all know having this information makes parts and service support easier.  For example, customers call with unit numbers because they don’t use serial numbers to reference their equipment.  With a CRM, your team can quickly find the serial number of the customer’s unit from the database.

From a marketing perspective, equipment data can help you measure the potential size of the aftersales market.  If you’re selling maintenance contracts, you already know how many dollars per hour of parts and labor each machine should produce.   With a complete fleet list, you can estimate total potential revenue and market share.    Now, you have a sales lead for your aftersales PSSR reps.

In the Digital Dealership, aftersales should also be utilizing equipment data.   By integrating the equipment data with your Digital Dealership, you can present equipment information in the online parts store, but more importantly, all over your Digital Dealership.  You can promote Parts Kits, PM kits or Maintenance programs to the customer when they visit.  As a comparison, the digital world’s success started when websites stopped being static and started to tune the content to each visitor.  It’s no different with your Facebook, Amazon and countless other social sites.  These businesses present you relevant information based on what they know about you.

To make this all work, it is as simple now as it was 20 years ago.  To build an information driven dealership, your systems need to be up to the task.  An ERP, DMS or CRM that can store customer fleet data is critical and should be a key item to consider when switching to a new Dealer Management System.  If your current system can’t handle customer fleet data, and you’re not switching, get an integrated CRM. Next, make sure you have your sales and aftersales teams think about collecting this data.  If it becomes a normal part of your conversations throughout the dealership, and a focus of your customer service, gathering the data gets easy.

Finally, invest in a partner or team member who’s full or part time job it is to analyze the data and implement programs using the data, with the business unit owners.  Your sales manager or product support manager needs support.  Most of the dealers I know have limited resources in house, so it might mean a new person or finding a vendor to help you.

One thing is for sure, and you see it all around you, the most successful businesses today, have a strong digital presence and use the information they have to their advantage and their customer’s benefit.

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A Watchkeeper or a Beekeeper?

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A Watchkeeper or a Beekeeper?

In “A Watchmaker or a Beekeeper,” guest blogger Bruce Baker walks you through the main personality types in leadership roles, and how they can impact your business.

Low morale, low profits, lack of employee engagement, high turnover and rampant gossip can be attributed to a company being led by either a Watchmaker or a Beekeeper – care to guess which one is the culprit?

If you guessed Watchmaker, you’re right!

In James Fischer’s book, Navigating the Growth Curve, a Watchkeeper is a person who needs most business components to be predictable – something they can control at all times. They believe that to be effective, the “business machine” must be controlled by its operators. This is their overarching purpose of management – to control the business. They further believe that the machine exists for its builders’ primary purpose: to generate as much money as possible for its owners/stakeholders.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with making as much money as possible. Still, it is essential that building an intentional business must be done sustainably over the long term. This includes not profiting at the expense of the company’s employees and stakeholders. The better approach is as you might have guessed by this stage, is being a Beekeeper.

Beekeepers are always mindful and have hindsight and foresight when managing and growing their business. Instead of rejecting or resisting the complexity and chaos that certainty comes with business growth, Beekeepers embrace complexity and, at times, chaos by allowing their teams’ or hive’s intelligence to be the operator instead of themselves exclusively. They appreciate and understand that their business is a living and intelligent organism, and if allowed, will generate far more innovative ideas and sustainable solutions. As a result, the Beekeeper’s business will continually self-organize around its problems and challenges.

When reading the fable in Navigating the Growth Curve, Horace’s recommendation is for Peter to become more like a Beekeeper to capitalize upon his team’s collective intelligence. Peter initially tried very much to control every aspect of his team, causing anger, hostility, and disengagement, leading to a downward spiral that could have been prevented by merely asking for their input.

This is a hard lesson that business owners/leaders can’t seem to learn often enough. Unfortunately, we regularly find far more Watchmakers than Beekeepers primarily due to individuals insisting that they should have all the answers and asking for their employees’ input may put them in a negative light. This is far from the truth! The opposite is true.

There is a Beekeeper in all of us. Still, during our day-to-day challenges as business leaders intending to do the right thing, our Watchmaker tendencies take over more than often without us even realizing it.

The 7-Stages of Growth concepts and programs offered by Workplaces are designed to help leaders predict how complexity will affect them, focus their efforts and resources on the right things at the right time and adapt to their company’s needs as their business grows.

I want to share the first steps in the journey of becoming a Beekeeper referencing the 7 Stages of Growth Model and the Business X-Ray we take our clients through. We emphasize that the only complexity in any business is its people, starting with the business owner during this exercise. The business owner and the leadership team’s ability to embrace this complexity and leverage its power will take the company and team to the next level.

Let me share the initial 4-steps we start within the Business X-ray session that will set you on the course of business growth success.

  1. Recognize the intelligence of the team by asking its opinion.

As scary as this can be, once you have it behind you, you will be amazed at the results and the amount of ‘anxiety’ it can take off your plate. Most leaders we work with hesitate to ask for their team’s input/feedback. Many reasons come to mind, but the following are the regular reasons we come across:

  • How can they possibly know enough about the company to give me advice?
  • They’ll use it as a ‘bitch’ session, and I’ve heard enough of that.
  • I don’t have time to take their suggestions – I have my issues to deal with.
  • If I ask them for their opinion, they’ll expect me to do something with it, and I have enough to do right now.

Leading is all about learning how your company and the team think and feel can only be brought about by asking and engaging.

  1. Filter out the noise

Noise is only too common in the business world today. Too many things are important, leaving nothing that is truly “important.”  There are too many agendas that are not leveraged into concise plans of action, leading to low levels of focus and execution.  Once the team’s power is recognized and leveraged (i.e., all voices and their opinions are encouraged), critical issues are brought to the surface and problems are solved.  During the Business X-Ray session, key initiatives are identified with detailed action plans ensuring results are achieved.

  1. Unify the team around the plan

Once the key initiatives from the X-Ray are identified, the work begins. Communicate this information to the rest of the company either through group and individual meetings or the entire company at one time.  Ensure that each initiative has a ‘champion’ – someone willing to be the ‘team lead’ on getting to the end goal. A lot of work? You bet, but the rewards are well worth it!

  1. Implement organic and self-organizing systems reinforcing change

Organic and self-organizing systems include people engaging and achieving results together. This essentially allows the team to put their handprint on solutions and subsequent systems and processes that produce results. Leaders are working less hard and far smarter with less direct supervision, control, and micro-management.  Allowing this to happen brings about a path of least resistance which anyone in chaotic environments would strive for.

Practice being a Beekeeper and minimize the amount of time you spend as a Watchmaker. The results will be empowering for not just your team but for you as well.

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Making Our Teams and Ourselves More Successful

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Making Our Teams and Ourselves More Successful

This week, guest writer Sonya Law walks us through the people skills we need as we work towards making our teams, and ourselves, more successful.

We achieve more as a team when we operate from a place of openness rather than fear – when we chose to thrive not just survive, we achieve more. On the road to getting there you will no doubt come across fear which is the greatest roadblock and inhibitor of growth and missed opportunities.

Recently I was asked to chair the Human Resources Summit for 2021 and immediately I went to FEAR, I said to them I think you have the wrong person.  They said no we don’t you are perfect for this; I remember then asking them what makes you think that?

The number one inhibitor of growth is fear. Rather than see the opportunity we sometimes succumb to FEAR.

WHY is that?

Usually it’s our own self-limiting beliefs, the story we tell ourselves that holds us back, the narrative.  We believe that we can only do something if we have done it before and we look for evidence that proves or disproves our fear.  When we operate in this way it is from what is called a fixed mindset.  Whereas a growth mindset is directed toward, I like to try new things.  The top three thought leaders and books that explore this in more detail are:

  1. Mindset, author Dr. Carol Dweck.
  2. Atomic Habits …author James Clear.
  3. What got you here won’t get you there …author Marshall Goldsmith.

As Albert Einstein said “We can’t use an old map to explore a new world”.

So, what’s holding you back?

It all flows from your mindset, through the lens of The Biology of Belief by Dr Bruce Lipton PHD says:

Your beliefs become your thoughts.

Your thoughts become words.

Your words become actions.

Your actions become habits.

Your habits become values.

Your values become your destiny.

To put it in a business context, our mindset, habits and values will guide your decision making, willingness to change and appetite for risk, innovation and growth.

So how do we overcome this?

  1. Self – Awareness, what is our narrative the story we tell ourselves?
  2. Become a lifelong learner, what matters is what we learn today and even more important what we will learn tomorrow.
  3. Cultivate a Growth Mindset, be open to feedback and willingness to

A great book that explores this further is The Journey BEYOND Fear, leverage the three pillars of POSITIVITY to build your success, by John Hagel.

Still the journey beyond fear is still a primal one and still many set themselves up for failure because they are not aware and not invested in changing their mindset or habits to orientate themselves toward success.  People still diet, even though they know they should exercise and eat a balanced diet and get enough sleep, we can be our own worst enemy by not engaging in healthy HABITS.

It’s the same with FEAR, if fear is a false expectation appearing real, why do we feed ourselves negative narratives about what we are capable of, thus limiting our potential?

How do we explore this further and adopt a practice of self-enquiry to gain insight into why we act the way we do?

Three very important questions to ask yourself:

  1. What is the story I tell myself?

The Narrative is it consistent with me moving towards achieving my goals.

  1. Positive: is it enabling?
  2. Negative: is it Disabling?
  1. What am I passionate about?
    1. Positive: Do I focus on what I am passionate about what brings my life meaning, purpose and joy, does it align with my values?
    2. Negative: Or am I easily distracted and reactive?
  2. How am I choosing to respond and show up, what energy do I bring into the space? Do I explore opportunities?
    1. Negative: Do I practice avoidance and blame others.
    2. Positive: Or do I take responsibility and stay curious.

What are the benefits to a Team of operating from a place of openness rather than fear?

  • Openness to explore new ways of solving problems, collaboration,
  • Leads to Innovation,
  • Which facilitates Growth.

A good leader has vision and can frame the opportunity to be explored by the team.  Which allows the team to thrive not just survive, to innovate and grow both professionally and personally with passion.

If you are interested in a presentation on Growth Mindset, please contact Sonya Law from www.slhrconsulting.com.au.

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Your Company Legacy and the Digital Dealership

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Your Company Legacy and the Digital Dealership

Tonight, guest blogger Mets Kramer continues to educate us on all the digital aspects of our business with a look at your company legacy and how it fits in with the Digital Dealership.

“In the past, the model for an organized business was a phone and a Rolodex (younger readers can Google what that is). The new digital platforms like your Website, CRM and marketing tools are now the modern Rolodex”

When my team started our marketing efforts, I was stunned to learn there were over 15,000 equipment dealers of all sizes, in North America.  A huge number of these dealers were small organizations, of 1 to 5 team members, who do great business buying, selling, or renting equipment.  In this blog, I want to address the value of Digital Dealerships and brand development for small organizations. This is especially important for those of you who started your dealership and are trying to find ways for your business to support you into your future.

Over the past few years, I have been lucky enough to work with many small dealers. I admire their tenacity; it takes a lot for these dealers to take their own fate into their hands. Often these dealers are smart and entrepreneurial; most come from larger dealers.  They saw a gap in the market, a niche, they could exploit and make a good living. Now their future depends on how well they execute.   For most of these dealers, their eventual legacy will be what sustains them into retirement and their future generations.

So how does this relate to the Digital Dealership?

One of the great things about the digital revolution in our industry is the potential to become, with a little investment, more than a person with a Rolodex. The Digital Dealership, or your digital presence, can help you extend your legacy well into the future in several ways.

  • First, your digital presence is like having an extra team member or sales rep. You’re existing and new customers can learn about you, answer questions they have for themselves and initiate communication with you all by going through your digital profile. I have seen lots of small dealers work hard to keep up with quotes, rentals and inventory information in a very laborious way. Each time sending emails with additional information like pricing. A well created digital presence can take some of this burden off you. Now, even if you are a team of one, you are actually a team of two, or even three. Creating and investing in a Digital Dealership establishes an effective sales path that’s open 24 hours per day. Now, you can focus on getting out to see customers instead of being stuck behind the desk.
  • Second, for a small growing dealership with big aspirations, a digital presence and platform helps you standardize. In many cases over the years, I have come across great dealers who are heavily dependent on one or two key salespeople. Usually, these key players are the owners, or a highly effective salesperson. The problem with this situation is repeatability. If one key person exits the business, it’s hard to recover. Creating a digital presence and a standard process, including CRM, makes your business repeatable. It lets you add new team members, set a standard operating practice so you can repeat what’s working, with new people. Your Digital platform can help to transition your customers and maintain the goodwill you’ve built over the years.

By creating a digital presence and developing a consistent brand, you become more than just a one-on-one relationship. Your hard work over the years, and that of your team, creates a legacy which can be easily understood by new people joining the team. This lets your customers feel like they are still dealing with the original creator of the business, who they first trusted to serve them.

More and more, we see new business relationships initiated from digital platforms. Buyers are looking for solid information, in addition to knowledge and great service.  In the past, the model for an organized business was a phone and a Rolodex. The new digital platforms like your Website, CRM and marketing tools are now the modern Rolodex. They help you organize and maximize the efforts you have put into the business for many years. Now you have the tools to have your business support you into the future.

To build is to have something that lasts; to create a legacy.

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Job Shock: Part Six – The First Half

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Job Shock: Part Six – The First Half

Job Shock: Part Six – The First Half

Edward E. Gordon, the founder and president of Imperial Consulting Corporation in Chicago, has consulted with leaders in business, education, government, and non-profits for over 50 years. As a writer, researcher, speaker, and consultant he has helped shape policy and programs that advance talent development and regional economic growth. This week, he continues his blog series with Job Shock, Part Six – The First Half.

Gordon is the author or co-author of 20 books. His book, Future Jobs: Solving the Employment and Skills Crisis, is the culmination of his work as a visionary who applies a multi-disciplinary approach to today’s complex workforce needs and economic development issues. It won a 2015 Independent Publishers Award. An updated paperback edition was published in 2018.

Solving the Pandemic & 2030 Employment Meltdown

RETAIN Case Studies: Partnerships Rebuilding Local Employment Pipelines

The June Gordon Report provided an introduction to the general characteristics of regional public-private partnerships focusing on economic and workforce development or RETAINs. Across the United States RETAINs have many local brand names.  RETAINs bring together enlightened community leaders from many industry sectors. They cooperate in developing initiatives that provide career education and information to students and retrain incumbent workers to meet the skill demands of workplace technology changes. The goals of RETAINs are to strengthen local institutions and competitive companies while providing local residents with better job opportunities.

There are many paths to pursuing these objectives. Here are examples of RETAINs that are continuing to develop programs that address the talent challenges in their communities.

Manufacturing Renaissance, Chicago, Illinois
For the past 38 years Manufacturing Renaissance (MR) has been recognized as a leading expert, advocate and practitioner of policies and programs that support the manufacturing sector as a primary strategy for reducing poverty, expanding inclusion, and sustaining middle-class communities. MR has currently developed programs in three areas: Career Pathway Services, Policy and Advocacy, and Economic Development. Here is a snapshot of MR’s Career Pathway Services:

Manufacturing Connect. MC is a program designed to expose, inspire, prepare, and support youth and young adults to pursue career pathways in manufacturing.  MC is a community-based program serving in-school youth, ages 14-18, to provide high quality, career pathway programming including career exposure, technical training and work experiences to help young people start and keep good paying jobs in manufacturing.

Young Manufacturers Association. The YMA serves as both a network and a program for young adults, aged 18-29, who are pursuing careers in manufacturing, in-between jobs, in training or interested in starting a career in manufacturing. Through regular meetings and social events, they support one another as peers through training, transition into permanent employment, professional and life skills development, and balancing personal and work life dynamics. The YMA as a program provides services on an as-needed basis, including career coaching, wrap-around supports, employer liaison to help troubleshoot issues that come up at work, and technical training. Together, the YMA network and program are serving the untapped talent and potential that young adults specifically represent to their communities and their current or future employers.

Instructors Apprenticeship for Advanced Manufacturing. IAAM was developed in partnership with the Chicago Teachers Union Foundation and the National Institute for Metalworking Skills to train the next generation of great machining instructors to be technologically, culturally, and pedagogically competent in the machine shop classroom.

Career Pathway Services is not a traditional workforce development program. MR draws heavily from a youth development and social services orientation to engage youth and young adults who typically may not identify or seek out manufacturing as a pathway that can assist them in achieving their life goals. MR introduces young people to the sector, finds a variety of ways for them to relate to peers already in the sector to help illuminate what could be possible for their future. No matter what they ultimately choose, young people benefit from having a network of professional and social support, work experiences, technical and professionalism skills. For those who enroll in our training program and choose to pursue a career-track job in manufacturing we support them as much as possible through training, job placement and beyond to help ensure their success.

MR is expanding its reach in Cook County and showing the way for other RETAINs to begin similar efforts. It illustrates that for a RETAIN to be successful there must be strong cooperation among educational entities, the business community, unions. government agencies, and non-profit partners.

High School Inc., Santa Ana, California

The initial impetus for the creation of the High School Inc. Academies Foundation came from local business leaders in the Santa Ana Chamber of Commerce. Starting in 2003, members of the Chamber of Commerce held discussions with school districts officials on how to raise student achievement. The result was a partnership involving the Chamber, the Foundation and the Santa Ana Unified School District. An official “Memorandum of Understanding was signed by all three partners in May of 2006. This agreement outlined the responsibilities of each partner for the development and operation of the High School Inc. program.

The first six High School Inc. Academies began in 2007 on the campus of Santa Ana Valley High School in the Santa Ana Unified School District. The district’s Career Technical Education (CTE) department conducts monthly meetings with High School Inc.’s staff to maintain the continuity and effectiveness of the academies.

At Valley High School the High School Inc. Academies merge both academic and technical skills through Project Based Learning (PBL), competitions, mentorships, and business internships. Because of the success of the High School Inc. academies, there has been considerable growth in the school district’s creation of career pathways in business and industry sectors. These pathways start as early as sixth grade in the school district’s intermediate schools and send students into the waiting High School Inc. Academies.

The number of Valley high school students categorized as “socioeconomically disadvantaged” in 2008 was 80 percent. However, with the help of talented teachers and staff members, and the existence of High School Inc., Valley High School has raised the level of achievement for all Valley high school students.

Mary Tran, Executive Director of High School Inc. reports that the six High School Inc. Academies have grown from an enrollment of 96 students at its start in 2007 to over 1,572 students in 2019. The Academies boast a 98% high school graduation rate. In the past year there have been 160 professional internships for seniors. The number of students receiving “Industry Certifications” after a minimum of two years in the program was 511, with over 319 students participating in business/industry themed competitions. Students in the 2018-2019 received over 950 hours of volunteer time from business and industry representatives. The program has received numerous awards and recognitions including the prestigious “Golden Bell Award” given to High School Inc. in 2014 by the California School Board Association.

Jack E. Oakes, an officer on the Board of Directors for High School Inc., says “High School Inc.’s development has produced the realization that, before students can be College and Career Ready, they must be ‘Achievement Ready.’ Students reach this new level of preparedness by being motivated to strive at or beyond their potential. The High School Inc. model ensures that students are Achievement Ready before they graduate and pursue higher education and careers. The reforms at Valley High School embrace the mission of High School Inc. ‘to empower youth and strengthen communities through education and business partnerships.’”

Summing Up
Each organization profiled here has continued to evolve to meet the challenges posed by technological, economic, and workforce shifts. The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted American life at many levels. It opens up new opportunities for many communities to use the RETAIN model as their first step toward a more knowledgeable workforce and the better paying jobs of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

The last segment of “Job Shock” will focus on why the 2020s will be a crucial decade for building a skilled workforce. As the nation emerges from COVID-19 shutdowns, the disconnect between needed skills and available jobs is gaining increasing attention. The time has arrived for RETAINs to take the lead in rebuilding education-to-employment pipelines in communities across the United States.

Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.

The Digital Dealership: Comparing Equipment Presentation

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The Digital Dealership: Comparing Equipment Presentation

Tonight, guest blogger Mets Kramer continues to educate us on all the digital aspects of our business with The Digital Dealership: Comparing Equipment Presentation.

One of the Statements I have made repeatedly in this series is: “The average buyer does 85% of their research digitally prior to contacting the dealer” (Thanks @Charles Bowles). What does this mean for dealers?   In the most practical way, it means “Call for details” is dead. Providing information is critical.

In this blog, I would like to get each of you to do some research. Considering my statement above, which of the following websites or products would you feel ready to buy (assuming you needed it) based on the digital presentation of the product.

To get started I would like to look at the used passenger vehicle market.  This is one market we all have experience in, and one that has seen a radical change over the last 10 years.  It has also been a strong industry, leading the Equipment industry by 10 to 20 years, showing where digital technology is going in the future.

First let’s look at Carvana and CarMax, leaders in digital sales, presenting the vehicles they have for sale.

https://www.carvana.com/vehicle/1836344

https://www.carmax.com/car/19617484

Then Compare the Experience Here at a Toyota Dealer, which does a decent job, but is behind.

https://toyotaoffortworth.com/vehicle-details/used-2017-toyota-4runner-limited-JTEZU5JRXH5155428

Notice how Carvana and CarMax are highlighting issues to avoid surprises, providing delivery and a 7-day guarantee to handle risk and objections.

Which of these listings made you feel like you know enough about the vehicle?  It is a big step to buy your first vehicle without seeing it, for sure, but would seeing it in person really tell you more?  If you could not see it in person, which would you choose?

Now let us look at Equipment, the topic we all focus on daily.

Compare the following sites

  1. DeWitt Equipment Hitachi ZX-160LC-3, presented with images, 2 videos, details, and a PDF specifications document from Hitachi.

https://dewittequipment.com/our-products/2009-hitachi-zx-160-lc-3/

  1. Holt CAT 289D, presented with an inspection report and report from Electronic Technician, specifications, and images

https://holtused.com/2018-cat-289d-ces001277-near-austin

  1. Marcel Equipment CAT D6N – presented with images, detailed description and full repair and condition info.

https://marcelequipment.com/inventory/2016-caterpillar-d6n-lgp/

  1. 4Rivers CAT 320E, presented with 4 pictures and a short description

https://www.4riversequipment.com/shop/general-construction/caterpillar-320e-995554/

After Reviewing these different sites, which machines do you feel you “know” best?  Which one would you buy without seeing it in person?  More importantly, which machine would you be ready to contact the dealer about if you only contact dealers when you’re close to purchasing?

When presenting your equipment on your website you have the greatest opportunity to present the machine fully, since you control your site.  Your goal should be to present enough information to stop visitors from hunting around for more information.   You need to get them to stop scrolling or clicking, call, contact, email, etc. The best way to do this is to answer all their questions.

How would you change your website, to present your equipment better, with this in mind?

If you would like to review your website and look at how easily you can present your equipment with more detail, simply contact me at:

mets.kramer@strategicevolutions.ca  or (289) 680-6387

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Learned Helplessness

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Learned Helplessness

In tonight’s post, guest blogger Bruce Baker walks you through a struggle we are seeing all around us: learned helplessness.

Many business owners and CEOs we partner with suffer tremendously due to being in a state of learned helplessness.

It is astonishing to see people that reach out to us at Workplaces simply because they are in a state of pain and the challenges they have or perceive they have don’t have a resolution.  After lengthy discussions, the challenges they have “tried everything” to solve become less daunting and transition into something inspiring. At least four out of five times, we have the privilege of partnering with these individuals to better their business situation and ultimately achieve the goals that they work so hard to achieve. Unfortunately, once they experience solving these challenges (something they never thought possible) and, of course, do their “celebratory dance,” they fall right back into their learned helpless state due to a new challenge they face yet again.  This constant state repeating itself seems to be a drug that people seek to justify the pain of their challenge and their perceived inability to solve it.

As time goes on, the more resilient the Business owner/CEO inevitably becomes, the more they transition their business and themselves to an ongoing and sustainable state of success. This is not because they now have “better business tools” necessarily, but because they reduce falling back into a state of learned helplessness.  Those who persevere and learn this new conditioned response to challenge and, at times, failure becomes more successful consistently.

To conclude, I wanted to share a powerful story (author unknown) that I have always turned to when I feel this way and need a path back to a positive state. The story goes like this:

As my friend passed the elephants, he suddenly stopped, confused because these huge creatures were being held by only a small rope tied to their front leg. No chains, no cages. It was obvious that the elephants could, at any time, break away from the ropes they were tied to, but for some reason, they did not. My friend saw a trainer nearby and asked why these beautiful, magnificent animals just stood there and made no attempt to escape.

“Well,” he said, “when they are very young and much smaller, we use the same size of rope to tie them and, at that age, it’s enough to hold them. Then, as they grow up, they are conditioned to believe they cannot break away. They believe the rope can still hold them, so they never try to break free.” My friend was amazed. These animals could at any time break free from their bonds, but because they believed they couldn’t, they were stuck right where they were.

Like the elephants, how many of us go through life hanging onto a belief that we cannot do something simply because we failed at it once before?

How many of us are being held back by old, outdated beliefs that no longer serve us? How many of us have avoided trying something new because of a limiting belief? Worse, how many of us are being held back by someone else’s limiting beliefs?

You do not deserve to feel this way!  Your business should be a source of pride and achievement for you, whether you are significantly challenged today or are feeling helpless because you can’t find a solution.  Don’t let your ego and your feeling of learned helplessness be your guide in building your business; you will fail and not return. Instead, reach out to someone you trust, someone that will hold you accountable and show you that the solutions you seek are not far away.

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The Five Bs for Baby Boomers

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The five Bs for Baby Boomers to cultivate a culture of innovation

In this week’s guest post, Sonya Law offers an explanation of the five Bs for Baby Boomers and the ways in which they can help to cultivate a culture of innovation.

What’s the most important part of being a leader today?

It’s not about being the smartest, wittiest, or being politically astute.

It’s about being innovative, leveraging the talent of the people around you, and thinking beyond today to solve the future problems that society will encounter.

How the best leaders make everyone smarter is to utilize the talent of everyone in the organization through effective listening, communication, and collaboration.  The book Multipliers by Liz Wiseman explores why some leaders drain capability and intelligence from their teams while others amplify them to produce results.  Post the pandemic, the number one skill employers seek in their people is Innovation.  Prior to the pandemic, we expected innovation to be the top skill for startups and tech firms but now it is a requirement of all employees in today’s world.

However, those for whom being innovative, open-minded, curious, and experimental comes most naturally that is Millennials, are being overlooked which erodes agility.  Especially in work environments where both Millennials and Baby Boomers cohabitate, they are often not on the same page and speaking the same language.  In some cases, not all, Baby boomers think Millennials can’t focus are distracted by their mobiles, and are not motivated or ready to be taken seriously.  So how do we get baby boomers and millennials working together to better understand each other and leverage their combined talents, we everyone serves each other.

The five Bs for Baby Boomers when communicating with Millennials:

  1. Be an empathetic listener
  2. Be prepared to give informal feedback more regularly
  3. Be clear about the goals and connect us with our WHY
  4. Be socially aware of how we are making a difference in the world and share these good news stories on social media
  5. Be open-minded to take a different route and open to using digital platforms as a collaborative workspace

The most comfortable with technology are Millennials so why would you not capitalise on this if we are to be smarter aren’t we best to leverage what they know?

Millennials are digital addicts and want to do and share everything online whereas baby boomers in most cases they draw a line between their work and home lives and do not necessarily live out their entire life online, across multiple social media platforms.

This disconnect is real and endangers the passing down of valuable knowledge cultivated by the baby boomers and all their hard work they have poured into organisations, at the risk of this not being passed on, legacy yes but innovation no.  If we could harness the knowledge of the baby boomers, this intelligence could be used to inform the innovation of the future.

In a global economy where we are experiencing climate change and pandemics, the challenges that we are facing together are the responsibility of our leaders to unblock your people.  To leverage the talent of all the people to think tank, unlock potential, work more innovatively, learn to fail fast and move on, adapt, grow and thrive if we are to compete.  The success off the backs of the baby boomers’ hard work has laid the foundation on which to build, so let’s build in collaboration into our workspaces that leverages the talent across the whole organization.

So why not leverage technology to innovate, collaborate and even assign tasks and set priorities?

Stratappsaas.com is a connected workspace that facilitates innovation and enables execution of the strategy in real-time, where everyone works on one connected workspace, a focused workspace that eliminates inefficiencies of switching between emails, apps, and static documents and is especially attractive to millennials, who want to use technology as a platform to get work done and share ideas.

This idea of leveraging technology is not only useful for Millennials it is a practical one given the shift toward hybrid work models and work from home becoming the norm, the need for technology to enhance communication, collaboration, and execution has become a necessity.

The five B’s for Baby Boomers are applicable for all leaders in attracting, motivating, and sustaining talent in any workforce.

Especially at a time when there is a war for talent in a candidate short market.  It is also a good idea for leaders to get familiar with spending time away from the desk, especially true of Baby Boomers who prefer to man their post but a step away from their command-and-control leadership style can be refreshing and good for innovation.

Remember the last time you went for a long walk how good it felt, to clear your head and the solutions came up freely, this is what progressive leaders practice, it is expansive and visionary.  This big picture thinking inspires innovative thinking and essential to staying ahead of the curve in coming up with better products and services for your customers.  If we get too stuck in the weeds of operations and forget to step out and come up with new thinking it stifles new ideas and innovation.

It is good to seek new thinking and challenges, but stability also matters too, so it is a blend of the two generations – baby boomers’ steadfastness and the millennials’ enthusiasm – which will inspire the future of work!

Leaders who leverage the talent of all their people will cultivate a culture of innovation … take care of your Millennials and they will solve the problems for you!

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The Digital Dealership: Getting Practical

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Digital Dealership: Getting Practical

Tonight, guest blogger Mets Kramer continues to educate us on all the digital aspects of our business with The Digital Dealership: Getting Practical.

For the past few weeks, we’ve looked at creating a digital dealership and what defines going fully digital.  One of the main areas of focus, was changing our understanding of how providing information was a key aspect.   Being fully digital, requires being able to provide all the information customers require, about your inventory, in a digital, and typically self-serve way.

Working from current research on purchasing, we know customers are doing 85% of their research, about their purchase, digitally prior to calling a dealer.   This means customers want to find the information they need, to make a purchase decision, in your online platform.   As a digital dealer you need to provide this information.

To put it into perspective, you cannot call Amazon to ask a question about the product you are looking at, so Amazon provides lots of space for product descriptions, so you can make a decision.

For equipment it’s no different.  To provide adequate information to buyers, a digital dealer needs more than a short summary of a couple features and a few pictures.   Consider the following as important.

  1. Specifications, of the machine and model
  2. Service History
  3. 10+ images
  4. 1 or more videos – Operating, walk around, engine running, etc.
  5. Oil Sample history
  6. Repair and condition report
  7. Market and operating cost info
  8. Attachments and features

In a traditional approach, of digital billboard advertising, providing all this information and making it available on the website, takes a huge separate effort loading data into the site, or an outside system.  Furthermore, in all “out of the box” or “off the shelf” platforms, the presentation is standard and doesn’t present the equipment in a way that reflects your dealership.

So, I’m going to put my money with my mouth is;

I would like to show any of you, how manageable taking charge of your own digital presence is.  Modern software and website technology makes building a website easy and representative of your dealership.  It allows information to flow from your inventory management to your website and back to your CRM.  This will allow you to serve up video, images, documents, and detailed descriptions, and even recognize visiting customers.

If you have been following this series and want to see it in action, I’ll provide for you a CRM and a blank website template, linked to your inventory in the CRM.  The Site will be a cutting edge Litespeed server with an Oxygen website template connected to the Vizybility CRM and your inventory, using our WordPress plugin.  Our team will show you how manageable it is, how you can present your inventory and products exactly how you want.  We will work with your team for two months to show you how it will change your digital presence and your customers engagement.  We will even connect your customer data from CRM to Mailchimp so you can run standard and drip campaigns to keep your customers engaged.  If after 2 months you are not convinced, it’s on me.

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