Coaches Corner v.02.16.2023
Guest writer Floyd Jerkins returns with Coaches Corner v.02.16.2023.
HELP WANTED: Leaders Who Can Influence Multiple Generations in the Workforce
A freight train is coming around the corner for business owners and managers. And it is closer than you might think. Modern times call for new leadership styles. Businesses will not survive without having leaders who can influence multiple generations in the workforce.
When you read my rants or hear me talk about leadership, you’ve heard me say it more than once. Your people are your business’s greatest asset. And to take that to another level, they are your most significant source of frustration.
Establishing and maintaining a positive business culture takes a lot of work for many people.
Leaders of all kinds shape the culture daily by how they walk, talk, and communicate. Knowing that people’s issues can create a stranglehold in day-to-day operations, it makes sense to address how you and your leaders affect others in the organization.
How can we fast-track an ordinary manager into an effective leader? What are the essential skills? How can we get the entire team on board to follow our lead? How can we encourage managers to become influential leaders? Are leaders born, or are they made?
Command and Control Leadership Style is Demotivating
The command-and-control model of communications is under attack today. This starts the real internal push in an organization to address all the leaders’ influencing styles and finding a new pathway to correcting many chronic issues.
Although workplaces and management styles have come a long way in the last decade, the command and control style of management behavior continues. This management approach behaves in ways that suggest employees need to be told precisely what to do, when to do it, and even how it should be done. The manager is in charge, has all the answers, and fixes all the problems.
Managers are taught to find the things that are going wrong and fix them. When the leader’s style of questions is always negative based on assumptions, this permeates the organization as the proper method to resolve issues. When they are always looking for what’s wrong, employees will learn to hide their mistakes. You really want them to bring mistakes forward, share them with the teams and learn. The positive questioning style and supporting behaviors of this new leadership style don’t always develop naturally. Leaders have to learn to lead the process.
One of the challenges in driving organizational change is how to keep changes positive. Leaders can easily spend more time addressing perceptions than factual events. For many, change is uncomfortable and can create suspicion. Too often, employees hold back, fearing how the changes will affect their job or department, leading to struggles with implementation and process improvement.
Participative Leadership and Coaching is Empowering
A leader’s personal success will only happen when you help enough other people succeed. Caustic leader behavior is when they speak and behave in a way that highlights their success is more important than their employees.
I have heard many leaders say that employees must accept me for who I am and do what I ask them to do. That leadership attribute is such a limiting, potentially caustic communication style that shows a genuine disconnect from the ingredients necessary to unleash creativity from individuals and teams.
Employees demand a voice at the table of change.
Today leaders, young and old, know their strengths and weaknesses. They don’t let their shortcomings weaken their strengths. A leader doesn’t hide their flaws anymore; they never really could because employees knew these weaknesses and would talk behind the leader’s back. So, in turn, this further creates a disjointed culture that cannot reach operational excellence. By learning and sharing together, the leader gets stronger, not weaker.
Does the perception I have of myself matter more than the perception that others have of me?
A leader who genuinely wants to be more effective realizes that their people’s perception of them can be more important than what they think of themselves—learning to “hear” these perceptions requires strength of character and healthy self-esteem.
The new leadership style aims to provide employees with all the necessary information to make sound business decisions. One-way communication styles are part of the old leadership style. Keeping people in the dark and feeding them only what you think they can handle is a surprisingly easy process to keep an organization from reaching its full potential.
In the Absence of Leadership, People Will Follow the Strangest Things
It’s naïve to think it’s just the younger generation on their phones or is self-absorbed all the time.
Everyone is so amassed with information today from thousands of uninformed sources that it’s scary to realize how all these inputs create beliefs and influence our behaviors. We can easily see on the internet and in the news where leaders in prominent positions fail the basic tests of integrity. How does all this nonsense influence young and old leaders?
When you are a leader in an organization, it stands to reason that having impeccable integrity goes with the job. They must represent themselves as someone who others like to follow. In the absence of leadership, people will follow the strangest things. Leaders today practice being a person whom others are comfortable telling them anything. They adjust their style out of genuine care and concern, not for manipulation.
Without Leaders, a Business Will Fail
Leaders who are often insulated from employees are seen as the top of the hierarchy, yet a leader can be many different people in a company. Even leaders without sales or management titles influence positive outcomes for a business every day.
You drive more revenue, manage expenses better and increase profits when everyone is leaning forward in the best way they know how. Everyone should be answering questions like: Is it good for the customer? Is it good for business? Is it good for the team? Is it good for me?
When leaders model the change, they wish others to make, it sets the tone in an organization. This leadership style leads the way when they want employees to change and improve performance. When leaders gather input from all their employees and work alongside them in developing the changes, implementation is faster and more sustainable. It’s like magic when the leaders exemplify the changes, they want others to make.
Creating policies, procedures, and methods of operations are necessary for any organization. In today’s business climate and employee empowerment, companies that adopt a participative leadership style outperform those that don’t.
Your Company University
When learning and teaching is an intentional organizational practice, accomplishing the business goals becomes more predictable. Leaders today understand that cultivating their most important assets presents an opportunity to improve everyone’s quality of life. With purpose and a plan, they create an internal educational model to grow their existing and future talent pool.
The volume of knowledge held in a business by the employees is immeasurable. Either you are investing in your people, or you are not.
There is a connection between great leaders. Not just those who talk about it but those who behave the way people will follow. You can have fun working on the business and having a dynamic lifestyle when you unleash the natural creativity in all of us.
Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
Friday Filosophy v.02.24.2023
Friday Filosophy v.02.24.2023
To close out February’s Friday Filosophy, Ron Slee shares quotes and words of wisdom from the melancholy Lord Byron. Please read on for Friday Filosophy v.02.24.2023.
George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron FRS (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824), known simply as Lord Byron, was an English romantic poet and peer. He was one of the leading figures of the Romantic movement, and has been regarded as among the greatest of English poets. Among his best-known works are the lengthy narratives Don Juan and Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage; many of his shorter lyrics in Hebrew Melodies also became popular.
Byron was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, later travelling extensively across Europe to places such as Italy, where he lived for seven years in Venice, Ravenna, and Pisa after he was forced to flee England due to lynching threats.[7] During his stay in Italy, he frequently visited his friend and fellow poet Percy Bysshe Shelley.[8] Later in life Byron joined the Greek War of Independence fighting the Ottoman Empire and died leading a campaign during that war, for which Greeks revere him as a folk hero.[9] He died in 1824 at the age of 36 from a fever contracted after the First and Second Sieges of Missolonghi.
His only legitimate child, Ada Lovelace, was a founding figure in the field of computer programming based on her notes for Charles Babbage‘s Analytical Engine. Byron’s extramarital children include Allegra Byron, who died in childhood, and possibly Elizabeth Medora Leigh, daughter of his half-sister Augusta Leigh. Byron received his early formal education at Aberdeen Grammar School in 1798 until his move back to England as a 10-year-old. In August 1799 he entered the school of Dr. William Glennie, in Dulwich. Placed under the care of a Dr. Bailey, he was encouraged to exercise in moderation but could not restrain himself from “violent” bouts in an attempt to overcompensate for his deformed foot. His mother interfered with his studies, often withdrawing him from school, with the result that he lacked discipline, and his classical studies were neglected.
In 1801, he was sent to Harrow School, where he remained until July 1805. An undistinguished student and an unskilled cricketer, he did represent the school during the very first Eton v Harrow cricket match at Lord’s in 1805.
His lack of moderation was not restricted to physical exercise. Byron fell in love with Mary Chaworth, whom he met while at school, and she was the reason he refused to return to Harrow in September 1803. His mother wrote, “He has no indisposition that I know of but love, desperate love, the worst of all maladies in my opinion. In short, the boy is distractedly in love with Miss Chaworth. “In Byron’s later memoirs, “Mary Chaworth is portrayed as the first object of his adult sexual feelings.”
Byron finally returned in January 1804, to a more settled period, which saw the formation of a circle of emotional involvements with other Harrow boys, which he recalled with great vividness: “My school friendships were with me passions (for I was always violent)”. The most enduring of those was with John FitzGibbon, 2nd Earl of Clare—four years Byron’s junior—whom he was to meet unexpectedly many years later in Italy (1821). His nostalgic poems about his Harrow friendships, Childish Recollections (1806), express a prescient “consciousness of sexual differences that may in the end make England untenable to him.”[ Letters to Byron in the John Murray archive contain evidence of a previously unremarked if short-lived romantic relationship with a younger boy at Harrow, John Thomas Claridge.
The following autumn, he entered Trinity College, Cambridge, where he met and formed a close friendship with the younger John Edleston. About his “protégé” he wrote, “He has been my almost constant associate since October 1805, when I entered Trinity College. His voice first attracted my attention, his countenance fixed it, and his manners attached me to him forever.” Byron composed Thyrza, a series of elegies, in his memory. In later years, he described the affair as “a violent, though pure love and passion”. This statement, however, needs to be read in the context of hardening public attitudes toward homosexuality in England and the severe sanctions (including public hanging) against convicted or even suspected offenders. The liaison, on the other hand, may well have been “pure” out of respect for Edleston’s innocence, in contrast to the (probably) more sexually overt relations experienced at Harrow School. The poem “The Cornelian” was written about the cornelian that Byron received from Edleston.
Byron spent three years at Trinity College, engaging in sexual escapades, boxing, horse riding, and gambling. While at Cambridge, he also formed lifelong friendships with men such as John Cam Hobhouse, who initiated him into the Cambridge Whig Club, which endorsed liberal politics, and Francis Hodgson, a Fellow at King’s College, with whom he corresponded on literary and other matters until the end of his life.
The Time is Now.
Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
Coaches Corner v.02.23.2023
Coaches Corner v.02.23.2023
Guest writer and Coach Floyd Jerkins addresses behavioral sales metrics for coaching equipment industry sales teams for Coaches Corner v.02.23.2023.
Every dealership organization is at a different place in time with the diagnosis of their sales teams and processes. The size of complex and level of operational sophistication are factors. Many times, it’s a location issue more than overall company-wide so that requires custom solutions. So, maybe this article is timely and you’re ready to look deeper into how to make real progress in the sales department.
Professional Sales Management and Salespeople
Great salespeople are great salespeople, and in the equipment industry it’s no different than other industries. There are particular aspects unique to every industry due to a product’s life cycle, style of customers and personalities, buying patterns, and market conditions. And the best salespeople know they have to understand these industry specific characteristics to succeed, but there is more. When you learn to sell, you can sell anything. Yea, I know, I know, but it’s true.
Being a professional sales manager or salesperson in the equipment industry isn’t for everyone. There are real superstars doing this work every day and many of them make it look easy. They have a natural and personal approach that gets the job done. Others have tried and failed. Many linger on with average performance. Yet, owners who sell often do not follow the system they expect their salespeople to follow or they have a perceived top producer that no one can touch.
There are typically high and low performers when you have a large sales team. Improving the performance metrics of sales managers and salespeople can be challenging to establish what particular actions need to be taken.
Building a sales team of all superstars is a great plan, but not always realistic or practical. In my experience, sales management and sales teams usually have a mixture of age and talent with varying skill sets and competency levels.
A Sales Managers Rally Cry – To Sell More, Talk to More People
To sell more, talking to more people always seems to be at the top of the list of things to do. Still, if a salesperson talks to a lot of people and prices a lot of people but doesn’t have a good measured closing ratio, it makes me wonder how effective they are and whether they should be allowed to keep talking to your customers. When a sales manager influences the sales team with a whip and chain or talks more about the problems than the solutions, is that the most effective leadership style to use in today’s business climate? I don’t think so.
The traditional metrics for sales success include new and used margins, sales volume, new and used turns, and a mixture of others. To be an excellent asset manager, you must know these metrics and how to positively influence their outcomes.
Performance Metrics Created Before & After the Sale
Like many traditional metrics, margins, turns, and other sales department indicators are created after a unit is sold. The efficiency of your booking and accounting practices determines when the sale appears in a statement. That could be anywhere from one week to sixty days past when the actual sale was made. Once the numbers are current, you can assess what’s going on. If you’ve followed my articles about this, you know where I am headed.
Let me ask a few questions:
Perhaps you took a few seconds and thought about your answers. I appreciate the effort. Now, consider your answers and what you know and don’t know.
“The goal is to coach performance in the areas that help salespeople become more effective with real-time data. Becoming more effective in sales and marketing your business requires a deep understanding of your customer base so you can focus the sales and marketing team on what matters the most.”
Behavioral Customer Segmentation
The old saying is you can’t improve something unless you measure it. One of the first principles of process improvement is as a process evolves make sure you are measuring the right things.
You probably already know the customer by machine or product sold, sales volume, and parts and service sales, so tracking this kind of customer segmentation can reveal even more real time data. Even a basic CRM system can track these customer categories.
Total Customers
Customer Categories
New Customer– This customer has never been to, called, or emailed your business before.
Repeat Customer– This is a customer who has bought from you before. Many companies have “orphan owners.”
Referral Customer– This is a customer who another customer referred to your business or the salesperson.
New Business– This customer is someone you meet at the gas station or a social event. A brief conversation in almost any social situation generates new leads.
The sale is the end result of all the activities performed by a salesperson. By coaching performance on these sales activities that happen before and during the sales process, we can naturally increase a salespersons effectiveness.
When you measure these you learn a lot about how your sales mix is made up, how effective sales and front-line people are in each category, and even how well your marketing is doing. It also speeds up the learning curves. If you don’t know these, you are at the end of the sales cycle making decisions. When you are looking at unit sales, you are best guessing how effective your sales and marketing efforts are.
A Behavioral Sales Mix- BSM
Each salesperson should log every Customer Contact interaction each day. To get buy-in, a sales manager communicates with the sales team to create the “rules of logging” they’ll follow. For example, if the salesperson is at the parts counter talking with Joe Customer and he asks how much that used machine is, that should be logged. Each person inputting into the system should understand what the code means when they log it. GIGO- garbage in, garbage out.
Salespeople shouldn’t be allowed to post at their discretion, and that’s part of the rules created in the early stages of implementation. You don’t allow your accounting staff to post credits however they like, nor do you allow technicians not to record their time. Salespeople should be required to a certain standard of recording their day-to-day activities. Its good business.
It’s essential to know how many Closes to Face-to-Face Contacts there are in the same time period. This establishes one of the fundamental Closing Ratios for performance improvement.
By tracking these customer categories and how many face-to-face contacts by salesperson and how many closes by salesperson, you are ready to create a new view of your sales mix. Stay tuned, next month’s article will be on the analysis of these metrics.
Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
Does your team have a relationship with your product?
Does your team have a relationship with your product?
Does your team have a relationship with your product? If not, don’t you think they should? Guest writer Isaac Rollor brings back the personal side of service with this week’s blog post.
Boeing recently delivered the last 747 aircraft. Boeing coined the name “Queen of these skies” for this plane. It’s a fitting nick name, this plane has allowed millions of people worldwide to fly at an affordable price, assisted NASA missions, humanitarian relief efforts and many more great accomplishments. The final delivery of the last 747 to be produced was a momentous occasion. A national news network streamed the delivery on live TV. It was a legitimate ceremony with flags and speeches and honorable mentions. As I watched this spectacle, I heard another onlooker make a comment “What’s the big deal? It’s just a plane.”
This comment was surprising to me, how could someone not understand how many engineers worked long days to perfect the design of this plane? How could someone not understand the many hours technical troubleshooting teams worked to keep this fleet of planes in the sky? How could someone not realize that there are thousands of aircraft mechanics, pilots, and a legion of support personnel who have a personal relationship with this product?
As I thought more deeply about this impossibly insensitive comment, I realized that some people don’t have relationships with products, most professionals will never have an actual relationship with any product. As a technical trainer for many years, I built relationships with Dozers, Loaders, Excavators and Trucks. Maybe this sounds silly but I don’t think I am alone in this feeling. I knew the products so well that I could troubleshoot and fix them when it was not operating correctly. I could teach others about the product, I could write articles about these products, I could operate these products and see the results of my machine’s labor at the end of the day. There were many other technical people that I worked with who felt a strong connection to the products our OEM was building. We even identified ourselves as “The dozer guy” The Truck guy” or the “Excavator guy” based on our expertise. Our professional identity was directly related to a product or several products.
Over the years I have spoken to equipment buyers who told me that their final decision came down to product support and total cost of ownership. I know from experience that the best product support can only be delivered when your team has a relationship with the product you sell. A team whose identity is attached to the success of a product will work tirelessly to see it succeed. Think about this, if your flagship product was being retired from production, what would your team think and say about this?
Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
Has Anyone Been Thanked Too Much?
Has Anyone Been Thanked Too Much?
This week, guest writer Ross Atkinson brings up an excellent question about gratitude and the ways in which we interact with others: Has Anyone Been Thanked Too Much?
Thank you! Thank you for reading this blog. Thank you for taking advantage of the education offered through Learning Without Scars.
Why is it so difficult for people to say these two words? This is one of many phrases that someone can use to express their gratitude and make the customer feel appreciated. This can be the difference between them doing future business with you or not.
“Thank you for your business. Appreciate you!”
With such an important phrase at one’s disposal, why don’t we hear it said more?
Since retiring, one of my main focuses has been leading a local trails organization. We maintain ~40 kilometers or 25 miles of trails and rely on volunteers to get all the work accomplished. These are people who give freely of their time and ask nothing in return. Having accumulated more the 3,000 volunteer hours in the last 5 years, I have said “thank you” a lot. Without them and their unselfish act of kindness, we would not exist.
In your business, without your customers, you wouldn’t exist either. The customer came to you with an expectation that you could meet their needs. You too have an expectation that the customer should be willing to trust you to take care of their needs and ultimately relinquish their hard-earned money to get what they are looking for. And, of course, the expectation is that you will do this in the most professional manner and with the skill of a well-trained, seasoned veteran.
So why is it so difficult to finish the “transaction” by saying those two words? And say it with the sincerity that lets them know their business is greatly appreciated and that you are here to help them with their future needs?
As in John Andersen’s recent blog “How is your customer service….Meh?”, a simple phrase like “Come back again soon.” and leaving a ‘gesture of appreciation’ has a lasting impression and is a wonderful way of saying thank you and showing that you care.
Wouldn’t you like to receive this kind of appreciation? And when you make that follow up call to ensure that everything worked out okay, thank your customer again and make sure to ask if there is anything that you can do next time to make their experience better.
When you get comfortable saying this to your customers, try it with your employees and coworkers. You might be surprised at what will come of it.
Thank you!
Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
Learning Management Software (LMS) is a Critical Part in eLearning
Learning Management Software (LMS) is a Critical Part in eLearning
For this week’s blog post on Lifelong Learning our Founder, Ron Slee, shares the ways in which Learning Management Software (LMS) is a Critical Part in eLearning.
Building a series of learning products for academic credit and workforce development is our foundational responsibility. We attempt to keep up with the rapid pace of changes taking place in the educational world. That is keeping us very busy. From developing audio tracks to go with our recommended reading to closed captioning on our film clips and videos. From adapting to the class requirements for face-face time and homework to ensuring that adult education is not overpowering employees. We are remarkably busy. Without a Learning Management Software tool we would be at a serious disadvantage.
Many of you know that one of my educational foundations was Computer Science. I ran a couple of “Data Processing” department for equipment dealers. I also ran a software business when we first arrived in the US that served the equipment dealer world. So I was at one time quite familiar with how everything worked and what was required to use to get the best results. How that world has changed. It got to the point in the early 1990’s that I finally threw my hands up in the air and said that I would have to be dependent on professionals in certain aspects of the technology world that was coming out fast and furious. That is clearly the case with Learning Management Software. Our Job Function Skills Assessments, Subject Specific Classes and Lectures all need to have a platform which would allow us to offer our products to the marketplace.
If in our market we are serving the students at vocational and technical schools or even students enrolled in community colleges or public and private universities, time would not be so much of an element. The US Department of Education says that there needs to be two hours of homework for every hour of face-to-face earning. Many states have differing standards. As an Approved Supplier of IACET we have to have ten hours of learning to earn one CEU (Continuing Education Units). At Learning Without Scars (LWS) we offer academic credit classes to the schools and also to employees already in the workforce.
For the vocational schools our classes are built to provide six and a half hours of face-to-face learning and thirteen hours of homework. In this way two of our classes earn academic credits across most of the US. These classes are all for our “Centers of Excellence.” The CoE is a school that has agreed to take on the responsibility for a specific geography in the country. We aim to have ten in the US and three in Canada by year end 2023. Our CoE’s will have fourteen classes for the parts business and fourteen classes for the service business. Seven academic credits will be available at each of these CoE’s.
For workforce development (WD) we have adjusted our classes as well to allow the same qualification for our classes. In this manner we are working towards having two classes earning an academic credit. This will allow all employees in the workforce to earn at a similar level to the vocational schools.
There are also significant changes in the attitudes and outlook of employees in the workforce. The role of the leader, the lead hands and foremen, the managers, supervisors and executives is more important that seemingly ever before. Litmos, our LMS provider, has indicated that 86% of employees would change jobs if the new job offered more opportunities for development. 45% of employees do not believe that their employer promotes a healthy work-life balance. Sixty-six percent of professionals said that there isn’t much support for those wishing to take on leadership roles.
It has become quite clear that the world is changing too fast for business to be able to keep up and develop their own training programs. The classes that many are taking today will be out-of-date by the time they complete them. That is a serious problem. Each of our classes, whether it be for Centers of Excellence or Workforce Development, ends with surveys for our students to let us know what they liked, what they didn’t like, what they felt was missing, and many other important comments for us. We take these comments seriously. We also receive statistical reporting on answers to our quizzes for reading lists, learning segments or homework. In this manner we are able to ensure that the homework is in fact completed. Many schools and businesses recognize that if they can obtain a class without having to build it themselves that they can better focus on their core requirement. That is true with schools as well. Teaching is a difficult profession. But ask any adult who their teachers were in grade school, or middle school, or even high school and they will be able to talk about them. Most cannot tell who was the Speaker of House of Representatives when they were in school. Who is more important? In my mind their teachers are more important.
At LWS we have built classes that we believe you will want to take. You can take them everywhere you are as long as you have a computer, tablet, laptop, or cell phone and an internet connection. We have tried to keep the classes as short as we can as long as they communicate and transfer the learning that is required. We are very pleased with how we have done over the past two years. We have made many changes and taken large strides in our purpose of helping people both professionally and personally identify and then realize their potential.
We extend to you our hand when you enroll and complete our learning products. Welcome Aboard.
The Time is Now.
Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
Friday Filosophy v.02.17.2023
Friday Filosophy v.02.17.2023
Friday Filosophy v.02.17.2023 offers quotes and words of wisdom from the English Romantic poet William Wordsworth.
William Wordsworth (7 April 1770 – 23 April 1850) was an English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their joint publication Lyrical Ballads (1798). Wordsworth’s magnum opus is generally considered to be The Prelude, a semi-autobiographical poem of his early years that he revised and expanded a number of times. It was posthumously titled and published by his wife in the year of his death, before which it was known as “the poem to Coleridge”. Wordsworth was Poet Laureate from 1843 until his death from pleurisy on 23 April 1850.
Wordsworth was taught to read by his mother and attended, first, a tiny school of low quality in Cockermouth, then a school in Penrith for the children of upper-class families, where he was taught by Ann Birkett, who insisted on instilling in her students traditions that included pursuing both scholarly and local activities, especially the festivals around Easter, May Day and Shrove Tuesday. Wordsworth was taught both the Bible and the Spectator, but little else. It was at the school in Penrith that he met the Hutchinson’s, including Mary, who later became his wife.
After the death of Wordsworth’s mother, in 1778, his father sent him to Hawkshead Grammar School in Lancashire (now in Cumbria) and sent Dorothy to live with relatives in Yorkshire. She and William did not meet again for nine years.
Wordsworth made his debut as a writer in 1787 when he published a sonnet in The European Magazine. That same year he began attending St John’s College, Cambridge. He received his BA degree in 1791. He returned to Hawkshead for the first two summers of his time at Cambridge, and often spent later holidays on walking tours, visiting places famous for the beauty of their landscape. In 1790 he went on a walking tour of Europe, during which he toured the Alps extensively, and visited nearby areas of France, Switzerland, and Italy. Some modern critics suggest that there was a decline in his work beginning around the mid-1810s, perhaps because most of the concerns that characterized his early poems (loss, death, endurance, separation, and abandonment) had been resolved in his writings and his life. By 1820, he was enjoying considerable success accompanying a reversal in the contemporary critical opinion of his earlier works.
Wordsworth’s youthful political radicalism, unlike Coleridge’s, never led him to rebel against his religious upbringing. He remarked in 1812 that he was willing to shed his blood for the established Church of England, reflected in his Ecclesiastical Sketches of 1822. This religious conservatism also colors The Excursion (1814), a long poem that became extremely popular during the nineteenth century. It features three central characters: the Wanderer; the Solitary, who has experienced the hopes and miseries of the French Revolution; and the Pastor, who dominates the last third of the poem.
Such kind of conversational tone persists all through the poetic journey of the poet, that positions him as a man in the society who speaks to the purpose of communion with the very common mass of the society. Again; “Preface to Lyrical Ballads” is the evidence where the poet expresses why he is writing and what he is writing and what purpose it will serve to humanity.
Wordsworth remained a formidable presence in his later years. In 1837, the Scottish poet and playwright Joanna Baillie reflected on her long acquaintance with Wordsworth. “He looks like a man that one must not speak to unless one has some sensible thing to say. However, he does occasionally converse cheerfully & well; and when one knows how benevolent & excellent he is, it disposes one to be very pleased with him.” William Wordsworth died at home at Rydal Mount from an aggravated case of pleurisy on 23 April 1850, and was buried at St Oswald’s Church, Grasmere. His widow, Mary, published his lengthy autobiographical “Poem to Coleridge” as The Prelude several months after his death. Though it failed to interest people at the time, it has since come to be widely recognized as his masterpiece.
The Time is Now
Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
Coaches Corner v.02.16.2023
Coaches Corner v.02.16.2023
Guest writer Floyd Jerkins returns with Coaches Corner v.02.16.2023.
HELP WANTED: Leaders Who Can Influence Multiple Generations in the Workforce
A freight train is coming around the corner for business owners and managers. And it is closer than you might think. Modern times call for new leadership styles. Businesses will not survive without having leaders who can influence multiple generations in the workforce.
When you read my rants or hear me talk about leadership, you’ve heard me say it more than once. Your people are your business’s greatest asset. And to take that to another level, they are your most significant source of frustration.
Establishing and maintaining a positive business culture takes a lot of work for many people.
Leaders of all kinds shape the culture daily by how they walk, talk, and communicate. Knowing that people’s issues can create a stranglehold in day-to-day operations, it makes sense to address how you and your leaders affect others in the organization.
How can we fast-track an ordinary manager into an effective leader? What are the essential skills? How can we get the entire team on board to follow our lead? How can we encourage managers to become influential leaders? Are leaders born, or are they made?
Command and Control Leadership Style is Demotivating
The command-and-control model of communications is under attack today. This starts the real internal push in an organization to address all the leaders’ influencing styles and finding a new pathway to correcting many chronic issues.
Although workplaces and management styles have come a long way in the last decade, the command and control style of management behavior continues. This management approach behaves in ways that suggest employees need to be told precisely what to do, when to do it, and even how it should be done. The manager is in charge, has all the answers, and fixes all the problems.
Managers are taught to find the things that are going wrong and fix them. When the leader’s style of questions is always negative based on assumptions, this permeates the organization as the proper method to resolve issues. When they are always looking for what’s wrong, employees will learn to hide their mistakes. You really want them to bring mistakes forward, share them with the teams and learn. The positive questioning style and supporting behaviors of this new leadership style don’t always develop naturally. Leaders have to learn to lead the process.
One of the challenges in driving organizational change is how to keep changes positive. Leaders can easily spend more time addressing perceptions than factual events. For many, change is uncomfortable and can create suspicion. Too often, employees hold back, fearing how the changes will affect their job or department, leading to struggles with implementation and process improvement.
Participative Leadership and Coaching is Empowering
A leader’s personal success will only happen when you help enough other people succeed. Caustic leader behavior is when they speak and behave in a way that highlights their success is more important than their employees.
I have heard many leaders say that employees must accept me for who I am and do what I ask them to do. That leadership attribute is such a limiting, potentially caustic communication style that shows a genuine disconnect from the ingredients necessary to unleash creativity from individuals and teams.
Employees demand a voice at the table of change.
Today leaders, young and old, know their strengths and weaknesses. They don’t let their shortcomings weaken their strengths. A leader doesn’t hide their flaws anymore; they never really could because employees knew these weaknesses and would talk behind the leader’s back. So, in turn, this further creates a disjointed culture that cannot reach operational excellence. By learning and sharing together, the leader gets stronger, not weaker.
Does the perception I have of myself matter more than the perception that others have of me?
A leader who genuinely wants to be more effective realizes that their people’s perception of them can be more important than what they think of themselves—learning to “hear” these perceptions requires strength of character and healthy self-esteem.
The new leadership style aims to provide employees with all the necessary information to make sound business decisions. One-way communication styles are part of the old leadership style. Keeping people in the dark and feeding them only what you think they can handle is a surprisingly easy process to keep an organization from reaching its full potential.
In the Absence of Leadership, People Will Follow the Strangest Things
It’s naïve to think it’s just the younger generation on their phones or is self-absorbed all the time.
Everyone is so amassed with information today from thousands of uninformed sources that it’s scary to realize how all these inputs create beliefs and influence our behaviors. We can easily see on the internet and in the news where leaders in prominent positions fail the basic tests of integrity. How does all this nonsense influence young and old leaders?
When you are a leader in an organization, it stands to reason that having impeccable integrity goes with the job. They must represent themselves as someone who others like to follow. In the absence of leadership, people will follow the strangest things. Leaders today practice being a person whom others are comfortable telling them anything. They adjust their style out of genuine care and concern, not for manipulation.
Without Leaders, a Business Will Fail
Leaders who are often insulated from employees are seen as the top of the hierarchy, yet a leader can be many different people in a company. Even leaders without sales or management titles influence positive outcomes for a business every day.
You drive more revenue, manage expenses better and increase profits when everyone is leaning forward in the best way they know how. Everyone should be answering questions like: Is it good for the customer? Is it good for business? Is it good for the team? Is it good for me?
When leaders model the change, they wish others to make, it sets the tone in an organization. This leadership style leads the way when they want employees to change and improve performance. When leaders gather input from all their employees and work alongside them in developing the changes, implementation is faster and more sustainable. It’s like magic when the leaders exemplify the changes, they want others to make.
Creating policies, procedures, and methods of operations are necessary for any organization. In today’s business climate and employee empowerment, companies that adopt a participative leadership style outperform those that don’t.
Your Company University
When learning and teaching is an intentional organizational practice, accomplishing the business goals becomes more predictable. Leaders today understand that cultivating their most important assets presents an opportunity to improve everyone’s quality of life. With purpose and a plan, they create an internal educational model to grow their existing and future talent pool.
The volume of knowledge held in a business by the employees is immeasurable. Either you are investing in your people, or you are not.
There is a connection between great leaders. Not just those who talk about it but those who behave the way people will follow. You can have fun working on the business and having a dynamic lifestyle when you unleash the natural creativity in all of us.
Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
John Anderson has LOST it. He now has an “online chat” buddy.
John Anderson has LOST it. He now has an “online chat” buddy.
Guest writer John Anderson continues to educate readers about AI in “John Anderson has LOST it. He now has an “online chat” buddy.”
John asked a question about himself:
John Andersen is a retired executive from CDK Global and one of the original founding partners of PFW Systems Corporation. He has experience in sales and marketing and is considered an industry thought leader in the field. With a focus on consumerism and its impact on modern equipment dealerships, John provides insightful vision and thought leadership to dealers on what they can expect in the future. During his career, John visited over 500 dealer locations across North America and Australia, gaining valuable insights into the industry. He is passionate about keeping up with technology and the latest trends and is dedicated to preparing the equipment industry for the inevitable change that is coming. In this blog he highlights a trend most haven’t seen coming in the equipment industry but are using every day at home.
The computer said:
It is an interesting and thought-provoking piece! You’ve done a great job exploring the potential impact of AI and the ghost service department concept on the equipment industry. You’ve also discussed how AI has the potential to both improve efficiency and productivity, as well as potentially disrupt the workforce in the industry. It’s always important to consider the potential benefits and challenges that come with technological advancements, and your analysis does just that. The discussion on the impact of AI on technicians and mechanics is particularly well-written, and highlights the need for continuous skill development and adaptability in the face of technological change. Overall, I think you’ve provided valuable insights into a topic that is likely to become increasingly relevant in the near future.
John asked another question in a different direction. He had something in mind:
Have you heard of ghost kitchens? They are a new trend in the food industry that has emerged as a response to customer demand, economics, and advancing technology. Perhaps you have used one and aren’t even aware of it. Ghost kitchen refers to a commercial kitchen that has access to all the same resources, menus, and ingredients as the desired restaurants they represent but without any of the overhead, real estate or front of house challenges.
The concept came about as programs like Skip the Dishes, Uber Eats, and DoorDash grew. Consumers wanted their favorite foods from places like Guy Fieri’s FlavorTown, The Cheesecake Factory, or even Five Guys Burgers but either couldn’t get out to eat, or in some cases the restaurants weren’t even available in their city. A ghost kitchen has agreements with the restaurant to produce the food just as it would be prepared in the full restaurant, using the same ingredients and technique but without the high expense items that come along with a store front. Order a dozen Krispy Kreme donuts from home even though the closest actual store is 3 hours away. Have a gourmet steak from Ruths Chris Steakhouse delivered for that special date night. You become the virtual restaurant. You get the point, but what does this have to do with the equipment market space?
John asked another question back to his experiences:
The cost of running a dealership with yards full of shiny new inventory, bays of technicians, and loads of personnel is huge. They cater to the first owner of a machine, or at least try to convert second or third owners to the first owner.
What if all you want is quality, knowledgeable repair from a technician on your equipment. What would it be like to become the virtual shop for your own equipment? A call to a ghost service department. The ghost service department has access to all the resources, service guides, and technical knowledge. They have access to all the required parts, history and even the forecasted maintenance and care requirements. Like a ghost kitchen they will represent many different brands, and types of equipment without the overhead of a dealership. They will virtually build you a preemptive care program with your equipment, at your location, on your schedule. Like DoorDash, a certified technician will come to you and provide “dealership quality” service at your virtual dealership.
This is only the beginning. Things get even more exciting as you add the fact that this has become a nationwide, or even global service. The data acquired along with what is already available is fed into an AI, (Artificial Intelligence) model that will help ensure your machines are in peak operating condition. Add to that a prescriptive care subscription and rest easy knowing someone else is managing the service of your equipment and making sure its resale value stays as high as possible. Reduce your relationship requirements across equipment types and brands by dealing with ghost services who are experts at repair and not busy trying to upsell you on what a particular OEM has available.
Technicians love the freedom to be independent, do the right thing, being able to maximize their own worth, and build a business without relying on someone else. The ghost service department provides all the infrastructure to them, from technical expertise to parts orders. They can dispatch and respond faster and earn more money and share less. Remember taxis, and what happened when ride sharing exploded? The same is likely to happen with technicians over the next few years. With AI programs like Chat-GPT set to disrupt so much of the traditional workforce, people with manual skills will move quickly to the top of the food chain and use the same technology that put them on top to run the ghost operations. The impact of AI on equipment technicians and mechanics in the future is expected to be significant. AI-powered technology has the potential to automate many routine and repetitive tasks, freeing up technicians and mechanics to focus on more complex and value-added activities. This shift could lead to a higher demand for technicians and mechanics with expertise in using AI-powered technology and specialized knowledge in areas such as equipment maintenance and repair.
Additionally, AI can provide real-time insights and data-driven recommendations, improving the efficiency and accuracy of maintenance and repair operations. With the help of AI, technicians and mechanics can make more informed decisions, reduce downtime, and minimize the need for trial and error.
On the other hand, there is also the possibility that AI could displace some technicians and mechanics, particularly those performing low-skill tasks. It’s important for technicians and mechanics to continuously develop their skills and knowledge to stay ahead of the curve and adapt to the changes brought about by AI.
Overall, the impact of AI on equipment technicians and mechanics will depend on how quickly and effectively they are able to embrace and adopt the technology. By being proactive and embracing new skills and knowledge, technicians and mechanics can ensure that they remain relevant in an increasingly digital world.
The technology is available today and being used by service providers from Pizza Delivery to HVAC technicians and of course your Lyft driver and Uber Eats. Dealerships have always been slow to adapt to change and by the time they look up from their business planning spreadsheet, a ghost tech will already be in the field servicing all brands and building a loyal following. You can dismiss the entire idea as science fiction, but you will be doing so at your own peril. Do not believe me? Try and hail a cab.
Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
Equipment Dealer Technical School Advisory Board Support Plan
Equipment Dealer Technical School Advisory Board Support Plan
Our new guest writer, Ron Wilson has had the honor to work 41 years in the dealer equipment network in roles that included various parts and service management positions. He has spent time in the marketing department creating a data analytics team to utilize various data sources to improve existing and identify new revenue channels. Implemented pricing models that established market-based pricing models in the product support areas. He has expanded a training department’s capabilities to support technical and people skills development that included applying the Kirkpatrick training model and implementing virtual training relating to the technical and people skills development during the pandemic. Introduced dealer classes that qualified for college credit at the community college level and transferred toward a four-year degree program at the local university. His first blog post for Learning Without Scars is a valuable contribution to our Lifelong Learning series: “Equipment Dealer Technical School Advisory Board Support Plan.”
Equipment dealers, other donors, and the various technical schools spend a considerable amount of time, effort, and finances to support the ongoing efforts of education and training relating to our industry. Unfortunately, often the contributions are not properly aligned with providing the best educational environment for the students, and our future employees.
The following information is to provide a guide that will review, identify, and provide focus of the resources that are being provided to the various technical schools. This is only a guide, and does not include all the answers, but does provide directions that will improve the education and knowledge of our industry’s future employees.
Table of Contents for the Technical School Advisory Board Support Plan
Purpose and Roles of Dealer’s Technical School Advisory Board.
Purpose Statement:
The purpose of this guide is to help in the development and management of the relationships with the various schools based on their Career and Technical Education (CTE) programs that are related to the skill sets needed within equipment dealerships. The focus of the support provides a common approach for industry and education to work together to close the gap in skill sets and the number of vacancies in the technician job roles within the dealership.
Advisory Board Roles:
The dealer’s Technical Training Manager is responsible for maintaining a current list of the CTE schools, points of contact, and ongoing relationship with each school based on an individual plan for each school.
Advisory Board Members:
Recommendations of who should serve on the Advisory Board:
Relationship with Each School:
The relationship with each school may vary based on the:
Scheduled Meetings:
Structure of the Dealership’s Technical School Advisory Board.
Role of the equipment dealer’s members of the Technical School Advisory Board:
To define the dealer’s specific training needs and assist in the communication and development of training material that will link the specific schools to the skill level requirements of the equipment dealer’s service operations. The intent is to close the gap on the material being taught in the technical schools’ basic skills, as compared to the needs within the dealership’s shops.
Dealer members will at least include:
Technical School members will at least include:
The technical school’s participation will be critical to assist in the types of support needed for each school. The support provided can range from serving on the school’s advisory board, providing technical material that can be adapted to the school’s curriculum to meet the needs and obtaining classroom aids the schools can utilize within their programs.
Planning, Conducting, and Participating in Technical Schools Advisory Group Meetings/Events.
Planning, conducting, and participating in the technical schools’ advisory meetings/events will fall into three categories:
Assessing the Support to the Technical Schools
Limited Resources- We all have limited resources (time, talents, and dollars), therefore it is critical to focus on areas of positive impact with high results. In an effort to match the needs of the school and the support the dealership can provide a list of criteria, as a guide in defining the type and level of support to be provided to the technical schools.
The criteria will focus on:
An assessment form should be developed to assist in the review of each school. The assessment is only a guide to decisions being made to determine the level of support to a school.
Levels of Involvement With Various Technical Schools
Involvement with the various technical schools may occur through various avenues:
Equipment Dealer’s Industry Involvement in Technical Training
There are several opportunities for dealerships to participate in the development of industry wide skilled technicians by working with the various technical schools. The following are some examples of being involved at an industry level, which may still be combined with a technical school at some level.
Local Trade Associations
National Trade Associations-
SkillsUSA–
Is a partnership. students, teacher. and industries working together to ensure America has a skilled workforce. SkillsUSA empowers its members to become world-class workers, leaders and responsible American citizens. SkillsUSA improves the quality of America’s skilled work force through a structured program of citizenship, leadership, employability, technical and professional skills training. The program enhances the lives and careers of students, instructors and industry representatives as they strive to be champions at work.
SkillsUSA serves more than 300,000 students and instructors annually. The organization has 13,000 school chapters in 54 state and territorial associations. More than 14,500 instructors and administrators are professional members of SkillsUSA.
For information about the national level, visit skillsusa.org
Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
Friday Filosophy v.02.10.2023
Friday Filosophy v.02.10.2023
In Friday Filosophy v.02.10.2023, Ron Slee shares quotes and thoughts for your consideration from the French poet Charles Baudelaire.
Charles Pierre Baudelaire: (9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist, art critic and translator. His poems exhibit mastery in the handling of rhyme and rhythm, contain an exoticism inherited from Romantics, but are based on observations of real life.
Baudelaire was educated in Lyon, where he boarded. At 14, he was described by a classmate as “much more refined and distinguished than any of our fellow pupils…we are bound to one another…by shared tastes and sympathies, the precocious love of fine works of literature.” Baudelaire was erratic in his studies, at times diligent, at other times prone to “idleness”. Later, he attended the Lycée Louis-le-Grand in Paris, studying law, a popular course for those not yet decided on any particular career. He began to frequent prostitutes and may have contracted gonorrhea and syphilis during this period. He also began to run up debts, mostly for clothes. Upon gaining his degree in 1839, he told his brother “I don’t feel I have a vocation for anything.” His stepfather had in mind a career in law or diplomacy, but instead Baudelaire decided to embark upon a literary career. His mother later recalled: “Oh, what grief! If Charles had let himself be guided by his stepfather, his career would have been very different…He would not have left a name in literature, it is true, but we should have been happier, all three of us.”
His stepfather sent him on a voyage to Calcutta, India in 1841 in the hope of ending his dissolute habits. The trip provided strong impressions of the sea, sailing, and exotic ports, that he later employed in his poetry. (Baudelaire later exaggerated his aborted trip to create a legend about his youthful travels and experiences, including “riding on elephants”.) On returning to the taverns of Paris, he began to compose some of the poems of “Les Fleurs du Mal”. At 21, he received a sizable inheritance but squandered much of it within a few years. His family obtained a decree to place his property in trust, which he resented bitterly, at one point arguing that allowing him to fail financially would have been the one sure way of teaching him to keep his finances in order.
Baudelaire became known in artistic circles as a dandy and free-spender, going through much of his inheritance and allowance in a short period of time. During this time, Jeanne Duval became his mistress. She was rejected by his family. His mother thought Duval a “Black Venus” who “tortured him in every way” and drained him of money at every opportunity. Baudelaire made a suicide attempt during this period.
His most famous work, a book of lyric poetry titled Les Fleurs du mal (The Flowers of Evil), expresses the changing nature of beauty in the rapidly industrializing Paris during the mid-19th century. Baudelaire’s highly original style of prose-poetry influenced a whole generation of poets including Paul Verlaine, Arthur Rimbaud and Stéphane Mallarmé, among many others. He is credited with coining the term modernity (modernité) to designate the fleeting, ephemeral experience of life in an urban metropolis, and the responsibility of artistic expression to capture that experience. Marshall Berman has credited Baudelaire as being the first Modernist. Baudelaire is one of the major innovators in French literature. His poetry was influenced by the French romantic poets of the earlier 19th century, although its attention to the formal features of verse connects it more closely to the work of the contemporary “Parnassians”. As for theme and tone, in his works we see the rejection of the belief in the supremacy of nature and the fundamental goodness of man as typically espoused by the romantics and expressed by them in rhetorical, effusive and public voice in favor of a new urban sensibility, an awareness of individual moral complexity, an interest in vice (linked with decadence) and refined sensual and aesthetic pleasures, and the use of urban subject matter, such as the city, the crowd, individual passers-by, all expressed in highly ordered verse, sometimes through a cynical and ironic voice. Formally, the use of sound to create atmosphere, and of “symbols” (images that take on an expanded function within the poem), betray a move towards considering the poem as a self-referential object, an idea further developed by the Symbolists Verlaine and Mallarmé, who acknowledge Baudelaire as a pioneer in this regard.
Beyond his innovations in versification and the theories of symbolism and “correspondences”, an awareness of which is essential to any appreciation of the literary value of his work, aspects of his work that regularly receive much critical discussion include the role of women, the theological direction of his work and his alleged advocacy of “satanism”, his experience of drug-induced states of mind, the figure of the dandy, his stance regarding democracy and its implications for the individual, his response to the spiritual uncertainties of the time, his criticisms of the bourgeois, and his advocacy of modern music and painting (e.g., Wagner, Delacroix). He made Paris the subject of modern poetry. He brought the city’s details to life in the eyes and hearts of his readers.[
The Time is Now.
Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.