Courage of Conviction

This past Saturday morning, I woke up at 4:45am so that I could be out the door by 5:30am for my latest training run - 22 miles.

I can’t think of a training run, especially a distance training run, where I haven’t learned something.  What I learned Saturday was the notion of breaking large things down to manageable parts.

Now, I’ve always known that it’s easier to break down a long run into smaller runs - ie - making a 22 mile run the equivalent of two 11 mile runs or two eight mile runs with a seven mile run.  What I learned this Saturday is to break the 22 mile run into even smaller parts.  I broke the run down into a series of one, two and three mile runs.  I would run the distance I was shooting for, maybe a two mile run, and reward myself with a drink of fluid and a short walk of a block to allow my body to rest for a moment.

These short runs are great training for when I am in the “wall-” the time in a marathon when everything hurts and you question why you are doing the marathon at all.  If I can train my body and mind to only worry about doing a one, two, or three mile run at a time, then if I do hit the wall, I only need to worry about going a short distance before I get a break.

See, breaking down a 22 mile training run into a 3, 2, 2, 2, 3, 3, 2, 2, 1, 1 and 1 mile runs is alot easier from a mental perspective.  22 miles is a long distance.  Two or three miles is a nice warm up run.  The perspective is different.  I also come away with more mental energy because I only ran two or three miles at a time as opposed to the accumulated mileage.

Is all of this a slick attempt at fooling myself.  Maybe, but it’s working.  I completed the full run doing a 10 minute pace, which includes rest times.  I know it would have been a slower pace had I focused on the full 22 all at once.

Exit questions:  What big project do you have - what’s your 22 mile project?  How can you break it down to manageable parts?

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So often in life, what we know to be true can only take us so far.  Many times, if we are to go to that next level we are seeking, we have to start thinking differently.

The old saying that sums this up goes something like - What got you to where you are won’t get you to where you are looking to go.

I bring this up this week because over the past week, I’ve observed something interesting - I’ve noticed a huge strain on relationships - personal, professional, etc.  Over the past week I’ve listened to people tell their story of the ending of a marriage, several business partnerships, a strategic partnership, etc.

I know this much, ending a relationship can be difficult, regardless of whether it is personal or professional.  That’s because the people involved have invested time, energy, emotion, and effort into one another.

So often though, people stay in relationships that they have either outgrown or are worse, harmful to them.

My question to you this week is this - examine your relationships - both personal and professional.  What’s working and what’s not?  Which relationships need time and attention and which relationships need to be ended.  What’s your plan of action to move forward?

In business, look at your sales relationships, client relationships, relationships with people you network with, relationships with your co-workers/employees.

In your personal life, look at your relationships with all the people who make an impact on your life - family, spouse, children, parents, etc.  And all the people who you make an impact on - friends, etc.

Strong relationships are important not only because of what they bring, but also because of what they prevent.  Poor relationships cause many forms of stress.   How productive are you at work when you are dealing with a stressful relationship?  I’ll guess that the answer is not very productive.

Confront and resolve those stressful relationships as soon as possible.  In a difficult business environment you need all your focus on being productive, not fretting over a relationship.

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The Republicans are making an effort to remove Bob Barr from the ballot.  They are using Cumberland County GOP chair Vic Stabile as the means by which to do this.  I know know Vic well enough having been a Committeeman in Cumberland County as well as the past chair of the Cumberland County Young Republicans.

My commentary isn’t really about Vic - he’s just doing what the party bosses have asked him to do.

My commentary is directed to the statewide party leadership and the McCain campaign.

First, why on earth would you choose a county chairman that has lost registered Republicans?  Why not go to York or Lancaster, I think they’ve gained registered Republicans.  I’m sure you can find a county somewhere in this state that has gained registered Republicans.  It’s almost like you are trying to throw Stabile under the bus and make him the easy target for criticism.  There’s a lot to be critical of his handling of the county GOP, but gee, do you really need to add to it.  Unless of course he volunteered for the duty, in which he deserves all the criticism.  But again, the “leadership” should have seen the criticism coming.

Second, when I read the article it made me mad.  Then that subsided to sadness.  Sad, because the Republican party in Pennsylvania now reminds me of a patient that has been told he or she has cancer.  Many people don’t know how to handle this information.  Some even get mad at the messenger.  This is similar to the state of the GOP in Pennsylvania.  Reformers have been telling the Republican leadership that it has serious disease and must change its life or else suffer the consequences.  The reformers have told the GOP over and over and over again, yet, like the patient who can’t accept the news, it has lashed out at the messanger, dug in and insisted that it is just fine.

This is sad, because we all see what’s happening, but the patient refuses to accept reality.  At some point the cancer patient who refuses treatment will likely die a slow and painful death - all of which is preventable with appropriate treatment.  But as you know, the longer a sick person waits for treatment, the more difficult the treatment and the less likely the treatment will work.  The same is true for the GOP today.

Third, Lowman Henry’s excellent commentary on this episode is a great example of how the GOP is pushing people away.  Given recent comments by McCain statewide chairman Bob Asher equating conservatives to Nazis and now this push to kick Bob Barr off the ballot, I have come to the conclusion that the leadership of the GOP is not only inept and truly powerless, but also scared.  People who are afraid become angry.  People who are afraid attack.  People who feel they have no control of a situation will do something, even something stupid, in order to get some feeling of control, even if the long term effects of that action create more powerlessness and fear.

The GOP has gone from its humble beginnings founded on an idea that all men are created equal and the cause of abolition of slavery was vitally important to the survival of the nation to a party whose leadership is consumed with power, arrogance, and egotism.  The average registered Republican has sent message after message after message to the leadership, and it has fallen on deaf ears.  Now people are leaving the party who has ignored them and the people in positions of power are afraid and so they must blame someone for their downfall.  People consumed with power, arrogance and egotism are blind to the fact that it was they themselves who brought about their own downfall.

Fourth, the way to win votes is not by eliminating options as Stabile proposes to do, but rather win over hearts and mind in support of ideas and people.  Scaring people into voting for your candidate is a poor strategy.  Once the fear is gone, people have no reason to stay with you and often resent you for putting them in fear.

Lastly, I’d like to offer some free advice to the McCain campaign.  Any regular reader of this blog knows that I’m not a supporter of John McCain.  The remote possibility that I will vote for him on election day keeps getting smaller and smaller by the day because of people associated with Mr. McCain’s campaign.  I’m still waiting to hear a good reason why I should vote for John McCain beyond the “lesser of two evils” argument.  If that’s the best you’ve got, you might as well quit your campaign now.  Please understand that I’ve heard and seen plenty of reasons to vote against McCain.  They far outweigh the positives for me.  I’d really like to see a presidential candidate who has leadership ability.  I don’t even have to agree with this person on issues.  Right now I don’t see leadership from either of the two major candidates.  One leaves a trail of organizations that fall apart after he leaves and who has to re-re-re-re-relaunch campaigns and the other is a state senator running for President who supposedly has great oratory skills, but somehow I’m not impressed.

It’s as if neither of these two want my vote - they are both making it easy for me to vote for a third party candidate or write someone in on election day for President.  How sad.

Our oldest daughter, Emma, will be entering Kindergarten this year.  This past Friday, I took her over to school for bus orientation.  This is the time when all the new Kindergartners have an opportunity to practice getting on and off the bus, how to sit on the bus, learn about bus safety, etc.  The parents even had the opportunity to take a short bus ride with the new students.  In all, it’s a very nice program a few weeks before school starts.

Couple this with Kindergarten registration last month and a couple of other events and it makes the transition to school much smoother for the children so that by the time school is in full swing, they already have some level of comfort.

I tell you this because how often do we throw our coworkers, employees, our customers and clients, or even ourselves right into the mix of what’s going on.  You wouldn’t go out for a 10 mile run without warming up would you?  You wouldn’t just drop your children off at school the first day without even knowing their teacher’s name would you?  Yet how often do we skip the “warm up” for work?  Maybe it’s a project or something for a client.  If we don’t provide some kind of guidance for the people who will do the work, why should we expect that person to do what we want perfectly?  Guidance doesn’t mean micromanagement, it could be as simple as taking 5 minutes to show someone what you are really looking for, or assisting them for a few minutes until they get the hang of it, or even taking the time to lay out a standard operating procedure that someone can follow.

Take a moment and think about some of the recent projects in your business.  Did you do any “warm-ups” with the people who were doing the work?  What could you have done?  What would have made the project gone better?  How about for yourself - what warm-ups are you doing?  Are you planning out what exactly you will be doing, or are you flying by the seat of your pants?  Which way do you think you’ll get better results with?

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In a weak economy, businesses need to ask themselves some tough questions - like what are we selling?  And no, you don’t get credit for the simple answer of naming your product or service.  Those are just means to an end.  So the question is really, what are you really selling?  Are you a widget, or are you selling something that will save people time or money that will allow them to spend more time being profitable, more time with family, etc.  Here’s a couple of paragraphs from the full article I did on this topic:

One of the differences between a business that is thriving in hard economic times versus one that is struggling is this - the thriving company has made themselves recession-proof by focusing on value.

In other words, companies that see their product or service as just a commodity will continue to suffer.  Companies that see their product or service as adding value to their customers businesses and lives are thriving.  In a weak economy people are spending money on products and services that help them solve a problem, relieve a pain, or add value to their businesses or lives.

So what are you selling?

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