People fall into one or two categories when it comes to personal development. One group sees PD as an expense while others view upleveling their performance as an investment.
In which camp have you staked your tent?
Ironically, the most successful people I know, consistently invest in their personal development. It’s not a one time deal. In fact, they feel empty when not working on their endgame.
I provide complimentary consultations to prospective business and career transition clients to understand if we’re a good fit for each other.
My process, unveils their endgame, what happens when they arrive at the finish line, what achieving their endgame will do for them both personally and professionally, and what it’s costing them to continue to live in their old life and simply exist in the land of -status quo.- Oh btw, all in their own words.
For the majority of these prospective clients, those who decide not to put the car in drive and move towards their endgame do so because they view coaching, personal development, etc. as an expense.
Why?
One common reason is deep down, they don’t believe they have the discipline to do what it takes to go after what they want. They just don’t want it bad enough.
So they say to themselves, “I’ll only be flushing this cash down the toilet. Why bother.”
We all have doubts in our abilities. A coach can help you sort through your monkey mind chatter and go for it vs. listening to that little voice that says “If I were you, I’d turn around and go back.”
Invariably, the common response from clients once our partnership begins to show even the slightest bit of traction is: “I wish I would have hired you sooner.”
Today’s guest post is courtesy of Steve Keating (CME, CSE,) Selling Skills Manager for Toro Company.
The one line that stood out for me in Steve’s post was:
Leaders see people as an investment, not an expense.
Leaders are learners. Leaders invest in growth. The best leaders exemplify and model success.
Are you a leader?
If you are, take that difficult first step.
Hop into the car, turn the key, put that baby in first, and schedule a consultation where we’ll begin to create a road map to get where you want to go, quicker.
Vroom vroom!!!
Enjoy another brilliant post by my virtual friend, Steve Keating.
When To Stop Investing In People – by Steve Keating
I frequently speak with groups on the topic of leadership. Sometimes the groups are just too large to have a real two-way conversation but once in a while they are small enough to allow for a real dialogue to take place. Those are my favorite presentations.
Last week was one of those smaller interactions. One of the questions I received was as serious, challenging and complicated as a question can get.
The question came during a segment in which I was speaking about the difference between a management mindset and the mindset of a leader. A management mindset thinks “I have a person working for me who isn’t getting the job done. I better spend some time on them.” A leadership mindset thinks, “I have a person working with me who isn’t getting the job done, I better invest some time with them.”
Leaders see people as an investment, not an expense.
Let’s be clear on this, leadership is about people. We don’t lead companies, we don’t lead budgets, we don’t lead buildings or inventories, we manage them. We lead people!
People don’t want to be managed, they want leadership. You’ll hear people complain every single day about being micro-managed but you’ve probably never heard a person say the word, micro-led.
Leaders invest their time, experience, knowledge and even a piece of themselves in the development of their people. The success of their people is as important to them as their own success. If their people fail they take at least partial ownership in that failure.
But…
There does come a time when a leader has done all that they can do and still one of their people is just not progressing. Investing in people is much more complicated than any other investment, there is much more at stake. But just like any other investment that doesn’t work out, at some point in time you just have to cut your losses.
The question I was asked was, “When is it time to stop investing in a person and let them go?”
THAT is one big question. I hate failing at anything, I hate failing with people development even more. I’m supposed to be good at it, I’m supposed to help people perform better. When I don’t then I’ve failed. So the decision to stop investing is a big one… but it’s not a hard one.
Here’s how I answered the question.
I stop investing when the good of the one begins to outweigh the good of the many. Simply stated, when the time required to help just one person grow begins to negatively impact and limit the amount of time I can invest with the rest of the team, I have to stop investing in the “one.”
This is particularly true when there seems to be little or no return on that investment. No leader can sacrifice the “many” for the “one.”
Letting someone go, demoting them or reassigning them is a terrible decision to have to make, but leaders make that decision. Leaders do not let their ego get in the way, they admit, that for whatever reason, this is “one” they just can’t help develop.
Leaders do what needs to be done, that’s one way, one very big way, that you can tell they are a leader.
When I was at Verizon, I was very fortunate to receive a lot of amazing professional development. Now as an entrepreneur having to pay for this myself, I still continue to invest deeply. I KNOW I see payoffs in the growth of my business.
Karin, it doesn’t surprise me you’re a personal development lifer! 🙂
Odd as it might seem I’m big on personal development. I haven’t hired a coach but I read a lot of books and articles and work on it that way. Someday I may go the other route… I just have to work on my trust issues a bit more.
Everything you’re doing Mitch is part of PD.
Trust? What do you mean?
You know me, I usually make people earn my trust. So, going to someone like this without making them earn my trust in them first… that would be a major change for me, one that I might have problems overcoming initially…