Maurilio Amorim

Month: November 2012

  • A Dysfunctional Team? Blame the Boss

    “I just wish my team would get along,” I heard from a leader not long ago. That’s not an uncommon complaint. But the more I learn about organizational health, the more I blame the leader for getting it in such predicament.

    business fight

    In my experience, unrest, infighting among departments or ministries, or divisions within an organization can be traced back to two main factors: lack of clarity and/or organizational culture. And in either case, they are always set from the top down.

    Lack of clarity allows any good idea to be valid. Without a clear and articulable focus for your organization, any good idea is worth fighting for. I have worked with leaders who want to lead by consensus without a clear focus of identity and purpose. It’s a disaster. Usually the person with the strongest personality within the organization gets his or her way while others resent and get frustrated.

    A contentious culture will eventually render the team and the organization ineffective. Long, inflammatory emails with multiple recipients are signs that you are part of a contentious culture. The passive leader who allows for bickering and infighting among his generals creates a culture that those who are not willing to fight for everything they do will not succeed. As a matter of fact, they’ll not stay long. There’s a healthy environment where team members have the right to push back on decisions, but that’s done with respect and welcomed by everyone.

    What’s your experience with either lack of clarity or a contentious culture in your work history?

  • How I Lost Weight During The Holidays

    Last year I actually lost weight during the holidays. It was not a special diet but tweaking my eating habits that allowed me to lose 10 lbs during a time where most people gain 10 lbs. I don’t know about you, but most people come out of the holidays and into the new year broken and bloated.  Conventional wisdom begs the question, “how many pounds can I really gain between Thanksgiving and the new year?” Well, in my experience the answer is 14. Yes.  Once I gained 14 pounds in 14 days. Don’t ask. It was ugly. Last year, however, I decided to see if I could hold my weight in check during the month of parties, baked goods, and eating bonanzas. Not only was I able to keep my weight in check, surprisingly,  I was able to drop 10 lbs during the month of December. Crazy, isn’t it? Here’s how I did it.

    Losing weight during the holidays

    Don’t Stop Working Out. Keep up with your aerobic exercise.  If you aren’t doing it, then get started. I run, cycle, or do both at least 3 times a week. In the northern hemisphere the days are short and the tendency is to skip your workout. Don’t do it. Find a friend and keep each other accountable.

    Exchange a Meal. Replaced one meal per day with a high-protein smoothie. Your body needs the protein and not all the carbs. You’ll be amazed how much better you’ll fee anyway.

    Find Your Best Calorie. Not all treats, parties, or foods are created equal. Good stuff usually has a ton of calories. I’m thinking of one of my favorite appetizers, brie on croute: brie baked in puff pastry with brown sugar and pecans–about a million calories per serving. I didn’t give up the brie, but I also didn’t eat the Velveeta cheese ball or other high-caloric-and-yet-not-very-tasty treats. If I’m going to eat something high in calories and fat, I make sure it’s something I love and that’s not plastic cheese. Go ahead and be a calorie snob.

    Regulate Your Appetite. You’ve always heard not to go grocery shopping on an empty stomach. Well, I sometimes eat something high in protein and low in fat before leaving for a party that I know will feature a lot of tasty but unhealthy options. This way I’m not scarfing down a ton of sausage balls before I even realize it.

    If You Fall, Get Back on the Horse Quickly. I know too many people who upon their first diet “fail” decide that “since I already broke the program, I might as well eat whatever I want.” A few nights ago I was getting some water in the kitchen and found a box filled with goodies from a French bakery. It was late, I was weak, and the box was gone a few minutes later. I felt bad about it but decided that the next day was a new opportunity to do it right. Much like each hole in golf, each day is another opportunity to make good choices, even food choices.

    What’s your best holiday food strategy?

  • Expose Yourself Out of Business

    “We priced it low because we wanted the exposure.” Every young, and even some seasoned entrepreneur can fall on the trap of the “exposure” temptation. In the search for legitimacy and clout, entrepreneurs want to have the recognizable “big fish” names in our portfolios.  After all, that means great PR and lots of new clients, right? Wrong.

    Bankrupt

    There are several traps of  such reasoning:

    It sets the wrong expectations. You will enter an organization at the wrong level. Your first job defines what level of player you are. You do not want to be the “cheap” guy. Trust me on this one.

    It’s not sustainable. Even if your project is successful and the client loves the results, you have set an unrealistic expectation of cost, timelines, and services. When your next bid comes in at twice the price of your first, your new client will balk. “They’re good but not that good.”

    It prevents you from doing your best work. When you’re scraping to get things done, working late hours, and doing things on “the cheap” you cannot do your best. Lacking margins and the budget to get the job done properly will hurt you later. The client will not give you grace because of all the extra effort. More likely they will give you grief for the extras they expected you to do.

    The  law of inversion always applies: The least profitable project has the most demanding client. This happens to me all the time. The project that you are doing mostly as a favor where you have very little or no profit turns out to be the project from hell.  You end up losing money, patience, and your religion by the time the project is finished.

    Next time you feel the urge to lower your prices or compromise on your timeline just to “get in,” think twice. Better yet, don’t do it. If your work is good and you’re worth it, win the business on your strengths and not by creating artificial, unsustainable, unreasonable expectations. That’s often a lose-lose situation

    Have you been burned by trying to take on a project or client in order to can exposure?

  • Start Over or Start Again?

    The appeal of a new beginning to all of us is the opportunity for a “do over,” to wipe the virtual slate clean. But what often happens is quite the opposite. Recently I talked with a friend who is starting over. It’s a complete new start: a new career, a new town, a new perspective in life. My advice to him was simple: make sure you start over and not start again. I think a lot of people miss the point of the start over and find a way to repeat the same mistakes in a different environment, different business, or different relationship. We didn’t learn the lesson we should have learned, so instead of starting over, we start again. It’s just a matter of time before we find ourselves in the same predicament that caused us pain before.
    start over

    But with every start again, the price we pay gets higher. The second start again is often more expensive than the first.  We are older, more cynical, and often less energetic. And in the world of search engines and social networks, a complete fresh start is virtually impossible.

    At one point we all have considered a fresh start. Maybe you’re thinking of a career change, ending a long-term relationship, or even both. But before you pull the plug and pay the price that your new beginning requires, you should do some soul searching. A sober look at how you got so far from where you wanted to be and your part in getting there will help you avoid the next chapter of your life look like the last one only with different characters.

    Have you had a fresh start before? What have you learned from it?

     

  • Know Your Audience and Improvise: A Lesson from a Restaurant Server

    Understanding your audience’s motivation is key in finding opportunities to reach them. That point was driven home a while back during dinner at J. Alexander’s in north Atlanta. Our server, Jimmy, did something I haven’t seen done much lately in a restaurant. He assessed the situation and improvised, getting our gratitude as well as up-selling us another course.

    audience jimmy kibler
    Jimmy Kiblere understands his audience

    As I looked at the description for the sea bass special, the words “puddle of brown butter sauce” got my attention. I told Jimmy I was trying to eat clean and if there were an alternative to my butter dilemma. Shortly after our exchange he asked if we wanted an appetizer. Since our options were fried, cheesy, or fried and cheesy, I declined. Thinking on his feet, literally, Jimmy asked, “What about our seared Ahi tuna appetizer?”

    Interestingly there was not an Ahi tuna appetizer on the menu. “It’s not there, but I can make a special one.” Sold.

    Not only did I feel special and cared for, but Jimmy quickly up-sold me when I was already determined not to have anything that was high in calorie or high in fat and had decided to bypass the first course.

    When you understand your audience’s motivation, in my case eating clean, and improvise to tap into such motivation, the seared tuna with greens, then  you have a win/win combination. I wonder what the growth in sales across the entire J. Alexander’s restaurant chain would be if servers were tuned into their patrons’ motivations, were able to improvise and adjust the menu to offer them what they were really looking for. Not only would the customer satisfaction index go up, the economic impact would be significant, I’m certain.

    How aware are you of your audience? In a world of customization, are you able to improvise to serve your clients and your bottom line?

  • What to Do on a No-Win Business Situation

    One of the toughest lessons I had to learn as a businessman was to identify and successfully deal with a no-win situation. That’s a very difficult situation for an entrepreneur to navigate because most of us are optimists by nature. We want to believe we can rescue the relationship, deliver on our promise,s and save the day. But with experience and better understanding of human behavior, I have come to believe that sometimes the best course of action is to cut your losses and walk away before the hole you find yourself in becomes your grave. No one wants to admit failure and throw in the towel too soon, but here are a few scenarios that if you find yourself in, you should consider walking away.

    no win situation

    Lost trust. Whether one or both side loses trust, it’s time to call it quits. If you cannot trust your partner, an employee, a vendor, or a client, nothing good can come from the ongoing relationship. The day you come to the realization that “I cannot trust that person,” you need an exit strategy. The sooner you do it, the better.

    Unreasonable expectations. High expectations help your product and organization grow to the next level. Unrealistic expectations kill the joy of a project and the spirit of a team, no matter how committed it is. Some clients are unreasonable because they are ignorant of what it takes to get the job done: “it should take you only a few minutes to change the ‘skin’ of our website.”  They can potentially be brought around through education, but they are the exception. Some are unreasonable because they cannot be pleased. “Yes it’s what I wanted but you should have fought me harder on it because I don’t like it now. And you shouldn’t charge me for the changes because I’m not happy.” And then there’s the deadly demanding-ignorant combination, truly a living nightmare.

    Ungrateful taker. Historically, the clients to whom I have given the deepest discounts, often at a financial loss, are usually the ones who demand more and more without much appreciation or understanding for the true value of what they’re getting. It amazes me to see that happen over and over again.

    In business as well as in life, we need to know when to say enough. I use to think that walking away from a client or a project was a sign of weakness, the mark of a quitter. But today it’s the sign of a wise person who knows that not every relationship is salvageable.

    Have you ever faced a no-win situation? What did you do?