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posted on:
2/8/2012 10:51:49 AM EST
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You Are Your Product—Develop It.
tom peters, little big things, in search of excellence, ways to pursue excellence, leadership
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This document is #8 in a series of 48 highlights from Tom Peters' The Little BIG Things: 163 Ways to Pursue Excellence (HarperStudio, 2010). For more information, visit tompeters.com .
SELF
21. You Are Your Product—Develop It.
"The last of human freedoms—the ability to choose one's attitude in a given set of circumstances." —Viktor Frankl, psychologist and Holocaust survivor, on concentration camps
"You must be the change you wish to see in the world."—Gandhi
All you have for sure is your ... attitude. So: Work on it, including, yes, your smile (the smile/warmth was a huge part of Nelson Mandela's success); and shape it. Why:
Energy begets energy.
Wow begets Wow.
Optimism begets Optimism.
Honesty begets honesty.
Caring begets caring.
Listening begets engagement.
Message: LBUAA/Leadership By Unilateral Attitude Adjustment.
22. Job One: Amuse Yourself! You must stay fresh and energized. (If you want to transmit freshness and energy to others—see immediately above.) Hence you must—and most don't in the heat of day-to-day affairs—somehow or other find the time/make the time to re-tool yourself. It's one of my hardest personal tasks—but, perhaps, my most important task.
23. Fitness Power = Staying Power. I'm not playing "health nut" here. I'm playing "attitude nut." Fact is, if you're fit you feel better about yourself which adds to your resilience (especially important in tough times) and is indirectly transmitted to others.
24. Mental Gymnastics, Urgency of. Unless your mind is jerked around, stood upside down, shocked, etc.—you are not growing. If you can't say, a couple of times a week, "I had my mind twisted like a pretzel today," you are sliding down a slippery slope to stale thinking and staleness in general. (Both mind & body must be fit and stretched!)
25. You Are Your Story! So Work on It!
"A key—perhaps the key—to leadership is the effective communication of a story."—Howard Gardner, Leading Minds: An Anatomy of Leadership
He/she who has the best/most compelling/most resonant story wins:
In life!
In business!
In front of the jury!
In front of the congregation!
Few things are more important to moving mountains (or even anthills) than storytelling. You must be an emergent and compelling story—and you must mainly communicate through stories to kindle change.
Your schedule—TODAY—is a short story with a beginning, narrative, end, and memory that lingers on. Your current project is ... an unfolding story about making something better, exciting users, etc. Your organization's raison d'être, and hence its effectiveness, is a story.
FYI: Developing effective storytelling skills is hard work! (But worth it X10.)
26. Develop Your R.POV8—ASAP! Seth Godin says: "If you can't describe your position in eight words or less, you don't have a position." My abbreviation is R.POV8, for Remarkable Point Of View in 8 words or less. In my own case, I beat Seth's requirement by 7! Took us a year+ to "get it right" for the Tom Peters organization—we ended up with a RED (Pantone #032) Exclamation Mark. Fits my last 30 years perfectly—thanks, Seth!
This document is #8 in a series of 48 highlights from Tom Peters' The Little BIG Things: 163 Ways to Pursue Excellence (HarperStudio, 2010). For more information, visit tompeters.com .
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