Where’s Your Trumpet?

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I recently came across an aphorism of John Maxwell's (Attitude 101 from Nelson Business) who said “life is about 10% of what happens to you and 90% of how you react.”

One obvious implication is that if we choose to react less we will create more room for those things that happen to us. By choosing the events we want to notice we can respond in a considered manner with an outcome in mind, rather than being pulled hither and thither by our emotions in an uncontrolled way affected by random occurrences.

So far so good, but we also need to recognize that our life is often taken up with more than what happens. How much of life is worrying about things that will never happen? John Maxwell seems to have left that out of his reckoning.

Bob Proctor offers the following as an educated guess about the things that worry people:

Things that never happen – 40%;
Things past that can’t be changed by all the worry in the world – 30%;
Needless worries about our health – 12%;
Petty miscellaneous worries – 10%;
Real, legitimate worries – 8%.

And Sir Winston Churchill reminded us of the old man who said on his deathbed that he’d had a lot of trouble in his life, most of which never happened.

Evolution has favoured those people that accentuate the negative. Individuals who vividly recall their previous unhappy experience – or more likely someone else’s – with poisonous toadstools, or an angry grizzly bear is more likely to survive and reproduce successfully.

Consequently, ask anyone to recall the events of the day and they will more easily and more frequently recall the bad happenings than the good. The traffic jam, the delayed train, the stressful meeting, the missed lunch, the extra workload, the broken promises will all figure more prominently and with greater precedence than the safe arrival, the word of appreciation, the delicious dinner and the expectations fulfilled.

Similarly, when asked to list their notable traits most people will denigrate themselves rather than risk blowing their own trumpet. We have been trained to focus much more on our shortcomings than on our virtues.

Evolution is not the only culprit. Home and, in particular, schooling has played a large part. We will probably all recall (there it goes again) the “must try harder” on our report card, what subject it was and who taught that class.

I believe schools could learn much from the adult world, if only they would let themselves learn.

When Andy Murray is practising he is not directed to another sport where his talents are less evident. Steve Gerard is not asked to “try harder” with his goal-keeping. Vanessa-Mae is not admonished to brush up her trombone playing.

When working with my clients we both seek ways to capitalize on their manifest abilities and morph that success into equally promising areas. We do not seek to change a tap washer if the boat is holed below the waterline.

In cataloguing our own qualities it would pay greater dividends, more often, by investing where the returns are already shown to be good, than in wasting time, effort and money reinforcing failure.

We all have different talents and different levels of talent. Maximize your personal returns and give others the scope to maximize theirs by delegating what you are not so good at, or do not enjoy as much.

In international trade it’s known as comparative advantage.

Valuing People

What species of thinking produces an expression like ‘Human Capital Management & Measurement’ and then holds a conference that devotes a whole day to the subject? To me such terminology displays arrogance in those that use it and portrays disdain for those about whom it is used.

As professionals let us be clear: 'capital' is the money or other assets owned by a company. Judicious use of such assets helps to keep it in business. 'Capital Assets' are the plant and machinery owned by the company and used in producing goods. As much as some directors and senior managers may like to think otherwise a company does not own the people who choose to work for it.

In no sense can people be counted as capital!!

Some companies, perhaps the same companies, do have the habit of referring to people as ‘assets’ or ‘resources’. Again, assets are property; people are not. The staff may have certain qualities which yield benefits to the firm (why else would they be employed? Duh!), but the qualities belong to the people, not the firm. I await the day - not holding my breathe - when a firm says, “the people who work for us did a great job last year, but there is no guarantee they will stay with us and no certainty they will remain as capable when circumstances change.”

And where ‘Human…Management’ is concerned, the best response is Steven Covey's: “You cannot manage people - you can only manage tasks. People must be led.” Inevitably, I can only doubt the capacity to lead of anyone who refers to the people on whom they depend in terms more suited to inanimate, unfeeling objects.

The same conference boasted of "developing both a talent management strategy and… effective measures of [an] organisation's human talent." Good grief.

Even if talent could be measured (how talented was Mozart? Was that an 8.7 or a 9.3?) just what particular talent - note the singular - will your business need most tomorrow? Or in 12 months time?

Do two people with the same talent double your talent score, or leave it unchanged?

Is a talented pianist worth two talented footballers, or can I swap six talented accountants for one talented plumber? And, as Network Rail struggle to complete their west coast mainline engineering works, what price talented engineers? Several million pounds I would judge, based on the £2.4 million it had to pay in 2007 for failing to complete work on a project in Portsmouth on time.

The terms we use to refer to others shape our attitudes and influence our thinking. Words are not neutral. As a professional I hope I do not treat those I work with in such a callous and cavalier fashion. People respond better and feel more motivated when they are acknowledged and recognised for the all qualities they have, rather than being taken for granted, sucked dry and then carelessly discarded when no longer of use.

If we wish to get the most from our people we must treat them as people. On the other hand, should you happen to work for an organisation that subscribes to this stack ’em, rack ’em and sack ’em approach, please put on a pair of trainers…and run like hell.