Growing and Growing

For career development … Cordell Parvin is a fellow Richmond Spider (…although a few years before me…) and former construction attorney. I came across Cordell’s name about 6-7 years ago when I was contemplating a move to Dallas, Texas and I reached out to fellow law school alums. While that venture did not turn out, I have kept in touch with Cordell regularly through his books, blog, and Tweets. While you can find a lot by browsing his blog, my favorite year-end posts include:

• Why You Should Create a 2010 Plan … Cordell has a webinar on this topic today.
• Practical Tips on How to Do Year End Planning
• And today’s post about Planning at the 50,000 Foot Level

For balancing family and career and life … sure you have your Zig Ziglar’s, your John Maxwell’s, and even your Rick Warren’s … but my favorite, local, “living-life-right” model is Nashville’s own Michael Hyatt, CEO of Thomas Nelson Publishing. I first started following Michael’s blog, Leading with Purpose, at the beginning of this year when I revved up my career planning and life assessment. Michael is a model husband-father-businessman-leader, who Tweets about leadership and life. Here are a few of my favorite posts, including the year-end assessment:

• Seven Questions to Ask about Last Year … the Year Ahead post is expected soon.
• Five Characteristics of Weak Leaders, which gives you a look at how not to lead.
• Two Approaches to Influencing the Family … notice that Michael likes numbers!

For sheer motivation … speaker and author Andy Andrew challenges you to evaluate the importance of halftime. As for me, this week is my “halftime” moment and the second half is about to begin. The year 2010 presents some great opportunities for my career, my family, my community and my church. How about you? I know. I have lived them, too. The past few years have been tough. But the best years lie ahead.

What are you going to do to make 2010 different? … or better yet … What are you going to do to make a difference in 2010?

One of my favorite leadership gurus, Michael Hyatt (CEO of Thomas Nelson Publishing) posted a few good recommendations a couple months ago about using templates for greater efficiency. Michael wrote:

For years, I have used the concept of “templating” to improve my productivity. The idea is that you create a template for any task that you find yourself doing repeatedly. So instead of “reinventing the wheel” every time, you do it once, save it as a template, and then reuse it.

Michael described the way he processes the hundreds of emails in his in-box, including the use of templates to respond to personal meeting requests, book proposal requests, customer complaints, media inquiries and many others.

If you just stop reading here, you can walk away with a grand nugget of wisdom on how templates can improve your overall efficiency. However, I was thinking this morning about using templates for adversity … or for emergencies … or for conflict … or for any behavioral pattern that you experience. For example, there is a conflict in our house called “pre-teen attitude” that usually emits from my 11-yr old daughter and that often causes shortness or frustration in my words. Like the emails Michael talks about, I find that this situation is occurring repeatedly. Enter the template, where I plan for these events and map out my response. In this particular example, I am learning to not escalate the exchange of words with my daughter, but instead respond with a game plan.

Honey, I tell her, you know your mom and I do not allow that tone and disrespect in our house. Please go up to your room and come back when you are ready to talk in a better manner.

Of course, I meet resistance: But, Dad, I didn’t do anything wrong!

And, of course, I have prepared my response because this has happened before. Please go up to your room and we will talk later.

Almost every time that we have talked after the cool down period, we get to the heart of the problem. I can also say that almost every time that I don’t use my template for “pre-teen attitude,” we never get to the heart of the problem. Here are some tips for using templates for adversity:

1. Write out the top five events that occur repeatedly. These can include instances when you lose your cool, times when you get frustrated, or even those events that you know will occur often, such as getting ready for church on Sunday mornings. A few of mine include: (a) my children talk with disrespect to us; (b) my relationship with my wife is challenged when we are apart; and (c) my children have a strange attraction to emergency rooms.
2. For each event, write out the traditional behavioral pattern due to lack of planning. For instance, in my examples above, the events are generally riddled with either anger, frustration or anxiety if we don’t follow a plan.
3. Finally, create a new template for your adversities. This is often the easiest and the hardest part. It is easy because you often know what doesn’t work … that is, how you traditionally respond to the situation does not work. It is hard because it really takes some thinking and it may take you a few drafts before you get it right.

Since my children are prone to accident (… or perhaps it is because I have so many children …), we inevitably will spend one day in the emergency room or medical clinic every few months. If it is a cut, scrape, bleeding a little, cough, or puke, then my wife “may” call on the way to the doctor and I “may” meet them. If it is broken, bleeding a lot, or not breathing, then my wife drops the other kids at my parent’s house, she “will” call me, and I “will” meet her wherever. By preparing for these events, we save a lot of heart ache and hurtful words.

In what areas can templates improve your life?