Might as well ...

A few years ago, I wrote a blogpost entitled "Tripod" about how a friend believed that the ability to have fun was like a three legged stool.  In order to make the stool stand (have fun) you needed to have creativity, spontaneity, and a positive cash flow.

This last weekend, I met a group of gentlemen who taught me the next verse: "Might as well ..."

Last Friday through Sunday, I had the good fortune to attend a weekend of training around the woodworking skills.  Weekend with Wood was sponsored by Wood magazine and the venue was at Meredith Corporation. I'm not sure of the final numbers, but it seemed as though there were about 500 people in attendance  We had the opportunity to enroll in six different classes with instructors and professionals brought in to help us learn or hone our skills.

Tommy Mac, the host of Rough Cut Woodworking on PBS, spoke after Saturday night's dinner.  The food and presentation were all great, but the group of men I ended up sitting with made the evening so much more fun.  This "gang" of guys were from Michigan and it was obvious that they have known each other for a lifetime.  In the group there is a doctor, and artist, a contractor, and an engineer.  One of the group had won, as a door prize, a week at the Marc Adams School of Woodworking, probably a $750 value without travel. While they were sitting at dinner, these men decided that it was unacceptable for one to go to this class without the others.  It made perfect sense. I'd already discovered that the four of them came to the event together in a motor home that one of them owned.

Then came the problem.  One of the four announced there was no way he could afford the piece of equipment that he had purchased at the event AND go to the woodworking school.  Just for clarity, what he had purchased was a Wood-Mizer - a portable gas powered band saw. It allows someone to turn logs into lumber and they probably costs in excess of $20,000.

The response from the group?  "Might as well ..."

Now, this is where I had to jump in and ask questions.  It was obvious that they all knew exactly what had just been said, but as an outsider, I was baffled.  The group explained to me that if ever, as a group, there was a real question as to if they should do something, it always came down to this phrase.  In their own shorthand they were saying that life is too short to not do the things that bring you joy and happiness.

It is so interesting that I had landed with this group, because in my own way, that's why I was at the event. When I had first seen advertising for the weekend, I'd thought how great the weekend would be. But because I always have trouble with the "cash flow" part of the tripod, I'd decided that I would not do it. Then, many different things happened and people pushed me to go. I also had a little cash come in that wasn't completely spoken for. Without even realizing it, I had landed at "Might as well ..." and ended up at the event to meet the guys who were able to explain it all to me.  Is it not just amazing the way the universe works sometimes?

Okay, just a little more about the weekend and the overall serendipity of it all.  First, I am still nowhere close to attempting to build chairs.  They are just too tough and have way too many angles to them.  Additionally, you have to come up with a way to scoop out the seat to make them really comfortable.  Beyond that, however, I learned all sorts of new tablesaw and bandsaw techniques. I even came to believe that I should look at a SawStop brand saw somewhere along the line.  And with all of the giveaways that Meredith Corporation had for us, at the end of the day I had received more than I paid out for the event.  Wow, just wow.

So, for any of you who are woodworkers, you need to go back and find out information about this year's event and then plan to be there next year.  You will not regret it.

Give Me a Number

As many of you know, I spent a couple of decades working for Payless Cashways.  For those of you that don't know what Payless was (it's been a while now), it was a retail lumber company that competed with Lowe's, Home Depot, & Menards.  At this point, I guess that I should say "tried to compete", but that's another story.  Anyway, I had the privilege of working with one of the finest group of leaders that I've ever seen assembled.  The group that I am speaking of was the store managers in the Midwest region.  This group was energetic, smart, and driven to succeed - all of the attributes that really differentiate good leaders from those who are challenged to be the best.

When I worked with this group, I had an opportunity to learn a lesson that I've never forgotten.  It came from our Regional VP.  At one point he told me that if he wanted results from our group, all he needed to do was figure out how to attach a number to whatever project we were working on and then generate a list showing how we all did.  From that point forward, all that he needed to do was sit back and watch the fun.  This was long before the days of discussions about metrics and driving the business through the numbers. Dave knew instinctively that this would work with the group in front of him.  And wow, did it.  Whether we were looking at the number of credit cards that we put in customers' hands, or the footage of woven wire fence that we sold, we would compete to be at the top of the list.  On the other end, we would do darn near anything to stay off the bottom of the list.

I have discovered that this works on virtually everything.  Here are a couple of examples.  About 18 months ago I decided to get serious about losing weight ... again.  But this time, as part of what I was doing, charting my progress became part of the ritual.  At this point I have lost over 17% of the weight I began with and I will tell you that one of the reasons that I was able to do it was because each and every day, I want to see the number on the chart get better.  I know that there are some people that this would not motivate, but for me it is a big thing.

When it comes to motivating others, I ran across a great example just last week.  Many of you know that one of the organizations that my family supports YESS (Youth Emergency Service & Shelter).  They are a great organization - taking care of kids who really need help.  Each year their largest fund raiser is an event that will occur this weekend.  They take several (45,000) small rubber ducks and float them down a body of water.  The winning duck, or actually their owner, wins prizes.  Anyway, back to the important part of the story.  All of these rubber ducks need to have numbered tags placed on the bottom of them.  For the second year, DMB Supply agreed to tag ducks at our location.  Last year we tagged 5,000 ducks and it took about three and a half hours.  This year, we tagged 6,000 ducks and we did it in only two hours.  What was the difference?  We had a baseline from last year.  We knew what we had been able to do and everyone jumped in to make it better this year.  And of course, I was in the middle, acting like a cheerleader, letting everyone know how we were doing.  Next year who knows; maybe 8,000 in two and a half hours or 10,000 in three?  We will have to see.

I really enjoy the fact that we are living in a time that there can be numbers attached to virtually everything.  Weight loss, ducks tagged, the list is virtually limitless.  But one of the things that is so important in this is that there needs to be someone that makes hitting the number important, and probably even more-so, makes everyone know that doing it is possible.  This really helps to bring the best to the top in almost all groups of people.

Management textbooks used to talk a lot about Theory X & Theory Y.  Although I do not remember which is which, one of them asserted that people were generally good and would try to do their best.  The other believed that people generally had to be pushed to get them to do anything.  It was the proverbial stick vs. carrot argument.  Do you lead a person to the right place, or do you have to drive them there.  I clearly believe that it is about leading them there.  That is how Dave managed the group of Payless store managers. Last week when we were tagging ducks, it was all about talking to people about what they could do.  Give them a graph that shows where they are and show them what direction "better" is, and I know they will rise to the occasion.  If you don't work this way, try it, you may be surprised. If you do, keep after it.