Horizon Point Consulting

Category: Personal Development

We all need a little personal development mixed in with our professional and career development. Read blogs in this category for stories and best practices for personal wellness and wellbeing, skills improvement, and  more.

  • How to Serve at Work (and at Home)

    How to Serve at Work (and at Home)

    The sink is piled high with dishes. The trash is overflowing. Laundry hasn’t been done in days. The baby is crying, and the third grader needs help with homework.  

    And my husband is playing Xbox. 

    I don’t want to have to ask for help, I want him to notice I need help and do it. 

    My urge for him to read my mind and miraculously unload the dishes and clean out the sink without me having to ask is temporarily outweighed by how bad the dishes piled up are bothering me. 

    “Could you empty the dishwasher and reload it, please?” I ask.

    “In a little bit.”  he says. 

    But it’s bothering me so bad, I do it myself.  I want it done NOW, not in a “little bit” whatever that means, which could be next year as far as I’m concerned.  

    And I seethe in resentment. Can he not SEE clearly that I need help? I don’t want to have to ask. I want him to want to serve me and our household by just doing what needs to be done.  

    Acts of Service is not my primary love language (quality time is), but it is my second.   Short of spending quality time with me, I want you to help me.  I think this may have something to do with the phase of life I find myself in when demands of home and work are intense all at once. 

    My husband has no need for acts of service as a love language.  He wants to do things his own way on his own time, so he rarely recognizes the need for acts of service. Hence him also wanting to do the dishes “in a little bit.” 

    But this example points to the fact that there are good and bad ways to serve others.  And “bad” ways are actually worse than not serving at all. 

    First, people who don’t value acts of service don’t want you to “help” them.  They want you to let them do it themselves. So, there’s that.  Resist the urge to serve when offering a “How can I help you?” leads them to think you think they are incompetent or incapable.  Or when they have such a need for control in how things get done, they want to do it themselves.

    For those that do want acts of service,  The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace suggests asking the following questions:

    1. What would be helpful to you?  In my example, the dishwasher unloaded and the sink cleaned out and a reloaded dishwasher, please. Then you can tackle third-grade homework, thank you. 
    2. How would you like the task(s) done?  Lord help me if my husband doesn’t know how to load and unload the dishwasher.  He does, and my issue isn’t so much how I want it done (although in other cases that might really matter) it is when I want it done….
    3. When would be the best time to help? NOW please, just now.  

    As the book states, “When we demonstrate that we are willing to help our colleagues in the ways most beneficial to them, rather than what is convenient for us, we communicate that we value and respect them (and how they do things).”

    I have a colleague whose primary love language is acts of service. She is constantly serving others at home and at work, so my guess is this is what she values because 75% of people predominantly speak the love language they want to receive.  

    I think I’ve often neglected to serve her by asking these questions because she is so quick to do it before me.  For example, we all work remotely, so we don’t have a common place where we meet or keep office items.  Therefore, it is not uncommon for us to need to get physical items to each other, such as documents that need to be signed, tools for training, or something to take to a client. She is always first to offer to bring it to me. Whether it is convenient for her or not. 

    I need to do better in serving her by asking, “When and where would be helpful for you for us to exchange these items?” and go get them from her when and where it is best for her, not for me. 

    By paying attention to how people want to be served through how they serve others, and by doing it their way, not ours, we demonstrate that we know how to appreciate others that value acts of service. 

    How can people best serve you at home and at the office?

     

    Disclaimer:  I kinda threw my husband under the bus in this story.  This is a true story, but the bigger truth is that nine times out of ten he is super helpful and servant oriented.  I’ve seen marriages unravel because of controlling wives (or husbands) who want all things done their way, on their time, and as my husband says, expects their spouse to always be able to read their minds.  When they don’t read their mind, they then stew in resentment for days or weeks.  This isn’t the extreme I’m pointing to either. We’d be best at home and at work to look for ways to serve each other realizing that part of that service is doing things how and when the person we are trying to serve wants it done.  But sometimes, serving also means realizing that giving someone a minute to play Xbox (or whatever mindless activity they need at the moment) when they’ve had a long day at work is an act of service too. 

  • 4 Ways to Apply Quality Time at Work

    4 Ways to Apply Quality Time at Work

    “Would you rather me 1) give you a high five or 2) work on a puzzle with you?” I asked my five and nine-year-old over the holiday break.  

    It was one set of about twenty force choice questions from the Five Love Languages for Kids quiz I was giving them in order to explore how my husband and I can continue to be mindful of how we can best customize our parenting to each child. 

    Both easily answered, “Work on a puzzle with you.” 

    The Love Languages quiz started in romantic relationships and describes five primary love languages: 

    1. Physical Touch
    2. Receiving Gifts
    3. Words of Affirmation
    4. Quality Time
    5. Acts of Service

    It helps us to build self-awareness of how we like to give and receive love.  

    We continued through the questions and discovered that both our children’s primary love language is quality time. 

    My husband stumbled into the quiz with the kids, so he and I also both took the couple’s quiz. Turns out, both of our primary love languages is also quality time. 

    So being mindful of this, we have started family night on Friday evenings which consists of making homemade pizza or some other simple meal together, eating, and either playing a game or watching a movie together.  We are trying to be mindful of how to give and receive love in a way that is meaningful, and we are fortunate that we all have the same primary love language. 

    Turns out love languages are also applicable in the workplace.  The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace and the corresponding Motivating by Appreciation (MBA) Inventory assessment help colleagues better understand how to customize appreciation towards others in order to build successful and empowering relationships at work. 

    Quality time may be your language of appreciation, but at work, it doesn’t have to be expressed through pizza and game night, and that isn’t actually how most people at work want or need it to be expressed.  

    From the book, “Our research indicates…. The employee simply wants to feel that what they are doing is significant and that their supervisor values their contribution.  Taking a few minutes to check-in and hear how things are going communicates genuine expression of interest in what they are doing and makes them feel valued.” 

    So if you are a supervisor or colleague is someone who values quality time, how do you express this at work?  Here are four ways to express quality time, grounded in realizing that by giving away time, you are giving away your most precious resource.  And your time is not about proximity to someone but about personal attention. 

    1. Focused attention:  On our first family game night, I started cleaning up the kitchen about ten minutes into the game while my husband was resisting the urge to look at his phone.  This new “tradition” wasn’t going to be successful if we didn’t focus all of our attention on it, and our kids quickly reminded us of this. “Mom, it’s your turn. Why are you cleaning up now?” they asked.   

    If we want to be good at giving quality time, we have to focus our attention on specifically that.  Stop multitasking, give undivided attention, and listen to give away true quality time.

    2. Quality conversation: The book states that this is “dialogue in which two individuals are sharing their thoughts, feelings and desires in a friendly, uninterrupted context.”  This is why and where regular one-on-ones with those you manage are so important.  And this means your one-on-ones have to comply with number one above- focused attention.   Your phone, email, etc. should be put up during quality conversations.  

    Quality conversation requires empathetic listening by maintaining eye contact, resisting the urge to interrupt, listening for feelings and thoughts, observing body language and affirming feelings even if you disagree with their conclusions. 

    It also requires asking good questions.  Even though we don’t have a game or movie night every day of the week with our kids, we do try to sit down as a family for dinner most nights of the week.  Quality conversation is started by everyone having to answer three questions: 1) What was your high of the day? 2) What was your low of the day? and 3) What is your hope for tomorrow?  This has led to meaningful dialogue and a better understanding of each other. 

    3. Shared Experiences: Connecting inside and outside of work through shared experiences is an important way to express quality time.  Research by the authors of the book indicates that “men whose primary appreciation language is quality time often prefer to share experiences as opposed to sit-down conversations.”  A round of golf anyone? 

    We have quarterly planning meetings as a team at Horizon Point, which usually involves a full day of sitting around a table focusing attention and engaging in quality conversation to plan for the next three months.  I decided to begin 2020 by adding the element of the shared experience to this. We took the first part of our meeting where we shared our 2019 accomplishments and brainstormed on goals for a walk on the Wheeler Wildlife Refuge. The Sandhill Cranes are out in full force this time of year, and it was great to get outside with everyone and experience something together.   

     

    4. Working collegially with coworkers on a task and small group dialogue.  “Research shows that millennials and even Gen-Xers highly value working collaboratively with others,” states the book.   Working in groups is a way to engage learning and small group dialogue along with it helps to generate ideas and suggestions in a way that may help people feel less intimidated than by sharing one-on-one thoughts with their supervisor. 

    The key to applying love languages of appreciation at work is to make it personal.  By tuning in to what people need and giving them that- as opposed to what we need or what is easiest to give or what we can give in one blanketed way to everyone all at once- is the best way to show appreciation and motivate towards positive results. 

     

    How do you want to be appreciated at work? 

  • It is What It Is, or Is It? How to Shift from a Fixed to Growth Mindset

    It is What It Is, or Is It? How to Shift from a Fixed to Growth Mindset

    “I can’t turn little Johnny into a Stanford bound student,” said one school principal when I was meeting with him.  “These parents expect us to take a B or C student with a 21 on the ACT and create Ivy League individuals. I get all the hype about growth mindset,” he said. “It is everywhere in my world, but the truth is, I can’t take your five-foot-nothing kid that can’t jump and turn him into Michael Jordan no matter what I do.”

    I get it. Some goals are realistic and some are just delusional. He was quite funny sharing these thoughts, and although I agree with his point, I think he’s missed the point about what growth mindset really is.

    What is it, anyway?  As we wrote about in a previous post, growth mindset is “the idea that skills and abilities can be improved, and the development of skills and abilities is the goal of the work you do.”

    One of my husband’s favorite phrases is, “It is what it is.” It’s his catch-all response when he wants to bring my glass half full mindset down to earth or when I blame myself for things not being better than they are whether it be our kids’ behavior or my progress on tackling a task and getting it done.  It’s his way to try to tell me that things (or people) don’t change, so don’t worry yourself over it.  It is what it is.

    It is a classic fixed mindset thinking. Thinking that says we are born a certain way and we can’t get better or worse at much. We are what we are. Our behavior is what it is.

    But is it? Can we change things through our mindset?

    In the War for Kindness, the author asks the same questions about what most people see as a fixed trait- empathy.  Many of the things that govern our behavior we see as traits, he says, things that are relatively fixed over time and situations.  But he argues that most things are actually skills instead of traits.  Things we can practice and get better at doing and feeling. Even empathy. We can apply principles and practices to strive to be more empathetic and when we do, we become kinder individuals. Doing the practice is the focus.

    We’d be well served in education and in the workplace to realize this.

    So how do we do this? First, we can think, “If this, now what?” in our thoughts and questions, changing our mindset from a fixed one to one focused on growth. And as leaders, we need to do this and model it in order for others to do it too.

    For example, “I don’t really like to do business development. I don’t know how to do it and I’m not good at it,” is a fixed mindset approach.

    You may honestly not like to do business development work. It may not come naturally to you, so it’s hard. But is it what is? Do you leave it at that?

    A growth mindset, by contrast, would acknowledge the difficulty but would say now what? For example, “I don’t really like to do business development and I’m don’t feel like I’m good at it, but if I practice it, I will get better at it.  I’m going to ask two new contacts to lunch this week to tell them about our products and services.  And I’m going to keep doing that every week for the next quarter and see what results I get.”

    You can acknowledge your current reality, without it limiting your future one.

    And as this practice shows, it’s often the way we frame our thinking that helps us to become more empathetic or a better performer at work within the range we have to work with.  The thinking has to come before anything can change.

    So the kid that is striving for the Ivy League may not get into the Ivy League school of their choice, but by focusing on growth and practicing to get better they may raise their ACT or SAT score several points.  And the process of that may teach them more about grit, resilience, and perseverance than the academic subjects on the tests.  In the process, that leads them to be a better student and get more out of college, even if it is “only” at a great state school.

    How can you acknowledge “If this, now what?” instead of settling for “It is what it is?”

    Like this post? You may also like:

    It’s a Long Term Game, not a Short One

  • No New Year’s Resolutions in 2020

    No New Year’s Resolutions in 2020

    January. The time to set a resolution for better living and better outcomes.  Have you set one or two or ten? 

    Resolving to be better is always a good thing but resolve rarely accomplishes.  As Paul David Tripp says in New Morning Mercies for the December 31 devotional: 

    …the reality is that few smokers have actually quit because of a single moment of resolve. Few obese people have become slim and healthy because of one dramatic moment of commitment. Few people who were deeply in debt have changed their financial lifestyle because they resolved to do so as the old year gave way to the new. And few marriages have been changed by means of one dramatic resolution.

    Tripp goes on to say that change is important, but our method for trying to will that change is wrong.  We often think grandiose in our change mindset instead of realizing that change happens through growth (in grace as Tripp would say) in the day to day.  Growth that happens through the mundane priorities of and habits exhibited on a regular Tuesday or a typical Thursday. 

    So in 2020, focusing on a mindset of growth can lead us down a path to success.  Where when we look up in July or October and realize a process has taken place that has changed us because we practiced change instead of resolving to it.  

    According to the NeuroLeadership Institute in the Growth Mindset Culture publication in 2018, growth mindset is “the idea that skills and abilities can be improved, and the development of skills and abilities is the goal of the work you do.”

    In a Growth Mindset Case Study Collection also by the NeuroLeadership Institute, one company featured described their focus on growth mindset as, “perseverance in times of change, being curious and asking lots of questions, and achieving more tomorrow than they did today.”  Love this. 

    Three factors contributing to great growth occur are: 

      1. Priorities
      2. Habits
      3. Systems

    For example, if you are “resolving” to be a better leader in 2020, ask yourself what priorities, habits, and systems can actually help you be one with “the development of skills and abilities” being the goal. 

    1. Priorities: My priority is to help other people grow through my leadership in 2020. 
    2. Habits:  In order to be a better leader in 2020, I will: 1) Hold regular (weekly, biweekly or monthly) one-on-one meetings with each of my direct reports and 2) Provide one stretch assignment per quarter to each of my direct reports.
    3. Systems:  I will use our project management (or some other system) to log and follow-up regularly on action plans created in the one-on-one meetings and for the stretch assignments.  I will utilize our performance management/appraisal system (or create one) to provide feedback and rewards for each of my direct reports based on their performance.

    “The little moments of life are profoundly important precisely because they are little moments that we live in that form us,” as Tripp goes on to say for his December 31 thoughts.  Priorities, habits, and systems are lived out in the day to day, day in and day out. 

    What priorities, habits, and systems can you set today that will form you and grow you in the day-to-day? 

    Happy 2020!

     

    Author’s Note:  The little moments are truly what shape us.  I had a “little moment” this past weekend where I ran into an old high school friend.  It did our souls good to see each other, however so briefly, and we exchanged phone numbers to be able to get together again soon.   She texted me a screenshot of the devotional referenced in this post this morning.  I had been wrestling with thoughts for a New Year’s post. The idea of growth mindset taking shape and her text and the thoughts in the devotional set me to immediately write.

    I could have gone a different way on my run on Saturday morning and not seen her, she could have not taken the time to send me this devotional, and we both have the choice to either follow-through or neglect our commitment to get together again “soon.”   The point is, the priorities, habits, and systems we create lead us to experience moments of growth and honestly holiness, not the other way around, and it so simple to neglect them in the hustle of life.  

    It is so easy to reschedule a one-on-one meeting with a direct report because something else “came up” and then never actually reschedule it.  It’s so easy to not log that follow-up item in your system because you’re too busy or to not provide quality feedback because it is uncomfortable. But to neglect these things in the day-to-day is to neglect growth in you and in others. 

    I’m so thankful for my friend taking the time to help me grow in the day-to-day by sending me the devotional screenshot.  I can live in that example by making sure I schedule a time to get together with her by the end of January, or by sending her the next things that come my way that make me think of her. 

     

    Like this post? You may also like:

    Insights for Learning

    Three Tips for Leading Well in 2020

    A New Take on Time Management 

     

  • A Pound of Prevention

    A Pound of Prevention

    “A pound of prevention is worth an ounce of cure” is a phrase I heard for the first time this week.

    I was at lunch with an attorney who specializes in employment law, and she said that phrase as we were talking about clients who don’t see the benefit of proactive, preventative measures and instead just hope everything turns out alright. I immediately wrote it down and googled when I got home, and the internet says it’s a Benjamin Franklin quote. Apparently, Franklin wrote an anonymous letter to his own newspaper in Philadelphia in 1735 about the importance of preparing for possible fires ahead of time versus waiting until the fire is burning to make a plan. 

    How many of us have waited until the metaphorical (or literal) fire was burning to actually do something? 

    One of the common “fires” companies face is invaluable leaders retiring or leaving for other opportunities. Many organizations do not spend enough time proactively planning for succession, and then they find themselves without a VP or other critical leader and have to scramble to find a suitable replacement. We speak to this in our recent blog post “Who Is Your Successor?”. 

    Another fire that can burn quickly is non-compliance – knowingly or unknowingly failing to comply with employment law. This is common for small businesses who see rapid growth and suddenly find themselves crossing the FTE thresholds for various legislation (e.g. the Affordable Care Act typically applies at 50 FTEs). As a business owner and/or leader, you are responsible for ensuring that your organization complies with federal, state, and local employment laws. If you operate your business in more than one state, you may need to take another look at your policies. Having an updated employee handbook – and actually having every employee read and agree to it – is a pound of prevention that every single organization needs to take seriously. 

    We don’t wait until the fire is burning to buy an extinguisher. Let’s not wait until there’s trouble to protect our organizations and our employees.