Andrea was the VP of Process Improvement in a $500 million technology company. She came to me and said,
“I don’t know what to do. Bill, the new CEO, doesn’t value my work. He moved me under Paul [a division president] and now Paul says he wants me to be his Chief of Staff. I don’t want to be Chief of Staff, I don’t think Paul is very smart and I’m not happy about this.” Notice that Andrea started out doing what most people do—focusing on what she doesn’t want.
High impact leaders focus on what they do want.
So we worked together to get Andrea clear on what she wanted—regardless of whether or not what she wanted was POSSIBLE. That’s what often holds people back—believing it’s not possible to have what they want.
Six months later Andrea said, “I love my work. This is fun! The sales people love what we’re doing, I’m helping Paul meet his goals, and we’ll bring in an extra $5 million this year.”
Start with your own list
The trick is to start with what you want and then stay focused on what you want, even though others around you may be pulling in other directions. Like most people, Andrea had started out talking about what she didn’t want. So we began by turning the “don’t wants” into a list of “wants:”
Don’t Want Do Want
– To be Chief of Staff – To have work and projects I own
– To be managed by someone – To create mutual respect
I don’t respect
– To manage someone else’s agenda – To run a segment of the
business
Next, we added to Andrea’s wants:
– Get Business development
experience
– Create revenue
– Collaborate with staff and
customers
– Contribute to company
profit and success
– Use my expertise
Once she was very clear on what she wanted, we aligned Andrea’s list with Paul’s goals so that she could show him how she would help him achieve what he wanted. Andrea then went back to Paul and talked to him about her new ideas of how she could contribute to his business.
Fast forward a year and Andrea had created a new business line, that was making Paul’s division more profitable by bringing the process improvement work that she loved to help customers increase their own profit margins—and she did it by focusing on what she wanted.