Leadership
7 Steps To Reinvent Yourself
Gonna keep this positive. So just a word for background. Any casual observer would see that the declining results funeral service is experiencing signal a much greater problem: A growing segment of the public isn’t sure why they need us or, worse, what they need us for. Now to better news: Statistically, the odds are very […]
Reinvention: Islands of Excellence In A Sea of Mediocrity
“one cannot manage change. One can only be ahead of it.” Peter Drucker The Cornerstone Assumption of the funeral side of DeathCare is that being nice is the same as being effective. Our “worldview” of being nice people is that we must never, ever make waves or create awkwardness. We run pell-mell from any form […]
Is A Scarcity Mentality Keeping You From Being A Good Leader?
A Scarcity Mentality is the zero-sum paradigm of life. People with a Scarcity Mentality have a very difficult time sharing recognition and credit, power or profit – even with those who help in the production. They also have a a very hard time being genuinely happy for the success of other people. Yet it is […]
Are You Really A Team…Or Just A Workgroup
Most people speak of those they work with as a team. But, in my experience, people rarely understand what a team really is. In funeral service what typically represents a team is really a group of people who are very nice but work towards their own ends independently. If the firm has clear standards and […]
Do You Hate Confrontation?
Most of us do, especially those in the helping professions. Yet, we all know that our jobs require that we occasionally interact with others in challenging ways. When we engage this way our blood pressure rises, palms sweat and we may even lose sleep. For those of you who supervise or manage others here is […]
Are You A Change Champion?
There are, in fact, many firms today that remain in denial that our profession has changed dramatically and will continue to change into the foreseeable future. We cannot help them. I have lost count of the financial statements I have analyzed over the last several years. What strikes me is that virtually all of them […]
The Excellence Trap: How We Confuse Efficiency With Effectiveness
Are you a shop foreman or a leader? In recent years a new focus has crept in to the profession. We are trending toward becoming shop foremen instead of leaders. The belief being that we must measure everything and compare everyone to everyone else. This is, in fact, a good idea and a long time […]
Making Myself Unnecessary
I am a little annoyed with myself. As I address this topic of Leadership i find that I have fallen into the same trap as most others. I have succeeded in treating the difference between managers and leaders as two ends of a continuum and conveying the impression that one (managers) is bad and the […]
Our Industry’s Self Talk: The Bad and the Great.
Alternative Title: It’s Time To Get Over Yourself! Not long ago I was part of a group studying the challenges of recruitment in the funeral profession. I was stunned to hear the “table talk” of practicing funeral directors. Our conversations centered around why people wouldn’t want to be funeral directors…the long and unpredictable work hours, […]
On Motivation – Money Is Not The Answer
Did you know that money is not a motivator. It is only a hygiene factor. Paying too little creates dissatisfaction…paying fairly only takes away the bone of contention…paying too much does not create enthusiasm and can often lead to dissatisfaction. So what really motivates people. It’s simpler than you think and if you are as […]
Roadmap To A Great Legacy
I started out too many weeks ago addressing the virtues of a senior leader making themselves unnecessary and I ran straight into a wall! My apologies but this is too important to take lightly so I took my time to untangle the issues and turns out it’s really pretty simple. There are three roles each […]
I Wish I Had Said That:
Sometimes you read stuff and it fits so perfectly all you are left with is: “I wish I had said that.” Just as I was preparing my next followup article on how to make yourself unnecessary Linked-In published this blog post. Since I couldn’t improve on it I will just share it. If you are […]