What Kids Hear

I said, “Please pickup your shoes and put them in your closet”

Anna heard, “Please pickup shoes and toss down the laundry chute”

I said, “Find you sister and come upstairs for dinner”

Lincoln heard, “Find three more stars in Mario Galaxy”

I said, “Please drain the tub and dry yourself off”

The kids heard, “Please splash 20 gallons of water onto the bathroom floor and run around the house naked”

I said, “Please pull out your homework and finish your math”

Luca heard, “Please help yourself to bowl of Cheerios 30 minutes after dinner”

I said, “It’s time for bed”

The kids heard, “It’s time to jump on mom and dad’s bed”

I said, “Please feed the dog”

Anna heard, “Please feed your grilled cheese sandwich to the dog”

I said, “Wear the clothing mom put out for you on your bed”

Anna heard, “Put together the most hideous looking outfit known to mankind”

I said, “Please only use as much toilet paper as you need”

The kids heard, “Please use no less than 185 sheets at a time”

I said, “Please hang up your church dress”

Luca heard, “Please toss your church dress in the middle of the living room”

I said, “Walk as quietly as you can down the church hallway”

The kids heard, “Stomp your feet loud enough that everyone will know we have arrived”

We must speak a different language. Maybe when they reach middle school they’ll have the opportunity to learn the language called Parental English.

Because something is getting lost in translation.

Technorati Tags: ,,

The Carwash

We have two carwashes in Auburn. Both provide the same services. Both are well-kept. Both are about the same distance from my house. I don’t give much thought when deciding between the two. I usually end up at the one closest to where I am running errands which happens to be the newer carwash.

But last Saturday I was running errands closer to the older carwash. After I sprayed off my car I pulled over near the vacuums to dry it.

That’s when an older man dressed in cowboy boots and a western hat approached me. I assumed he was going to ask if I was interested in buying a set of speakers. At a fantastically low price, of course!

But he wasn’t selling anything.

He introduced himself and asked if I had everything I needed to clean my car. I asked if he was the owner and he nodded. He told me he recently bought the carwash because he liked being around people. He recently retired and this would give him somewhere to spend his days.

He told me he appreciated my business. He asked if I had any suggestions on how he could improve the carwash. I told him everything was fine except the soap came out too thick on the brush. He said he’d take a look. Maybe it needed to be thinned out.

He listened more than he talked. He seemed genuinely interested in my feedback. He shook my hand and thanked me again.

In all the years I’ve washed my cars, I’ve never once been thanked for my patronage.

In an era where so much customer interaction is being outsourced to everything except a human being, it’s refreshing doing business with a person rather than a computer or machine.

But today this new owner won me over. When I have a choice, I’ll always go where I feel appreciated.

And I’ll tell my friends.

Technorati Tags: ,,

Most Days

Most days I set my alarm for 6:30 am.

Most days Elka nudges my arm with her cold nose if I try to sleep in.

Most days I hog the hot water with a long shower.

Most days I get dressed without waking Kim.

Most days I open the door to the garage without waking the kids.

But not today.

lucapigtail

Today Luca heard me leaving for work. She got out of bed and came downstairs as I was gathering my briefcase. She nudged herself close to me and put her head down. I could tell she was tired. Was everything OK?

I put down my briefcase and put my arms around her. She’s so warm and cuddly in the morning. In my rush to get out the door this morning I’d not given much thought to my family. I usually slip out unnoticed.

But today Luca noticed.

I picked her up and held her at eye level. She told me she misses me while she’s at school. I told her I miss her while I’m at work. She gives me a big hug around my neck. I kiss her forehead, and tell her we’ll see each other that night.

Most days I don’t give much thought to the time I spend away from my family.

But not today.

Technorati Tags: ,

Don’t Knock The Pump

I don’t remember when it happened. Must have been when I was out of college and dropping fifteen bucks on a bottle of soap didn’t require eating Top Ramen for a month.

soap

At some point I got tired of picking up a cold, wet bar of soap each morning. No matter how I tried to store my soap it ended up in a puddle of frigid, cloudy water. Forget the fancy little soap trays. They are like little wading pools for your bar of Dove.

I saw this bottle of Clinique Liquid Facial Soap one day at Nordstrom and decided to give it a try. The women dressed in white lab coat with impeccable skin and hair tried to steer me towards the line of men’s products in the ugly grey containers.

But I wanted the soap in the translucent green bottle. I bought it and haven’t used anything since.

The soap is dispensed through a pump. No more fishing for a cold one each morning.

How unmanly is that?

Back to watching Sex and the City reruns.

Finding Balance

Coaches told me I had a quick first step. If a defender played me tight, I could take a dribble back step, cross over from right to left and create some space with my feet. Although I’m right handed, I could go to my left but not my right. This was before the three point line was painted in gyms around the country, and my job wasn’t to score as much as it was to find the open teammate when the defense collapsed.

Keep my dribble alive. Keep my head up. Deliver the pass.

So when I showed up for the Dick Motta basketball camp I was surprised to find a player from a rival school I could not beat off the dribble. Not only was he quicker than I was, but he could go to his right and left.

It bothered me all summer. But as basketball camps turned to baseball clinics I didn’t give it much thought. Until I met him at a football game. I told him I was looking forward to a summer full of baseball, basketball and football.

park

He played basketball. Only basketball. All summer long.

And then it started to make sense. While I was becoming an average player at three sports, he was becoming a very good player (he went on to play in college) in one sport.

I’ve thought back to this memory often when I’ve felt our children are being pulled in different directions. Part of me would like them to immerse themselves in many different activities. Luca enjoys playing the piano. We feel she has a talent for music. But should we focus her limited time and attention in that direction at the sacrifice of dance or soccer?

Kim and I talk about how much time our kids should spend in activities outside of school. Currently it feels like a gut decision. And it could vary from child to child. We change our minds a lot. What feels like the right amount one month may feel like too much the next. Nothing is written in stone.

Our approach has been to encourage our children to try various activities within reason. We don’t believe it’s in their best interest (or ours) to be running ourselves ragged toting the kids from one activity to another. That might mean this summer is for soccer while swimming waits till the fall.

Would we better off finding one activity per child like my friend who only played basketball?

Maybe.

But for now, they still have a lot to experience. If they decide to focus their efforts on a single activity at some point, we’ll address it at that time. No rush.

I think back to how much fun I had and how much I learned by playing baseball and football. The friendships and experiences, at least for me, outweigh whatever chance I might have had to improve my skills as a basketball player.

And had I only played basketball I wouldn’t have known how satisfying it feels to patiently wait on a curve ball and then pound that sucker into right field.

My Favorite Shirt

A couple of years ago I was wandering through Nordstrom looking for a dress shirt or two when I came across a rack of mock turtlenecks. I took a black one off the hanger, held it up to my chest and was immediately sold.

It’s made of 100% pima cotton that’s thick but not too thick. It stretches a bit but not too much. It goes well with jeans or Dockers. It’s the perfect shirt.

shirt

And of course, it’s black. One can never have too many friends or too much black in the closet.

So I bought a black mock that day and wore it everywhere. It become my favorite shirt. That was two years ago.

A few months ago I noticed the shirt had seen better days. The stitching along the neckline was beginning to fray. I could see small pieces of banding coming through. But that didn’t stop me from wearing it. It endeared itself to me more so.

But I began to look around for a replacement. I went to Nordstrom, but could not find the same style or brand. I had no luck searching online either. I was about to give up and try shirts from J. Crew or Lands End.

Then today I was walking through Nordstrom’s flagship store in downtown Seattle and noticed a rack of full of my favorite shirt! Of course, I bought a black one. And navy.

Thirty bucks a shirt. What a steal.

I’m back in business.

When I Grow Up

Along the path to adulthood I knew I was making progress when I gave up certain habits. Like the day Pop Rocks and Fun Dip stopped being a part of my regular diet. Or the first winter I went without tossing snowballs at the school bus. image

You know, signs along the path of life that make one feel like a grown-up.

Occasionally I wonder if I’ve taken a wrong turn somewhere because I can’t stop at a gas station without buying beef jerky.

There’s something about beef jerky that makes me feel like a kid again. I’ve got a number of excuses ready if the clerk ever asks, “Is that for you?”

But it was expensive. I’d save a few bucks by mowing lawns in the summer or shoveling walks in the winter that I’d have enough to buy the long skinny jerky sticks at George’s Market off 36th Street in Ogden.

When I started playing baseball I graduated to Jerky Stuff. It came in what looked like a tin of chewing tobacco but was filled with 97% fat free goodness. I’d place a pinch in my lip till the flavor was drained or I accidentally swallowed it. Usually the latter.

I can’t imagine the money I’ve spent on beef jerky over the years. Probably enough to buy a cow or two.

Technorati Tags: ,,

Skip With Us

Luca held my left hand while Anna held my right . We were making our way through the mall looking for something to eat we could all agree on.

Mission impossible.

sisters

In one ear I hear Luca chatting.

The other ear was getting a work out from Anna. 

“DAD! Nintendo. Pizza. DAD! Pants. Game. DAD! Pink. Candy”

It all starts to blend together.

But then we get to a section where the area is clear. No shoppers, strollers or kiosks selling blinking phone accessories.

That’s when I feel both my arms yanked forward in a violent motion.

“Skip with us, Dad! Come on!”

So the three of us skipped hand-in-hand through the mall last night.

That’s how I’d like to remember it anyway. Because if anyone saw us it probably looked like an an out-of-shape dad getting dragged through the food court by two cute little girls.

The 80/20 Rule

The first time I heard about the 80/20 rule I was taking a economics course at the University of Utah. I don’t recall the context of the discussion but it seemed reasonable.

80/20 Rule = 20% of your efforts produce 80% of the results

You may have heard it expressed as:

People wear 20% of their wardrobe 80% of the time

80% of income is distributed to wealthiest 20%

20% of your sales force produces 80% of sales

Users spend 80% of their time using 20% of a product’s features

The first time I recognized this rule in action was the time I was in charge of the Microsoft Project partner program. I spent months analyzing over 150 partners who built add-ons or complimentary products to Project. What I found was that of those 150 partners, about 15 were responsible for driving over 80% of partner related revenue.

I decided to cut back the number of partners in the program to 90 and focus my efforts on the top 15. In theory this seemed like the right thing to do, but in practice, I only had time to work closely with 5 partners. wire

Lately I’ve wondered if the 80/20 rule can be applied to my group of technicians. I think back 6 years to how I managed 40 people and it’s easy to see where I failed. Of those 40, maybe 10 were top performers, 25 were good techs, and 5 were subpar performers. I assumed the top 5 could manage themselves and didn’t need much guidance to succeed. This freed up time to spend elsewhere.

As their manager I felt it was my responsibility to fix the problems. As a result I spent 80% of my time with bottom feeder 5. I don’t believe I was a total failure in this approach but I didn’t have much success helping them move into the middle tier, and not one ever raised his game to join the top tier.

Fast forward to today where I manage the same group of technicians. The group is half the size as before due to how we’ve structured our teams. This time around I’ve taken a different approach. I now spend 80% of my time working with my top 5 techs.

But I’ve found that my best technicians look for ways to improve our company. They are the most confident and thus willing to challenge my suggestions. They listen to our customers and want to improve our products. They drive at least 80% of the new business opportunities. They can manage themselves but still need someone who can push ideas through the organization.

The biggest benefit I’ve noticed from this approach is the top 5 set the example for rest of the group. If the bar is set high, the group will police itself. I still spend time with those who need daily guidance but not at the expense of my most valuable techs.

At the end of each week I ask myself: Did I spend more time managing problem techs or more time leading the best ones?

I still fall short. But my goal is to move from spending the greater part of the week solving problems to leading the top performing members of the team. The less time I spend fixing problems, they more time I can devote to growing our business.

Photo by Betsy Martian

Technorati Tags: ,

Late Night Scrambled Eggs

“One of my best friends moved to California”

One look at her face and I knew she’d had a tough day at school. Luca had followed me into the kitchen and I wasn’t sure what to tell a 7 year old who bid her best friend goodbye for the last time this afternoon.

I picked her up and placed her on the kitchen counter. As curious as I was to hear about her day, I didn’t want for her to walk through the painful memory again. So I asked if she wanted a late night snack.

lucabelle

She nodded.

I figured she’d ask for strawberry milk, Pirates Booty, or a slice of bread with just the right amount of butter.

“Will you make some scrambled eggs? I know how to crack them”

So I stirred while she cracked ten eggs. It was almost midnight before we sat next to each other at the table trying to figure out how salt makes eggs taste better.

“I know why your eggs cook faster than moms”

“Why is that?” I asked.

“Because you turn the stove to eight and mom only turns it up to five”

As I sat there next to my daughter I told myself that I must keep my mouth shut and listen. She grabbed the salt and shook it over her plate. More questions followed such as, “Is pepper the opposite of salt?”

And then she began to tell me about her day. I know where this leads. Her raspy voice touches my heart.

She tells me about her other friends. She tells me how much she likes her teacher and how excited she is to give her report on Germany at the end of the month. She asks if I’ll help her choose a treat to share with her class.

And then she stops talking and puts her fork down.

She’s trying as hard as she can to hide the tears, but a couple escape down her cheek and onto the table.

I wish her friend had been able to stay through the school year. I wish I could tell her she’ll see her friend again soon. But I don’t have the magic words to make everything better. The best I can do is be there to listen. Sometimes that’s all I can do.

She helped me pickup the dishes before brushing her teeth for the second time. As she gave me a hug she whispered, “I’m going to pray that Rebekah visits me in the summer”.

“Maybe Rebekah will do the same”, I replied.

Technorati Tags: ,,