The Danger of Constantly Bailing, Flaking, Texting-Out and other Career Killers

Filmmaker Woody Allen once said, “80 of success is just showing up.” That’s only part of the equation. But the way things are going these days, not many folks could come close to 80 percent. What are we so busy doing?

Last week’s post about our inability to honor commitments in the smartphone age riled many folks up. So, we thought we’d do a follow-up piece about what psychotherapist Nancy Collier, LCSW calls “Last Minute-Itis.” We weren’t familiar with this term until recently, but read on if you find yourself constantly bailing, flaking, texting out and wimping out on your business colleagues, friends and family.

According to Collier, the next time you make a plan with someone, you should put yourself in their shoes and see what it feels like to commit to the plan inside yourself. “Shut the back door that the cell phone opens,” advises Collier. “You may find that just by removing the possibility of a last minute text-out, by closing your options rather than keeping them open, you feel more spacious and relaxed.”

Hmmn.

*** How often are you communicating with your clients? Chances are it’s not enough. Take our Insta-Poll and find out how you stack up to your peers

According to Collier, you may find that you feel “more dignified” as a result of committing to do something and by giving someone your word. At HB, we have found that’s what pros do in every walk of life no matter how busy they are…..they make a promise and then keep it. Pretty simple advice!

Collier said that thanks to the cell phone and other mobile technology, people have become more insensitive, immature and self-involved. “It is teaching us that it is okay to behave in a way that is disrespectful, undignified, and ultimately unkind,” Collier added.

New York Times columnist, David Brooks opined recently that we are living in a Golden Age of Bailing. He wrote that there used to be a time when a social commitment was not regarded as a “disposable Post-it note.” He added that reliability is a “core element of treating people well” and that if you don’t “flake on” people who matter you will forge deeper and better friendships and live in a better and more respectful way.”

With the cell phone now making it acceptable to avoid having to make any firm choices, Collier said “we are losing this critical life skill,” adding that it is producing a generation of young people who are “perpetually on the fence” between choices, “inert, and paralyzed by the looseness and open-ended-ness that technology creates and supports.”

Brooks feels we should probably make bailing harder, suggesting “three moral hurdles” every instance of bailing must meet:

1.      Is it for a good reason (i.e. your kids unexpectedly need you, a new kidney became available for your transplant) or is it for a bad reason (you’re tired, you want to be alone)?

2.      Did you bail well (i.e. sending an honest text, offering another date to get together) or did you bail selfishly (ghosting, talking about how busy your life is, as if you were the only person who matters)?

3.      Did you really think about the impact on the other person? (Brooks reminds us it’s always a mistake to bail on somebody’s life event — wedding, birthday party, funeral — on the grounds that your absence won’t be noticed.)

Our take?

• Put yourself in the other persons shoes…hint, emoji’s won’t help no matter what your age.
• Leave plenty of time cushion between events and obligations in your calendar.
• Follow the Pomodoro 25/5 technique (25 minutes hard thinking/5 minute break) or our own 5-4-1 technique in which you work hard for 5 hours in the morning, followed by a 60+ minute lunch break. Then you come back re-energized so you can work hard for 4 hours in the afternoon, followed by a 1-2 hour break in for family time or personal time. Then you finish up with one hour of regroup time to review the promises, commitments, to-dos of the day and get set up for tomorrow.

We have found techniques like these will prevent you from making commitments under duress—commitments you can’t possibly keep. 

• Make appointments with yourself--and keep them. For instance, “I will get this report done by 11am today”…..or “I will start my morning run at 7am and not be late”…….I will be home no later than 7pm and finish up work after dinner.”

Conclusion

Life moves pretty fast and Sh*!*!*!* happens. You can’t always control your environment, but if nothing else, try to follow the 90/90 principle that we use here at HB. That means honoring 90 percent of your commitments 90 percent of the time (commitments to others and to yourself) and you’ll find that’s a pretty good batting average without the tyranny of being a perfectionist.


VCRGD6XDXT3T

TAGS: David Brooks, Nancy Collier, Golden age of bailing, flaking, ghosting, Pomodoro technique

Read This Before You Hit ‘Cancel Meeting’

We all get hopelessly over-scheduled at times. But if you find yourself constantly rescheduling your work appointments, running hopelessly behind schedule, never being able to commit to plans with friends or family (including your spouse and kids), then you may have some issues to sort out.

Not to be Miss Manners on you, but every time you bail or flake on somebody—whether in a professional, social or family setting—you’re signaling lack of respect. You’re also signaling that you can’t manage your own time and that you have no respect for other people’s time. It signals that you’re spread a mile wide and an inch deep, and that you’re a chronic “over-promiser” and “under-deliverer.”

Sorry to be harsh, but that’s what you’re telling the world. Don’t be that guy (or gal).

If this sounds like you or someone close to you, you’re not alone. Thanks, to the smartphone, it’s never been easier to bail, flake, blow-off or simply ghost people without risking a face-to-face (or telephone) conversation. It’s never been easier to get out of a time commitment without having to apologize or show remorse. It’s what psychotherapist Nancy Collier, LCSW calls “Last Minute-Itis.”

*** How often are you communicating with your clients? Chances are it’s not enough. Take our Insta-Poll and find out how you stack up to your peers

Cancelling because of a serious illness is one thing, but when you habitually bail or flake it’s not only disrespectful, it’s a sign of weakness. It’s like blowing off your morning jog, your thrice- weekly gym workout or falling of your diet or budget plan—it means you’re disrespecting yourself.

Do you really want to do business with people (or clients) who can’t honor their commitments? Do you really want to be friends with (or in a relationship) with like this?

We didn’t think so.

According to Collier, tech-driven bad behavior is symptomatic of our increasing inability to make or honor commitments. “The fact that it is acceptable to bail in the final hour means that we no longer have to commit to anyone or anything. We leave our lives forever loose, with the option always present that if something better comes up or we change our mind, we’re out. We live in a constant state of ‘we’ll see.’”

We’re living in a “Golden Age of Bailing” wrote NY Times columnist, David Brooks last week. Brooks said bailing stands at the “nexus of so many larger trends” including the “ambiguity of modern social relationships, the fraying of commitments, and the ethic of flexibility ushered in by smartphone apps.”

Brooks pointed the finger at technology which makes bailing out on commitments very easy. “You just pull out your phone and bailing on a rendezvous is as easy as canceling an Uber driver.”

Brooks said there are different categories of bailing.

1. Canceling on friends. People feel free to bail on close friends, because they will understand, and on distant friends, because they don’t matter so much, but they are less inclined to bail on medium-tier or fragile friends.

2. Professional bailing. This tends to have a hierarchical structure. A high-status person will frequently bail on a lower-status colleague, but if an intern bails on a senior executive, it is a sign of serious disrespect.

3. The networker flake. In the information age, the highly ambitious are masters of acquaintanceship — making a zillion useful contacts, understanding the strength of weak ties and bailing on a networking prospect with a killer-eyed coldness when a better offer comes along.

Author and motivational speaker, Brendan Burchard offers four suggestions for sticking to your word.

#1. Don’t commit. Stop committing to things that you’re not passionate about. When you lack passion for the commitments you make, they tend to feel like heavy obligations or trifle commitments. They’re easy to cancel or quit. Learning to turn down more opportunities (even the good ones!) will help you stick to your word.

#2. Respect other people’s time. Your time is not more valuable than others. Respect others’ time much as you respect and want to protect your own. Remember that everybody has priorities and a to-do list each day. Your decision to cancel on them disrupts their day and life, and that’s not fair. You don’t want people ruining your schedule so don’t do it to others.

#3. Know your payoffs. Sometimes, we say ‘yes’ to a lot of things but we forget the payoff when we start working on them. We forget why we said ‘yes’ in the first place and lose passion, and so we quit. Before you cancel on anything, try to remember why you originally said yes. In other words, revisit the payoff so that you’re willing to endure the struggle.

#4. You break it, you buy it. If you cancel on someone or fail to deliver, you’ve broken your word. You need to buy back your character, reputation, and integrity with an act of kindness, generosity, or attrition. You’ll have to go beyond your original commitment. Not only does this type of act regain your reputation, it also supports you on your journey to being a good person. When you mess up, be more generous. 

Conclusion

In my next post, I’ll share some cures from the experts for Last Minute-Itis and three moral hurdles that every bailer should meet in order to have the privilege of canceling last-minute.
In the meantime, take a deep breath and count to three, before you hit the Cancel Meeting request. Think about the person on the receiving end and the likelihood they’ll honor a commitment with you the next time.

VCRGD6XDXT3T

TAGS: David Brooks, Nancy Collier, Golden age of bailing, flaking, ghosting.

Notice What You Notice

As the calendar page flips over to August, many of you may be on vacation or stuck in a long airport delay. The kids or grandkids are out of school, and half the people you need to reach at work are either out of the office—or have one foot out the door. Either way, everyone’s out of their normal routine a little and things just aren’t running as smoothly as you’d prefer.

Like it or not, you’re mind’s going to drift and the temptation is to focus on what’s wrong with your practice, business, family, golf swing, tennis stroke or relationships. It’s good to address those issues head on, but better yet, focus on the good things you can make better, not the bad things that are dragging you down.

In a surprisingly pithy op-ed piece today, Times columnist David Brooks suggested that there are two types of people: those who keep a journal (mental or actual) and those who don’t. “People who keep a journal often see it as part of the process of self-understanding and personal growth. They don’t want insights and events to slip through their minds. They think with their fingers and have to write to process experiences and become aware of their feelings. People who oppose journal-keeping fear it contributes to self-absorption and narcissism.

Maybe Brooks is on vacation this week, but we think the point he’s trying to make is that the more your can distance yourself form your own “intimacy with yourself” the more reliable your self-awareness is likely to be.”

You may have to take an exotic trip or put yourself in some kind of social situation that’s way outside your comfort zone. Maybe it’s joining a new networking group or civic organization, taking up a new sport (in which you’re sure to look foolish at first) and striking up a conversation with someone in your building elevator or commuter train that you keep interacting with but never engage. Pay attention to your body language and voice inflection in those situations. Are you listening more or talking more?

Notice what you notice

Back in my triathlon days, I had a great swim coach, the late Doug Stern. Doug had an amazing ability to remember every single person’s name in his aquatics class—even with five or six dozen people in identical swim caps thrashing about him—and he mentioned everyone by name several times during each workout. Don’t think that matters!

But, it wasn’t Doug’s charisma that made him so great, it was how he got you attuned to your body in the water. “Notice what you notice,” he always told us when trying to help us master a new stroke technique.

Conclusion

Sharon Sloane, CEO of the training video company Will Interactive, told NYT interviewer Adam Bryant that she finishes every day with some “chair time.” That’s when she just sits quietly by herself at the end of the day, turns off her devices, and just lets the day “wash over” her. What really happened? What did she not pick up on in a meeting? Which dots didn’t get connected at the time?

Whether you’re in the water, on land, or in the air this month, take time out from the grind and notice what you notice. You’ll be glad you did.

Best, HB

Our blog has more, as does the FREE Resources page of our website.

VCRGD6XDXT3T

TAGS: Doug Stern, notice what you notice, Sharon Sloane, chair time, David Brooks, Adam Bryan, keeping a journal

Are You Ready for Generation C (Competitive)?

Are you planning to hire youngest members (or prospective members) of your profession this summer? If so, you might want to get to know them better. They bring a lot to the table, but they certainly don’t sit at the same table that you and I did at that age. Don’t waste their talents.

On the surface, Millennials may seem to lack the verbal acumen of previous generations and they certainly don’t seem as willing to pay their dues. But, they’re more than just tech-addicted slackers. They have a huge built-in network of contacts from Day One of their professional lives—contacts that could be useful to you as well. They can find the vast majority of what they need to know right on the web (even if you can’t) and they’re MUCH MORE COMPETITIVE. Much more. University of Michigan studies suggest that today’s students score about 40 percent lower in measures of empathy than students did 30 years ago. Maybe it’s because they’re come of age at a time when “disruption” is considered a good thing, at least in business and technology circles.

Growing up with cutthroat competition

If you have a millennial and Gen next person in your life right now, you know what we mean. Everything from Little League baseball and youth soccer, to marching band to getting into college is substantially more competitive today than it was for older generations. What we did at 18, they’re doing at 14. What we did at 15, they’re doing at 12. It doesn’t matter if you’re talking about the classroom, the ball field or summer internships. The stakes just seem higher.

As David Brooks’ wrote in his New York Time op-ed piece Tuesday, not only is getting into college more competitive, but students begin to be haunted by fears about their job market prospects much earlier. The image of a “benign job market is pretty much gone (as expectations about what constitutes a good job have risen). Even incoming college freshmen seem to fear they will not find lucrative and rewarding work.”

According to UCLA’s annual study of incoming college freshmen, job training and making money is a much higher priority for today’s students than it was for previous generations. For instance, researchers found that in 1976, 50 percent of freshmen said they were going to college in order to make more money. By 2006, almost 70 percent of freshmen said that. Their values have changed, too. In 1966, only 42 percent of freshmen said that being well-off financially was an essential or very important life goal. By 2005, 75 percent of students said being well-off financially was essential or very important.

“Affluence, once a middling value, is now students’ top life goal,” quipped Brooks. “In the shadow of this more Darwinian job market, it is more acceptable to present yourself as utilitarian, streamlined and success-oriented.”

In order to stay connected with the next generation, Nicole Malcom, Director of Operations for the American Holistic Nurses Association (AHNA) told me recently that “you need to stay abreast of the latest technology, even if you are not currently using it.”  Gregory Brooks, President of the association management company, AMC Source told me NextGen is very resourceful. “They’re connected globally and prefer to bypass red tape. To get to them, you must provide community, tools and resources they need—stuff that they cannot get on their own.”

Conclusion

“The next generation is idealistic and cause-oriented,” according to Chris Williston, voice of the Independent Bankers Association of Texas (IBAT) whom I interviewed recently for Association Adviser.  “They want to connect with your cause, but they need to understand the narrative you’re putting forth and how they can become a part of it.  If you can do that for the next generation, they will tell your story for you, with themselves cast in the starring role.”  If that’s egocentric and narcissistic, so be it. You need Generation C on your team. Learn how to work with them, not against them. Or else, you’ll soon be competing with them.

Have a great weekend. Honor the moms in our life. HB

Our blog has more, as does the FREE Resources page of our website.

VCRGD6XDXT3T

TAGS: David Brooks, UCLA study of incoming freshman, University of Michigan study of empathy, Independent Bankers of Texas, AMC Source, Association Adviser, American Holistic Nurses Association

Are We Too Deep into Data?

Numbers are only part of the equation when it comes to smart B2B decision-making

David Brooks’ NY Times op-ed piece today got me thinking. Our society’s obsession with gathering huge amounts of data fosters “certain cultural assumptions that everything that can be measured should be measured.” He also notes that data is a “transparent and reliable lens that allows us to filter out emotionalism and ideology.”

Here at HB, we sometimes get labeled as data junkies because we generate a growing portion of our revenue from rigorous benchmarking research and gap analysis studies that we do for our clients. We also try to help online advertisers, agencies and media owners separate the numbers that matter from the numbers that are simply easy to gather—we call those McMetrics. We also urge our clients to supplement all their surveys, polls or other research initiatives with verbatim interviews with respondents. Why? To make sure the human side of the data comes through.

Full disclosure: Our Super Bowl office pools are a little wacky, including one based on the probability that certain categories of commercials will run at specific times of the Big Game. No we didn’t have an over-under on the chances of a second-half blackout. But data showed that a tidal surge of tweets and posts about the bizarre Superdome snafu helped re-kindle interest in an apparent blowout victory for the Baltimore Ravens and brought an estimated 5 to 6 million viewers back to the game.

Beyond the Click

Back in 2002—the dark ages of online media—I co-authored a rigorous research report with Bay Street Group president, Rick Telberg, entitled “Beyond the Click.” The ideas was to help online advertisers, marketers and agencies better understand the “latency principle” of banner ads. In sum, online consumers don’t necessarily visit your website the instant they see your banner ad and if they do go to your website on the day your new banner ad has run, it’s not necessarily because that particular ad is the most effective one in your campaign, i.e. the one that prompted the consumer to take action. We still get contacted for copies of Beyond the Click and the research also explores the “build effect” of a campaign and the weekend “catch-up” effect of busy professionals.

Brooks admits he’s still trying to figure out when it’s best to rely on intuitive pattern recognition and when we should just ignore intuition and follow the data.  Data, he argues is good at helping us understand when our intuitive view of reality is wrong. Second, he posits that data can “illuminate patterns of behavior we haven’t yet noticed.” For example, does frequent use of such word as “I,” “me,” and “mine” mean you’re more egotistical than people who don’t?  Turns out, when people are feeling confident, they are focused on the task at hand, not on themselves. High status, confident people use fewer “I” words, not more, according to University of Texas prof, James Pennebaker, in his book, “The Secret Life of Pronouns.”

I recently spoke with Eric Wulf, CEO of the International Car Wash Association (ICA), about his organization’s industry benchmarking data initiative which has become one of the ICA’s most popular member benefits.  Wash Count™ is a tool ICA developed to help car wash operators benchmark and compare their business results by market, by geography, by type of facility and many other factors. That’s important to an industry that’s increasingly going from mom-and-pop operators to corporate conglomerates. More than 800 sites contribute data to ICA’s research initiative. But here’s the key, said Wulf: “Our staff spends a lot of time onsite with members, picking up pieces of intelligence and always asking them, ‘How’s it going?’ It’s very important to add the face-to-face interaction to the raw data.

Macro View

Despite yesterday’s report that the economy shrank slightly in the October to December quarter, don’t start sounding the recession alarm bells yet. Housing had another strong month and business investment in equipment and software, rose at an annual rate of 12.4 percent, the best showing in more than a year, the Commerce Department said. Meanwhile, the Institute for Supply Management (ISM) reported that manufacturing grew a lot faster in January thanks to an increase in hiring and new orders. The ISM’s widely watched index is now at 53.1, up from 50.2 in December and its highest level in almost a year.


Conclusion

Data used responsibly is an essential tool for gut checking our assumptions and preventing emotional bias from clouding our decision-making process. But, remember, it is just one tool in a smart B2B marketer’s tool kit. At the end of the day, we’re all humans, trying to get the right products and services into the hands of the right kinds of humans at just the right time when they’re ready to buy.

VCRGD6XDXT3T

TAGS: Institute for Supply Management, Super Bowl Blackout, Eric Wulf, International Car Wash Association, David Brooks, New York Times, Rick Telberg, McMetrics, Beyond the Click, James Pennebaker, University of Texas

How B2B Marketers Can Leverage the Talent Society

Best length for online video ads and economic conditions on upswing

While David Brooks’ insightful op-ed piece in yesterday’s NY Times was not intended for B2B marketers, he hit on a number of important trends that will undoubtedly change the way connect with your target customers, clients and evangelists.

Both individuals and workers want more space to develop their individual talents, Brooks observed and they want “more flexibility to explore their own interests and develop their own identities, lifestyles and capacities. They are more impatient with situations that they find stifling.”

Over the past half century Brooks believes we have gone from a society that protected people from their frailties to a society that allows people to maximize their talents. “Today, the fast flexible and diverse networks allow the ambitious and the gifted to surf through amazing possibilities. They are able to construct richer, more varied lives. They are able to enjoy interesting information-age workplaces,” he writes.

Bottom line: People with skills can really thrive in this tenuous, networked society, said Brooks as they can develop and nurture their individual brands. But people without those advantages would be better with our traditional command and control, corporate hierarchical structure that stifled individualism and creativity but rewarded employee loyalty.

Our Take: Smart marketers have learned that you can build long-lasting and rewarding relationships with key customers that span multiple decades and multiple job changes. Being honest, creative and delivering on what you promise is what customers remember about you—not what price you quoted them or how many lunches or golf outings you treated them to.

What is the best length for my video ads?

If you’re trying to take advantage of the surge in online video advertising, be smart and think short. That’s the advice from Poll Position whose recent survey of 1,179 adults concluded that 15 seconds is how long 54 percent of respondents say is acceptable before they get turned off. Only 12 percent of Internet users said viewing a 30-second ad prior to viewing free content was acceptable to them and only 7 percent were willing to view ads of 45 seconds or longer.

Macro view

While there’s no telling what the impact on corporate profits will be if the President gets his new corporate tax planned passed, the Dow is hovering at the 13,000 point level—an altitude not seen since May of 2008. And, the S&P 500 index is approaching the cheapest level ever compared with bonds thanks to the Fed’s zero-percent interest rates. While the Euro zone debt crisis can’t be ignored, U.S. capital markets seem reasonably confident the Greek bailout plan will eventually stick. What’s more, things seem much better at home as long as you ignore the housing market. More than 240,000 real jobs were created in January and we now have the lowest unemployment rate since early 2009. Corporate balance sheets are stuffed with cash. With interest rates likely to remain low for the near future, companies should be poised to continue hiring cautiously and investing in capital equipment and IT infrastructure which bodes well for those of you in the B2B space.

Take a break from the news once in a while. Things are better than you think. Don’t let this rare opportunity to invest, hire and connect with new customers pass you by. It may not be this cheap for years to come.

VCRGD6XDXT3T