THERE'S GOT TO BE AN
EASIER WAY TO RUN A BUSINESS
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MANAGER WANTED Must be willing to sell soul to the company, work 70-80 hours a week for little more than minimum wage, miss children's growing up, lose marriage, start drinking too much, live with stress and die of a coronary at age 53. |
Do you think your phone would be ringing off the hook with eager applicants? Of course not ... and unless this is your idea of a good time, you don't have to put up with this sort of life, either.
Easy to say, but what else can you do?
My background is in the restaurant business, a labor-intensive, service-oriented industry that certainly has a reputation for demanding incredibly long hours from its managers. For that reason, most of the personal examples I give will be from that industry although I think you will find similar examples in your own experience.
The management model I learned was definitely one of 80+ hour weeks. I graduated from one of the country's premier hospitality degree programs, yet even in school -- as in every foodservice job I held -- I was taught that this is a killer business where you need to work 18 hours a day, eight days a week. I was told if I was not willing to make that kind of time commitment, I should pursue another line of work.
I never questioned it. I suspect most businesses have a similar myth passed down from one manager to the next. You may have bought into an idea like this, too.
The Cost of Misunderstanding
The cost we pay for this lack of understanding is staggering.
It is measured in lower profits, reduced productivity, burnout,
turnover, broken marriages, substance abuse and an impossible
level of stress.
The sad truth is that a majority of the problems most managers deal with day after days are not inherent problems of their industry but rather very predictable symptoms of their level of understanding and their idea of what constitutes effective management.
Even as I was working myself to death (120 hours a week in one job!), I couldn't help but feel there just had to be an easier way to do what I was doing. I am definitely a hard worker but I am not a masochist, so I started looking for other approaches that might be more effective.
A New Model
Perhaps because I was actively looking for a better way, I
crossed paths with some folks who were doing breakthrough work
in understanding how individuals and organizations really
function.
They helped me understand what I was doing in a different way and when I saw a bigger picture, I was suddenly off the old management merry-go-round. The human part of my work became effortless and the difference in my effectiveness was earthshaking!
Remember Columbus
I know it is easy to think, "In your dreams. It just isn't that
easy." If you feel that way, let me remind you that in 1491,
the world was flat! Everybody knew the world was flat -- it was
a fact of life, yet just a year later, it was impossible to
hold that view. So that little voice in your head that says,
"There's GOT to be an easier way to do this," is right. Once
your understanding shifts, your life, professionally and
personally, will change forever.
A Blinding Flash of the Obvious
You already have the answers but you just don't see them yet
because they are not where you're used to looking. The shift
comes when you recognize simple, common sense truths that have
been right in front of you all along but which, because of the
way you were trained to think, you never fully understood
before.
This book will examine the principles that can help you make this shift for yourself ... if you want to ... so buckle up and let's get started!
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Copyright © 2008 by William Marvin, all rights reserved