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JJ DID TIE BUCKLE

September 27, 2011 By Leave a Comment

 

In the Marine Corps there are words used, almost religiously, that represent characteristics sought out in Marines.  These characteristics are known as “The 14 Leadership Traits”. These traits are guidelines for Marines to follow in order to attain:

  • Leadership Responsibilities
  • Billets
  • Rank

The acronym JJ DID TIE BUCKLE is used when teaching young Marines of these dispositions:

  1. Judgment
  2. Justice
  3. Decisiveness
  4. Integrity
  5. Dependability
  6. Tact
  7. Initiative
  8. Endurance
  9. Bearing
  10. Unselfishness
  11. Courage
  12. Knowledge
  13. Loyalty
  14. Enthusiasm

Additionally, such traits are used to explain the necessity of respect for those of higher rank; for the Corps has endowed them with their rank because they have attained these qualities and are to be emulated.

DECISIVENESS is the ability to make decisions promptly and to announce them in a clear and forceful manner. I read an article that headlined: Decisiveness Generates Momentum. To improve your decisiveness practice being positive in your actions instead of acting half-heartedly or changing your mind on an issue.

“The percentage of mistakes in quick decisions is no greater than in long-drawn-out vacillation, and the
effect of decisiveness itself ‘makes things go’ and creates confidence.”
 – Anne O’Hare McCormick (1882-1954), First woman to win a Pulitzer prize for journalism

 

INTEGRITY means that you are honest and truthful in what you say or do. You put honesty, sense of duty, and sound moral principles above all else. Be absolutely honest and truthful at all times. Stand up for what you believe to be right.

 

Click here for one minute videos of DECISIVENESS & INTEGRITY.

Filed Under: Building Blocks, Featured Articles, Leadership Tagged With: , , ,

LEADERSHIP MARINE CORPS STYLE

September 19, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Note: Since last week’s issue I have heard from many of my readers expressing interest and excitement about this series on leadership.  Much of what you read is copied from existing documents. Why should I try and change something that works?

Forty years ago at this time I was deeply emerged in my Marine Corps boot camp experience and beginning my leadership journey.  Let’s journey together.

LEADERSHIP is the sum of those qualities of intellect, human understanding, and moral character that enables a person to inspire and to control a group of people successfully.

LEADERSHIP TRAITS or characteristics are those qualities of personality which are of greatest assistance in obtaining confidence, respect, obedience and loyal cooperation. There are 14 traits.

LEADERSHIP PRINCIPLES Developing these 11 leadership principles will help make you a better Marine. Together, they form a set of traits and values that define your character as a leader.

Adopting these principles guide your actions with your Marines and your unit, and provide direction throughout your career. The skills you learn now will stay with you long after you’ve finished training.

The principles are also an important tool for self-evaluation. As you progress, you can use them to identify your own strengths and weaknesses, and seek self-improvement.

JUSTICE  is defined as the practice of being fair and consistent. A just person gives consideration to each side of a situation and bases rewards or punishments on merit. To improve yourself in this trait be honest with yourself about why you make a particular decision. Avoid favoritism. Try to be fair at all times and treat all things and people in an equal manner.

JUDGMENMT  is your ability to think about things clearly, calmly, and in an orderly fashion so that you can make good decisions. You can improve your judgment if you avoid making rash decisions. Approach problems with a common sense attitude.

VIDEO

This one link will take you to one-minute videos of all 14 traits. My recommendation is to view only the two traits you learn this week, in this way you won’t be confused about this week’s lesson.

Since this information as a whole is new to you I also recommend that you bookmark this page and make it a daily habit to review each of the two videos for this week.

Success in any endeavor is not built in a day, it’s built by daily habits. Do you want to learn something? Review it 5 or more times a week, make it a habit, plant and replant the info between your ears.

WARRIOR TRAITS. CITIZEN VALUES.

 

Filed Under: Attitude, Building Blocks, Education, Featured Articles, Leadership, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

The Foundations of Character

September 13, 2011 By Leave a Comment

My readers are business people in some way.   And if you’ve been in business or on planet earth for any length of time you’ve met people.  Each one of those people you met has character. Some have outstanding character and others do not, not yet.

Like everything else about us our character changes, it evolves and hopefully grows towards outstanding or favorable.  A simple definition according to Webster is:  one of the attributes or features that make up and distinguish an individual.

Have you ever been exposed to a leadership training program of some sort? Do they offer Leadership 101 in universities? I consider myself fortunate to have been exposed to one of the finest leadership programs in the world by the United States Marine Corps.

While in boot camp (Parris Island, SC) the principles and traits of leadership were instilled within me. Currently the Marine Corps has some great short videos pertaining to leadership. Along with a short article that I write, you will also get a link to a video.

Am I trying to train you as Marines? No. But much of what I learned in the Marines I apply to my life today and so can you.

Beginning next week I will cover the 14 traits and 11 principles of leadership. You’ll watch videos that give the testimonies of Marines in and out of uniform.

The end of the year is just 15 weeks away at which time I will conclude this series.  Feel free to email me with your thoughts, comments or questions in the coming weeks.

Semper fidelis (Always faithful)
Marine Corps motto

Filed Under: Building Blocks, Education, Featured Articles, Leadership Tagged With: , ,

Got Pens??

August 1, 2011 By Leave a Comment

When I can find the time I love going to Grand Openings and Ribbon Cuttings with my local chamber of commerce. I especially like restaurants but not for the reason you might think as I don’t eat the food they serve most of the times.

I like restaurants because I’m appreciated by the wait staff.  I make it a point to talk to as many waiters and waitresses as possible.  I give them something they all need and appreciate,  a couple of ball point pens.

In the trunk of my car is a stash of my promotional ball point pens. I’ve got red and white ones for Prusa Marketing.com and Surf City Santa.com and I’ve also got the green grass and sunshine yellow ones for Prusa Marketing.

I’ve been telling my customers for years that if you’ve got pens as a promotional item you need to give them out at your favorite restaurant as they will find their way home to future customers.  Anywhere a pen is used is a good place to give a pen. I know the checkers at my local Ralphs store love getting pens from me.

On a recent Friday night I attended just such an event at a new hamburger joint.  Can a place be called a hamburger joint when they serve $10 burgers? Whatever happened to the $6 burger? When I was a kid McDonald’s sold burgers for 15 cents, but that’s ancient history.

The following Sunday I got an unsolicited email from a friend that read:

 I just used your pen to sign my bill at Slater’s 50/50. You’re on the ball!

Have a great day!
Cynthia Varnell

Cynthia also attached a pic of the pen she used.

The really interesting part of this story is that while at the grand opening I was talking to a Promote U reader and sharing with her the idea of giving out the pens to the wait staff.  After I got Cynthia’s email I forwarded it to the reader who replied that she needed a pen for her HR business.

Just yesterday I was in line at a small Arabic market (great coffee). The checker needed a pen for a credit card transaction.  After he began to sweat and frantically look for one, I gave him the one in my pocket and a smile came to his face and he said, “Thank you.”

When he started to check my items I asked him his name. He replied “Nassar” and we shook hands, I made a friend.  Leaving the store I put my bag in the trunk and grabbed a handful of green and yellow pens.  Went back in and gave my new friend some pens, they were warmly accepted.

Filed Under: Building Blocks, Education, Featured Articles, Networking, Promotional Products

Save and Continue

July 11, 2011 By Leave a Comment

When people ask me what sort of content Promote U has I tell them I write about stuff that I observe and notice in the world and people around me.  That doesn’t sound very glamorous does it?

Possibly the same stuff has happened to you or it will. Unless you write it down or share it with others, you’re the only one that learns a lesson

You’ve heard the phrase, “Experience is the best teacher.” That’s not necessarily true as someone else’s experience can be invaluable.

The reason I write each week is to share with you my experiences and from that I hope to give you:

-          Insight

-          Understanding

-          A different viewpoint

-          An edge.

Remarkably my readers compliment me on the content but then most of them have had some time to get accustomed to my writing. I’m often curious what the first time reader thinks and if they’ll come back for the next issue.

Some weeks the main story content is obvious to me and other weeks it’s not. Either way I never worry about what I’m going to write. Something always presents itself that can help others.

While compiling the different sections of Promote U this week I had issue #227 nearly complete. I just had to write the main article before I could relax that evening.  Up until this point I had about three hours invested in the issue.  Three hours of:

-          Think

-          Create

-          Write

-          Proofread

-          Rewrite

-          Proofread

-          Rethink, etc.

Shazamm!  My PC was struck by a bolt of thunderous lightening. The page on the screen changed and my three hours of work vanished in the cloud, somewhere.  I clicked the return arrow but alas it was gone. Three hours of creative genius and inspiration gone with a click in the Google search window.

If only I had saved the document along the way. What now? The only thought that entered my mind was laughter, loud contagious laughter.  Too bad there was no one around to question my sanity.

In that moment I realized that I had two choices:

1.  Whine, mope, cry, tell myself how stupid I am, pout and feel sorry for myself.
2.  Smile, laugh, realize how truly funny it was and continue.

 

We all have circumstances (crap that happens to us), sometimes good and sometimes not.  My point is this: We all have circumstances we generally can’t control but we do have attitudes we can control.

It’s easy to have a good attitude when things are going your way. The true test is how you respond to adversity.

As a result I have learned to save and continue while creating my documents.

Your attitude is a choice, pick a good one. It will serve you well.

Filed Under: Attitude, Building Blocks, Featured Articles, Networking, Sales Tagged With: , , , , ,

How small is your world, Cleveland?

July 4, 2011 By Leave a Comment

During the 90’s in my aviation career I traveled the world. After a few 8, 10 and 14 hour flights you begin to realize how small your backyard is.

I enjoy meeting new people and making friends, worldwide.  After a brief conversation I usually discover common ground and thus a “connection” is made.   The more connections you make away from your backyard the smaller the world becomes.

Enter the Internet. Now my travels are limited and mostly within the county I live in. Once a year I do go to Las Vegas for my annual trade show and congregate with 15,000 peers (the world comes to me).

Social Networking

I enter the Facebook site on average twice a day, LinkedIn twice a day and email many times a day.  I’ve made a Facebook friend of a guy in Wyoming I’ve never met; he’s 26-years old. We have an instant connection even though we never met and there’s so many years difference in our ages.

Google Alerts

I’ve got Google Alerts set to email me when the name John Prusa hits the Internet. I got an email this morning.

On Wednesday, June 29th 2011, John Prusa was honored by his local chamber of commerce as the 2011 Volunteer of the Year. John was not present to receive the award; my guess is he was busy volunteering somewhere.

Will the real John Prusa please stand up?

  • John Prusa of Evanston, Wyoming is a Facebook friend. How many Facebook friends do you have with your name?

 

  • I also have Johny Prusa from the Prague, Czech Republic friended on facebook.

 

  • The 2011 Volunteer of the Year is John Prusa, owner of Highpoint Lawn Service in Stow, Ohio (34 miles south of Cleveland)  and one of the founders of BEST (Benefiting Everyone with Stadium Turf) for Stow.

In addition to owning a successful business in Ohio and New York for almost 20 years, Prusa is a member of the high school booster club, Rotary Club, was a former president of the Ballet Theatre of Ohio and has always enjoyed coaching softball.

Calling a tractor a second home, [Prusa] has selflessly helped transform the football practice fields and soccer fields at the Stow Munroe Falls high school complex from fields of dusty brown to shimmering green. This entrepreneur has contributed time, talent, and treasure to the construction of the bathroom, concession and storage building located by the high school softball fields.

The people you meet and the company you keep.

I sure wish I knew these guys personally. I’ll bet we’d have a great time together and find much in common besides our names.

I’ll bet if I walked the streets of Stow, Ohio or talked to the football coach at the high school they’d all not believe who I am.  But once they heard the story I’d make a connection and a new friend. What do you think?

You can send a note of congratulations to John Prusa @ Highpoint Lawn Service, 1337 Commerce Drive # 4, Stow, OH 44224-1758.  You know my policy of using blue ink in correspondence so use it. I’ll be sending a copy of this article along with my promotional items of pens, lanyards and notepads.

 

 

Filed Under: Building Blocks, Facebook, Featured Articles, Networking, Promotional Products, Social Media Tagged With: , , , , ,

Listening or Defending?

June 26, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Do you listen to your customers or defend yourself?  We listen when we put an effort to understand something.

If you listen you let the customer speak and then ask clarifying questions to extract more information from them:

  • Tell me more about that…..
  • Can you be a bit more specific?
  • Give me an example.
  • How long has that been a problem?
  • What have you tried to do about that?
  • And that worked?
  • How much do you suppose that has cost you?
  • How do you feel about that?

None of these are in defense of you, they are all about the customer and their problem.  When you defend yourself you ask things like:

  • What do you mean we didn’t…..?
  • Why would you say such a thing about us?
  • But I told you before we began that…….
  • How can that be?
  • When we do this we must do that and it’s final.
  • But…..

Can you see the difference? As a customer you want to be listened to. The rest of the story…..

As a vendor it doesn’t matter if you own the company or work for a company people don’t take kindly to criticism. That’s probably because we think we are all doing the best we can and how dare someone say otherwise.

A customer voicing their bad experience to you or a person telling were you went wrong or a parent reprimanding a child are all opportunities for growth. There’s a plaque on my wall that says:

What to do with failure:
  • Receive it as from the hand of God.
  • Learn all you can from it.  Failures are to grow by.
  • Forget it and press towards your goal.
Failure is FORCED GROWTH.

I’ve learned that the majority of us begin our day with expectations of greatness in what we do, we are always trying our best and sometimes it just isn’t.  When that best isn’t what others think is the best we could have done God sends them back into our world to present us with an opportunity to grow.

If you are listening and asking questions to clarify you are growing.  If you are defending yourself you are stagnant. Webster defines stagnant as not advancing or developing. Stagnation precedes death, which could be the death of your business or a relationship. Defending leads to annihilation that leads to adios, bye-bye, so long and auf wiedersehen.

To listen leads to prosperity. The choice is yours. Listening is a skill and skills are learned.

Defending is a reaction, a natural response, it’s an instinctive characteristic that must be suppressed if you want growth.

Remember to: Listen, Acknowledge, Clarify & Respond. You can do that when you:

1. Stop talking
2. Imagine their viewpoint
3. Look, act and be interested
4. Observe non-verbal behavior
5.  Listen between the lines
6.  Speak only affirmatively
7.  Rephrase and reflect what they have said
8.  Take a vow of silence

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: Attitude, Building Blocks, Education, Featured Articles, Sales Tagged With: , , ,

Building Blocks #5

March 17, 2011 By Leave a Comment
“This One’s For Me!”
by John Prusa

I can remember when I was a kid it was always a thrill to open our mailbox on the street at the end of our driveway. It was even a bigger thrill when you found a card addressed to you.  Wow!! What could it be? Well, if it was near your birthday or Valentine’s, Easter, Thanksgiving or Christmas it was most likely a card from a relative.  My grandmother Ella was good for $5 every time she sent a card. There was always a sense of anticipation the week before your birthday that you would collect enough cash to buy yourself something fun.

We don’t outgrow those feelings of anticipation and excitement when we get mail, no matter how old we are.  It’s the felling you get when you know someone in some distant far away place is thinking about you and you’re thinking about them. Those are good feelings and they conjure up good memories.  In order to have good memories some one had to make an effort to connect with you.

You can instill those good feelings and good memories into the people you meet by taking a moment of your day to write them a note.  That’s right. In your own handwriting jot down why this person is important to you or how they make you feel when you spend time with them or how you couldn’t have completed your assignment/project without their contribution.

I think it was Dale Carnegie that said when you meet someone imagine they have a sign hanging from their neck that says “Make me feel special.” You may never know how special you’ll make someone feel by taking a moment of your time to express yourself to someone. Go ahead jot it down. Mail it, hand it to them or stick it in their shirt pocket on their way out the door.  Reminding people you care about, about how much you care has far more value than any amount of cash. How many people will you make feel special?

Filed Under: Building Blocks, Featured Articles Tagged With: ,

Building Block #4

March 3, 2011 By Leave a Comment
“Weekly Contact”
by John Prusa

My goal to my clients is to be accessible and to provide value, every week.  There’s no physical way for me to visit everyone every week. That may be true for those with a small sphere of influence but it’s not true for me and probably not true for you either.  So how do I stay in front of so many people? Simple I send out this e-zine on a weekly basis. Weekly not daily (over kill) or monthly (under kill) or when I feel the urge (wounded).  You may know by now that on Tuesday morning 7:30 AM Pacific Time you’ll get Promote-U in your mailbox.

Note: I’m not an expert at e-zines, but I’m working towards it. Yes, my e-zine makes me money but that’s not the reason I send it. I send it to deliver a value message to my contacts, the people in my sphere of influence.

History: Christmas of 2006 I gave myself a new book published in September 2006, Jeffrey Gitomer’s Little Black Book of Connections. It was only the 2nd book of his that I had read. As of today I’ve read 9 of his books, he’s one of my mentors. In the Little Black Book he has four pages devoted to e-zines, pages 147-150. In those pages he suggested that with the technology we have today and the time constraints we work within only a fool would NOT have an e-zine.  Well my momma didn’t raise a fool so I put together my first e-zine using my email system. With all the problems and inadequacies of my email system it didn’t take long for me to find Constant Contact. (Hint: If you’re considering Constant Contact let me refer you and we’ll both get a $30 rebate, just reply to this email.)

Value: Does Promote-U deliver information of value?  Information that’s helpful to my contacts. Information that helps them build their business. Information that helps them make a profit or increase productivity. Information that  helps them make better connections.  According to the feedback I get the answer would have to be YES!  Read some of the mail for yourself….

Thank you so much for your newsletters. YOU ARE THE BEST! I always learn something very special about networking or about life in general. Thank you so very much for sending these to me.

Thank you for your clever and insightful emails throughout 2009.  Not only did I find your “Price is Right” blurbs helpful, but I mentioned them to other salespeople, and they were impressed as well. With that said, have you considered sending out a recap with all 23 pearls of wisdom?  I know I for one would greatly appreciate it and find it helpful to print out and have at the office when preparing for client meetings. Thanks again for your assistance provided via these emails.  I wish you and yours a happy, healthy and prosperous 2010.


Filed Under: Building Blocks, Featured Articles Tagged With: , ,