Never Confuse RPM with Torque

I got my first really awesome sales job in the  mid-90's. I was really confident in the interview and made all sorts of promises about being a diamond in the rough, etc.  'Robert' (who was one of the best bosses and mentors I could have ever lucked into) bought that-my first real sales pitch I suppose-and gave me the job. I was very determined to not only prove that I was worthy of the faith he put in me but to also be a VSBW (Very Successful Business Woman) in my own mind. 

As most really good managers do, he watched me. He hovered around my desk when I made my cold calls and he rode with me to pitch new clients. He saw me bring tons of office supplies from the supply closet and even supplement them with those I purchased myself.  He saw me come in earlier and stay later than everyone else around me. I made sure I was very very busy.

One morning he called me into his office.  He asked me how I thought it was going, how I liked it and how I thought I was doing.  At some point the words 'I work really hard' must have slipped out of my mouth. He leaned into me and said 'The first thing you have to do is learn to never confuse RPM with Torque.'  It took me a few minutes to figure it out...I think it was after he said something like 'Do you get what I'm saying?' but I DID get it...I just didn't know what I was doing wrong.  Over time that saying has remained one of my favorites. We all get so very busy but sometimes don't always analyze our torque against our RPM.  I know I have to revisit that phrase when:

• I find myself frustrated several days in a row
• When all of my files stay in my To-Do pile longer than a few days
• When I have conversations with clients or prospects and leave the meeting with no clear idea of what my very next step with them is
• When the words 'I'm really busy' come out of my mouth
• When I start to lack a sense of accomplishment on anything

As someone whose hard-earned corner office is in her home, I find myself falling into this trap more than I might if I worked in a staffed corporate office. I have to be careful to not get caught up in anything other than my work during the hours I'm at my desk. I have to go into conversations with a clear resolution to move something forward even if it is just to advance the relationship I have with that client. I have to force myself to do something-make a note, file, make a phone call, delegate to my staff-with every file or project folder I touch. Sometimes I have to just find something that I can work on and finish in a few minutes time so I can feel that I did something to completion.

It's easy for me to feel busy...I have to remember it's important to be busy doing something that makes an impact. How do others keep from falling into the 'always busy but never completing' pit?
JEM

3 Reasons Shopping for Office Supplies Makes Me Happy

I went to Staples this morning. I don't go often but I love it. I have been giddy since last night when my printer cartridge just could not be shaken anymore into printing without lines across the paper. I am never this excited about shopping ever. I realized why office supply shopping  beats clothes shopping (or shopping for anything else) for me every time.


When I buy office supplies I get a feeling akin to purchasing a lottery ticket with a huge payout and a limited amount of people vying to win. Except for my aforementioned stapler I have no loyalty to any of my existing office supplies. Every pen, every notebook, every paperclip and every file jacket is just one new eye-catching and sale priced replacement away. Because anyone of them could be THE ONE.  The one file jacket design that would suddenly make all of my files finished, legible and alphabetized.  The one paperclip that might inspire me to more compactly combine my many ripped out notebook pages of valuable information.  The one notebook that might make me abandon the current routine of just grabbing anyone of 5 floating around on my desk when the phone rings and I may have to take notes.  Every single item holds the possibility of making my professional life So Much Better.

I can buy a whole lot of office supplies without spending a whole lot of money and I have absolutely no purchaser's remorse about it! I absolutely, as the owner of a company and a very important person in my own basement, am justified in buying a whole cart full of supplies.  I NEED them.  Heck sometimes I even feel superior to the women simultaneously leaving the card shop in the same shopping center because I spent my money on BUSINESS stuff.  Guilt free shopping-does it get any better?

Office supplies don't elicit indecision or self-loathing during the shopping process.  Clothing is sometimes true to size and sometimes not-sometimes I think I'm magically losing weight, sometimes I feel like a heifer-and I don't know until it's too late which way it's going to go.  I worry that I could save money if I wanted to a different point in the season to buy it or  I worry that I'll show up to a meeting and someone will be wearing the same outfit and look really so much better in it than I do. While there is far too much frustration involved in buying clothes and most everything else I feel like  my new pens/designer paperclips/file folders/blank CDs are perfect to buy.  They don't make my hands look fat, they rarely go on end-of-season sale, and I don't care if everyone else has one just like them.

I don't view this borderline obsession with office supply shopping as a bad thing.  It's a quick process that doesn't involve much time. I don't have to go to multiple stores to get my fix since the closest Staples to my house does the trick every time.  Things don't break or run out or need replacing every week. I don't go often enough for the clerks to recognize me so I can still go without applying make-up or clothes that necessarily match. I never come home and decide that the highlighters looked better in the store than they do on the desk and need returning. There are 4 drive-thru opportunities between my house and the store that can accommodate any cravings I have.  All good.

Am I the only one?

3 Ways Teenagers and Soap Opera Characters Lead Amazingly Similar Lives

This isn't a business post or an inspirational post. It isn't even a post with great tips for doing something better/different/faster.  It is a mom post.  About the thoughts that occur to me sometimes in dealing with my boys.  My sons are ‘grown’ if we’re strictly counting legal age of accountability. One is 21 and one is 18. The 18 year old just graduated and lives with us. Yesterday I was reminded again how teenagers and soap opera characters lead very similar lives. This is what they seem to have in common:

1-The perfection of the long, overly-dramatic, did I mention LONG? look they give when they are questioned about a sticky subject or caught in an obvious untruth. Let’s face it, almost everyone has at least briefly watched a soap opera. You know how the character is able to hold this look right into the camera just as the show goes to commercial break? The one that begins as a frightened ‘Oh my gosh, did Willow just hear me admit that the triplets I’m carrying may be my father’s brother’s drycleaner’s cousin’s babies and not my husband who is being held in a unidentifiable third world country jail’? and then slowly turns into a look of challenge and ultimately defiance ‘I don’t believe she heard anything and I’m going to stand here and look innocent and peeved that she appeared to be eavesdropping in the first place’? THAT’s the look my Max has perfected when I ask him how it is that report cards were sent out a month ago and yet haven’t seemed to show up in our mailbox a mere 5 miles away from school yet, or when I remind him that I’ve asked him 300 times to unload the dishwasher and ask just what day that could possibly happen. If only I could get him on contract so he could get paid for the acting. Which leads me to #2…


2-The effortless nature of wearing nice clothes, being invited to great parties, having gym/club memberships, and just showing up everywhere they are supposed to be without ever seeming to actually go to a JOB (unless you count the occasional hospital, police department, or family corporation). People in soap operas are like most teenagers. They always have nice clean clothes and yet never seem to be hovering over a washing machine. They are members of the neighborhood pool without ever having paid a homeowner dues bill. They just expect that they will have good food and be given great opportunities without any thought of actually clipping coupons and stocking the fridge. And like the magic of television, my children are walking around in pretty nice clothes and well-fed through no effort of their own.


3-The lack of acceptance of the simple fact that it is far better to confess early than be found out later.
On television people rarely learn from their mistakes or the mistakes or others. They stubbornly refuse to admit to the affair, the evil twin, or the baby switch scheme but they always always always end up exposed as liars. Teenagers are often the same way. My son knows his report card is horrible and he knows that eventually it will find its way to me. Yet when he is questioned repeatedly about his grades, his exams, etc, he is adamant that all is good. So when it finally arrives I am mad. Mad at the grades but more angry (here is the crucial part that soap opera characters and teenagers never grasp) at having been repeatedly lied to about it. Really angry as I sit and remember the many opportunities he had to ‘fess up when he chose to hold on to the cover-up instead. And never has there been a shot-out of gangsters at the local hotel or any other sudden and far-fetched tragedy  to instantly make me forget that I'm mad at him.

I suppose I could wish that my children had aged right through their teenage years and reappeared on my doorstep looking quite unlike themselves or either of their parents as the soap opera characters do but I don't.  Despite the frustrations I have great boys and enjoy them far more often than I want to throttle them. And since they are young in real-life I can assume that they will outgrow most of their soap opera ways.  Until then, join us tomorrow for another episode of 'From my Basement Corner Office'...
JEM