Chester Elton

And I'm happy to report that the first one is a starred review ! Our newest book The Orange Revolution was reviewed by Barbara Jacobs at Booklist, published by the American Library Association.

My family and I were recently on vacation in London. We thought that by climbing up onto a couple of huge statues we could get a better view of the changing of the guards at Buckingham palace. We were right; it was very cool with just a hint of danger. So there I was with my two older boys when a Bobby yells at us, “Get down! Show some respect! That’s not a statue, it’s a MONUMENT!”

Having lived in the USA for the last few decades I thought, “What’s the difference?” Apparently quite a bit, if you are English.

A statue is a sculpture in the round representing a person or persons, an animal, or an event, normally full-length. Its primary concern is representational.

A monument is a type of structure either explicitly created to commemorate a person or important event or which has become important to a social group as a part of their remembrance of past events.

The biggest difference for tourists is that you can climb on a statue but don’t mess with the MONUMENTS!

It made me think about business, about our lives. What do we want to leave behind? Will we leave behind statues? Something that is by definition representational? Or will we be honored by a monument? Something that help to remember an important past event with social significance?

It all depends I think on how we live our lives and treat the people we work with and for. Have we been builders or have we been destructive in our relationships?

I recently went through a terrible experience where my passion to get things done and believing that my course of action was the best became very toxic in my relationships. Competitive by nature, it seemed to me that the course forward was obvious and that we needed to charge ahead. What I didn’t do was make sure that those that I cared most about didn’t get run over in my charge ahead. I damaged some people that I care deeply about and I am not sure if those relationships will ever be the same. Stupid, and needless.

You can build a statue to stupidity but you would never build a monument.

I would hope that we would all in our hearts want to leave behind some kind of monument to our lives, a token or symbol that the world was a little better place because we were there. That our passions were tempered with compassion for others and their feelings and dreams.

So, as it always is, it is up to us to decide how we will live our lives to know how we will be remembered.

-Chester

Live from a cruise in the Mediterranean Sea, Chester talks to Kaye Jorgensen, Senior VP of Human Resources for O. C. Tanner. Kaye discusses the important role that HR is playing in helping companies battle through the recession, and reveals the source of her daily inspiration and motivation: her colleagues and co-workers.

14:37 minutes | Download | Read the Transcript

Meet Raymond, one of the millions of people who live on the streets of Chicago. He has inspired me by the way he counts his blessings. Raymond appreciates what he has instead of worrying about what he doesn’t have.

With permission from his friend Kevin Smith and the Chicago State Farm Office where they work, I have reprinted his story below and encourage you to watch the short video on Kevin’s Facebook page. Kevin and his office are great friends of the Carrot Culture Group, we value their friendship and the way they share the power of Appreciation with all their clients and friends. Everyone has a story to tell. Everyone can inspire. Everyone truly does matter.

Raymond: By Kevin Smith

Our State Farm Insurance office mission is to "appreciate you". The idea is similar to Apple's "think different"...it's more of a movement than a mission. Everything we do has to come back to the mission. We believe if your mission is about appreciating people and spreading it around, everything else--like sales and profit--will come. This also improves atmosphere, moral and the lives of staff and families.

We gage high performance on "appreciation" and like any great brand and mission, we have a mascot: Garrett the Carrot. We use the carrot to symbolize appreciation and give the concept a face. Whenever somebody impacts anyone in our offices life, we give them a carrot and take a picture. We ask them to spread appreciation. This could be anything, such as good service; going above and beyond to help a friend or a hard working wife....kind actions get a carrot. It’s the reward for doing good.

It has become a staple of how we live our life in our office. Juan and Karina, office manager and associate, noticed a homeless man wanting to clean our windows. They started bring him clothes, buying him lunch, etc. They told me, "Raymond works hard and deserves our help." That was the moment we gave him the carrot of the week award, a weekly recognition for whomever helped us most.

We later we saw Raymond riding his bike 10 miles to our office for a $10 dollar job with the carrot dangling from his handle bars. We also learned Raymond has been homeless for 20 years, had been in trouble with the law in the past and almost lost his life several times to lack of food. He later told us that it was his decision to work hard and be grateful for what he has that changed his life. He went from living on the streets to now living in a $200 dollar a month room, eating food regularly and most importantly, spreading appreciation.

I asked him why he has the carrot on his bike. He simple answer was, "He’s my mascot. He is my motivation!" That answer opened our eyes and hearts. A homeless man is living day by day, teaching our community the importance of being thankful for what you have. We see Raymond every week and every week we are inspired and, yes, grateful.

Kevin Smith, State Farm Insurance

Follow Kevin on Twitter @kevinsmithchi

The managerial role is evolving to work with their teams instead of above them. In our new research around building breakout teams, we came across leaders who understood that a great team will beat great talent in the long run.

When commenting on the future of American football, NFL coach Bruce Coslett described the evolution of the sport as “an era in which the rugged individual is giving way to the era of the team player. Everyone is needed, but no one is necessary.” He didn’t know he might well have been describing the trajectory of the manager’s gatekeeper role in business, but it’s true. Leaders of the revolutionary teams must begin to see themselves as playing a role on the team rather than as someone outside an above their colleagues.” That’s when the magic happens and championships of all sorts start to roll in. 

And it isn’t just a sports thing. It even shows up in children's story book classics. Rudyard Kipling spelled it out succinctly and poetically in The Jungle Book:

The strength of the pack is the wolf, and the strength of the wolf is the pack.

We call it the Orange Revolution, when great talent meets great teamwork. Business is competitive. We are in it to win it, to be world-class and the top of our industry. We find that the more power managers give to their employees, the more those employees esteem their leaders. In our 200,000-person research study published in The Carrot Principle, we found that when managers built strong team cultures focused on recognition and member engagement, employee ratings of their managers’ skills at goal setting, communication, trust, and accountability soared.

Recognition is the lever that ignites the fire. Great business leaders know that and use it to ignite great work and outstanding results. Learn more by downloading the first chapter of The Orange Revolution, due for release next month!

Photo credit: foamhands.com