WHAT IS UNCOMMON SENSE?

If you spend enough time in the business world, you will meet leaders with all different kinds of smarts. Book smarts. Street smarts. Emotional smarts. Smarts that come from years of real world experience. Some people rely heavily on just one category of smarts. Others put all of their smarts together and simply call it "Common Sense."

This book isn't about having "Common Sense." Common Sense is no longer enough to succeed today. Instead, today's world has become increasingly an era characterized by "UnCommon Sense."

What is "UnCommon Sense? UnCommon Sense requires that you put together everything that you have learned with three other components:

1) Heart (care, compassion and concern),

2) Emotional Sensitivity and Guts (intuition and the ability to "thin slice" situations coupled with the willingness to pull the trigger and leap into action) and

3) Courage (a good sense of when to stretch and/or break rules and when to set new precedents by using disruptive thinking).

Before I offer you numerous examples of UnCommon Sense, I want to honor time tested elements of Common Sense. There is a lot to be said for Common Sense. Let me offer you Dr. Tom's Top 5 Bits of Wisdom that I have learned from books, in the street, as a psychologist, coach and counselor, and from the school of hard knocks.

BOOK SMARTS

1) Numbers don't lie. Particularly the bottom line. Thoughts, dreams, wishes and hopes are all terrific, but at the end of the month you have to pay salaries and rent. Money talks. Everything else walks.

2) If you can't measure it, you can't manage it. Know the right metrics. Have the right processes in place. Look at them frequently and be agile and ready to adjust to changing situations in the ever- changing world.

3) Find out what the world wants and then find a way to sell it to them at the right time in the right place in the right way. Some businesses don't check in often enough with their customers and potential customers to make sure that they have the right product at the right price, a product which can be readily available and supported.

4) Get it in writing. Goals. Contracts. Expectations. Boundaries. Limits. Talk is cheap and doesn't stand up as well in court.

5) The new concept du jour is "evidence based." Make sure that you have solid research and experience with new tactics before you put them into action. Review "best-in-class" practices, adjust them to fit your environment and then implement them.

STREET SMARTS

1) Everyone has to have their own unique hustle (be it 3 Card Monte, The Naked Cowboy or The Purple Cow). Make sure you have something unique to offer.

2) The world is not fair. Fair is where pigs win medals. In this world, you get what you take or what you make happen.

3) Play for keeps. There are no do overs. There is no free lunch. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is too good to be true (particularly if it comes from an unknown Benin official who offers to send you $5Million dollars via email.)

4) The easiest people to "sell" a product or an idea to are greedy people. Those people love to get a "deal." Most salespeople fall into this category.

5) The real value of a product or service is what it costs in the open, unrestricted, street marketplace.

EMOTIONAL SMARTS

1) Feelings matter as much as, if not more than, logic. People buy ideas and products emotionally and then justify their purchases with logic.

2) You usually catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. People like to deal with other people that they like. They also like to deal with other people who they think like them. Be likeable. Like others.

3) It is easy to talk "at" other people. Most people really want to be heard and more importantly to be understood. Communication involves suspending your judgment and becoming curious about what they have to say. What you say matters, BUT how well you listen matters more.

4) Trust and credibility are the 2 factors that drive relationships and businesses. They are the most precious commodities in any relationship. They can only be rebuilt twice in a life time, if damaged.

5) Communication must be intentional, not accidental. It is important to think carefully about everything you say in emails, phone calls and personal meetings. Use "emotionally evocative language." Imagine if you were able to deal with the issues of the day AND plant seeds (of hope or doubt) about the future in every communication. You would be well ahead of the game when it comes time to sell your ideas.

REAL WORLD SMARTS

1) What you did in the past doesn't matter very much. You can't fix yesterday. You can only influence and fix today and tomorrow. You never really own winning. You just rent it. And the rent collector comes every day. Just when you think you can stop running as fast as you can, someone else runs right past you. There is always someone else out there who may want it more than you do. They are willing and able to work harder than you do if you get complacent. Never relax.

2) No matter how good you are, you can always get better. The best in class are always striving for feedback and continuous improvement. They are always looking over their shoulders to see what is around them. They are willing to borrow, steal or import the ideas of others to make things better. The best companies today import 50% of their ideas from outside the company.

3) Politics are everywhere. There is no such thing as an apolitical situation or organization. However, my definition of politics is different than yours. When I say politics, I don't mean lying, saying yes when you mean no, sugarcoating or kissing up to anyone. Those are old impractical definitions of politics. What I mean by politics is positioning your ideas in front of other people so that they have the maximum ability of being favorably received, while being honest and credible.

4) There are red rules and blue rules. Red rules are engraved in stone and can never be broken. Blue rules are rules that apply most of the time. Most of the business world is blue, not red. The motto for today is "ask for forgiveness, not permission."

5) The world is changing so rapidly that you need to be adept at making changes instantly. The world rewards the first player, the first page and the first respondent. Speed and agility triumph over legacy.

If you have learned all of these things and know how to apply them, you are off to a great start and likely to fit in well in the business world. But if that is all you know, you may top out rather quickly at the level of manager or director. To gain access and have success in the upper echelons of private and public sector organizations requires something additional, something I call UnCommon Sense.

The Difference between Common Sense and UnCommon Sense

How many times have you heard someone say: "That guy may have a lot of degrees and experience, but he has no Common Sense. He couldn't lead his way out of a paper bag." We all have seen leaders who are great at going by the book. Following the rules. Knowing the procedure. Coloring within the lines. But when you chat with them about leading people in a passionate and caring manner, they seem clueless and even worse, disinterested. These leaders assume that their employees will follow their directives and instructions simply because they have to.

Over 500 years ago, Machiavelli told us that "it is better to be feared than loved." Machiavelli may have been correct amidst the carnival of Italian politics of the 1500's, where new leaders were regularly purged and replaced. But he would not be correct today. Too many managers believe that their power lies in their job title. Nothing could be further from the truth. Their real power lies in their ability to work with and motivate a diverse workforce.

Common Sense suggests that leaders should pay primary attention to productivity levels, getting the work done correctly, on time, within budget and up to spec. After that, leaders may be able to afford themselves the luxury of paying attention to their employees' feelings, hopes and aspirations. Lead the tasks and then show your concern for your employees.

UnCommon Sense suggests that you do exactly the opposite. If you show respect, dignity, caring and concern for your employees and lead with passion, it may be easier and more rewarding for you and for them to meet and exceed their work productivity goals.

The UnCommon Sense examples that follow are simple and straight forward. You will be able to put them to use wherever you work, be it in the private sector, public sector or non-profit/charity sector.

Where did I learn UnCommon Sense? From paying attention to everything around me, every single day of my life, in school, at home and in the American workplace.

I have had many jobs. I have worked as a Director of Leadership Development, University Professor and Elementary School Principal. I have also worked as a door-to-door salesperson, taxi cab driver and stand-up comic. I learned UnCommon Sense at every one of those jobs.

I have worked with all kinds of people from white collar to blue collar to no collar. I have worked with "boots on the ground" employees to Senior Level Executives. I have worked and spoken with organizations in 49 of the 50 great states in this country (OK, the 6 esteemed people in South Dakota have not invited me to their state, yet.) I have worked with hotel clerks, bank tellers, truck drivers, dentists, prison guards, nurses, civil servants and engineers. I have learned UnCommon Sense from working with every one of them.

I learned more UnCommon Sense walking into buildings selling cable television and driving cabs in the not so friendly streets of NYC than I ever learned in university classrooms. Sometimes I was treated well. Other times I was treated like a piece of dirt. But UnCommon Sense teaches you that school is always in session, particularly if you are a good student. So pay attention. The school of UnCommon Sense is different from any other school that you have ever attended.

Every job you have will provide new opportunities. Every person you meet can teach you something. Every place you have ever been before, every place you go to now and every place you will ever visit in the future is a place where you can learn something. There is UnCommon Sense everywhere as long as you know where to look for it, are willing to look for it and can understand it.

There are few, if any, textbooks on UnCommon Sense. While you can learn some valuable lessons from reading a book like this, getting out there and putting these ideas into action is the only way to guarantee your success. Life is OJT (on the job training.) Put your "boots on the ground," roll up your shirtsleeves and get ready to jump into the muck and mire.

Much to your dismay, there will be a lot of homework. The world assigns homework every day. The world expects you to practice these lessons and get better and better using them.

There are two differences between homework that you completed at school and this type of homework. First of all, only YOU AND the rest of the world grade your homework, instead of your teacher grading it. You will get graded in terms of your joy, happiness, pay, raises and promotional opportunities. The second difference at this school is that you don't have to do any of your homework to graduate. Everybody graduates. Whether you are ready or not. Whether you are ready to be successful or not. Life is too short not to graduate and go out and find your place in the world. Some people just end up in better places than others.

If you want to make great strides as a leader, pay attention every day to everything you see around you, do your homework and realize that lifelong learning is the name of the game. School never ends for smart people. I got my Ph.D. in 1975. That's over 40 years ago. I got my Management Degree in 1983. We were doing computer programming on punch cards. How much of that education still serves me well today? I'd be a fossil or at least a dinosaur if I didn't work hard to stay current in the school of UnCommon Sense.

The reward for really paying attention and mastering these skills is that you get a bit more freedom and you can work with more interesting and eccentric people and can choose which people to work with and which people to avoid.

In this book, what you will learn is how to work with every kind of human being on the planet in a way that shows caring, builds trust and gets results. Imagine walking into any room of people and believing that you can connect with everyone there, gain commitment, create passion and actually work together effectively and efficiently to accomplish your mutual goals.

In this book Common Sense and UnCommon Sense will be placed side by side for you to look at, think about and evaluate for yourself.

The only way for you to know which is better for you is to try many of the approaches and see which ones result in better outcomes. The more options you try the better. Are you ready?

Let's get started.

MOTIVATING YOUR EMPLOYEES

COMMON SENSE

Employees are motivated by pay, promotional opportunities, perks and time off.

UNCOMMON SENSE

Once employees are making enough money to pay their bills, they are motivated by feeling valued and appreciated. To get peak performance from them involves helping them to feel that they are part of a greater whole and that their work is meaningful to themselves and to others around them.

I often hear leaders say that it is tough to motivate people during a tough economy or in the public sector because there just isn't enough money available to use for pay raises and bonuses. Promotional opportunities are limited to praying for your boss to have a traffic accident in the parking lot. Nonsense.

When I worked as a cabbie, my dispatcher, who made Attila the Hun seem like a saint, doled out the cabs to drivers according to the following factors:

1) What time you showed up for work

2) Whether you brought him food

3) Whether you told him a dirty joke.

So, late, unfunny, foodless drivers always got the worst cabs. They got the cabs that made those noises that led you to believe that you might not get back to the garage at the end of the day. The worst part of it was that he thought that he was a GREAT MOTIVATOR. I was motivated. Motivated to lick any food that I brought him when I was coming down with a cold. I realized early on that I never wanted to treat anyone else that way. No one will work very hard for very long when they feel that their good work has little to do with how they are treated.

Consider these people instead:

Matt works as a busboy in a local restaurant. He has been offered higher paying jobs but has always turned them down. Why? Because he loves working in that restaurant. Everyone knows his name. He looks forward to seeing his regular customers. He enjoys chatting with them. He brings pottery that he has made in his spare time to give to his favorite customers. He knows what is expected of him, and his boss genuinely likes and appreciates him.

Josie is a hygienist in a dental office. This is the 4 different office that she has worked in. She loves it so much at her new office that she gives thanks every day for the opportunity to work there. Is she getting paid more at this office? Maybe a few more dollars. But if you ask her what she really likes, it is the family atmosphere of the office. She feels that she is supported by the doctors, knows her role and is valued by her patients and the rest of the staff.

Think this is true just for service employees? Not so. Life is too short to work just for the money. 90% of chemists working at biotech companies are likely to never work on a drug that actually makes it to the marketplace. Only 1 in 10 will ever experience the satisfaction of knowing that their work directly resulted in developing a treatment that helped folks cope with an illness. Do you see the other 9 people lining up for space on the 9 floor office ledge waiting for their turn to jump off? No. Why not? In many of the better companies, chemists are encouraged to see their work as successful, even if it doesn't result in a saleable drug. Their contribution may have been to rule out other possible formulations and push the research process into another direction. There is no sense of failure. They learn what doesn't work so well.

Think of the people whom you work with. How much appreciation do you show them on a regular basis? I am not talking about the once-a-year company picnic or the insincere "good job," said without any real feelings or specifics attached. I am talking about simple, heartfelt, open communication where you take the time and make the effort to know what they are doing, ask questions about it, think about what they have said and then respond with a unique and meaningful compliment.

Have you taken the time to get every employee to feel like they are part of the bigger picture? There is a classic NASA story about then President Lyndon B. Johnson visiting the NASA Space Center in Houston in the 1960's. He walked up to a janitor and asked the gentleman what his job was. The gentleman beamed back: "Mr. President, my job is to help put a man on the moon." Now that man got it. He saw his role in the grand scheme of things.