Why Blog

I sometimes hear employers gripe about the high cost of training their employees.  They complain that just when they get someone trained and productive, the employee decides to move on—or so the story goes.  In these tough economic times, many of us have had to trim our organization’s budget, but I encourage you to not cut your staff training and education budget too deeply, and definitely do not skimp on your own professional and leadership development.

In his book, Creating Magic, Lee Cockerell, former Walt Disney World executive, encourages those in management to engage, involve and show employees in each and every way possible, that every single one of them is important.  He writes that companies and organizations can “create magic” by training their people well.  He suggests that managers 1. give people a purpose, not just a job, 2. take their role as a teacher seriously, and teach by example and 3. become a COACH (Care, Observe, Act, Communicate, Help). ¹

As a leader it is my responsibility to make sure I do everything I can to hire the right people for the position-- to get, as Jim Collins, author of Good to Great would say, “the right people on the bus.” This means developing a relevant, descriptive and well thought out job description for each position, as well as an effective interview process.  It also means not settling for “good enough,” or compromising on qualifications or experience.

Historically, sailing vessels determined their course by measuring the direction and distance they had traveled and marking it on a map. The technique left some to be desired in terms of accuracy, but it was the method used for centuries.

A magnetic compass was used to determine direction, an invention known since the mid 1100’s.  To determine distance, the speed of the ship needed to be calculated. A simple device was used. A large piece of wood, or “log” was tied to a rope containing knots equally interspersed along its length.  The “log” was thrown over the stern, and the “log-line” was allowed to be pulled out, length by length behind the ship.  A “sandglass” was used to measure time, the earlier sandglasses emptied in 30 seconds. The number of knots pulled out in the given time gave the speed of the ship.