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Creating Winners

Written by: Robert Whipple

Article Overview: A key leadership function is to create an organization where people feel like winners. This is not really that difficult to do even in the most oppressive environments. This article outlines some techniques you might find helpful at creating a winning organization.

Creating Winners

At work, many people feel forced to endure an unfair world where they feel like losers. In organizations of exceptional leadership, the exact opposite occurs. People enjoy their work because their leader has created a culture of "winners." People become bonded together as a winning team, and joy and celebrations replace the drudgery of work. These are the lucky few that work in organizations where the leader understands how to leverage the small win.

Jack Stack wrote:

"Winning is not just a matter of pride, of course. It is also a habit. Unfortunately losing can be a habit as well. When people are in the habit of losing, you won't see fire in their eyes, only sand. If you want to light the fire, you have to begin by creating wins and celebrating wins - by making a big deal out of little victories and then building on the little victories to achieve bigger victories. It's a way of putting fun in the workplace - literally. We throw parties and hold celebrations at the drop of a hat. What we're really doing is creating a team."

Excellent leaders understand a key mission is to create this environment. They know that when they establish a culture of winners, the entire organization will prosper and win.

Success is defined, not in terms of wealth or power, but in doing worthwhile things. There are wealthy and powerful people who are utter failures, just as there are many successful people who have no money or fame. It is the journey, not the destination, that embodies success. Earl Nightingale in his program, "Lead the Field," identified success as "the pursuit of a worthy goal."

Notice it is not achieving the goal or receiving awards for accomplishing amazing feats. Success is in the doing, in the pursuit. Once you have reached a particular goal, immediately set out a course for the next increment of your life. If this new goal is worthy, the simple pursuit will mean you are successful.

This is wonderful news because you can feel the elation of success every day of your life. It is there in the fiber of your daily living as long as you are pursuing a worthy goal. Teach this insight to everyone in your organization. It will take the drudgery and pressure away, adding joy in its place.

The best way to create winners is to become an expert at positive reinforcement. This is the glue that holds good feelings together and makes a winning culture sustainable. Dr. Ken Blanchard has written more than a dozen books, all focusing on creating this kind of environment. Each one has a new twist to help leaders understand different dimensions of outstanding reinforcement. His teachings have changed the business world over several decades.

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Article Tags: Leadership, Organization, trust, Winning



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Re: Can you outsource your product launch? - Yes that what I am talking about. Creating a buzz for your online product launch basically. Is this part of what you do?
Re: Social Media & Digg, Google, MySpace, and YouTube - Hi Kathy, What I meant about it being worth it was in the sense that I described. Creating multiple accounts for various sites and posting and ranking your own stuff. It's very time consuming to say the least. I'm just wondering if there's anyone out there that has done this and thinks it's beneficial.
Re Thinking Smarter - Hi Beat, Thanks for sharing this win. It's inspiring to hear about. Can you imagine what our life (and our businesses) could look like if we continued to open up to our creativity? Every day becomes an exciting journey for us and even those around us. Happy "Creating"... Tami
What are your success criteria? - Out of curiousity, what has to be present for you to know that your business is a success? The top three things for me are: 1. Maintaining a 6 figure income year in and year out. 2. Creating and promoting my own products. 3. Income not solely dependent upon my personal effort. How about yours?
Design offer - 2 - I'm always surprised these days when people offer their services -- in appropriate forums like this one --- and yet don't have a website that they can direct us to to see their work. Creating a website, even a very simple one, should be the first act of any entrepreneur. There's no reason not to have one, and every reason to have one!


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