Post from Transformation Tom- Set an Example: Chapter from “The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas”

August 6, 2018 / tomdowd / News

Be the person you want others to be. This is easy to say but hard to do. Whether we like it or not, in the professional world we are constantly on stage in plain view of people around us. Whether it is the people we work with, work for, or customers we serve, we are always being observed and judged—in person, on the phone, or through written communications. We are constantly being viewed, whether face to face, in conference calls, video conference calls, or just walking down the hall.

Observers are making judgments constantly, and we are being labeled with an ongoing reputation, good or bad, every day. There is a laundry list of people with reputations in any office, and we have probably worked with them all at one point or another. In some cases, I know I’ve made my own uninformed observations and judgments of others.

Every company has one of the following: the complainer; the individual who refuses to work unless given A to Z instructions; the person who freezes under pressure; the one too good to associate with others; the one only in it for himself, and at least one overly competitive team member. The list can go on and on, but you get the point. Reputations and judgments can be made quickly and are tough to get rid of. There are traits and personalities that only add to the intensity of the reputations that bubble to the top. In any case, you are constantly being looked at and judged in the eyes of your peers and colleagues.

When our corporate culture was a little looser with expenses and entertainment, we had month-long events in one of our departments. We had contests and practical jokes, all in the supposed context of fun and employee satisfaction. Points could be accumulated as part of the team competition through practical jokes. The event culminated in a festive sports outing during which we went outside to release some tension and have some fun. I was constantly reminded by my manager that it was “supposed to” be fun. I say “supposed to” because over the years of this annual event, the practical jokes got more intense as teams tried to outdo each other. Besides the risk of injury, there was a higher likelihood of risk to reputations if you were a target. The atmosphere began to get a cliquish feel to it, like the days of junior high and high school. The leadership encouraged it. As a manager, I was told to play along.

I like to have fun as much as the next person, but felt the intensity was reaching a level that was pushing the line of professional boundaries. As soon as I had this feeling, I could have done something. There were several examples I could have set. I could have had a long conversation with the leaders who condoned this and clearly stated what was on my mind. I could have reacted better to the jokes that were being played on me. I could have realized nobody was getting hurt and subsequently could have made it more of a team effort.

There were times I felt that I was individually being targeted, which only exacerbated the issue, pushing the jokes to see how much further our competitors could get under my skin. I would come in as early as possible to rid my office of whatever was in it or done to it. In the month-long event, I had a reputation for overreacting to the practical jokes, and I inadvertently created a game in which the other teams would see how much they had to do to keep me from cleaning up their practical jokes before everyone came into work that day. This caused stress personally and created a divide in an event that was originally intended for the cohesion of the collective group. What kind of example was I setting?

I should have shown more maturity, gotten the right people involved, and set the example. I could have gathered the opinions of the team and determined how they wanted to handle the entire event. If we had talked through it, we may have even found that no one wanted to do any of it, but felt the peer pressure to keep it going. I had the opportunity to set the right example but never chose to take it.

Unfortunately, some of the events brought Human Resources into the picture that forced a long conversation with me. I had a chance to state all of my points. It was not easy or comfortable. However, it felt right. I wish I had set the example and not waited for HR to intervene. Although I moved on to another area the next year, the event was significantly toned down, and the pressure to find the next great practical joke was gone. Instead, it was back to good old-fashioned office fun, with competitions and food. By the way, you can never go wrong in making people happy with food.

Thomas B. Dowd III’s books available in softcover, eBook, and audiobook (From Fear to Success only):

Now What? The Ultimate Graduation Gift for Professional Success
Time Management Manifesto: Expert Strategies to Create an Effective Work/Life Balance
Displacement Day: When My Job was Looking for a Job…A Reference Guide to Finding Work
The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas: Growing from a Cynic to a Professional in the Corporate World
From Fear to Success: A Practical Public-speaking Guide received the Gold Medal at the 2013 Axiom Business Book Awards in Business Reference
The Unofficial Guide to Fatherhood

See “Products” for details on www.transformationtom.com. Book, eBook, and audiobook (From Fear to Success only) purchase options are also available on Amazon- Please click the link to be re-directed: Amazon.com

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Post from Transformation Tom- Show Compassion: Chapter from “The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas”

July 30, 2018 / tomdowd / News

In over twenty-five years of working in the corporate world, I have only called out sick two or three times. Early in my career in managing people, I would often comment on why the same people were always on the verge of being placed on corrective action for tardiness or illness. Each time someone called out, I had a cynical response assuming that there was some lack of truth behind why they called out.

I only thought in terms of what stage of life I was in at the time. Prior to being married and having kids, I didn’t understand why people couldn’t make arrangements to have someone else watch their children. When I got married, I was lucky enough to have a wife who stayed home and dedicated herself to raising our family. Why couldn’t their spouse take care of their children? I still had a one-sided view. When my kids were born, I was back to work in a week while other fathers were looking for twelve weeks. When I worked forty-five hours, fifty hours, and sixty hours per week, I didn’t understand why people couldn’t commit themselves to those same hours. I didn’t get it. I lacked the compassion and understanding of what others might be going through.

As part of my progress towards transformation, I began to have ‘personal’ meetings with my managers. I would periodically set up time and just talk about their families, interests, and hobbies. During these meetings, although it started off very hard for me, I refused to discuss business. I began to learn what motivated people and made them tick. I began to understand the passion people had for things outside of work. At the time, my passion was work. My passion, loyalty, and commitment to my company was the same passion, loyalty, and commitment many people had for their families, hobbies, and other things outside of work. I was beginning to understand.

I ran into someone I used to work with about five years earlier. He had moved to another state. He was still with the company and was visiting our office. We talked about the years when we had put in mind-numbing hours of overtime. I asked him if anyone even remembered that we had put in those hours. We both laughed because we knew the answer was no, and realized that much of it at the time was for non-productive show. The funny thing was that many of the leaders we were so emphatic about impressing were no longer even with the company. What we did remember was the fun we had, the people we touched, and the relationships we built—in simple terms, the things we should care about. When compassion is clear, the job will find a way to get done.

I think it sunk in when I sent an email to one of my direct reports. She was not in the office when one of her people called in sick, so I took the call. My previous cynical side of me would have questioned it. After I hung up, in the past, I’m sure I would have made up in my head the “real” story about why she had called out. Instead, I sent a short and simple email to her manager that read, “Penny’s horse died. I finally understand.”

Thomas B. Dowd III’s books available in softcover, eBook, and audiobook (From Fear to Success only):

Now What? The Ultimate Graduation Gift for Professional Success
Time Management Manifesto: Expert Strategies to Create an Effective Work/Life Balance
Displacement Day: When My Job was Looking for a Job…A Reference Guide to Finding Work
The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas: Growing from a Cynic to a Professional in the Corporate World
From Fear to Success: A Practical Public-speaking Guide received the Gold Medal at the 2013 Axiom Business Book Awards in Business Reference
The Unofficial Guide to Fatherhood

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Post from Transformation Tom- Control What You Can Control (You Have More Control Than You Think): Chapter from “The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas”

July 22, 2018 / tomdowd / News

You should stop and ask yourself what you truly have control over. You may find yourself starting down a path of those things you can’t control, such as the weather and the stock market (at least not by yourself). You also can’t control whether or not other people talk about you, so you might as well give them something good to talk about. If you are part of a large organization, you can’t always control something happening in other parts of the company where you don’t have oversight. All of these uncontrollable factors may impact your satisfaction level, your frustration level, and your ability to make a difference. You need to trust that your teammates will get the pieces of their job done and be a good partner who will be there to assist when the need does arise.

You should focus on your own little world and the sphere of control you do have. Start with just thinking of you. You have control over your attitude, whether you take action, whether you speak up, and whether you want to offer your ideas. You may not be able to control the root cause of your stress and frustration, but you can control how you deal with that root cause.

There are plenty of factors to consider regarding what you do have control over. What is your patience level? What is your acceptance level that you can and will have an impact on the bigger picture? Are you open and willing to put yourself out there when you are not in your comfort zone? What is your acceptance to learning from your mistakes? How willing are you to put in the effort to transform yourself into someone in a better position to impact the things you can control?

I worked for a company in which people were very loyal and were leaders in the industry. As a whole, we were confident and convinced that nobody could run this type of business as well as we could. When the company was bought, it was devastating. Although the buyout saved us from ruin, we still had people walking around saying, “Who bought who?” There was a population of employees convinced that they were better than everyone, though this was just one reaction among many. Some people froze in fear of losing their jobs, while others took a more proactive approach by dusting off their résumés. I personally called a relative who worked for our new company. Her company had been acquired a few years earlier. Her advice was to control what I could control. She even mentioned that with a company this large, I might actually find more opportunities to thrive with a decent attitude. It seemed counterintuitive at the time, but she was right.

How could my small voice control anything in a company so large and that seem constantly in flux? I began by trying to understand the new company mission and culture. Although this seems basic, the old company had an extremely strong culture. Instead of bringing the best of both worlds together, some people refused to accept the new culture and outwardly spoke against it, and even made fun of it. This type of reaction can cause conflict and limit what is within your own control. I made an effort to embrace the new culture and openly speak about the opportunities in front of us. After a while, if there was still negativity, I took control by avoiding any unnecessary interaction with the cynics.

It was possible to bring over pieces of the old culture that worked, but only after we accepted the new culture and were open enough to adapt. I saw many people leave the company. Some left on their own, while others were caught up in redundant positions and asked to leave. This was not easy to watch. However, many were left in a state of shock and felt as though they lacked control over their destiny. The unknown and unpredictability were scary, and we truly did not know where we would all land. However, we could control the small sphere around us. We could control our effort, or ability to assert ourselves within the new company culture, and keep the best pieces of our business moving forward.

I came to the realization that the old company would not have survived without the acquisition. Although I, too, was loyal and knew we did many things right, I believe I adapted to the new company culture sooner than many others. There were many people from my past in the old company who I felt had held me back or had not given me an objective chance to succeed (perceived or real). Many of these individuals were no longer with the company, either by their own choice or through the new company direction. What did I have to lose? While some others were waiting for instructions, I found myself jumping in with both feet. I decided that I would give it a try and move on if I didn’t like it.

The openness to adapt was a boost in my own confidence because I knew that it was one of the things I could control. I started to enjoy it and stopped thinking about what negative things could potentially happen to me. I started thinking instead about the opportunities I could make for myself. I was controlling my attitude. I was having fun being in this unknown, non-prescribed new world. I was controlling my actions. I had new people listening to my ideas and opinions. I was starting to enjoy this clean slate and felt like I was making a name for myself more than I had in the previous sixteen years. As the full transition and buy-out was completed, I still saw people holding back and waiting for the next move to be made for them. Almost four years later, I still had conversations with people from the old organization who were still clinging to old habits and laughing at the new company culture. It was almost sad to watch because it was predictable that their success had reached its peak. My message wasn’t about full conformance; it was about belief in a new company that we now all worked for together. Hanging on to the old was not controlling what they could control. It would only hold them back.

I remember a conversation with an executive from the old company with whom I had worked on and off for many years. He commented on how he planned to stay low and do just enough to get by. His premise was that it was easy to get lost in a company that large and he could just hold on tight. I felt as if he had lost control of many things he could influence. He minimized his ability to control his attitude, his ability to lead, and his ability to make a difference. Several years later, he maintained this attitude, and he was let go. That was unfortunate. In the midst of what could have been a disastrous buyout of my old company and my potential long-term career, I found confidence and success because I took control of the things I could control.

Thomas B. Dowd III’s books available in softcover, eBook, and audiobook (From Fear to Success only):

Now What? The Ultimate Graduation Gift for Professional Success
Time Management Manifesto: Expert Strategies to Create an Effective Work/Life Balance
Displacement Day: When My Job was Looking for a Job…A Reference Guide to Finding Work
The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas: Growing from a Cynic to a Professional in the Corporate World
From Fear to Success: A Practical Public-speaking Guide received the Gold Medal at the 2013 Axiom Business Book Awards in Business Reference
The Unofficial Guide to Fatherhood

advice, anxiety, author, book, business, business development, Business Training, change, Coach, coaching, communication, Communications, Confidence, control, development, differentiate, differentiation, diverse, diversity, Dowd, fear, goals, growth, impatience, impatient, inclusion, Inspiration, leadership, Management, Marketing, mental, model, Motivation, Networking, patience, Personal, personal growth, practice, preparation, prepare, professional advice, Professional Development, prove, public-speaking, Résumé, Résumé Writing, right, role, role model, speaker, speaking, success, Thomas, Thomas Dowd, tom, Tom Dowd, training, transformation, transformation tom, transformationtom, visualize success

Post from Transformation Tom- Write Down Your Goals…in Pencil: Chapter from “The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas”

July 15, 2018 / tomdowd / News

I have heard on more than one occasion that an extremely small number of people have specific written goals—as low as five percent. As another way to differentiate yourself, be among the five percent to lay out your path for success on paper. Whether it is personal, professional, academic, health, or any other aspects of your life, you should write out your goals.

The likelihood of you taking the appropriate actions to achieve the goals goes up exponentially when you have them written. The goals should be specific so you know if and when they have been accomplished. Each goal needs to also be aggressive or it is not worth shooting for. The aggressive goal, however, should not be so far out of reach that it is not attainable. You should set progressive goals so you can see the small wins piling up. You need to understand that you may not achieve one-hundred percent of them—at least on the first try. The idea that you can go back to achieve a missed goal may refine the quality and outcome of what you are trying to accomplish. The fact that they are written allows you to see your progress and creates action plans to attain them.

If you achieve your goals, you should build on those successes and set more goals. These goals should be expandable for future steps. For example, I wanted to progress up through all of the phone positions in my line of business, and then move on to the somewhat natural progression of assistant manager, manager, and beyond. The goal of what I wanted to accomplish was set.

In addition, I set timelines for when I wanted to achieve them. The timeline has always been the hardest part for me. I have always wanted to get to each of the next steps as quickly as possible. There were many hurdles that delayed my ability to achieve my goals and I missed many of my expected timelines.

When establishing timelines, you need to account for potential roadblocks. Not everything will be clearly laid out for you. As previously stated, there were the two times in my career when I was asked to move in the other direction, to lower roles, because leadership didn’t feel I was effective or prepared for the additional responsibilities. There were also the times I felt ready to move up but did not interview well. Regardless of the reasons, I needed to reset my goals.

Resetting the goals means many things. It might mean resetting the timeline to the same goal and staying on course. Resetting the goal may mean adjusting the goal metric itself to move in a different direction. This is not always the easiest thing to do, since you may be unfamiliar with the road you are looking down. As stated earlier, pull back on the aggressive timeframes, scale, or intensity of your goals, and set the goals in smaller increments. Again, the increments should be realistic and challenging. The key message is to write down your goals and know they will evolve. Goal setting should be dynamic and fluid. More than twenty years after leaving college as a communication major, I had no idea I would have gone through so many aspects of the financial industry. When you write out your goals, I would suggest using a pencil.

Thomas B. Dowd III’s books available in softcover, eBook, and audiobook (From Fear to Success only):

Now What? The Ultimate Graduation Gift for Professional Success
Time Management Manifesto: Expert Strategies to Create an Effective Work/Life Balance
Displacement Day: When My Job was Looking for a Job…A Reference Guide to Finding Work
The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas: Growing from a Cynic to a Professional in the Corporate World
From Fear to Success: A Practical Public-speaking Guide received the Gold Medal at the 2013 Axiom Business Book Awards in Business Reference
The Unofficial Guide to Fatherhood

Post from Transformation Tom- Have Multiple and Diverse Role Models: Chapter from “The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas”

July 10, 2018 / tomdowd / News

We work with many people who set the right example. They may not be perfect but there is something about them we want to emulate. Take a careful look at them and see what styles and skills may work for you. Seek out the great things they have that you can grab hold of and add to your own abilities.

When it comes to role models, we sometimes think in singular terms. We pick out the one person we want to be most like and sometimes try to emulate them. This narrows down our own potential and might pigeonhole what we are trying to accomplish. Seek out multiple role models who have a wide variety of skills. A diverse set of role models will open more possibilities for adoption into your own routine and expand your proficiency. As stated in an earlier passage, you want to maintain your own uniqueness and it is important to maintain your differentiating factors. We don’t want you looking to be a clone or a wannabe, but we would be leaving an opportunity on the table if we didn’t become keen observers to role models around us. We can always find best practices to share and pick up good habits and styles that work for us.

A role model differs from a mentor because there is typically less interaction—or the opposite, constant interaction because you work closely with them. Whether you are monitoring them from up close or afar, you should take note of what makes them successful.

My first real taste in a role model was a peer of mine named John. John was the person who swapped jobs with me when I was told I needed to do something different after my first managerial stint. John was a computer programmer who was looking for a change. I was the manager not cutting it in the eyes of the leadership. Apparently, the timing was perfect. I disliked John for a variety of reasons. First, he was right next door and I saw every move he made. Second, he was a nice guy and people seemed to be having fun and working harder for him than they had for me. I realized my distaste was actually jealousy. I began to watch him from next door with a new lens and began to learn what I had done wrong when I had overseen the team.

Many of the things he was doing to earn the respect of the people came down to managing the details. He was spending individual time with the people and maximizing his floor presence. He was practicing what I now see as fundamental in people management but was too close—or too inexperienced—to practice it when I first started managing. I was learning to study John in action, and it was fascinating. I began to understand that he was an unintentional role model who was teaching me. Watching his success early on was hard for me. As the years went on, I started to do what I had seen him do and began to see my own similar success. I began to make sure that I included this story in all of my mentoring sessions and leadership teaching sessions.

I have since targeted other role models based on my specific needs. The person who first called me a cynic has taught me about accountability, ownership, and leadership. At a social gathering, my wife asked him what he liked about his job. His response was simple and concise. He said, “I like being accountable. I like making decisions.” He is a true leader who understands that people depend on his direction and his ability to make decisions and then act on them. He is also a fantastic leader and communicator who can rally a group of people to go on any difficult mission together. In the worst of times, people turn to him for a clear and motivational message that leaves no question as to which way they should go.

I have a good friend who I met early in my career. He taught me how to be selfless and giving. Additionally, he was the person who looked past all of the negative perceptions others had of me. He took a chance on me when I was young and inexperienced. He took an active approach to listen to my ideas and wanted to know my opinions to make the business better. He trusted me and respected me, even when I still felt people were out to get me. He gave me a sense of confidence that I truly could be a leader.

There are countless other role models who have taught me the value of technical job knowledge and being an industry leader in certain banking fields. There are other leaders who have taught me the value of being straightforward and speaking from the heart. There are still others who inspire me and give me confidence just by watching them.

There is also a small pocket of people you observe, and say to yourself, “I don’t want to be like them.” This group of people may be just as valuable for your own growth. When I was struggling in a trial position leading a group of managers, I could not seem to communicate well with my boss. I believe this was due to the fear factor he instilled in me. He attempted to drive my performance by yelling and screaming at me in the hopes that this fear would make me do things better. If he had just understood my wants, needs, and expectations, he would have figured out that I would work hard and do the job anyway. He could have put his efforts and wasted energy elsewhere to make the team better.

Instead, there was constant pressure put on me. His favorite routine, or game, seemed to happen every Friday afternoon around five o’clock P.M. He would call me to come to see him in his office. Apparently, after a very long week, he wanted to ensure that I had a miserable weekend of fuming over his last instructions or put-downs regarding what I hadn’t accomplished during the week. I vowed I would never be like him. He became my role model antithesis.

Another role model I worked for was bright and he knew how to dig deep into a business to reduce expenses and increase profits. He also lacked people skills and held on to original opinions for a long time. Once he formulated an opinion of you it was virtually permanent. As I learned the basics of running larger operations from him, I still struggled early in my career in grasping the people-management skills. He was not afraid to make me aware of this shortcoming. The irony was that he could observe poor people skills, but didn’t ever see them in himself. When I finally got out from under his management and saw some success managing others, he refused to see any of my growth or acknowledge any of my recent accomplishments. I had an interview with him about five years later for a job overseeing a fairly large unit. He only continued to bring up my failures from those days when I had been inexperienced and directly working for him. He said (paraphrased), “It sounds like you have done some good things, but I can’t get past the time when you…” He must have mentioned my past on at least three occasions. In the middle of the interview, he said he was hungry and wanted to go to the café to grab a sandwich. I had to have a walking interview while he took care of himself. He lacked the ability to have an open mind or change judgments of me, and still had no self-awareness or was just pompous. After he refused to give me the job in his area, I vowed to never be like that. He was the perfect negative role model. I knew I had to begin to withhold my personal judgments of others, see other people’s growth, and be willing to give people second chances.

We have the advantage of seeing what goes on around us each day. Use these observations as a tool for your own development. Watch the people around you with a critical eye, and become aware of the diverse and sheer number of role models surrounding you. They will teach you a lot about who you are and who you can be. In some cases, you will acknowledge characteristics from people you want to emulate, and in other cases, find the characteristics you want to avoid. Be on the lookout for your next teaching moment—your role model may be right there in front of you.

Thomas B. Dowd III’s books available in softcover, eBook, and audiobook (From Fear to Success only):

Now What? The Ultimate Graduation Gift for Professional Success
Time Management Manifesto: Expert Strategies to Create an Effective Work/Life Balance
Displacement Day: When My Job was Looking for a Job…A Reference Guide to Finding Work
The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas: Growing from a Cynic to a Professional in the Corporate World
From Fear to Success: A Practical Public-speaking Guide received the Gold Medal at the 2013 Axiom Business Book Awards in Business Reference
The Unofficial Guide to Fatherhood

advice, anxiety, author, book, business, business development, Business Training, change, Coach, coaching, communication, Communications, Confidence, control, development, differentiate, differentiation, diverse, diversity, Dowd, fear, growth, impatience, impatient, inclusion, Inspiration, leadership, Management, Marketing, mental, model, Motivation, Networking, patience, Personal, personal growth, practice, preparation, prepare, professional advice, Professional Development, prove, public-speaking, Résumé, Résumé Writing, right, role, role model, speaker, speaking, success, Thomas, Thomas Dowd, tom, Tom Dowd, training, transformation, transformation tom, transformationtom, visualize success

Post from Transformation Tom- Prove People Right: Chapter from “The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas”

July 3, 2018 / tomdowd / News

When you are working with many people in an office, find positive people who support you, then stick with them. There will always be some level of negativity, all with varying degrees, in an office—nobody is perfect and mistakes are made. The question is, what is done to keep it alive and what is done to make it go away? Sometimes, the negativity is short-lived because a sale was lost or promotion was missed and people quickly got over it. In some cases, it is more long term, because of an economic recession, for example, during which people need more nurturing and support to find their way through. Negativity can start with an individual and quickly gain momentum for a group. Negativity has a tendency to grow like cancer and build upon itself if the people affected don’t make a conscious effort to stem the tide. We all have the choice to take action and surround ourselves with the types of people who want us to succeed, provide us constant support, and build a positive working environment.

In my early career, it seemed fun to sit around at lunch time and find things to complain about. One day, we would complain about the boss, the next day it may be a colleague, and the following day it may be a customer. I thought it was good therapy to get it all out and move on. However, we did not move on from the complaining. Even conversations about the weather were complaints about how hot and humid it was in the summer and how cold and miserable it was in the winter. My crowd of complainers built off the negative momentum. I found most of our conversations continued to have the same thread of negativity being pulled through.

What was interesting is how much my long-term mood and outlook changed based on who I was working with and spending most of my time with. As I took on more independent roles, I had more choices to decide who I would spend time with. I took fewer group lunches and started to separate myself from the companions who I felt were adding to the negative environment.

I was also learning to establish new relationships and networks. With my newer relationships, I was less comfortable openly complaining and found myself not getting caught up in a flow of negative dialogue. I found that as I was meeting more new people, I wanted to spread positive messages. One of those ways was to proactively recognize the work of the people I was spending more time with. When co-workers are across the country, it is nice to have a recognition email waiting for them. I started to also realize that it was becoming easier to compliment the people I was working with locally because spreading a positive message was becoming contagious for me.

I started to surround myself with similar people who sought to see the glass as half full. I still had my moments of doubt and negativity, but the moments were less frequent. That doesn’t mean that I stopped providing critical and balanced feedback when appropriate. It just means it was easier to provide constructive feedback when people trusted the source as someone who was looking out for their best interest. In fact, I believe my feedback was more useful since there was more sincerity behind it as opposed to entering a complaint session.

I knew I was making a difference and was being perceived differently when people came out and said, “Your stock is rising.” I had such a feeling of satisfaction that someone would outwardly say that to me. I actually heard this more than once from several people I knew believed in me and supported me. I had a trusted group of people who looked out for my best interest and kept me focused on seeing the best in everything.

I found a network of people who saw my strengths and maximized the use of those strengths. I wanted to spend more time with them because I fed off the positive energy. They believed in me and saw a path to success. I thought I was getting more roles that played off my strengths. In reality, this was true, but not to the extent I originally believed. I was not just in positions playing to my strengths—I was working smarter to expand on these strengths and turning my weaknesses into strengths. For example, in the past, I may not have had the confidence to question something that did not make sense. When I was surrounded by people who encouraged me to ask open-ended clarification questions, I came up with the learning curve more quickly and gained confidence. In another example, I was sent to a new manager and felt like I had to start over again. As previously mentioned, there were times when I was moved to different roles in my career when I wasn’t succeeding. In this case, my new manager said in our first conversation that I was taking over the forty-fifth ranked team in the company. His instructions were simple: “Make them number one.” He mentioned that he trusted me and would give me space as long as he saw the team’s growth. He was giving me a clean slate. As we continued to work together, he was making me believe in myself again. I was starting to take the right actions to have the team believe in me, too. The team rose to the second-ranked team in the company in less than two months. I was riding their coattails while being there to provide support and encouragement. I was proving my new manager right.

You can start to prove people right by finding the motivational factors to not let that someone down or by making the extra effort to show them what you are capable of. In all cases, your own success is facilitated when you surround yourself with good people who support you, people who believe in you, people who encourage you, and people who inspire you. Fend off the negative people who may be nearby, find the uplifting people, and together create your own positive vision by feeding off the positive energy and enthusiasm of others. Then, prove them right.

Thomas B. Dowd III’s books available in softcover, eBook, and audiobook (From Fear to Success only):

Now What? The Ultimate Graduation Gift for Professional Success
Time Management Manifesto: Expert Strategies to Create an Effective Work/Life Balance
Displacement Day: When My Job was Looking for a Job…A Reference Guide to Finding Work
The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas: Growing from a Cynic to a Professional in the Corporate World
From Fear to Success: A Practical Public-speaking Guide received the Gold Medal at the 2013 Axiom Business Book Awards in Business Reference
The Unofficial Guide to Fatherhood

advice, anxiety, author, book, business, business development, Business Training, change, Coach, coaching, communication, Communications, Confidence, control, development, differentiate, differentiation, Dowd, fear, growth, impatience, impatient, Inspiration, leadership, Management, Marketing, mental, Motivation, Networking, patience, Personal, personal growth, practice, preparation, prepare, professional advice, Professional Development, prove, public-speaking, Résumé, Résumé Writing, right, speaker, speaking, success, Thomas, Thomas Dowd, tom, Tom Dowd, training, transformation, transformation tom, transformationtom, visualize success

Post from Transformation Tom- Prove People Wrong: Chapter from “The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas”

June 26, 2018 / tomdowd / News

I was about to start this section as “prove negative people wrong,” but realized that not all situations involve a negative person. Some just involve an honest person strong enough to tell you something you may not want to hear but need to hear. Years ago, I was growing tired of my computer programming position. I had been in the role for only three months. The computer programming assignment was more a move to get me out of my previous job than a move because the job was a great fit for me. It was not a match made in heaven for a communication major with no computer expertise.

I knew I needed a change. I became more dissatisfied with my job as I realized that it was not the proper career path for me and I had a steep learning curve in a position I was not motivated to pursue. The experience was good in teaching me that this role was not for me. I am glad for the time because I was put in the shoes of people who do this difficult job of getting calls only when something is broken or receiving the urgent request when someone needed it yesterday.

I surprised myself by proactively setting up a meeting with the senior executive to see what it would take to transfer somewhere else—anywhere else, actually—to become a manager of people again. My approach was not to complain about what I was doing at this point in my career, because as much as I disliked it, I was still doing a valuable function.

If you recall, this was the time in my career when I was removed as a manager because I, the “interpersonal communications major” could not relate well with people. The senior leader said he did not see me successfully leading people. He would only make me manager again if he saw me as someone who could lead an entire department. He wanted someone in whom he could see true leadership material. He needed to see the potential of a candidate two positions ahead, not just in the next promotion. He said he did not see that potential in me as a leader and denied my request. I can’t blame him. My reputation was not stellar when it came to people management at the time.

As I look at it now, he was being direct and honest; something I crave now. I spent many years bitterly and conveniently remembering a different tone and context: he was out to get me, and I needed to prove him wrong. Although I genuinely believed he did not like me or want to see me succeed, I realize now that I created my own perception of the conversation to fit my need to be motivated. I needed the rejection to push me further to succeed.

There are two things you can do when you get tough feedback you don’t want but need to hear. You can do nothing. Nothing can also be expanded to complain about it, be frustrated by it, and do not seek a solution. The other option is to accept it and make the most of it. You can use the feedback to make yourself better and stronger. You can build character and put yourself into a better position to succeed. Direct and honest feedback does not come as often as we like. There is value in it and we should absorb as much of it as possible.

I believe that that interaction with the senior executive that lasted no more than ten minutes saved my career. I had a specific focus point to motivate me. I must have thought about it every day for over five years. It drove me. It pushed me harder. It became my driving force to rally at a time when I was ready to walk out the door. My wife reminds me now that my misery and frustration were growing so much that if I hadn’t changed my career course at that time, we probably wouldn’t have stayed together long enough to marry. In simple terms, I was getting on her nerves with my constant complaining.

The manager who chose not to give me another chance in a manager role did offer me a chance to support a newly-formed business in another state. I would not be managing people. However, I now had the drive to prove him wrong. I did have the added motivation on the personal front of being newly engaged to a great woman, and I wanted to have a great life for my soon-to-be wife.

Being told I could not do something or was not good enough drove me to seek out the answers I needed to improve and eventually get where I wanted to be. As often as I thought about it bitterly for so many years, I am thankful for the courage the person had to tell me what I had to hear, and I am appreciative for the extra kick I needed to want to prove to everyone that I could do whatever I set my mind to. I needed to prove the people wrong who said I wasn’t ready for it. More importantly, I needed to make the doubt in my own abilities go away. I needed to prove myself wrong. I stopped thinking about that fateful conversation every day when I got my first job managing managers about five years later. I reached my goal with hard work and a push towards transforming myself into the person I wanted to be and towards the person I knew I was capable of being. I proved him wrong. I wonder now if he was trying to motivate me from the start.

Thomas B. Dowd III’s books available in softcover, eBook, and audiobook (From Fear to Success only):

Now What? The Ultimate Graduation Gift for Professional Success
Time Management Manifesto: Expert Strategies to Create an Effective Work/Life Balance
Displacement Day: When My Job was Looking for a Job…A Reference Guide to Finding Work
The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas: Growing from a Cynic to a Professional in the Corporate World
From Fear to Success: A Practical Public-speaking Guide received the Gold Medal at the 2013 Axiom Business Book Awards in Business Reference
The Unofficial Guide to Fatherhood

advice, anxiety, author, book, business, business development, Business Training, change, Coach, coaching, communication, Communications, Confidence, control, development, differentiate, differentiation, Dowd, fear, growth, impatience, impatient, Inspiration, leadership, Management, Marketing, mental, Motivation, Networking, patience, Personal, personal growth, practice, preparation, prepare, professional advice, Professional Development, prove, public-speaking, Résumé, Résumé Writing, speaker, speaking, success, Thomas, Thomas Dowd, tom, Tom Dowd, training, transformation, transformation tom, transformationtom, visualize success, wrong

Post from Transformation Tom- Be Impatiently Patient: Chapter from “The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas”

June 19, 2018 / tomdowd / News

Maybe I will do it tomorrow. ‘It’ could be anything. Tomorrow I will set my goals. Tomorrow I will earn a big promotion. Tomorrow I will write the next great novel. Some of us keep wishing and some of us allow frustration to build up. Still, we take no action, except maybe a complaint or two, or maybe three. We have all heard that good things come to those who wait. However, I will tack on that great things will come to those who earn it and take action.

I have had many career conversations with individuals who complained that his or her manager had rarely, if ever, had a career development conversation with him or her. The complaints include comments that his or her manager has performance-based conversations that help with the present, but lack the long-term discussion to push them further in their careers. I have seen consistent focus group feedback and anonymous survey feedback reiterating the same thing.

I have had to provide some tough feedback to people by asking them, “When was the last time you read your performance appraisal?” A very large percentage of people I ask have answered that it was the day it was administered. People have a silver tray of feedback on their lap that they think they can memorize after a thirty to sixty-minute discussion. They are wrong. People need to reinforce constructive feedback that will make them better. They should not wait for the next performance review that will take place six months to a year from the last one. People should take hold of that feedback and take action immediately. Grab the feedback head on and start to implement the actions needed to make you stronger. Be impatiently patient to make yourself better.

If the complaints are accurate and you are really not getting career advice or long-term direction, you have the right to understand and ask for it. You need to know exactly what it takes to get promoted or get to the next level, or even what it takes to maintain great performance results. The conversation does not have to be contentious or even demanding. A simple request of, “Can you help me to better understand what it takes…” can go a long way.

Everyone should do their homework to at least know the minimum requirements and expectations for their current role and what is needed to get to the next level. My company used to have minimum requirements to get promoted to certain officer positions, including taking certain courses and submitting at least one original, formal, creative idea annually to make the business better. I would be amazed any time I had a conversation with a colleague who said he or she could not come up with a fresh idea or find the time to take the training courses.

The irony may be that the driving force for me early in my career was my inability to take accountability. I was driven to cover my bases for all the minimum requirements to ensure that never happened to me. I refused to allow any decision-maker to make an easy decision to count me out of the running for an officer promotion simply because I had not met the check-box requirements. That would make it too easy for others. Remember, I was in the habit of blaming others.

I was learning that if I was going to blame someone for not promoting me or giving me the next great role, I wanted to force the conversation to be more meaningful than, “Sorry, you missed the minimum requirements.” The drive to meet the requirements forced me to be impatiently patient because I was going to meet all of my annual requirements in January (if the cycle started at the beginning of the year), as soon as I saw it in my inbox, or as soon as physically possible to complete.

My concerns for missing small details or requirements, or gaining a reputation as a procrastinator, were not part of my personality. My fear of missing a deadline or not completing my workload actually enhanced the perception of me in the eyes of many leaders. I was gaining a reputation for getting things done quickly. I was also becoming known for reading the details that may have been glossed over by others. I was building a positive reputation based on my emerging skill set.

Although others were still getting promoted around me, it was not because I wasn’t meeting my goals. It was the many other components that had been reiterated many times over. My inability or slow adaptation to change how I got the job done was holding me back (e.g., relationship building, cynicism). The positive momentum change in how I was viewed in getting things done quickly was a good sign of future advancements.

I would eventually find my way to meeting many of my professional goals, but it was not within my personal, unwritten timeframes. I was beginning to be more driven and more specific in establishing these goals. I would set a certain age at which I wanted to achieve a title or position. There were designated times when I wanted to expand my role. I was often close, but I was not always within my personal deadlines. I was all right with that because my impatience was driving me to take the better road to eventually get to the position or goal I wanted.

In fact, there were at least two times in my career where I was in the right place at the wrong time. I was given expanded responsibilities at a time when I was not fully prepared for the positions. In both cases, I was asked to step back to a lesser role or change my position completely. I also learned that getting exactly what you want at the wrong time can have devastating impacts professionally. I learned from both scenarios to set clear goals, but be prepared for when I get there.

The lessons of not only knowing what I wanted but also when I wanted to get there, proved valuable. My impatience made me do more homework and research to set aggressive, but more realistic, goals. I knew myself better than anyone else and I began writing out a game plan to help me achieve my goals. Doing things on the fly and just pushing to get someplace fast happened far too many times early in my career, to my detriment. I had the drive to get there quickly, but I lacked the specificity of where I was heading. This held me back. I needed to know where I wanted to go and be impatiently patient to get there—with a plan.

Finally, if you are fortunate enough to take on a new role, you need to be impatiently patient in learning the business. You can never passively wait to meet the learning curve within a given timeframe in a new position. First, you need to understand the business is moving quickly and can’t wait around for you. Second, if you are effective in attacking the transition, you can accelerate your ascent to gaining technical knowledge. Your patient efforts to impatiently learn the business as quickly as possible will assist you in gaining credibility with the people you are working with as you gain insights on the integration between different faces of the business, technology, culture, and styles. Take advantage of a learning curve if there is one, but learn as quickly as possible by using the people and resources around you to absorb everything.

Thomas B. Dowd III’s books available in softcover, eBook, and audiobook (From Fear to Success only):

Now What? The Ultimate Graduation Gift for Professional Success
Time Management Manifesto: Expert Strategies to Create an Effective Work/Life Balance
Displacement Day: When My Job was Looking for a Job…A Reference Guide to Finding Work
The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas: Growing from a Cynic to a Professional in the Corporate World
From Fear to Success: A Practical Public-speaking Guide received the Gold Medal at the 2013 Axiom Business Book Awards in Business Reference
The Unofficial Guide to Fatherhood

advice, anxiety, author, book, business, business development, Business Training, change, Coach, coaching, communication, Communications, Confidence, control, development, differentiate, differentiation, Dowd, fear, growth, impatience, impatient, Inspiration, leadership, Management, Marketing, mental, Motivation, Networking, patience, Personal, personal growth, practice, preparation, prepare, professional advice, Professional Development, public-speaking, Résumé, Résumé Writing, speaker, speaking, success, Thomas, Thomas Dowd, tom, Tom Dowd, training, transformation, transformation tom, transformationtom, visualize success

Post from Transformation Tom- Differentiate Yourself—Make It Known: Chapter from “The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas”

June 12, 2018 / tomdowd / News

Too many times in the professional workplace, we try too hard to conform and fit in. We do not want to rock the boat or make waves. It is human nature to want to fit in and be a part of something. If you don’t believe me, think back to your freshman year in high school. As a new employee, we are typically learning something new and do not want to make any mistakes…Or at least any big ones. We may want to simply blend in. As time goes on, blending becomes part of the fabric and habits we’ve built.

When I first started my career in banking, I had success with my performance on the phones. I was able to take advantage of not being face to face in an interaction. I could quietly and effectively have phone conversations with my customers. My performance was consistent and I began to be recognized on a regular basis in front of my peers. I was asked to increase my job responsibilities and expand my role. I would be taught to assist with the reporting, and asked to spend time with peers who were struggling.

During my performance appraisals or the occasional internal job interview, I still sold myself short in describing what I did. If I was collecting bad loans, I would simply say I tried to help customers with their financial difficulties. I didn’t realize that I could be special and different among a sea of people with the same job responsibilities. With hundreds of collectors, everyone could give a generic job responsibility answer of, “I try to help customers with their financial difficulties.” This was a starting point but interviewers, future managers, and company decision-makers wanted to hear more from someone willing to differentiate themselves. What’s interesting is that I could not identify this need myself and did not pick up on any cues given to me to stand out. I would get direction to work hard, hit my goals, and sometimes hear the phrase “try to stand out.” I always interpreted this as making more ‘widgets,’ going faster, and working longer, but not necessarily describing how I could differentiate myself. As much as we don’t want to think about it, we are always on stage, and—in many cases—in competition. This isn’t an invitation to step on others’ backs as you climb the corporate ladder. However, you do have an invitation to give yourself some credit when it is deserved, and be prepared to be your own elevator when the time is right.

I applied for an internal management development program in my second year at the bank. The program accepted fifteen leaders. I went through at least seven interviews with senior members of the company. Can you guess what number I was? I was number sixteen. Candidates aren’t typically told where they finished after the interview process, but the people who nominated me wanted to help explain why I didn’t get it. I was told I had the skills and that I was on the edge of being selected.

I said that this was unfortunate because I thought my performance spoke for itself. In collections, I was the top performer nine times out of the twelve months. I was doing extra work on the side to assist the manager, and had recently completed a manager-selected program in which our group made some significant recommendations that would improve our business. I told the person giving me the feedback that it was all there on my résumé. The decision-maker said many résumés, especially after only two years of internal experience, looked alike and I should have brought these facts to light. There are few times in your life that you should assume anything. This type of situation was one of them. I was given feedback to not assume that they had any knowledge of me, had read my résumé, background, or application, and that I needed to bring that information to the forefront.

I began sharing with everyone the saying, “It is not bragging if it is a fact.” Stating your own facts, when timed and communicated appropriately, is acceptable. I am not overly confident to begin with; therefore, I do not typically come across as cocky. However, the inverse is that I have come across as plain and non-descriptive. You should be proactive in order to find your way of differentiating yourself and make sure the people you work with know it.

We are all special in our own way. Yes, this is a cliché, but still holds true. The message here is to bring out what makes us special and different in our interactions with others. In my mentoring sessions, I will often ask the people I am working with what they accomplished during the month. I often get typical answers such as, “Not a whole lot,” or, “Nothing different or out of the ordinary.” When I keep digging deeper, I find that they were involved in a project that saved thousands (or millions) of dollars, helped out an extremely frustrated customer, or asked to assist on a project team. Did everyone else accomplish these exact things, too? The answer is often no. You don’t have to brag and shout from your rooftops telling the whole world what you have done. However, you need to realize the difference between your day-to-day functions and what makes you who you are. As a mentor and manager, I have made it my mission to exert the effort to have people spill their guts to me when it comes to their accomplishments. I encourage people to proactively share their highlights and get used to telling their own special story.

I would often ask my direct reports to submit their accomplishments on a monthly basis. There were many months when I could put two side by side, and they would look very similar. The side-by-side exercise is what started to get me thinking about how to teach the people who worked for me how to reach for higher goals and therefore put more meaningful accomplishments down on paper.

We started to share more accomplishments openly in our staff meetings. The purpose was not for competitive reasons, but to share best practices. I would often praise them, and emphasize that being creative and innovative in order to make the team better made everyone stronger. I believe that the courage to try new things, whether or not it worked, is in itself an accomplishment.

When we had managerial requirements to go back on the phones for four hours a month, my employees often listed the requirement as one of their accomplishments. I would ask them what they truly accomplished by doing that? If they answered, “Met the requirement,” they were not getting the full picture and I had more work to do to teach them. If they gave an example of how they resolved a sticky situation with a customer or mentioned how they now understood what the front-line associates were complaining about relating to their computer system and had a solution to fix it, they were differentiating themselves as leaders.

No two people are the same. I am very proud to list out the various jobs I have worked. I can say that no one in the company has followed my career trajectory. I would often joke around, saying that I couldn’t keep a job. I wasn’t sure if people were kicking me out or if people really wanted me. As I thought about this more seriously, I realized that early in my career, people were indeed ‘kicking me out.’ They were attempting to have me get more experience and to play to my strengths—the things that made me special…made me different. I realized later in my career that this was still true to some extent, with more weight on people really wanting me. People wanted me because of my diverse background and the broad knowledge I could bring to their business. I could bring best practices, creativity, and freshness to jumpstart some spinning wheels. What makes you special? Does everyone know it?

Thomas B. Dowd III’s books available in softcover, eBook, and audiobook (From Fear to Success only):

Now What? The Ultimate Graduation Gift for Professional Success
Time Management Manifesto: Expert Strategies to Create an Effective Work/Life Balance
Displacement Day: When My Job was Looking for a Job…A Reference Guide to Finding Work
The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas: Growing from a Cynic to a Professional in the Corporate World
From Fear to Success: A Practical Public-speaking Guide received the Gold Medal at the 2013 Axiom Business Book Awards in Business Reference
The Unofficial Guide to Fatherhood

advice, anxiety, author, book, business, business development, Business Training, change, Coach, coaching, communication, Communications, Confidence, control, development, differentiate, differentiation, Dowd, fear, growth, Inspiration, leadership, Management, Marketing, mental, Motivation, Networking, Personal, personal growth, practice, preparation, prepare, professional advice, Professional Development, public-speaking, Résumé, Résumé Writing, speaker, speaking, success, Thomas, Thomas Dowd, tom, Tom Dowd, training, transformation, transformation tom, transformationtom, visualize success

Post from Transformation Tom- Stand Up for What’s Right: Chapter from “The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas”

June 5, 2018 / tomdowd / News

Similar to communicating assertively, you have the right to show your character and integrity. There are times where you can’t—and should not—accept what is going on around you. You may not always get your way, but you will know in your heart and your head that you did the right thing. If you are anything like me, you have the pull of guilt during situations in which you’ve said to yourself, “I should have done that differently.”

One of those guilty moments that I have carried with me for years is a performance appraisal conversation I had with one of my employees. She always had been bright and creative and exhibited great people skills in my eyes. She was likable, but was often seen as too soft and lacking the ability to drive performance. Many of her past managers carried this perception and managed her by providing feedback to be more direct and have more forceful conversations with her subordinates.

After some of my own observations, and a significant amount of time together using open-ended questions to bring out her strengths and opportunities, we both came to a mutual agreement that there wasn’t a need to drive people harder. What she needed to do was understand the reporting and analytics of the business better in order to better target performance discussions with her people. This “aha” breakthrough moment was important to building our relationship as manager and employer. We both felt good over the outcome of our intense conversations and started to see improvement.

At performance review time, my scores for her were lowered by upper management. One senior leader had clung to the older perception that she needed to have more forceful conversations to drive performance. I “tried” to persuade the senior manager to increase the scores back to where they had been. Looking back on my argument, it was more emotion-based and lacked enough substance to make a difference.

The conversation to pass on the lowered score to my employee was extremely difficult, to say the least. The reason for the difficulty was my problem. First, I had not properly prepared her for the discussion, because we both felt like we were on the same page with our assessment of her performance. Second, I was telling someone else’s story. I tried to communicate the corporate direction, but did not believe it myself; and she knew it. I did not want to come right out and say to her, I scored you higher and I disagree with my manager. The conversation was a mess. As I have pondered this conversation in my head many times over the years, I’ve realized that I had facts and figures to show her team’s improvement. Not only did I have her team’s results, I had action plans that she and I were working on that clearly identified her specific opportunity. My argument to increase her scores was glossed over with too much generalization and did not give me the facts to clearly make my points.

She was obviously upset. I found out later that she seriously considered leaving the company. Who could blame her? Do you want to work for a company that does not judge you on your true merits? During the conversation, she maintained more maturity and composure than I would have expected of anyone in that circumstance.

Although she constantly reminds me years later of that conversation, it is more jovial because she has seen my genuine learning and belief that she was better than she was scored. I learned to manage others differently based on that conversation, and I saw in her a confidence that she could prove people, like the senior leader, wrong. It showed me her strength—a strength I needed personally. Our personal relationship grew over the years and we became close. We have bounced ideas off of each other and became informal mentors as our professional paths grew apart.

She took the high road. I now make sure that I do as well. I have a card she sent to me a couple of years later. It appeared out of the blue. It was a simple hello card. She wrote in it that she wanted to thank me for taking the time to teach her about leadership, integrity, and attitude. She mentioned in the note that she appreciated the encouragement and challenge to grow. She even added, “For kicking me when I needed it.” I wish I had beaten her to the punch. I should have thanked her for her leadership in a time when she was a subordinate, for her integrity when she knew I was having conflicting thoughts, and for her positive attitude during a trying time. She “kick” started me into understanding how to act in a tough corporate environment. When there are times I feel the pull to go back to old habits, I just turn around and re-read the card. I have done this dozen of times to put myself back on track.

In an interesting twist, the senior manager who did not believe in her at the time brought her back to his line of business several years later. He clearly saw her leadership abilities by then. He showed his ability to be open to admitting he was wrong so many years before, and he needed someone who showed heart and character. She had always been willing to learn and adapt. He finally saw that and was able to utilize her maturity to assist in leading other less experienced managers.

Thomas B. Dowd III’s books available in softcover, eBook, and audiobook (From Fear to Success only):

Now What? The Ultimate Graduation Gift for Professional Success
Time Management Manifesto: Expert Strategies to Create an Effective Work/Life Balance
Displacement Day: When My Job was Looking for a Job…A Reference Guide to Finding Work
The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas: Growing from a Cynic to a Professional in the Corporate World
From Fear to Success: A Practical Public-speaking Guide received the Gold Medal at the 2013 Axiom Business Book Awards in Business Reference
The Unofficial Guide to Fatherhood

"leadership", advice, anxiety, author, book, business, business development, Business Training, change, Coach, coaching, communication, Communications, Confidence, control, development, Dowd, fear, growth, Inspiration, leadership, Management, Marketing, mental, Motivation, Networking, Personal, personal growth, practice, preparation, prepare, professional advice, Professional Development, public-speaking, Résumé, Résumé Writing, speaker, speaking, success, Thomas, Thomas Dowd, tom, Tom Dowd, training, transformation, transformation tom, transformationtom, visualize success

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