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When we first moved into our house, we paid to have a new furnace and Central Air System installed. Because the heat is carried throughout the house using a forced air system, it was important that we had a humidifier installed with the system. The system was installed in May and we could not be happier, until the winter.

When the weather got colder, I started to wake up with nosebleeds, and I started to feel under the weather. This is odd because I rarely get sick. When we checked our thermostat, we saw that humidity was less than 20% in the house. My wife suggested that we go downstairs and adjust the humidifier. After 30 minutes, we still could not find the humidifier. W went to the file cabinet, retrieved the contract that we had with the HVAC installation company, determined the make and brand of the humidifier, and we searched the model on the internet. Now that we knew what it looked like, we realized that it was never installed. Just to be sure, we hired a plumber to come in and install a new shut-off valve. While he was here, we asked him about a humidifier system. He gave us a quote and exactly where he would install it. Now we had back up information, a copy of our contract with the installation company, and a quote for a humidifier.

I called up the original installation company and informed them that we were having a problem with our humidity levels and that we were unable to find the humidifier that was supposed to be installed with the new system. The company sent out the same technicians who worked on the house. They went down to look at their work. After a few seconds, they realized their mistake. They told me that they had never installed the humidifier, and asked to see a copy of the contract. When I showed them the contract, they scratched their heads and told me that they owed me a humidifier. They apologized for the inconvenience. The new humidifier was installed two days later. For original workmanship, they failed the interview. For character and owning up to their mistakes, they passed the interview. I am not sure if we will hire them again. However, I appreciate the character they showed by owning up to their mistake and fixing the problem.

I do not like bad driving. I loathe bad drivers, especially those that are in front of me, and by the grace of automobile physics, are influencing my commute. Translation, these drivers are either putting my safe arrival in jeopardy or at the minimum, delaying it. I do not like those drivers on the narrow winding road near my house who drive too fast AND I especially do not like those drivers that cannot drive within the lines. I do not like the slow drivers in the left lane. I do not like drivers who think that cutting in front of me as if they were a James Bond Movie stuntman is a good method for arriving safely on time. And I really do not like my reaction to bad drivers, especially when my kids are in the car. Personally, I did not realize this until my oldest son asked me what did the driver in front of me do that warranted my vocalized disgust. The truth, he drove poorly in front of a person whose responses were out of whack with his goals.

      I cannot stop bad drivers. I cannot monitor each idiot (AKA selfish moron) who influences my ride, who cannot drive within the lines (Psst… slow down before someone I love gets hurt), or is too selfish to allow someone to pass them. Is driving in the left lane becoming a right? Is it becoming a privilege? Do they give out medals for total time spent driving in the left lane? Group events, like driving on a road, especially those events that are loosely organized, like driving on a road, need people to follow the norms… drive within the lines, stay right, pass left, etc.. This is not baseball, there are no unwritten rules to guide your actions.

What I can stop/change is me and how I react to situations. I need to develop better mental toughness and react positively. The two most important goals, in order, when I drive is to arrive safely, then to arrive on time. My reaction to these “Cracker-Jack” licensed drivers does not support either goal. It shows me that I do not know how to handle adversity. My reaction poorly models adult behavior to my children.

Goals this week:

1. Arrive safely
2. Arrive on Time
3. Control my reactions by developing true mental toughness
4. Be a better role model for my children
5. Align my actions to my purpose… to make others better.

What are your goals… Let me know.

Enjoy the week…

Every day is an interview.

We all make mistakes. It is part of the “joy” of being a human being. How you recover from your mistakes is more important than your efforts to not make mistakes. I cannot tell you how many times I see people dwelling on their mistakes. Dwelling on your mistakes prevents you from moving forward. If you cannot move forward, you cannot grow. If you cannot grow, you cannot become the success that you want to become. Those around you will take note. Every day is an interview.

At work, we try to prevent mistakes. More importantly, we try to learn from mistakes. These are not just limited to the mistakes that we make, they include the mistakes that others make. However, when a colleague is complaining about a mistake that someone else makes, I make a mental note. I do not have time for this. I want to stop them and ask them what they did to help their colleague or employee who made the mistake. I want to ask them what was learned from the mistake, and I want to know how they helped their colleague/employee. When you complain, you make the mistake matter. You do not move forward and you do not get to grow. Those around you will take note. Every day is an interview.

Lastly, I cannot stand it when someone feels sorry themselves. When you make a mistake, get over it and move forward. Learn from it and grow. Do not dwell on it. Do not tell others so that they can feel sorry for you. I want to know when my employees and colleagues make mistakes.The instant that they finish telling me about their mistakes, they need to tell me about their solution for fixing the mistake. The employees who do this are the ones who are going to succeed at the highest level. They are the employees who are going to be picked for my team when we are working on big-ticket projects and who I am going to rely on when the going gets tough. These are the people who I will keep in my close circle. Every day is an interview.

It is interview day… what are you focusing one? Being perfect? When we hire, we do not look for the perfect person, we look for the person who knows how to correct mistakes. I have made plenty of mistakes in my career. Luckily, I have been fortunate enough to be surrounded by people who know how to work with me to correct my mistakes.

In order to find the right person, we have carefully designed questions that aim at how the candidate answers. We are not so concerned about the answer to the question but to the integrity of the answer. Was it difficult for the candidate to answer? We try to find out what the candidate’s weaknesses are in the interview so that we can have a Professional Development designed for the candidate before they even start working for us. If a candidate comes out looking perfect at the end of our interviews, then we have not done our job. I struggle to hire a candidate who I cannot judge how they will perform after they have made a mistake.

There have been times when I have observed an employee making a mistake. Sometimes, I see the same employee make steps to correct the mistake before I can intervene. Other times, I am able to intervene and help the employee through the solution(s) to their mistakes. If they become defensive when I approach them, I know that this is an employee that I cannot trust to grow with us and our clients. This type of employee has just failed the day’s interview. Every day is an interview.

“Do not concentrate on being who you want for the interview, concentrate on being who you want for right now.”

On Sunday we were driving home from a bakery. My wife had found the bakery in an article rating the top bakeries in NJ. Little did we know that it was truly worth the 40-minute trip to get there. Best bakery food that I have ever had. We cannot wait to go back.

On the return trip, We were approaching a red light on the local highway. I noticed an object, which turned out to be a car jack, that was in the middle of my lane in the intersection. The traffic that had the green light drove right past the object. I was not sure what I was going to do. I could drive around it in the shoulder lane, but it was tight and I was not sure that I could make it without hitting the curb. I could wait for the traffic in the left lane to pass, switch lanes, or I could get out and get the car jack. Before I could process everything, a pickup truck drove past the car jack, pulled over, and removed the car jack from the intersection. Everyone was free to go. I waved with appreciation and drove home.

On the drive home, I was obsessed with my decision. What would I have done? Would I have pulled over, risked my safety, and my families for that matter, into the shoulder, walked into the intersection and removed the car iron? I am not sure. The kind thing to do would be to remove the car jack. However, was it worth putting my safety at risk? Was my duty to my family or to those driving on the road?

My purpose is to help others. I would be helping others by pulling over and removing the car jack. But, if I got hurt, would I be helping my family. Would I be able to provide for and protect them? Sometimes our personal philosophy/purpose does not provide us with a clear path to the right decision. Luckily, I was saved by the guy in the pickup truck and did not have to make the decision. However, I want to know what decision I will make next time so there is no hesitation.

Every day is an interview

Every day is an interview.

Earlier this week, I invited an acquaintance to join me and another colleague for lunch. After saying that she had other obligations, she proceeded to tell me that she needed to go on a diet. I politely listened to her struggles with dieting and her reasons for needing to go on one. There was not much substance behind her words and I knew that she would fail. Why? Because diets always fail. Always. Diets focus on short-term goals. How many diets have you succeeded in completing only to see the weight come back? If you want to lose weight,  you do not need a diet, you need to change your lifestyle.

While my acquaintance was speaking to me about her needs for a diet and the fact that no diet has ever worked for her in the past, I was getting frustrated. However, it was inappropriate for me to go ahead and tell her my feelings. The realization that she needed to change her lifestyle could not and should not come from me.  What made things more frustrating was that the colleague who was joining me for lunch was standing right in front of her. She had gone through a dramatic weight loss last year and kept the weight off. Why? Because she changed her lifestyle, including exercise, diet, and socializing. The perfect example and model for success was right in front of my complaining acquaintance, but she could not see it.

Whether my acquaintance needs to change her eating habits is up to her.  Right now, her solution to her desire to change her body composition is flawed and only focuses on short-term gains. How am I ever going to trust her to make the right decisions at work when she cannot make the right decisions in her own life?  What I do know is that I do not want her on my team for anything that is mission critical. Every day is an interview.

In my job, I am responsible for hiring the staff in my department. It is a big responsibility with a lot at stake, not only for us but for our community. At home, I am also in charge of hiring services for our house. Here are two examples of how every day is an interview.

We just got our new house and there was a small leak that I did not have the skill to fix our downstairs ceiling. There was no shut off valve for the line that was leaking, and the water was staining our drop ceiling. We had used plumbers at our old house, but no one that we wanted to hire again. I had no solid recommendations and I had to make a choice quickly. Earlier that week, I had been driving around town doing errands. A truck from a well-known plumbing drove by, cut me off, and drove aggressively. I automatically knew that I did not want to hire that company. I did not want that driver driving on the streets that my or my neighbors’ children play. I went with a different well-known company. Every day is an interview.

My oldest child plays sports and is getting to the age where it was time to start training his body to be stronger, faster, more flexible, and more resilient. I have seen a million trainers and very few have impressed me. The trainer we hired we did without checking out his gym. We hired him because we watched him workout. I was in the gym one day before I made a home gym for the family, and I saw this guy working out hard. However, he wasn’t that he was lifting a lot of weight. Instead, he was concentrating on perfecting the movements of his workout. I was in awe of his attention to detail and I knew right then that if I ever needed a trainer, this was the guy. Fast forward 4 years later, he opens a gym, my son tells me that he wants to start training, and the rest is history. Even in the early morning, when hardly anyone is in the gym, every day is an interview.

I truly believe that actions speak louder than words. A person may claim they are one thing, but in reality, they are acting as someone different. The manner in which we act when no one is looking is the true measure of our character and who we are.

The “Every Day is an Interview” philosophy is focused on how we act at all times, not just when the stakes are high. I have seen so many people in interviews who were acting their best in the hopes of getting the prize… a job and a paycheck. As hard as we try, sometimes we hire people who act differently than they did in their interview once they are hired. Their actions spoke louder than their words. They usually do not last long.

Each time I meet a person, I make a mental note about how they act, if they look me in the eye when they speak, if they are a “yes” person, if they have good posture, and if they are kind to others. I am interviewing them and I am taking notes. They might not be applying for a job, but they might have an important role in my future.

The reverse is also true. We are always being interviewed by others that we meet. Are you acting in a manner that is aligned with who you want to be? Are your words and actions in agreement? If not, what do you have to change? What steps are you going to make to enact these changes? Start with how you act when nobody is looking. This is a true measure of who you are. Remember that every day, and every moment, is an interview and each interview can have a profound influence on your life.

Continue the conversation and let me know what you think.