☝ I have been interviewing with a number of companies over the last couple of months, for VP of Sales & Director of Sales positions, managing departments of up to over 100. In every interview, mentor comes up. I am convinced that that few know what mentoring means. To be a mentor, you must be an experienced & trusted adviser with a positive personal relationship, providing a guiding influence in another's life, with their best interest at heart. Because of the personal relationship & time-consuming nature of mentoring, it is impossible to mentor 100s of people at one time. As a leader, you are not able to mentor everyone. Instead you must choose a core group of people to mentor, while inspiring that same group to mentor other core groups. Because of the compounding effect, a true mentoring leader with the right people can, over time, change the culture of their organization. Mentoring is not a process, it’s an attitude. Please follow me for daily education & inspiration. linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 facebook.com/DavidMaus01 instagram.com/David1Maus

☝ What’s in a question? Questions are the heart of selling? Think of the sales process like a cardiovascular system. Like blood delivering oxygen and nutrients to the body, information circulates through the selling process, fueling your presentation. The more information flowing around the process, the stronger your presentation will be. How do you get the information needed for a healthy presentation? Like the human heart pumping blood through the body, questions drive information through the process. Not all questions are equal. Because of limited opportunities available to ask questions, make sure your questions are probing and to the point. Every question you ask should uncover 3 key phycological points or “DNF”: DESIRES, NEEDS, and FEARS. If you satisfy needs, deliver desires and alleviate fears, you will earned the sale. If questions are the heart of sales, listening is the brain of the sales process. By effectively listening, you will be able to separate the DNF information from trivial minutiae. Sales are constructed on information and information is built on questions, thus questions = sales. Please follow me for daily education and inspiration. linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 facebook.com/DavidMaus01 instagram.com/David1Maus

☝ The most important mindset all successful people do is to be coachable. Coachable according to Merriam-Webster means “capable of being easily taught and trained to do something better”. This definition needs to be broken down and examined. Noticed the words “easily taught”. To be coachable you have to be willing to put your ego aside and admit that there are things you don’t know or understand. If you don’t realize your limitations, you will never easily learn anything. A good example of this mindset comes from arguably the greatest golfer of our time, Tiger Woods. When Tiger was unbeatable and winning almost every tournament, he understood that he had a major weakness in his game, putting. Tiger went out a got a coach that would help him improve his putting skills. Even though he was the best, he understood that he needed to be better. Second notice the words “to do something better”. It is obvious that you are in a position because you have the talent and skill to do the job, but we all need a coach or mentor that has been there and don’t it. They have already made the mistakes and have learned to avoid them in the future. A coach or mentor knows stumbling blocks and pitfalls and can teach you how to navigate around and overcome them, making you a better professional. Make sure you are coachable and be thankful for having a mentor to help and guide you. Please follow me for daily education and inspiration linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 youtube.com/channel/UCavmjPCRQ4LoAE8O20AP6nQ facebook.com/DavidMaus01 instagram.com/David1Maus Search and follow #davidmaus #onething

☝ As a sales professional, what would your customer say about you? I am going to get a number of angry comments to this post, disagreeing with me. I have been managing sales teams for over 20 years and interviewed thousands of customers that my team has served. I am amazed at some of the stories I have heard. One customer was furious when a salesperson was invited an annual event and became intoxicated and made sexual advances to attendees. Other customers’ complaints have been off color jokes, racist and sexist comments, stealing and using foul language, just to name a few. Although these complaints are extreme, you would be surprised how many times sales professionals offend their customers. Other than stupidity, a key reason for unprofessional behavior with customers is the salesperson mistakenly assumes they are friends with their customer. There are two compelling issues to consider. First and foremost, a customer is not your friend. They might like and enjoy seeing you, but you have a professional, not a personal relationship. 95% of customers have adversarial feelings and would preferer to not meet with a salesperson. There are a number of reasons for this (see my top five mistakes on the cover), but the biggest reason customers don’t want to see you are they don’t want to tell you “no” and they don’t want to spend money. The second issue to consider, if you choose to do business with a friend, you will at some point loose a friend and more than likely you will loose a friend and they will not be your customer in the future. There are different dynamics in business vs. personal relationship and rarely can the two coexist.

In today’s world, we throw around the term “branding” with careless irreverence to the meaning of the word. Most companies and people alike do not understand what branding is or the importance of branding to the success or failure of products, companies and people. To understand branding, you must go back thousands of years to the beginning. The practice of branding begun with the ancient Egyptians. Branding was used to differentiate one person’s cattle from another's by means of a distinctive symbol burned into the animal’s skin with a hot branding iron. The mark of the brand was a clear, distinctive identification of who owned the cow. Today, the term branding is used to give strategic personality for a product, company or person, suggesting the values and promises that are perceived. Branding is a set of marketing and communication methods that help to distinguish a person, company or products from competitors, aiming to create a lasting impression. There is often little to no difference between people, company and products in the 21st century, making branding one of a few remaining forms of product differentiation. A brand is a promise to its customers of what they can expect from products and may include emotional as well as functional benefits. Effective branding can result in higher sales of not only one product, but of other products associated with that brand. If you love Apple’s Mac Computers and trust the quality, you are more likely to buy other Apple products, like the iPhone. This is called brand development. Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus Search and follow #davidmaus or #onething

A brand name is the part of a brand that can be spoken or written and identifies a product, service or company and sets it apart from other comparable products within a category. A brand name may include words, phrases, signs, symbols, designs, or any combination of these elements. For consumers, a brand name is a convenient way to remember preferred product choices. A brand name is not to be confused with a trademark which refers to the brand name or part of a brand that is legally protected, like the M in MacDonald’s or the signature font for the Walt Disney company. Brand identity is a set of individual components, such as a name, a design, a set of images, a slogan, a vision, a design, writing style, a particular font or a symbol etc. which sets the brand aside from others. For a company to project a strong sense of brand identity, it must have an in depth understanding of its target market, competitors and the surrounding business environment. Brand identity includes both the core identity and the extended identity. The core identity reflects consistent long-term associations with the brand; whereas the extended identity involves the intricate details of the brand that help generate a constant theme. There are many other components to branding like brand personality, brand awareness, brand recognition and brand recall. For purposes of this article, I will stop here. Branding provides an identify to a person, product or company, while at the same time conveys a story of quality, convenience, value, style, community, benefit, consistency, innovation, technology, attributes and personality. When you think of Apple products, most people want to be part of the unique Apple community, in addition, you think of quality, benefits, style and technology. For McDonald’s, you think value, convenience, consistency and french fries. Read more on Branding in my article "What is Branding?" https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/what-branding-david-maus/ Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus Search and follow #davidmaus or #onething #davidmaus #onething: #leader: #leaders #leadership #leadershipandmanagment #leadershipskills #leadershipdevelopement #executive #executiveleadership #executives #executivedevelopment #executivesandmanagement #managers #management #managementdevelopment #managementskills #sales #salesmanagement #salesmanager #salesprofessionals #salesandmarketing #salespeople #success #successfulmindset #winning #ceocoaching #ceo #ceos #ceocoaching #ceoaction #ceomindset #organizationalleadership #organizationalculture #organizationaldevelopment #coaching #coach #mentors #mentorship #mentorshipmatters #mentoring #mentoringmatters #mentored #education #inspiration #inspirations #inspirational #inspirationalleadership #inspire #changemangement #change #motivation #motivational #hope #hopeful #help #helpingothers #helpingpeople #marketing #marketingmanagers #marketingdirector #directorofsales #directors #director #directorsandofficers #business #organization #businessowners #businessownership #businessowner

Why do brands fail? Most companies/people do not deliver a consistent message needed for brand identity. There are several reasons for this. The biggest reason for brand failure is lack of common vision. Most people develop a product and then identify their market. Successful brands start with the target customer to develop a vision and then create a product or company. What comes first; the product or the customer? Successful companies start with the customer and end with the product. Another reason for brand failure is trying make their product fit the broad market, not a target market. This fails for several reasons, including generation gaps, socioeconomics, culture, gender, education level, values etc.… Within each of these factors are multiple identifiable groups and each group will have different motivations. Very seldom does a one size fit all. Each group, in each category will have a common tread of motivational reasoning. Which means each group will tend to purchase the same category of product for a similar reason. For instance, young people will buy a certain product, while more mature people will buy another. Same with socioeconomics, rich people buy different products than middle class people. Many brands fail, because they have not defined, identified and targeted a specific market and/or have not created a product from the ground up to fit that market’s demands.

Brand failure can also be attributed to not having a consistent message. All to often businesses are too quick change, add to or take away from their message or worse convey multiple simultaneous message to gain quick fixes. Branding takes time, patience, consistency and hard work. Like they say, Rome was not built in a day and neither are any well-known brands. Companies spend years building and growing their brands. Consider Apple, who has been around for 46 years, Google 21 years, Microsoft 47 years, Coca Cola 137 years, Disney 96 years, Amazon 25 years, Facebook 15 years, MacDonald’s 79 years. Not what you call overnight successes. What these companies have in common is knowing their target markets, who their customer is, what their customers want/need and delivering products to satisfy them, using a simple consistent message. Another reason for failure is changing a successful brand. Re-branding is not simply expanding a brand or making subtle marketing changes. This is a result of the brand evolution. Re-branding represents a total overhaul of the brand or company. Re-branding should be only be used a last stitch effort to survive a catastrophic business disaster. Re-branding is tricky and more often than not will fail. A good example of a company trying to change it’s branding was back in the 1985 when Coca Cola introduced the New Coke formula to taste more like their leading competitor, Pepsi and at the same time discontinuing the original formula. Two days after the launch of New Coke, the company hotline received 31,600 complaint calls. 79 days after the launch of New Coke, Coca Cola executives announce the return of the original formula. The cost of New Coke and the damage to the Coca Cola brand was immeasurable, costing the company hundreds of millions of dollars. This is a cautionary tale against tampering with a well-established and successful brand. Fortunately, for Coke, they were able to re-brand, their re-branding and came up with “Coke - the real thing”. In the following years, Coca Cola discontinued New Coke. Today, Coke leads the market with the original Coke. Very few companies could survive a catastrophic fail like Coca Cola. Because of their market share, loyal customers and immense resources, Coke was able to survive, where other companies would have folded.

Another reason for brand failure is the inability to get the branding message to the public. Much branding is done through advertising. In years past advertising include television, radio, billboard signs, newspapers, etc... Because of the considerable expense, many companies cannot afford to invest in advertising. Today, advertising in conventional ways is still expensive, but there are more effective and less expensive ways to get your message out. With Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Snapchat and others, advertising can be more strategic and more easily cover your target market. In addition, social media advertising is a fraction of the cost of other forms of advertising. Smaller companies should be creative about building their brand. Being creative is time consuming and is a painfully slow process, but in the end can be the most effective way to build a brand. Some creative ideas include celebrity endorsements, charity work, producing or participating in local events, giveaway programs, etc.… Nine times out of ten, brands will fail. Understanding the branding process, identifying and understanding your customers and developing a product that solve problems or fill needs will give you a significantly better chance at success.

Read more on Branding: "What is Branding?" https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/what-branding-david-maus/ Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus Search and follow #davidmaus or #onething

☝ Actions Speak Louder Than Words. Please share your changes in comments. Subscribe to my YouTube channel for topics on work, education, leadership, management and business. "youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing". I grew up with the saying: “It’s not what people say that is important, it’s what they do”. I know from experience, it is easy to say something. The time consuming and sometimes painful process of doing is what is difficult. Even though words are important, putting action to your words, brings them to life, giving them meaning and importance. Words command attention, action commands respect. We have all heard, do as I say, not as I do. The only time this works is when you are dealing with children who are not equipped to make quick, intelligent decisions. Children don’t yet have the life experiences needed to navigate their environment. Responsible, nurturing parents often need to make and enforce decisions their children need to stay safe. As we gain experience, we become capable of evaluating and making decisions. These decisions control our actions that define our character. If you want to evaluate a boss, coworker, friend or any person, listen to their words and watch what they do. If someone embodies the words and principles they expound (positive or negative), they are walking their talk. Some people are negative and full of hate and they outwardly express that in words and actions. Other people are positive and full of joy and they spend their life putting others first. With each extreme, you know where these people stand and you are capable of accurately evaluating them. It is far more difficult to access someone who express great thoughts and grand ideas, without the backing of hard work, experience and actions. Whenever someone’s words and actions are not aligned, a huge red flag should be frantically waving over that person. A person’s integrity and character is always revealed in their actions. President George Bush said it best, “Integrity is what you do when on one is watching.” Integrity is defined as he quality of being honest and having strong moral principles. Actions, not words, reveals integrity or there lack there of. Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus Search and follow #davidmaus or #onething

There is no replacement for humanity in business! In the marvel of today’s technology and the wonder of tomorrow’s, we are losing the best most powerful tool ourselves. According to BusinessDictionary.com: Technology is a set of tools, processes, methodologies and associated equipment employed to collect and process information. Technology is tool to help answer questions. Technology does not give you the answer it simply collects and process information, so you can make decisions. Technology will never replace good judgement. Text messages and emails are great technologies and fabulous tools that help improve communication. However, they are not a replacement for conversations. In today’s fast pace world, we find it easier to send a message, rather speaking to someone. Rather than having a confrontation or being challenged, we tend to use emails and texts, because it keeps us behind the door. We kid ourselves into thinking that we are saving time with emails and texts, but in reality, it is extremely time consuming to compose a message with the correct tone and then have back-and-forth messages to clarify the issue. Communications with email can takes hours when a quick phone call could cover the same issue in 5 or 10 minutes. Social media is a great tool to communicate and stay in touch with people. Unfortunately, it seems that we use social media as a replacement for personal relationships. Instead of the human touch of a relationship, we are content to stay behind a computer or mobile device to create our identify with a few words and pictures. We have lost the art of conversation and social interaction with other humans. As a tool, technology, used along with your eyes, mind and heart can provide the best answers, good communication and strong relationships.

☝ Subscribe to my YouTube channel for topics on work, education, leadership, management and business. "youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing". Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus Search and follow #davidmaus or #onething

☝ The only thing for certain is CHANGE. People, organizations and society are in a constant state of change/evolution. Some evolutions are positive and others not. Whether you want to admit it, you as an individual you are in the most turbulent process of evolution, every day called learning. We learn from experiences and through a formalized input process though reading books, periodicals, journals and internet research or watching seminars, videos, going to classes and networking. Learning is the transformative process of taking in information that—when internalized and mixed with what we have experienced—changes what we know and builds on what we do. Learning based on input, process, and reflection. Learning changes us. One of two things will happen over a person’s life as it relates to personal wealth. You will get lucky and achieve instant wealth from being an athlete or entertainer, winning the lottery or getting an inheritance. More likely you will steadily grow your wealth over a lifetime of career advancement and saving. A person must be educated to keep moving up the professional ladder and/or educated enough to keep the money they have. Are you continuously taking steps to learn how to make and keep your wealth? Are you educated enough to compete in the workplace for promotions/advancements? Younger professional need to learn the basics, from years past. They need to understand the thoughts, reasons, ideas, hypothesis and theories of how your profession or industry evolved. With understanding the past, you will not try to reinvent the wheel, but instead, you will improve the wheel. Build on past successes/failures of your industry. Older professionals need learn what will happen in the future. They need to stay on top of technology and communication. Even though the world is changing, too many older professionals are stuck in their ways and processes. To evolve and stay ahead of the youngsters, older professionals need to commit to tomorrow, utilizing technology that will advance the company or organization into the future. Understanding advancing technology is vital to evolution. In addition, older professionals need to learn, understand and participate in new forms of communication. Whether you like it or not, social media is going to become more important in society and is currently the predominate form of communication for everyone 40 years old and younger. In addition, social media will be the primary tool used by ALL companies to brand, market and sell things. Don’t fight it, join it. Whether you are a younger professional or older, you need to always be learning. Don’t be complacent, always be advancing. Don’t think you already know it all, because you don’t. Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus Search and follow #davidmaus or #onething

☝ Subscribe to my YouTube channel for topics on work, education, leadership, management and business. "youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing". Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus - twitter.com/DavidMaus1Thing

Is selling an art or a Science? In years past selling was treated like an art. Presentation were like a dramatic performance. It was a silique designed to move the buyer to the closing. Every conservable question a customer might have, would be answered in the narrative. Many times, when the presentation was completed the client would be swimming in product knowledge with a lot of information that was not important to them. The big advantage to selling as an art is salespeople knew their product inside and out. In addition, they were creative, persuasive, passionate, excited about what they were selling and connected with their customers on an emotional level. In recent years, selling is being thought of as a science with exact processes, organized in a logical progression, with predictable results. As a science, a salesperson must study and investigate the customer and their business in order derive needs, desires and fears. The most important part of the process is asking questions, not just any question, but the right questions that penetrate the customer and their business. The first step in the scientific process of sales is discovering what questions to ask. For this, you need to become an investigator and learn about your customer. This is a relatively easy, but time-consuming process. Start with a thorough internet search to learn about the customer’s business from past successes to potential problem. Learn about the company’s current processes, as well as the products and equipment they use. Look through financial and legal information. Learn the pecking order or hierarchy of the company. Who are the decision makers? What are the needs, desires or fears of the company and decision makers? This information and more can be found in the company websites, Hoovers and Dun & Bradstreet, periodicals and journals. Use LinkedIn to connect with and reach out to current and past company employees. Review the company’s social media posts. Researching the company and the decision makers is by far the most time-consuming part of the sales process. Once you understand the company and what motivates the decision maker, you will be able to craft questions that will uncover the information you need. Asking good questions will also help build a positive relationship with the decision maker. The one thing that scares decision makers the most is the idea of making a bad decision on a purchase. By asking quality questions, the buyer’s anxiety is are somewhat alleviated, because they start to feel like you are concerned about their business. Now comes the hard part. Once you have asked your questions, you must stop, shut up and listen. You can only learn something if you listen. Not only do you need to learn, but you need to understand your customer’s needs, desires and fears. Don’t be afraid to ask follow-up questions that will give you a greater understand. Only after understanding the company and the decision maker’s motivation, can you begin to build your presentation. It is very important that your presentation focuses solutions that are important to the customer. Bringing in a lot of additional information could dilute the stuff that is important to the point the customer becomes confused and overwhelmed. I call this show up and throw up. This is when you start talking you customer out of the sale. By targeting precise needs, you stop selling a product, and start providing solutions. The process starts and ends with asking questions, listening and understanding. Listening for needs: Listening for desires: Listening for fears. For some sales professionals targeting solutions is ambiguous and hard to wrap their head around. An easy way to adjust your thought process from product to solution, begin with the end in mind. Understand what the customer ultimately wants. For example: as a consumer, you are in the store to pick up a razer and shaving cream. What is it you want, a razor and shaving cream? No, you want a clean smooth face. The result is a clean-shaven face. The solution is the razor and shave cream. If your wife is in the cosmetic section picking up a few things, does she wanting lipstick, eye shadow and other make up products? No, she wants a more polished, attractive and professional appearance. The result is a beautiful appearance. The solution is makeup. Solutions are based on what the customer ultimately wants. Only after you understand your client’s needs, desires and fears can you build a presentation that is clear, concise and on target. As a science, sales require customer research and involves a detailed thought process that is organized and logical, with predictable and measurable results. In the end, selling is both an art and a science. You need the skills and talent of the art and the science of selling solutions.

☝ Why is Effective Communication Difficult? Communication is the basis for all activities involving more than one person. Without communication, everything would come to a complete stop and existence involving others could not exist. With communication be so vital to everyday life, why is effective communication so difficult? To understand communication, consider the following points: • The most important skill a leader must possess is effective communication. • Effective communication is vital for strong professional relationships. • The biggest reason for a negative company culture is poor communication, where employees are forces to draw conclusions that create fear and uncertainty. Communication is the successful conveying or sharing of thoughts, ideas and feelings. Communication requires an element of success in transmitting or imparting a message. Communication has three parts: the sender, the message, and the recipient. The sender generates the message. It is transmitted in some way and the recipient translates it. The transmission of the message from sender to recipient can be affected by a huge range of things, including emotions, cultural situation, body of knowledge and the medium used to communicate. Effective communications begin with the sender generating a message that is clear and understandable to the recipient. This is where most communication fails. As busy professionals, we are always in hurry up mode. We generate messages that are not complete and somewhat fractional. The recipient is forced to make certain assumptions that could or could not be correct. The sender must consider the audience by anticipate emotions, understanding their knowledge and anticipate questions of the recipient, to create an understandable message that is crystal-clear. Clear communications should include the following points: the reason for the message, summary of the situation, clear course of action, anticipated positive outcome, benefit to the recipient and ending with short summary. If you want people to accept your message, use a little honey. Use words that don’t threatening. Remove words like you, he, she, they, your, angry, glaring, must, should, lying, terminated, but, can’t, error, problem. Include words like we, need, our, frustration, noticeable, misinformed, restructure, consider, misstep, challenge, dismissed, mistake, situation, concern. Good communication is what leaders use to motivating everyone around them. Communication reveals expectations, conveys positive reinforcements, expresses gratitude, educates, removes ambiguity, allows understanding and commands respect. Good communication is a game changer. Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus - twitter.com/DavidMaus1Thing Search and follow #davidmaus or #onething

☝ Company Culture is Important Company culture, also referred to as corporate and organizational culture are the collective dominant attitudes, behaviors, and values of the people making up the organization. Company culture serves both to define and to separate a company from other companies. Whether the company is structured in a strict hierarchy or is causal and fluid, how departments inter-relate, and how work teams are formed are all part of the company culture. The accessibility of the top executives and whether they stay in their offices or are seen throughout the building is another aspect of the culture. All companies have a culture, whether it is recognized and consciously shaped or not. Company culture can benefit a company or be detrimental. Culture is responsible for how things are done at the company, including what decisions are made and how they’re made. Although the company culture is initially established through the company’s mission, vision and values of the founders, as the company grows, everyone in the company comes to have an influence of some degree on the company culture. Every member of the organization is aware of their company’s culture and actively participate in the development and perpetuation of that culture. Leaders may strive to create or change a certain type of culture, but in the end, people’s personalities, attitudes, behaviors and values create culture. Once an organization has established a culture, it is extremely difficult to change for several reasons. First, since establishing culture starts at the top and is a reflection of leadership, culture cannot be changed unless leadership is self-aware and is willing to make personal changes and adjustments that can be mirrored throughout the organization. Since leaders are myopically dogmatic, meaning, their way is the best way, very few leaders are inclined to make changes. Second, once company culture is established, it becomes ingrained into every person in the organization and people begin to justify their actions/reactions as it relates to the culture. Even if you don’t reflect the culture of your company, in time you will adjust to fit in and move forward, hence becoming part of the collective. Over time an organization’s culture becomes your culture. Third, since a culture becomes imprinted on everyone in an organization, there may come a time when leadership wants to have a paradigm shift. By nature, most people will resist this change. In order to successfully change culture, a company must commit massive efforts, resources and time into influencing a change. Changing a culture does not happen overnight, it takes time to change people’s behaviors and attitudes. Finally, to have a culture change an organization will have to be willing to cut out the cancer. Leaders need to end professional relationships with those employees who resists the change and those who covertly undermine change. Even if the people are high producers, smartest scientist, most talented professionals or your friends, you need to end the professional relationship. If not, their negativity will spread through an organization like a deadly cancer. When assessing or evaluating a company, take a close look at their culture. For investments or employment, a company’ culture should be considered. Don’t be fooled, company culture is important. Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus Search and follow #davidmaus or #onething

☝ Subscribe to my YouTube channel for topics on work, education, leadership, management and business. "youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing". Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus Employee Engagement: Tapping into Your Company’s Most Valuable Asset Episode 1 ☝ I have been hearing a lot of talk about employee engagement. As I read articles and talk to companies, I believe there is a misunderstanding about what it means to have engaged employees. Companies are trying to create a different workspace, changing the physical environment by providing an esthetically pleasing area to work. Some companies believe they can buy their employee’s engagement by offering additional money or extra benefits. Although a pleasing workspace and additional money and benefits are always welcome, they do not flip the switch of engaging employees. What does engagement mean? According to Webster, engagement is a “state of emotional involvement”. Employee engagement, according to Wikipedia, is a product of the relationship between an organization and its employees. An "engaged employee" is one who is fully absorbed by and enthusiastic about their work and takes positive action to further the organization's reputation and interests. An engaged employee has a positive attitude towards the organization and its values. When you are an engaged employee, your work focus moves from your mind to your heart. When you engage an employee, you ignite their passion. Nothing is more powerful than a passionate warrior. It's not about the pleasing benefits you throw at your employees; it’s about having a relationship and emotional connection. Emotional relationships are formed when barriers between management and employee are torn down, removing the idea of “us versus them”. There are several proactive factors that create an environment of engagement. Employee's personal perception Positive perceptions that individuals hold of their own personal strength and ability is a key factor for engagement. If an employee feels inadequate in their abilities to do their job, they will withdraw, becoming invisible. Instead of giving it their all, they simply put in their time and go home. Fortunately, this is something that can easily be fixed with an engaged supervisor. When you see an employee who is struggling, identify the problems or weakness and provide additional training or continuing education. It is hard to fit a square peg into a round hole. Offering a different position that is more suited to the employee’s strengths can provide huge benefits to both the company and employee. This situation must be handled with care and good intentions. This can easily cause bruised egos and hurt feelings. In order to create a win-win for everyone, there must not be any feelings of punishment or demotion. #davidmaus #onething #leader #leaders #leadership #leadershipandmanagment #leadershipskills #leadershipdevelopement #executive #executiveleadership #executives #executivedevelopment #executivesandmanagement #managers #management #managementdevelopment #managementskills #sales #salesmanagement #salesmanager #salesprofessionals #salesandmarketing #salespeople #success #successfulmindset #winning #ceocoaching #ceo #ceos #ceocoaching #ceoaction #ceomindset #organizationalleadership #organizationalculture #organizationaldevelopment #coaching #coach #mentors #mentorship #mentorshipmatters #mentoring #mentoringmatters #mentored #education #inspiration #inspirations #inspirational #inspirationalleadership #inspire #changemangement #change #motivation #motivational #hope #hopeful #help #helpingothers #helpingpeople #marketing #marketingmanagers #marketingdirector #directorofsales #directors #director #directorsandofficers #business #organization #businessowners #businessownership #businessowner #branding #branddevelopement, #brand

An employee's attitude toward their job's importance has a great impact on the relationship they have with the company. Everyone wants to feel important and their efforts are appreciated. If an employee feels insignificant and that their work has little value on the overall success of the company, they feel separated from the team.

The third factor that creates an environment of engagement is making sure everyone’s job is clearly defined and understood. Most people rise to the level of expectations. When a job is clearly defined, communicated and reinforced with accountability, people will thrive and, in most cases, exceed expectations.

☝ Subscribe to my YouTube channel for topics on work, education, leadership, management and business. "youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing". For employee engagement, there needs to be a carrot to chase or something to shoot for. Clear career paths and career plans should be created for every employee in your organization. Supervisors should meet with new employees and develop a customized career path and plan, based on an individual’s current and future skills, as well as their expectations and commitment to their own success. Careers are a result of ambition and priorities. Career paths and plans should be dynamic by nature and should be adjusted as employees moves along in their careers. Once the career path is defined and a career plan is developed, progress can be monitored during quarterly or annual reviews. By having a written career path and defined career plan, employees know what is needed to keep their career moving forward. Career paths will motivate everyone in the organization to push harder and achieve more. Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus - twitter.com/DavidMaus1Thing

Feedback is the key to giving employees a sense of where they are going. Managers are not trained at giving positive and constructive feedback. Some managers don’t have the confidence to provide feedback and others have not learned the art of diplomacy of providing feedback that is not taken as a personal criticism. Criticism is always received as a personal attack and blow to the ego. There is an art to providing constructive/negative feedback that will communicate the need for change without damaging self-esteem while encouraging ownership of the situation. Some believe that being direct and upfront is the best course of action, while others dance around the issue. Both instances are unwise techniques to handle negative or constructive feedback. Because there are many ways to look at a situation, process, procedure or problem, a wise manager will guide their team member to different ways, thoughts or ideas. Looking at something from a different perspective could cause an automatic change in behavior from your team member. It is important to realize that as a manager, you have more experience. Not only do you know more, you have knowledge of a bigger picture that your employee is not privy to. For these reasons, you can provide a better perspective for the employee and solid reasons for the needed change. A simple and easy technique to offer alternative views is to say: “Have you considered looking at the situation this way?”. This allows you to introduce the needed correction without the confrontation of a perceived personal attack. When handling constructive feedback with a positive attitude, employees feel like they have supporters rather than supervisors. Employees that feel their supervisors support them are 67% more engaged.

☝ Subscribe to my YouTube channel for topics on work, education, leadership, management and business. "youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing". Employee Engagement: Tapping into Your Company’s Most Valuable Asset. Episode 6: the importance of having positive working relationships with supervisors. The most important relationship in business is the relationship between boss and employee. A huge key for happy employees is a positive relationship with the boss. Because of the professional hierarchy of a company, the boss is responsible for positive relationships within the company. Managers should be proactive with their employees in developing strong, positive relationships. If employees' relationships with their managers are fractured, then nothing will persuade the employees to perform at top levels. Employee engagement is a direct reflection of how employees perceive their relationship with the boss. Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus - twitter.com/DavidMaus1Thing Search and follow #davidmaus or #onething

☝ Subscribe to my YouTube channel for topics on work, education, leadership, management and business. "youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing". Employee Engagement: Tapping into Your Company’s Most Valuable Asset. Episode 6: the importance of having positive working relationships with supervisors. The most important relationship in business is the relationship between boss and employee. A huge key for happy employees is a positive relationship with the boss. Because of the professional hierarchy of a company, the boss is responsible for positive relationships within the company. Managers should be proactive with their employees in developing strong, positive relationships. If employees' relationships with their managers are fractured, then nothing will persuade the employees to perform at top levels. Employee engagement is a direct reflection of how employees perceive their relationship with the boss. Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus - twitter.com/DavidMaus1Thing Search and follow #davidmaus or #onething

An organization’s inspirations and values are the bases for company culture. Many times, corporate values are expressed in an organization’s mission or vision statement. Companies outline what the company aspires to be and how they are going to achieve their aspirations in a mission statement. A vision statement is a detailed, but brief, glimpse of where the company will be in the future. In addition, companies might have a values statement that outlines principles and issues that are important to the company. It is important that management from the top down embody the concepts and ideas outlined in the mission, vision and value statements. If management does not walk the talk and represent the company’s philosophy, the values and ideals, the various statements are merely words and have no meaning. Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus - twitter.com/DavidMaus1Thing Search and follow #davidmaus or #onething davidmaus, onething, leader, leaders, leadership, leadershipandmanagment, leadershipskills, leadershipdevelopement, executive, executiveleadership, executives, executivedevelopment, executivesandmanagement, managers, management, managementdevelopment, managementskills, sales, salesmanagement, salesmanager, salesprofessionals, salesandmarketing, salespeople, success, successfulmindset, winning, ceocoaching, ceo, ceos, ceocoaching, ceoaction, ceomindset, organizationalleadership, organizationalculture, organizationaldevelopment, coaching, coach, mentors, mentorship, mentorshipmatters, mentoring, mentoringmatters, mentored, education, inspiration, inspirations, inspirational, inspirationalleadership, inspire, changemangement, change, motivation, motivational, hope, hopeful, help, helpingothers, helpingpeople, marketing, marketingmanagers, marketingdirector, directorofsales, directors, director, directorsandofficers, business, organization, businessowners, businessownership, businessowner, branding, branddevelopement, brand,

☝ Subscribe to my YouTube channel for topics on work, education, leadership, management and business. "youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing". Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus - twitter.com/DavidMaus1Thing Search and follow #davidmaus or #onething I have been hearing a lot of talk about employee engagement. As I read articles and talk to companies, I believe there is a misunderstanding about what it means to have engaged employees. Companies are trying to create a different workspace, changing the physical environment by providing an esthetically pleasing area to work. Some companies believe they can buy their employee’s engagement by offering additional money or extra benefits. Although a pleasing workspace and additional money and benefits are always welcome, they do not flip the switch of engaging employees. What does engagement mean? According to Webster, engagement is a “state of emotional involvement”. Employee engagement, according to Wikipedia, is a product of the relationship between an organization and its employees. An "engaged employee" is one who is fully absorbed by and enthusiastic about their work and takes positive action to further the organization's reputation and interests. An engaged employee has a positive attitude towards the organization and its values. When you are an engaged employee, your work focus moves from your mind to your heart. When you engage an employee, you ignite their passion. Nothing is more powerful than a passionate warrior. It's not about the pleasing benefits you throw at your employees; it’s about having a relationship and emotional connection. Emotional relationships are formed when barriers between management and employee are torn down, removing the idea of “us versus them”. #davidmaus #onething #leader #leaders #leadership #leadershipandmanagment #leadershipskills #leadershipdevelopement #executive #executiveleadership #executives #executivedevelopment #executivesandmanagement #managers #management #managementdevelopment #managementskills #sales #salesmanagement #salesmanager #salesprofessionals #salesandmarketing #salespeople #success #successfulmindset #winning #ceocoaching #ceo #ceos #ceocoaching #ceoaction #ceomindset #organizationalleadership #organizationalculture #organizationaldevelopment #coaching #coach #mentors #mentorship #mentorshipmatters #mentoring #mentoringmatters #mentored #education #inspiration #inspirations #inspirational #inspirationalleadership #inspire #changemangement #change #motivation #motivational #hope #hopeful #help #helpingothers #helpingpeople #marketing #marketingmanagers #marketingdirector #directorofsales #directors #director #directorsandofficers #business #organization #businessowners #businessownership #businessowner #branding #branddevelopement, #brand davidmaus, onething, leader, leaders, leadership, leadershipandmanagment, leadershipskills, leadershipdevelopement, executive, executiveleadership, executives, executivedevelopment, executivesandmanagement, managers, management, managementdevelopment, managementskills, sales, salesmanagement, salesmanager, salesprofessionals, salesandmarketing, salespeople, success, successfulmindset, winning, ceocoaching, ceo, ceos, ceocoaching, ceoaction, ceomindset, organizationalleadership, organizationalculture, organizationaldevelopment, coaching, coach, mentors, mentorship, mentorshipmatters, mentoring, mentoringmatters, mentored, education, inspiration, inspirations, inspirational, inspirationalleadership, inspire, changemangement, change, motivation, motivational, hope, hopeful, help, helpingothers, helpingpeople, marketing, marketingmanagers, marketingdirector, directorofsales, directors, director, directorsandofficers, business, organization, businessowners, businessownership, businessowner, branding, branddevelopement, brand,

☝ HaHaHaHa! Laughing is fun, contagious and can improve your company’s culture. Why is laugher important? According to Webster laughter is the spontaneous sounds and movements of the face and body that are the instinctive expressions of lively amusement. When you laugh your whole body is involved. ☝ Subscribe to my YouTube channel for topics on work, education, leadership, management and business. "youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing". Please follow me for daily education and inspiration - linkedin.com/in/davidmaus1 - youtube.com/DavidMausOneThing - facebook.com/DavidMaus01 - instagram.com/David1Maus - twitter.com/DavidMaus1Thing #davidmaus #onething #leader #leaders #leadership #leadershipandmanagment #leadershipskills #leadershipdevelopement #executive #executiveleadership #executives #executivedevelopment #executivesandmanagement #managers #management #managementdevelopment #managementskills #sales #salesmanagement #salesmanager #salesprofessionals #salesandmarketing #salespeople #success #successfulmindset #winning #ceocoaching #ceo #ceos #ceocoaching #ceoaction #ceomindset #organizationalleadership #organizationalculture #organizationaldevelopment #coaching #coach #mentors #mentorship #mentorshipmatters #mentoring #mentoringmatters #mentored #education #inspiration #inspirations #inspirational #inspirationalleadership #inspire #changemangement #change #motivation #motivational #hope #hopeful #help #helpingothers #helpingpeople #marketing #marketingmanagers #marketingdirector #directorofsales #directors #director #directorsandofficers #business #organization #businessowners #businessownership #businessowner #branding #branddevelopement, #brand, #Laughing, #laughing, #happy, #joke