Tip of the Spear Ventures

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Is Happiness a Requirement for Success?

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Are you happy? Ask yourself right here/right now are you truly happy? It seems the world right now is not a very happy place. With a health pandemic raging on, long overdue protests taking place, and a world economy on the verge of collapsing the news headlines don’t share a lot to be happy about. It’s an unrealistic expectation for people to be happy all the time, even without the current happenings. So, it got us thinking here at the Tip of the Spear Ventures, is happiness a requirement for success? In this post we’ll explore the benefits of happiness and share two reasons why it’s not good to be happy all the time (Trust me… Research shows it’s not all it’s cracked up to be)… Enjoy!

Is Happiness a Requirement for Success?

Happiness Meet Ditch

Yesterday I had a Zoom meeting with a colleague (I’m sure you did too!) The meeting started off just like every other meeting I’ve ever participated in, but quickly took a hard left-turn straight into the ditch! After we initially exchanged pleasantries (“Good morning (Name)”… “Good morning Sam”) we breached the “How are things going?” moment. This is where the turn came in! My colleague expressed “I’m bitter, burned out, and besieged!” How do you respond to that? Truth be told, I’ve asked that question a thousand times, pre-pandemic/pre-protest and typically get the standard “I’m good, how are you?” response. But not this time! Was my colleague trying me on? Didn’t they really owe me the standard response so that we could get down to business? Why was I facing this derailing moment?

Positive Psychology and the Study of Happiness

Positive psychology is a field born roughly 25 years ago. Positive psychology is often mistaken of perpetuating a myth regarding happiness, inasmuch a good life is all about being happy. There have been a number of good works on the topic of happiness, including Shawn Achor’s “The Happiness Advantage,” Matthieu Ricard’s “Happiness: A Guide to Developing Life’s Most Important Skill,” and The Dalai Lama’s “The Art of Happiness: A Handbook for Living” (Even I’ve written on the topic in a post titled “The Leadership Challenge: Pollyannaish!”) But perhaps this happiness-focus is not exactly what it should be?

According to Martin Seligman, perhaps the most-often cited expert in the field of positive psychology, the study is meant to approach optimal human functioning at large, including the topic of happiness. Furthermore, it turns out that happiness might not be the best state to operate in for success (As a matter of fact, it isn’t!)

Success does not Require Happiness

In order to function optimally in our lives, we do not need to operate in a perpetual state of happiness all the time. So why would we not want to operate in such a state of bliss? Here are two (2) reasons:

Why are You Here? – Meaning and Happiness

The question is as old as time: “Why are you here?” or “What is your purpose?” Defining your meaning is difficult, after all it’s at the top of Maslow’s ‘Hierarchy of Needs’ for a reason. With this in mind, answering those questions is going to take some thought… Some real deep thought! The experiences, actions, and relationships that make your life worth living typically fall into the two camps of “hedonic” and “eudaimonic.” Hedonic life moments are all about pleasure (Seeing beauty, eating chocolate, and/or loving another). Eudaimonic life moments, on the other hand, are all about personal meaning and purpose (Upholding your personal values, finding ethical meaning expressed in what you do, and/or standing up for someone that can no longer stand). Most of the time, what is most meaningful isn’t the most pleasurable and vice versa.

Negativity Makes Life Better!

While happiness might be a preferred state, research shows that negative feelings can in fact be good for us! Anxiety and fear can protect us (think “fight or flight”), guilt can motivate us to make amends, and anger can help us increase focus on a problem at hand. While there’s a difference between feeling an emotion and acting out as a result of it, most are able to experience the negative emotion in life’s ups and downs with a goal of creating a healthy and manageable lifestyle.

SUMMARY

So, happiness as it turns out is not the sole requirement for success. While living a good life isn’t just about being happy, it also entails incorporating authenticity, pleasure, pain, happiness, sadness, love and conflict. If we were only happy all the time, we’d overlook opportunities to provide improvement to ourselves, those we lead, and the communities in which we serve.

Sam Palazzolo

Q&A with Tip of the Spear Ventures’ Sam Palazzolo

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‘We went from talking about sales acceleration and strategic plans to working in survival mode!’

Sam Palazzolo
Sam Palazzolo

I’ve been counseling businesses from the Fortune 500 to small businesses as a strategic partner for more than two decades. Believe me… I’ve seen my fair share of ups and downs! Perhaps that’s why I was recently interviewed to gather my thoughts on where we’re at as a business community and what we must do in order to recover successfully. Here is a transcript from that interview… Enjoy!

Interviewer: How would you describe the current recession… How does it compare to 2008?

Sam Palazzolo: I remember well the great recession of 2008. I had just left a successful corporate career at Toyota, including working retail running a few large franchises. I had just launched my second company when the recession hit (Good timing, right?) What we are seeing now is a similar pattern, albeit greatly accelerated. The difference between is that was a financial meltdown… This is a medical pandemic induced recession.

After successfully exiting a startup I was leading, I formed my current company (Tip of the Spear Ventures) in 2012. Part of my job is providing business advisory services to a host of clients. The advisory services focus on three (3) specialties as subject matter experts (SMEs):

  1. Sales / Business Development
  2. Mergers & Acquisitions
  3. Business Turnarounds

Interviewer: Set the stage for us… How were things going before all this happened?

Sam Palazzolo: I had been on pace to travel this year for 40+ weeks, down from my typical 48 weeks annually. The clients I visited were actively seeking help with their businesses, primarily in architecting Strategic Plans and Sales / Business Development blue prints until it all blew up and the phone calls started.

Interviewer: What hit first?

Sam Palazzolo: At the same time the order came to shut down and stay home, there was also a request to identify what to do now? So we were working right away with business owners early on.

Interviewer: How did your job change through all this?

Sam Palazzolo: I spent the majority of my days answering phone calls, texts and emails. We pulled together some intellectual property regarding the pandemic, and specifically what to do about it as a business leader. Based on our research, we compiled and presented webinars… Lots of webinars! To date, and we just calculated this figure at the end of May, we had completed roughly 70 webinars.

Interviewer: What were the webinars about?

Sam Palazzolo: We took a two-pronged approach. The first focus was on business survival — what can businesses do to preserve cash runway, raise funds, adjust sales forecasts, consider appropriate marketing, implement headcount strategies, and control capital spending.

These played themselves out in webinars on leadership, working remotely, virtual sales techniques, serving the customer virtually, and more. At the end of each webinar, we always make a point of polling participants for what additional topics they’d like to see researched/presented. This has fueled future session development on all too timely topics.

Interviewer: What kinds of issues have you encountered along the way?

Sam Palazzolo: Like everyone else, we’re working remotely. This poses several challenges, namely ensuring that you have the proper home office setup (Best internet bandwidth available, phone connections, etc.) You can count on the unexpected occurring! The big question is how will you overcome these technology challenges and make sure you receive forgiveness from participants.

Interviewer: What other issues are business leaders dealing with?

Sam Palazzolo: The top issues are reduction in income and sales, of course. Businesses were closed by direct order of the government, considering some essential and the vast majority non-essential. That’s what makes this unique. Usually a downturn in the economy takes a little time to develop, giving business leaders time to prepare. But this was on a huge scale, all at once. Roughly 15% felt as though they were thoroughly prepared to face the oncoming pandemic… Only 15%!

Interviewer: What’s the scenario in a normal recession?

Sam Palazzolo: Typically, if you think about an economic wave, the crest of the economic wave, things are going well and then something happens that starts a decline and the economy contracts. Normally that takes weeks or months to play out. Then you hit the bottom of the recession, the trough, that can last 16 to 18 months and the recovery begins, eventually leading back to prosperity. What makes this so unique is the sudden drop-off to a recession. As I mentioned previously, this is a medical pandemic NOT a financial pandemic. Regardless though, in a matter of days things began to plummet putting an immediate hardship on all businesses.

Interviewer: So, if everything reopens, is there a shortcut to the recovery phase?

Sam Palazzolo: Some believed early on that it could return to normal as quickly as it came upon us. A lot of it depends on how this plays out with the virus itself. People are now understanding it’s going to be with us for a while, which means a new normalcy, new health and safety standards across the board. It’s going to change a number of existing business models. People at this stage are doing a lot of hypotheticals about how requirements will affect business. The customer base, the employees, the supply chain.

Interviewer: Where are we now?

Sam Palazzolo: We’re in the pre-recovery period right now. We’re still assessing new information from the state and regulatory agencies on how to reopen. A number of businesses are weighing their options — is it worth continuing or just shut the thing down and move on. That’s a tough, stressful period for business owners and families. Our acquisitions business has helped identify a positive recovery path. Keep in mind, in any downturn in the economy you’ll see some businesses end up closing. Those businesses who do survive are often in a much better place. The reason being, former competitors are gone, creating an opportunity to grow. Others find new opportunities. It’s a cycle.

Interviewer: What is happening now with your clients?

Sam Palazzolo: We went from talking about sales acceleration and strategic plans to working in survival mode!

How to Embrace the Power of ‘Yes’ in Business Turbulent Times

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The Point: These are truly turbulent times in business for leadership. Make the right moves, and you’ll be a hero! Make the wrong or no moves, and you’ll be far from a hero!! I’ve seen a lot of negative-speak lately as COVID-19 takes an enhanced grip on the globe. Recognizing that it’s awfully difficult to agree to deals that no longer make sense (especially when your business hair is on fire!), it made me wonder if we’re looking at the business-landscape through too negative a lens? So in this post, we’ll explore how to embrace the power of ‘Yes’ in business turbulent times… Enjoy!

How to Embrace the Power of Yes’

Starting with ‘No’

“I loved saying ‘No’ when times were good… I cherish the opportunity now that times are bad to say it with even more conviction/volume!” a purchasing manager at a client recently shared with me. If they’re like most purchasing managers or leaders I’ve worked with, during negotiation they’ve learned the single best tactic towards achieving a successful outcome for themselves/their company is to begin with ‘No.’ While embracing the power of ‘No’ typically leads to continued negotiations, and hopefully positive (or ‘Yes’) results for both parties, the possibility exists for negotiations to breakdown, stall or worst case scenario come to a screeching halt.

So, what are the effects of starting negotiations with ‘No?’ From Harvard Business School and Harvard’s Department of Psychology, research has been conducted and summarized on how the utilization of ‘No’ not only leads to poor negotiation traction, but often times the negative feelings associated with future negotiations. Furthermore, negotiations that start with ‘No’ typically break down, as participants perceive the inflexibility of the other party.

Starting with ‘Yes’

In business turbulent times such as these, the last thing I would recommend to a client is to take a bad business deal. As a matter of fact, I don’t think even in non-turbulent times taking a bad deal in and of itself is a good option! However, is there a way in which we can successfully not start with ‘No’ during negotiations? What would be the outcome in starting with ‘Yes’ instead?

Starting with ‘Yes’ overcomes the initial negativity often experienced during a negotiation. The inevitable “I should have started higher” thought permeates the negotiators mindset. However, this can not only lead to earlier agreements, shortened sales-cycles, but also better outcomes for both parties now (as well as in the future!)

‘And” is Better Than ‘But’

So how can starting with ‘Yes’ be better in negotiations than starting with ‘No?’ The key, according to a mediation expert, is to utilize the conjunction ‘And’ instead of ‘But’ in negotiation moments. Supported by the Harvard research, this technique often “[O]pens a window of opportunity for addressing multiple issues, and using new approaches, while mitigating the taint of pejorative shadings [leaves both parties].” ‘And’ also avoids the dismissive nature associated with using ‘But’ during negotiations.

Starting with ‘Yes’ using ‘And’ Example

Here’s an example of how to properly utilize ‘Yes’ as well as ‘And’ in a typical negotiation. For framing purposes, your company is being pitched a new software piece that will significantly reduce costs and increase utilization (Yes, this is possible!) However, it’s your birthday and the strategic partner calling on your company knows it… So, they inquire:

SP “I heard it’s your birthday today?”

YOU “Yes, that’s correct, and I’d love a cup of coffee and a doughnut.”

SP “Well then let’s go get one!”

Admittedly, this is not the greatest negotiation example (after all, who wouldn’t like a doughnut, and do we really need to wait until it’s your birthday to have one?!?) But the point I’m making is that if we had started with ‘No’ and utilized ‘But” in the response we’d be looking at a negative negotiation with the potential of stalling/stopping and having caused future negotiation to not occur (All future negotiations!)

SUMMARY

In this post we’ve explored how to embrace the power of ‘Yes’ in business turbulent times such as these. We explored the Harvard research surrounding the negativity of ‘No’ as well as how to positively leverage ‘Yes’ for successful negotiation outcomes. The key in utilizing, and especially in starting with ‘Yes’ is to use the conjunction ‘And’ to stipulate what you’d like to see have happen as a result of beginning, and staying, at ‘Yes.’

Sam Palazzolo

The Leadership Challenge: Burnout

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The Point: As a leader, you’ve experienced burnout. I’m not talking about physical burnout where you can’t take another step from exhaustion. What I’m referring to is the emotional exhaustion that results in depersonalization and decreased personal accomplishment at work. Perhaps it’s the latest project approaching completion, or maybe the promotion that passed you by… We started thinking here at the Javelin Institute and Tip of the Spear Ventures what exactly is behind leadership burnout and what (if anything) can be done to successfully turn a leader from burnout to a blaze again. So, in this post we’ll explore the leadership challenge of burnout… Enjoy!

Burnout: The Good, The Bad and Mostly Ugly!

Leadership burnout is best characterized by emotional exhaustion that results in both depersonalization and decreased accomplishment/results in the workplace. The emotionally exhausted leader is overwhelmed by leading to the point of feeling fatigued, unable to face the demands of leadership, and unable to engage their stakeholders. The burned-out leader often develops a sense of cynicism, detaching themselves from work and viewing stakeholders – especially subordinates – as objects along the way.

Fatigue, exhaustion, and detachment culminate in the leader experiencing burnout to the point where they no longer feel effective because they have lost their sense to contribute meaningfully. The growing trend of leadership burnout should be identified as a threat to strategic plan adoption for most organizations.

Burnout and Safety

Unless you’re in a clinical setting as a leader, your performance is rarely one where decisions made (or a lack thereof) are life or death for individuals or organization… Or is it? Characteristics of the new economy’s leadership environment, including time pressure, lack of control over work processes, role conflict, and poor relationships between groups combined with personal predisposing factors (i.e., bias) and the emotional intensity of work put leaders at high risk. From my executive coaching conversations, I estimate the prevalence of leadership burnout range from 10%–70% among leaders (SVPs, VPs, Directors, Team Leaders, etc.) and 30%–50% among senior leadership (CEOs and CXOs – COO, CFO, CHRO, CRO, CMO, etc.) If you/your organization are not looking at the signs of leadership burnout (Further broken down in the next section), an intervention should be staged to address the topic.  Afterall, my experience shares that most leaders view their burnout as a threat to stakeholder safety because depersonalization is presumed to result in poorer interactions with them (Often causing lower communication effectiveness and poorer initiative results). However, typically the signs of leadership burnout go undetected or unaddressed.

Burnout Perspective

At one of the organizations I work with, 40% of the leaders surveys reported at least one symptom of leadership burnout. Burnout rates (unsurprisingly) were higher for those who rated their leaders unfavorably. My survey also found that even with exceptionally high customer experience (CX), customer satisfaction, and net promoter scores, leadership quality accounted for roughly half the variable in such scores. So, what exactly are the signs of leadership burnout? The following list of burnout signs is from Psychology Today, broken down into (1) Physical and Emotional Exhaustion, (2) Cynicism and Detachment, and (3) Ineffectiveness and Lack of Accomplishment:

Physical and Emotional Exhaustion

  • Chronic fatigue
  • Insomnia
  • Forgetfulness/Impaired Concentration and Attention
  • Physical Symptoms
  • Increased Illness
  • Loss of Appetite
  • Anxiety
  • Depression
  • Anger

Cynicism and Detachment

  • Loss of Enjoyment
  • Pessimism
  • Isolation
  • Detachment

Ineffectiveness and Lack of Accomplishment

  • Feeling of Apathy and Hopelessness
  • Increased Irritability
  • Lack of Productivity and Poor Performance

SUMMARY

In this post we’ve explored the leadership challenge of burnout. Best characterized by emotional exhaustion that results in both depersonalization and decreased accomplishment/results in the workplace, burnout poses a risk to be managed in the workplace. By knowing and recognizing the signs of burnout, leaders can address or seek assistance so as to maintain organizational and career course/trajectory.

Sam Palazzolo

PS – 2020 will be here before we know it, and I see some disturbing Leadership-trends taking place. If you’d like to receive a white paper I wrote on “5 Ways Your Leadership Will Succeed in 2020” CLICK HERE.

PPSS – As we crossed-over the halfway point of 2019, I’ve launched my most aggressive initiative to date. It’s a 501(c)(3) structured nonprofit that provides Executive Education to allow you to become the BEST leader possible (NOT Good, NOT Better… BEST!). If you’d like more information, please watch the following 2-minute overview by CLICKING HERE or plug this URL into your browser: https://javelininstitute.org/welcome-to-the-javelin-institute/

The Leadership Challenge: Decision-Making – Three Tips!

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The Point: We all make thousands of decisions daily. Take for instance your drive into work today; Did you take the same route as you always do? Did you take the road less traveled? Would you alter routes if you heard about the accident ahead that has traffic snarled to a stand still? My point is that decisions are everywhere, but there are some decisions that should have tremendously more weight assigned to them as a leader (Should we acquire our competitor as part of our growth strategy? Is our CXO really the best CXO we could have? Etc.) With all these decisions to be made as a leader, we started thinking at Tip of the Spear Ventures and The Javelin Institute, is our decision-making process the best that it could be? In making decisions, are we really asking the right questions at the right time? So, in this post we’ll explore the leadership challenge of decision-making and provide three tips… Enjoy!

Caution – Decision-Making Zone Ahead!

The University of North Carolina recently conducted research on decision-making as part of a study. Their conclusion was that the typical adult makes on average 35,000 decisions each and every day. These decision-making opportunities range from the simple (Should I brush my teeth or don’t brush my teeth?) to the complex (Who am I and what do I stand for?) 35,000 decision-making moments each day… Researchers at Cornell University estimate we make 226.7 decisions each day on food alone!

If there are 24-hours in a day, and the average person sleeps (or is supposed to sleep) for eight of those 24-hours, that leaves 16 wide-awake decision-making hours. The math boils down to 2,188 decisions to be made every hour, and roughly 36 every minute. That’s a lot of decision-making opportunities!

Are Autopsies Enough?

If you’ve followed me for some time, or even if you haven’t, I believe that decisions should be reviewed afterwards in autopsy-like fashion. The reason for these decision-making autopsies is to identify if in the given moment, with the facts as we knew them, if the appropriate decisions were made. If they were, great! If they weren’t, what better decision could have been made?

I’ve worked with thousands of leaders around the globe on this post-mortem autopsy analysis over the years, but is it enough?

Sam Palazzolo, Managing Director @ Tip of the Spear Ventures | Principal Officer @ The Javelin Institute

I recently was working with a leader on their decision-making abilities. They were labeled within their respective organization as a leader that was “Rarely in doubt, but often wrong!” Convinced that they were in fact making the right decision-making calls, they were at a standstill (and hence I was brought-in to work with them). After a few days, I realized something about our leader. They were extremely bright, well thought-out, and well liked in the organization. However, there was one aspect that struck me as so simple, so straightforward, that I wondered why our leader hadn’t thought of it… The one item was involving others in decision-making.

You alone as a leader cannot and should not look to make your best decisions based in and of yourself.

Decision-Making – Three Tips!

As a leader, there are a lot of decisions to be made. At stake with those decisions are items such as increasing shareholder value, achieving financial targets delivering key results, the employment of thousands, communities that count on you, etc. But decision-making in and of itself is not an insular game played with just one team player within an organization. You alone as a leader cannot and should not look to make your best decisions based in and of yourself.

While involving others in decision-making can become complicated really quick, here are three tips (or questions) that I would encourage you to ask to ensure that you get your best outcomes. Those three questions (or tips) are:

  1. Do you trust others that are providing you with information for decision-making?
  2. Do you argue freely before making decisions?
  3. Are you holding one another accountable for following through?

SUMMARY

In this post we’ve explored the leadership challenge of decision-making and provided three tips to assist. Having worked with thousands of leaders around the globe over the years, according to the University of North Carolina decision-making study I’ve seen somewhere around a bazillion decisions be made. Some decisions were good (lucky?), some were bad (unlucky?)… But overall there were decisions made that all could have been made better. My hope in sharing this post is that you take the three tips provided and begin utilizing them to make the best decisions possible.

Sam Palazzolo

PS – 2020 will be here before we know it, and I see some disturbing Leadership-trends taking place. If you’d like to receive a white paper I wrote on “5 Ways Your Leadership Will Succeed in 2020” CLICK HERE.

PPSS – As we crossed-over the halfway point of 2019, I’ve launched my most aggressive initiative to date. It’s a 501(c)(3) structured nonprofit that provides Executive Education to allow you to become the BEST leader possible (NOT Good, NOT Better… BEST!). If you’d like more information, contact me at sp@javelininstitute.org.

Leadership Challenge Decision-Making Three Tips