Results Are Not Enough.

As a leader, you do nothing more important than get results.?But simply getting results can be easy.??

?What’s not easy is getting the right results ... to the right degree ...?at the right time ... for the right purpose ... in the right ways.???

?It’s been my experience consulting with leaders of all ranks and functions worldwide during the past decades that many leaders get the wrong results – or the right results in the wrong ways.?

Here is a tool to help you get the right results.?It’s called the SAMMER Test, and you can use it continually throughout your career.?

The SAMMER Test is simply a way of testing the results you intend to achieve, or the results you actually achieve, to ensure they are the right results.?

The SAMMER Test encompasses the results you aim for in all your leadership activities.??

SAMMER is an acronym.?Results should be:

?S - Sizable.

?A - Achievable.

?M - Meaningful.?

M - Measurable.

?E - Ethical.

?R - Repeatable.?

?Let’s focus on the Sizable & Achievable.?

?SIZABLE RESULTS:?Whatever organization you work in, that organization must get results to thrive, however those results are defined.?This seems obvious, but many leaders miss the point.?The point is that whatever results you are getting now, you can always get more.?Not only can you get more, you MUST CONTINUALLY STRIVE TO GET MORE.?Sizable is not an option.?Sizable is a necessity.?

Analyze the results you must get with your leadership. See those results as more than those achieved by the organizational status quo. Leadership isn’t about getting people to do what they want to do.?If you simply had to have people do what they want, you wouldn’t be needed as a leader.?Leadership is about getting people to do what they often don’t want to do and be totally committed to doing it.?As a leader, you should always be challenging people to do more -- even more than they think they can do.???

Many leaders tend to be comfortable and not want to deal with change.?But comfortable people who don’t want to change are in truth in great danger.?Change defines our lives.?The only security in life is opportunity that comes with change.?I have found that in having people get sizable results continually, they come to see strengths in themselves that they did not know they had and are able to do things they might not have thought they could do.?Having people see those things and do those things is one of the differentiating factors between managing and leading and between great leaders and average leaders.?

?In cultivating the all-important attitude of continually striving to get sizable increases in results, you must not only challenge others but also challenge yourself as well. You must be constantly dissatisfied with the way things are, constantly looking to make things better.?It’s a leadership art,he art of positive, productive dissatisfaction.?

ACHIEVABLE RESULTS: But this art can only be manifested in combination with the art of the achievable.?Many leaders impose unrealistic expectations on people and so lose their trust and confidence.?People must be challenged to do what they don’t think they can do, but they must also be able, ultimately, to do it.

?Here’s a tip for making achievable happen in the realm of sizable.?Say to whomever you are challenging: “I know you don’t think you can meet the challenge I set for you.?But I know you can, and I’m going to support you in every way possible.”

?Promote sizable and achievable in your organization.?Identify results that are currently being achieved and think of ways that you can increase those results by challenging people to take action that helps them go beyond what they normally think they can do.???

?MEANINGFUL RESULTS: Leaders who find little meaning in their jobs or the results associated with those jobs, shouldn’t be leaders, or they should change jobs and/or results.?Most leaders understand this.?But few leaders understand that meaning also involves the jobs of the people they are leading and the attitudes of those people toward those jobs and the results the jobs aim for.?These leaders stumble on what I call the Leader’s Fallacy.

?The Fallacy operates when leaders believe that their beliefs are automatically reciprocated by the people’s beliefs.?

?The fact is, because leadership is challenging people to do what they would not otherwise do, leaders’ belief is seldom reciprocated.?Automatic reciprocity is an illusion.?If it happens, great.?But for the most part, leaders must work at making reciprocity happen.?

?That’s done through the Motivational Transfer.?I spoke of that in my 5.30 and 1.25 articles. ???

There are three ways to transfer our beliefs to others so they might believe as strongly as we do about a challenge.

(1) Convey information.?Often, this is enough to get people motivated.?For instance, many people have quit smoking because of information on the harmful effects of the habit

?(2) Make sense.?To be motivated, people must understand the rationality behind your challenge.?Re: smoking: People have been motivated to quit because the information is indisputably correct.

(3) Transmit experience.?This entails having the leader’s experience become the people’s experience.?This can be the most effective method of all, for when the speaker’s experience becomes the audience’s experience, a deep sharing of emotions and ideas, a communing, can take place.???

MEASURABLE RESULTS: As to measurements: you’ve heard the rule that there is no value in business without measurements.?Measurements link disparate things, organize activities, and help unify those activities.?Apply precise, meaningful measurements to the results we want before we challenge others to get them.?Without measurements, we can’t make consistent improvements.?Make sure your measurement system conforms to four attributes, that they are RELIABLE, REPEATABLE, ACHIEVABLE, and CONTROLLABLE.?

Focus on results you must achieve and make sure they are meaningful to you and to the people who must achieve them.?In other words, be sure you and others are motivated to get them.?If you are not so motivated, change your attitude and/or change the results.?If you yourself are motivated but the people are not, use the Motivational Transfer Process.?

If those results are not measurable, try to make them so, recognizing that in some cases results won’t lend themselves to measurements.?Apply the four attributes of measurements.

In the next article, I’ll talk about ethical and repeatable results. ?

Copyright ? The Filson Leadership Group, Inc.

The author of some 40 published books, Brent Filson’s latest two leadership books are: “The Leadership Talk: 7 Days to Motivating People to Achieve Exceptional Results” and “107 Ways to Achieve Great Leadership Talks.” A former Marine infantry platoon and company commander, he is the founder of The Filson Leadership Group, Inc., which for 40 years has helped thousands of leaders of all ranks and functions in top companies worldwide achieve sustained increases in hard, measured results. He has published some 150 articles on leadership and been a guest on scores of radio/tv shows. His mission is to have leaders replace their traditional presentations with his specially developed, motivating process, The Leadership Talk. www.brentfilson.com and theleadershiptalk.com.

Besides having lectured about the Leadership Talk at MIT Sloan School of Management, Columbia University, Wake Forest, Villanova, Williams, Middlebury, Filson brought the Leadership Talk to leaders in these organizations: Abbott, Ameritech, Anheuser-Busch, Armstrong World Industries, AT&T, BASF, Bell Atlantic, BellSouth, Bose, Bristol-Meyers Squibb, Campbell Sales, Canadian Government, CNA, DuPont, Eaton Corporation, Exelon, First Energy, Ford, General Electric, General Motors, GTE, Hartford Steam Boiler, Hershey Foods, Honeywell, Houghton Mifflin, IBM, Meals-on-Wheels, Merck, Miller Brewing Company, NASA, PaineWebber, Polaroid, Price Waterhouse, Roadway Express, Sears Roebuck, Spalding International, Southern Company, The United Nations, Unilever, UPS, Union Carbide, United Dominion Industries, U.S. Steel, Vermont State Police, Warner Lambert — and more