New life...

 Two weeks ago we got a little puppy, called Pappy - what a difference it has made to our lives having this little real life thing running around under our feet and bringing us much joy and pleasure. This got me to thinking about change.....

After Chester died 2 years ago ( he was 21) we said never again, it is to hurtful to lose a pet, but after a while we began to feel like something was missing and started to feel the pinch. So, we took the brave step - supported the local SPCA and found Pappy.

The next step in our venture was realizing that we had to make our home "Pappy" proof. This is no different to making it grandchildren proof at all, as we found out. Now, daily as we go in and out the house, the last thing to do is make sure that the place is Pappy proof or else we come home to a HUGE surprise.

Then of course comes the "potty" training. Starting with the newspaper down in the kitchen during the night and taking Pappy outside during the day periodically to enable him to do what he aught to.... He plays us well... Outside sniffing, running, " Bundu bashing" but not doing a thing THEN just make the decision to come back inside what happens.... Voops.... there's the puddle right where it shouldn't be.  Don't you just like new life around......? So glad we made the mindset change.

Procrastination

I have been pondering much on procrastination this past week, thinking back to when my children were very small and how they deployed ALL the procrastination tack ticks they knew in trying to avoid having to eat their veggies.

My advice to them was to eat the yuk veggies first and end off with the taste they found really good. 

It is much the same in business - if your are a procrastinator then you should start doing the jobs you don't like first. Get them done. Get them out the way. Get them behind you and then you can proceed and have an awesome day, not only doing the things you like but also having a sense of freedom and achievement.

Eat that frog by Brian Tracy sums things up really well. So, if you are a procrastinator pop to www.actnow.ie and EAT THAT FROG.

It has been a while - life happens

Time marches on, much water flows under the bridge, people come and people go, babies get born and people pass on, life gets hectic and then calms down, plans are made and plans are changed, money comes in and money goes out, you lose weight and gain weight, rose buds come and blossoms die off, vehicles work and vehicles breakdown, children laugh and children cry, happiness rules then sadness comes, we make good choices and we make bad choices, first it is sunny and then it rains, things run smoothly for a time and then the wheels fall off, you live in a house for 30 years and then you move, your children grow up and then grandchildren arrive, you set the house alarm and then you disarm it, you have nice neighbours and you get bad neighbours, you love the songs sung at church and then you struggle with them,..... 

Life happens.... The important thing is to persevere... It all comes right in the end, and if it's not right now, then it's not the end. 

Oh the pressure

What to do or what not to do.... The saga of having two customers with a crisis at the same time and just you to try and sort it all out.....

It doesn't matter how efficient you are or how organized you are, sometimes the inevitable happens.... Two jobs with the same priority..... Oh what a nightmare.

Well, that is where I have found myself this past few days.... Madly " burning the candle at both ends" to do my best to resolve the things that need to be resolved and keep both customers happy. This is no mean feat at all and does take its toll on the body when you get older!!!

Now, the thing is this - I consider myself an efficient and well organized person and I still struggled to make it all happen without suffering from stress... Is there anyone out there that has some constructive ideas on how to drop the stress factor, when you find yourself in situations like the one mentioned above?

Making a difference

Isn't " making a difference" in people's lives a wonderful feeling?

It is such an encouragement to continue imparting the knowledge you have, when people you have been mentoring or coaching succeed. 

Recently I was really touched by some feedback received from a GM of a company I have been doing some training with.

 She wanted me to know that the training I do is more than just educating people -

 QUOTE - "May you experience an overwhelming request for training as your training does so much more than just educating us, it builds you up and creates a desire to do better, to improve not only work performance, but to better your personal outlook on life"

Now isn't that just awesome... 

 

 

 

 

Frustration

I have recently experienced 2 full days down on our email system..... What a nightmare indeed.

I am amazed at how much business is really done via email and feel horribly frustrated at not being able to communicate well with customers and I don't even want to think about potential customer loss!

We are a small business and rely on service providers to handle certain aspects of our requirements within the business realm, how frustrating it is not to be a "computer boff", and be able to answer back or ask pertinent questions of our IT provider .. And above all get satisfactory answers.

What's the answer here? 

Running out and getting a computing degree will take too long, can't afford to get another "expert" in to argue the point and cannot contain myself anymore....a fuse is about to pop.

Traveling

Somehow when people are traveling they forget about risk management and in doing that they put you at risk... Thank goodness we can commit our journey to God and he takes care of us.

Unlike India..... Which has rather "random" driving as I think of it, South Africa has supposed structure to make driving safer, efficient and less stressful - one wouldn't think so by the number of accidents we see just driving between JHB and Howick.

The sad part about these accidents is all the lives that are affected by them in one way or another and very often it's the innocent that take the beating.

How do we reduce the accident numbers? This is an ongoing project and why we can't get it right beats me.

It seems to me that there is no consequence, or very little consequence for bad driving managed by our government - the consequence that is in place is not strictly managed and thus people have the freedom to do as they please, resulting in the carnage we see on our roads.

So, what do us " goody goodies" need to do about the situation then?

Well, I will leave that up to you..... I'll continue to try and make a difference wherever and whenever I can, in some way or another, and if pressure needs to be brought on the authorities to manage our roads, driving, drivers license process, etc more effectively, then I will be willing to introduce them to the CLIP system methodology and way of thinking.

For me the CLIP system does wonders when it is embraced........

Safe travel readers .......