FFL Blog Entries

• Foreseeing and intervening in anticipation of future needs or changes
• Initiating and preparing beforehand rather than reacting afterwards
• Taking steps ahead of time based on training, knowledge and experience

HARRINGTON COMMENTARY

Being proactive involves acting in anticipation of future problems, needs, or changes. Many problems can be avoided, and more opportunities can be further leveraged, when we act in advance of them. All it takes is using our knowledge and experience and applying it ahead of time. When we are proactive, our customers receive better support, recognize more fully our contributions, and grow to put even more trust in us.

For a moment, let’s pretend that your new favorite pastime is bicycling. You are jumping on that bike and riding it all over town. Congratulations. It’s great exercise, healthy for your body, and you are enjoying the great outdoors. Wow. I’m sort of jealous of you, even though I know this is imaginary!

Let’s assume that one day, while riding your bike, you hit a pothole, fly off, hit your head, get a concussion, and end up in the hospital emergency room. You don’t have any long-term issues because of the accident, but for a few days you have a BAD headache and generally aren’t feeling very well. After this, you realize that you should have been wearing a helmet as you rode your bike around town. Whoa! I’m not feeling so jealous of you now. I can’t believe you weren’t wearing a helmet in this imaginary situation.

I don’t quote Ben Franklin often, but here it goes: An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. In this hypothetical situation, having the foresight to wear a helmet could have helped you avoid some serious physical pain and suffering, as well as some hospital bills. Of course, this is just an imaginary circumstance. (In real life, I’m sure that you wear a helmet.) But we all face circumstance in which we have the knowledge and foresight to prepare ahead of time for situations and, if we act, we can save ourselves and others a lot of time and energy, and usually money, somewhere down the road.

At Funds For Learning, our clients hire us for many reasons. Of course, they engage us for our knowledge and experience dealing with the E-rate program. That’s a given. But they hire us for more than that. There is an expectation that we will take all of our expertise and training and put it to good use. They presume that we will be planning ahead, looking out over the horizon on their behalf. Or, to put it in terms of my bicycle analogy, our clients expect us to get them their helmet, knee pads, and wrist guards ahead of time before they get on their bike and ride around town.

Here are a few practical steps for being proactive.

1. Focus on what you can influence (See The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by S. Covey)
2. Make time to use the foresight you have been given
3. Stop reacting, even if for a moment. Sometimes all of our time and energy can be consumed with reacting. That’s okay, but, whenever possible, squeeze out a little time to be proactive. Even little investments in being proactive today, can lead to big returns later.

Consider your proactivity levels this week. In which areas do you currently feel like you are winning the proactive vs. reactive battle? Are you habitually reacting in certain areas? If so, can you identify (proactively!) what may be contributing to that?

Key words and phrases

Acting in anticipation; Causing something to happen; Taking steps based on experience; Foreseeing; Preparing beforehand; Intervening ahead of time; Initiating instead of reacting; Farsighted planning and action

Opposite terms

Shortsighted; Reactionary; Improvident; Myopic

GuideMarks – Distinguishing Characteristics of FFL E-rate Guides

Copyright © 2012 Funds For Learning, LLC. About the Funds For Learning GuideMarks.

Previous GuideMarks

• January 16, 2012 - Offer No Excuses
• January 23, 2012 - Teamwork
• January 30, 2012 - Thoroughness
• February 6, 2012 - Reinforce the Good
• February 13, 2012 - Your Best Work Forward
• February 20, 2012 - Timeliness
• February 27, 2012 - Focus
• March 5, 2012 - Professionalism
• March 12, 2012 - Solution-Minded
• March 19, 2012 - Work By Design
• March 26, 2012 - Neatness Counts
• April 2, 2012 - Share the Reason
• April 9, 2012 - Understand the Reason
• April 16, 2012 - Intentional Learning
• April 23, 2012 - Calming Presence
• April 30, 2012 - Commitment
• May 7, 2012 - Reliability

• Performing well in a consistent manner over a long period of time
• Yielding dependable and predictable outcomes again and again
• Contributing to the team on a consistent and trusted basis

HARRINGTON COMMENTARY

Reliability is something that everyone recognizes, but often times it isn’t discussed as much as it should be. 1) If a person is reliable, he or she may be taken for granted. 2) If a person is unreliable, it may be difficult or awkward to address it with them. Either way, the subject of reliability frequently gets less airtime than it should…

Well, today we are going to talk about reliability.

When I was 16, I had a job mowing someone’s yard. I was very irresponsible and unreliable in my duties. Some weeks, I showed up and did a good job. Other weeks, I didn’t. One time, I mowed the yard halfway, and then had to leave and come back another day to finish. Another time, I cancelled and didn’t mow the yard at all that week. I took swim breaks in the owner’s pool. My girlfriend would come hang out with me while I was there. I mowed and trimmed the yard differently from week to week. I got free Cokes out of the fridge. I was “hit-or-miss” (to say the least.)

I am sure that the owner of the house would have preferred that I had quit rather than showing up intermittently and occasionally doing a good job. Instead, I just muddled along, providing extremely inconsistent and unreliable service. At one point, I finally just stopped showing up to mow the lawn, and the owner stopped calling me. We never discussed it, but I guess I was fired. Or maybe I quit. I’m not sure, but it is embarrassing for me to look back and think about how unreliable I was that summer.

I don’t ever want to be that unreliable again.

At Funds For Learning, I am a member of a team that provides a quality service. For that team to be trusted by others, it needs to be reliable. It needs to deliver on its promises over and over again. It needs to provide the right service, at the right time, in a correct manner, without overdoing it or under doing it. If the team performs in that fashion, it will be reliable.

It stands to reason, then, that for the team to be reliable, it needs members who are reliable. A team’s work is the combined product of each individual’s contributions. Similarly, a team’s reliability is the combined product of each individual’s reliability. If the team members can’t be trusted to get the job done right, how can the team?

Therefore, it is important that the members of a team have a shared understanding of what reliability will look like for them. It is vital for them to define the right expectations, particularly when there is a high interdependency between responsibilities and outcomes. I define reliability like this:

Once we move past understanding what reliability is and how it is defined for a team, it’s important to examine ourselves. How reliable am I? When am I unreliable? What areas can I be counted on? Are there areas in which I falter?

Fortunately, in many cases, personal reliability is something that can be developed and improved. We can all take simple steps to increase our reliability. Here are a few:

1. Understand strengths and skills. Build up the skills and training that are necessary to be reliable.
2. If it’s not possible to become reliable at something, then stop doing it, and find someone else that can do it consistently.
3. Say NO. This is key. If you can’t be trusted to get something done, say so. Ironically, if you get really good at notifying others about what it is you can’t be trusted to accomplish, they will trust you more and you will begin to be seen as a reliable person. (Think about it! If you are reliable about self-reporting your unreliability, you immediately become a more reliable person. It’s almost a Catch-22, but not quite.)

I am convinced that being counted upon to help another human being with a need of theirs is one of the greatest gifts that we can ever give (or receive). As team members, we should discuss what reliability means in the context of our group performance; and each of us, as individuals, should consider our own reliability and takes steps to improve it.

Key words and phrases

Dependability; Consistently able to be trusted; Constant; Yielding the same results repeatedly; Responsible; Solid and sure; Predictable; Stable and steadfast

Opposite terms

Undependable; Faltering; Irresponsible; Can't be counted on

GuideMarks – Distinguishing Characteristics of FFL E-rate Guides

Copyright © 2012 Funds For Learning, LLC. About the Funds For Learning GuideMarks.

Previous GuideMarks

• January 3, 2012 - Reliability
• January 9, 2012 - Proactive
• January 16, 2012 - Offer No Excuses
• January 23, 2012 - Teamwork
• January 30, 2012 - Thoroughness
• February 6, 2012 - Reinforce the Good
• February 13, 2012 - Your Best Work Forward
• February 20, 2012 - Timeliness
• February 27, 2012 - Focus
• March 5, 2012 - Professionalism
• March 12, 2012 - Solution-Minded
• March 19, 2012 - Work By Design
• March 26, 2012 - Neatness Counts
• April 2, 2012 - Share the Reason
• April 9, 2012 - Understand the Reason
• April 16, 2012 - Intentional Learning
• April 23, 2012 - Calming Presence
• April 30, 2012 - Commitment