I Was Tagged....

My friend Shannon has tagged me for a meme, and since it will make for a post of sorts, here ya go:

Seven Interesting Odd Facts About Me:

1. I sit in bed at the end of the day surfing the web and watching bad repeats on tv.
2. I find Fridays alone with my boys harder than any day I spend at the office.
3. I have 2 tattoos.
4. I belong to an organization called the Entrepreneur's Organization (EO).
5. Through the EO, I'm going into my third year of a progrma called Entrepreneurial Masters Program (EMP). It's held in Boston for 4 days each year.
6. My mom, my sisters and I all live within 10 minutes of each other.
7. Ken & I struggle with Christmas/Hanukah and how to celebrate or not celebrate them with our children. We still haven't come up with a good solution.

8 Shows I Love to Watch:

Don't know if I have 8 but here it goes:

1. Grey's Anatomy
2. Private Practice
3. Seinfeld
4. Saturday Night Live
5. Mad TV
6. Flight of the Conchords
7. House (Like the show, don't watch it often)
8. The Office

8 Things That Happened Yesterday:

1. Kevin went to the dentist and had a clean bill of mouth-health.
2. I learned the correct procedure for taking Kevin to school late through trial and error.
3. I made an error in judgement involving my mother and her bank account.
4. I had a fight with Ken over how we would be celebrating this holiday season.
5. I made 12 collection phone calls.
6. I took a shower at 9:30 pm and it was wonderful to have alone time.
7. Kevin went to swimming lessons with Ken.
8. Jason watched Cars The Movie for the 689th time.

8 Places I love to Eat:

1. The Thai House
2. Il Jardino
3. Earls
4. White Spot
5. Tapenade
6. Bin 941
7. Taco Del Mar
8. The Keg

8 Things I Am Looking Forward To:

1. My corporate year-end on November 30th so that I can see how well we end up doing.
2. November 6, November 25, and December 5 -- all of my boys' birthdays.
3. Going to the workshop with Ken in a couple of weekends.
4. Going to LaConnor with Ken in December.
5. Getting my kids pictures from Sears that we had taken last weekend. The kids were awesome and I know the pictures are going to be great.
6. Having our friends look after our kids this Saturday so Ken & I can have a date night.
7. My 'Raintree Ritual' body treatment on November 20th.
8. My massage on December 18th.

8 Things On My Wishlist:

1. A new kitchen.
2. A new minivan (ugh -- did I just wish for a minivan???).
3. New flooring.
4. A new kitchen table.
5. More leisure time.
6. Better cashflow for the business.
7. For Tyler's two top teeth to finally poke through.
8. 10% growth each year for the next 5 years.

I'm supposed to tag 8 people, but Shannon tagged the ones that I would have tagged, so this will have to sit with me.:)

Hi, it's been a long time....

So this was precisely the reason I didn't want to start writing a blog....because of the responsibility to do it regularly.

Anyway, here I am: Better late than never.

So we have moved since my last post. We were crammed in our old house. All 6 of us were living in 1800 square feet, with 5 of us sharing one of the two bathrooms. Now we have 2550 square feet and 3 full bathrooms for all of us share. It's like a dream. We actually have enough space to spread out and put everything. And somehow, life seems easier. With a place for everything, it seems as if my life flows smoother. With things staying tidy even when there are a few things out of place, it seems as if I am calmer.

The challenges we face now are the annual birthday, Hannukah, Christmas extravaganza that every November/December brings. Jason is coming up to his third birthday, and on the verge of being completely potty trained (go Jason!). Tyler is coming up on his first birthday (already???) and Kevin is coming up on his sixth (!) birthday. All within a month of each other. To say that this time of year is a whirlwind is an understatement. But it's also fun and amazing to see the kids get big....

And throughout, Ken & I will try to make time for each other. We have plans to get away for a weekend (sans kids) in November and one in December which I am SOOO looking forward to. And come January, we will be taking the family to Tofino for our annual trip.

This is a good time of year.

Holidays?

Today was my first day of a week of holidays. How did I spend it?

I leased two vehicles, and then dropped off the lease documents at work. Then I checked my messages and discussed some staffing and fleet issues with my general manager.

I discussed some billing with my bookkeeper.

I discussed some marketing plans with my business development representative.

I checked my messages.

I fretted over June's early financials.

I fretted over our cashflow.

Throughout the day I checked my email.

I'm going to try a little harder to 'vacay' tomorrow, but it's hard! There isn't one day that I don't think of the business.

But what I really hope to do this week, is to get some of the 'big picture' stuff done -- you know 'working on the business instead of working in the business'.

I'd like to do my painted picture, and then make sure that my quarterly plans, and individual plans align well with this.

Personally, Ken & I are also doing a One Page Strategic Plan for our relationship and family. We did our first quarterly meeting this evening and I think we've set some good reachable goals.

At the end of the week, Thursday through Saturday, I am going on a retreat with my Forum. We normally meet once a month to talk about business issues and twice yearly we go on a retreat. We are going here this time.

And even though this seems to be a working holiday, I am getting some quality time with the kids too. Kevin is at bike camp this week, and is kicking butt at bike riding. He is so proud of himself! When I picked him up, we went to McDonald's with his friends. Then the kids ran through the sprinkler this afternoon.

Did I mention we move in 2 1/2 weeks?

Tough Go...

I have been having a brutal time trying to move forward with all the changes I want to implement with the business.

My focus hasn't been there and so I have been severely procrastinating.

I've forgotten the cardinal rule of getting out of a rut. Just start with one thing, and continue with the next thing, etc. Before you know it, you will get done what you need to.

I'm ready

Ode to Daisy

Okay, I'm kind of frusterated because I was about two thirds through a post, and the baby just kicked my lap top and deleted the whole thing.

Not cool. But one of the hazards of the job I guess.

I was writing a post about our impending move and how I'm kind of avoiding the details of it. But really, it turned into a post about my deep gratitude to Daisy, the nanny who joined our family in February of this year. She is indispensible.

Having a family and a career is not easy. It's almost cliche to discuss how difficult it is. But what I do know is that I love running my business. It challenges me and satisfies me in ways that I never have been before. I also know that I need to have this in my life -- I would feel empty without it. And frankly I am proud of all I have accomplished.

But I could not run my house without our nanny. Truly, she is the wife I have always wished for.

She keeps the kids well fed, cleaned and happy during the day. I do not need to think about what to make for dinner. It's cooked when I get home. Laundry is not my issue. Daisy does a better job at laundry than I do. My floors are cleaner than they should be in a house with three boys. If the baby has the sniffles, I know that she will give him the extra attention he needs without me having to stay home.

She is soft when she needs to be, firm when she needs to be and instinctive always.

As we get ready to move, I am so grateful Daisy is here to assist. I COULD not have this all organized without her. As I try to balance my busy, BUSY life, I realize that she is not a luxury. She is an absolute necessity.

The Ever-Challenging World of Leadership

Today was a usual Monday: or at least a usual Monday since I started implementing meeting rhythms. A full day of meetings with my direct reports. While I see the benefit of having these meetings, I don't think I have the KPIs/metrics nailed well enough yet that the meetings are as meaningful as they could and should be.

That is the biggest problem I'm having with The Rockefeller Habits: Trying to get the right metrics in place so that our big goals align all the way down to our individual goals. And furthermore, I'm having a challenging time keeping track of who is supposed to be doing what so that I can follow through with each person at the end of each week.

It's definitely a journey -- not a destination -- and a bumpy one at that, but I do see the positive results already. This system gives me a framework of accountability so that the question of whether someone is acheiving their goals or not becomes very objective and something that, they can see without me having to point it out.

Last year I had 2 project managers quit, and I think there were a number of reasons why they left. I blame myself (hey, I am a woman) for most of them.

First, I feel that by not having regular meetings with my project managers I lost touch with what was going on with them, and therefore, when things were bothering them, they just built up and built up until little things turned into big issues.

Second, I did not have any metrics in place for them to strive to acheive, and as such it was very easy for them to just mosey along with out any incentive to try and achieve their goals or the company goals.

Third, I think that by trading clients back and forth between them when their was an issue or complaint, rather than bringing them into the problem-solving process, I pitted them against me because they felt they couldn't trust me.

This year, with my new pms, I meet with them weekly, we have sales targets set up that they need to meet or else they need to justify why they didn'tmeet them. Also, we have open lines of communication, which definitely makes for a better environment.

But truly? I think I'm a pushover. And I think that I have a hard time putting my foot down when someone is not doing what is required of them.

The result is that I get taken advantage of by my employees at times.

What is the answer to that? I don't know.

The Rockefeller-fication Process

So Ken & I had a nice time last night. We went out for scallops and mussels here, and then went to a play afterward. I think I was still aggravated by my day spent with the kids though, and so the whole night I kind of felt, well, tense.

We talked a bit about how overwhelming life seems to be and I think we've come to some conclusions.

First, some back story: I am currently doing a technique/business methodology at the office called 'The Rockefeller Habits' and essentially it's about growth through structured meeting rhythms, specifically a daily meeting,and focused goal setting.

The goal with these meetings is that your staff gets on board with your overall growth plans and through staying focused on their top five priorities, which align with your growth plans, they actually help you achieve the company's overall goals.

I am truly in the infancy stages of implementing this at work but am already experiencing huge attitude shifts from the staff, tremendous buy in from my management, tons of ideas on how to improve our services, and best of all IMPLEMENTATION/EXECUTION of these ideas. If you've ever managed people, you know that the execution is the hardest part.

Seeing such huge successes at work from such minimal implementation of this process has really been inspiring. Perhaps trying to apply these techniques to our homelife could be fruitful. This would involve picking a huge, far away goal (A Big Hairy Audacious Goal), then reverse engineering it down to a 1-year goal, and then 4 quarterly goals. Further, we would have to make a point of meeting daily, weekly and monthly to make sure we are achieving our goals and staying focused.

To me, it sounds a little funny to manage your family the same way you manage your business, but it really does make a lot of sense. Currently, Ken & I seem to just go with the flow most times, and, while we are doing okay for ourselves, there is really no goals or dreams we are whole-heartedly trying to achieve. Implementing this type of system in our lives will, I hope, give us the structure we need to achieve our financial goals, our child-rearing goals, our marital goals, etc.

And, as I sit here in the middle of a day where our schedule includes two separate birthday parties, grocery shopping, lawn mowing, work preparation, all while simultaneously looking after 3 small boys, I have to believe that there is a better way.

There is freedom in routine!

So, all two of my readers, I ask you: How do you manage your hectic lives?