What behaviors are important to your organization? Can you list several pretty quickly?

You will find these behaviors closely related to your values.

Now think of people in your organization who are exhibiting these behaviors. Are they receiving any positive reinforcement to encourage more of the same?

A behavior met with no encouragement is in danger of extinction.

It is fast, easy and cheap to acknowledge desired behaviors and show appreciation for accomplishments. But it is not often done.

Try it! You might be amazed at the benefits to the individual who feels more motivated and more confident, to the organization through improving morale, and to yourself as you earn smiles, respect and better performance.

Organizations spend lots of time and money creating value statements and developing big roll-out plans, but all is wasted if you can't handle the basics:

• What behaviors do you want?
• Where do you need to encourage desired behaviors?
• Where do you need to discourage undesired behaviors?

Most of us have an area of focus in our jobs. The things we were hired to do. Trained to do. Our main responsibilities. The things we are supposed to be good at, or getting better at. But, do you ever feel as if this core of your job gets the least of your time and energy?

Tasks that are

• outside your main expertise,
• outside your area of interest,
• outside your main responsibilities, or
• done so infrequently that you never develop the skills or methods to execute effectively and efficiently

These "other" tasks tend to be ill-defined because no one has ever given them much attention. After all, they are outside the main focus and seemingly rather unimportant. You may not even realize they are really there. And without clarity of method and responsibilities, they are guaranteed to be wasteful. You or others may reinvent the wheel every time these tasks are performed. And if the tasks are done badly, they delay other processes and require rework.

The inefficiency of peripheral tasks applies not only to individual employees, but also to the company as a whole. Companies often focus almost exclusively on their "reason for being," their core competencies, their competitive edge. Why not? Isn't it important to focus on the highest priorities?

Not if those "unimportant" tasks are the source of greatest waste.

If you want to make significant improvements in your productivity, you need to bring order and efficiency to those "other" things. Find the method in the madness - the crazy, out-of-control parts of your job - and you will gain peace of mind and more time for the "important" things.

You are educated when you have the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper or self- confidence.

Robert Frost

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Ann Latham