The Incremental Life

build an extraordinary life one step at a time

Are You Living an Incremental Life? You Should Be

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The Incremental Life

The first step in seeing your goals and dreams realized is to realize that there are steps to reaching those goals and dreams.

How’s that for a convoluted sentence?

A successful life is one that is lived in purposeful increments. Proverbs 13:4 says, “Lazy people want much but get little, but those who work hard will prosper.” (NLT) Some translations use the word diligent to describe those who find prosperity. Notice the proverb doesn’t say only Christians or religious people will prosper, or only those who pray a special prayer or live according to a secret formula—it specifically says those who work hard will prosper.

No Easy Prosperity Schemes Here

The kind of life that finds prosperity through hard work is what I call The Incremental Life. The Incremental Life isn’t sexy or exciting to outsiders, but it’s a life set up for success.  The Incremental Life looks something like this:

  • The Incremental Life has goals and dreams in mind—a destination.
  • The Incremental Life has steps mapped out toward those goals—a plan.
  • The Incremental Life has intentionality behind every step—a purpose.
  • The Incremental Life has no excuses for shortcuts—a work ethic.
  • The Incremental Life has counted and understands the costs—a budget.

Climb the Stairs

The Incremental Life is like the staircase of a tall building. Each small step is a mark of upward motion toward your ultimate goal. There can be dozens, hundreds, or thousands of steps between where you are and where you want to be, and getting there will sometimes wear you out and wear you down.

There are landings all along the way, each one with a door that opens up to a new floor to explore. You can choose to stop and explore that floor, but should you? Is there something of worth behind that new door? Will you be distracted or delayed in reaching your final destination on time?

Why take the stairs instead of the elevator? You have far greater appreciation for what’s been achieved because it wasn’t easy. You didn’t take the easy way of staying on always-level ground and pushing a button that magically did all the work to lift you up while you stood still. You moved higher only through determination, focus, and effort. Even if you had to stop and rest along the way, even if you went back down a few steps because you dropped something, or even if you had help now and again, you can say you walked every step from the bottom to the top.

The first step in seeing your goals and
Jeff M. Miller (@jmarkmiller)
I’m Jeff M. Miller, and I help ordinary people who are stuck in a rut change their behaviors so they can be extraordinary. I’m an entrepreneur who retired from my full-time job in my early 40s to work from home. I’m a financial counselor, life coach, graphic designer, and passionate believer in helping others improve their lives a little more each day.
http://theincrementallife.com

6 Reasons Why Your Team is Uninspired

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6 Reasons Why Your Team is Uninspired

So, you’re an entrepreneur who’s hired employees, or maybe you’re a manager with employees under your supervision, and it’s the most dreaded day of the week. It’s meeting day.

Why the most dreaded? Because you know what’s about to happen. You’ll walk into the meeting room and present up your agenda to a bunch of glassy-eyed, uninspired employees and wonder why you even bother getting the a lousy group together.

Why isn’t your team engaged? Why aren’t they participating, offering feedback, and asking questions?

Though I personally think there are some pretty big caveats to the phrase “everything rises and falls on leadership,” this is probably a situation where it’s likely true. It’s highly probable that YOU are disfunction on your team, especially if your team was once full of inquisitive, passionate go-getters.

Here are 6 Reasons Why Your Team is Uninspired

  1. You’ve fostered an environment of perfection. They’re afraid you’ll think they don’t know how to do their job if they ask questions. They feel like you expect them to know everything, or that they have to be able to figure it all out on their own. They’ve come to believe that you think asking questions is a sign of laziness or inability.
  2. You’ve made them believe you hate to be bothered. Too many times they’ve knocked on your door and asked a question or floated an idea only to hear you say, “I’m too busy.” You also seem to have an affinity for saying no before you’ve heard them out or taken time to consider what they had to say. So why bother any longer?
  3. You’re either a micro-manager or a dictator. You want it done your way, right away, without any deviation. Again, if there’s no culture for innovation or experimentation, if you are rigid in your processes, whey would there ever be questions during a team meeting?
  4. You hate either hate change, or you’re afraid of it. Oh sure, you say you love change, you love innovation, but your words and actions say otherwise. Why would your team push for change when you always push back or run away?
  5. You haven’t communicated your vision. Maybe none of the reasons above are true about you. If that’s true, then it’s possible that you simply haven’t clearly communicated your vision and goals to your team. You can’t just mention it in passing every once in a while, or make it a mission statement your team only sees when you hand them the new employee manual—you’ve got to bang the drum of your vision constantly and consistently. It needs to be on the tip of every team member’s tongue. It need to be part of the company culture.
  6. You hired the wrong people. It happens to the best of us, but you’re still ultimately responsible. Sometimes you’ve picked the wrong team members. For whatever reasons they haven’t bought into your brand and vision. The only value you bring them is a regular paycheck. There’s no curiosity, no drive, no desire to succeed when they help the business succeed.

These six reasons might have been hard to hear, but sometimes those in leadership positions need a hard wake up call. When your team is dysfunctional, you should always look at yourself first and ask, “What am I doing wrong? What do I need to change?”

Are there any reasons why teams are uninspired that you think I’ve missed? What have you done to grow and inspire your team? Please share in the comments.

For more ideas on how to lead and inspire your team, check out Chris LoCurto’s podcast on 5 Unconventional Ways to Inspire Your Team.

Jeff M. Miller (@jmarkmiller)
I’m Jeff M. Miller, and I help ordinary people who are stuck in a rut change their behaviors so they can be extraordinary. I’m an entrepreneur who retired from my full-time job in my early 40s to work from home. I’m a financial counselor, life coach, graphic designer, and passionate believer in helping others improve their lives a little more each day.
http://theincrementallife.com