• Today we are talking about Change, be the change, embrace change don't wait or expect others to change.
• What do we mean by this? So let's use an oatmeal breakfast as an example:
  •  If you make oatmeal in the microwave in the morning and you put it in there for 30 seconds as the product recommends. We all have to follow the instructions but it leads to the bowl overflowing the last couple of seconds. What do you think is going to happen tomorrow morning if you put it in there for 30 seconds again instead of 25 seconds or getting a bigger bowl. You are going to enjoy a steaming bowl of oats with a side of cleaning up the microwave again. 
• Every day at work and in life we keep doing the same things and expecting different results. Like when I ran our front desk back in the day. As a young manager, I was always getting aggravated with the fact that my daff kept making the same mistakes over and over again. No matter how many memos or meetings I held the result was always the same. Yet now I am realizing I was making the same mistake they were, I wasn't willing to reevaluate my process for better results. Just as they wouldn't change I also refused to change.
• On a personal level are you trying to lose weight? What have you changed about your diet of exercise to help you meet your weight loss goals? Weight loss is something that I have personally struggled with. It's been difficult to make the right changes for the results I want. So it's not simply about changing something but making effective changes that lead to the outcome you want. So in our example if you want to lose weight you could eliminate a favorite food, but if you choose to replace it with something with equal calories or more you will have made no progress towards your goal. So no only must you be open to change you must be open to change that makes a positive impact on your goals.
• Like in our earlier work example I could have chosen to change by just changing my employees for new ones. But at what cost and what guarantee did I have that it would lead to my desired outcome? Having to retrain new employees using the same techniques I used before may very well lead to the same results again. All these points must be taken into account before a decision to change is made.
• When I was a young manager at our hotel, my dad was my boss. One of the challenges I faced was that my ideas were never taken into account. I was always the kid that didn't know what he was talking about. The frustrated me to no end, as I am older and wiser now I know that wasn't entirely the case I was just making bad arguments and expecting people to follow my lead without me justifying my thinking. But back then I has a headstrong young adult and I knew I was right and everyone else was wrong. This led to a lot of friction at the office, but eventually, I changed my approach and strategy. I saw the people my dad would listen to and I started having conversations with them. Soon I was convincing them to pitch my ideas to my dad as their own. A magical thing happened now I was able to get my idea implemented, all without an argument. And as a side effect, I started to build my team. But none of this would have happened if I wasn't willing to change my approach and expected my dad to just start listening to me all of a sudden.
• There was another situation not work-related that I ran into many years later when I had young kids. My son didn't want to listen to the advice his parents were giving him like any young child. We can tell them until we are blue in the face but if they don't want to listen they won't. But learning from my lessons in working with my dad I studied the situation. Where was my son getting his knowledge? Well, it scared me to find out that one of his sources was youtube! But that got my wheels spinning and I started to find videos of points I wanted to make to my son and I would share those with him. Again something magical happened he started doing what I wanted him to do it just took someone else to tell him. Boy that made some of parenting a little easier now I could outsource portions of it. But again if I had not changed my approach none of this would have been possible.
• So this podcast is about perspectives now let me share with you a perspective from the other side of this coin. I was recently reading the book The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch and there was one quote that really stood out to me. "When you're screwing up and nobody says anything to your anymore that means they've given up on you ... you may not want to hear it but your critics are often the ones telling you they still love you and care about you and want to make you better" The reason this quote stood out is because this is something I had experienced in life. I was a messy disorganized child (I say was but I still am) It used to drive my dad nuts most of our arguments were about the messy my room was and how I constantly left stuff lying around. This went on for years then one day my dad changed and he stopped pestering me about my messes. Initially, I was happy but slowly I began to see that it was still bothering him but he had finally given up on me changing. That thought really hurt now I had let my dad down, this one change had more impact on me than all the arguments we ever had. Did I change? well, the jury is still out and I am sure we will talk about it. 
• So remember like I said at the beginning of this episode change, be the change, embrace change don't wait for others to change.