Conference Calls - A Bit of Fun

I'm sure you've been involved in conference calls that can become somewhat mundane to say the least. Well, I've taken to pepping them up a little lately and thought it might add a little amusement to your day to hear about it...

We use an automated system for most of the conference calls I have to dial in to and these are set up to allow you to record your name at the start of the call. This not only introduces you at the start of the conversation i.e. 'Andrew has joined the conference', but also announces your departure, 'Andrew has left the conference'. It occurred to me that this little tool could add a whole new dimension to conference calls and offer a little bit of light relief when needed.

I have started the idea off simply and recently made sure that I logged into the call early so that nobody heard the introduction. Then half way through a particular heated discussion where I felt we were going round in circles, I hung up the phone. Now, of course I wasn't there to hear it, but I took great pleasure in knowing that my colleagues had just heard the message, 'Common sense has left the conference'. Childish I know, but these things must sometimes be done to brighten the day.

I've got a few more ideas up my sleeve and look forward to the next conference call. Who knows? If I keep it up, they might stop inviting me.

Motivational quotes

Here's a list of motivational quotes a friend recently emailed over, which I thought I'd share...

Attitude....... Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference.

Opportunity...... You always miss 100% of the shots you don't try for.

Change ......... Without change there can be no breakthrough, without breakthrough there can be no future.

Teamwork..... coming together is a beginning, keeping together is progress, working together is success.

Achievement ...... unless you try to do something beyond what you have already mastered, you will never grow.

Free Hugs

No story to this today. I just love the sentiment...




A bit of background story...

Continuous Improvement - One small step...

There's a true story about a group of Japanese managers of a steel manufacturing plant that visited a UK plant. Both plants were very similar only the Japanese one was making profit and the UK one was losing money.

At the end of the visit, the owner of the UK plant turned to the Japanese boss and said, "There's obviously something you've got right, that we haven't. What 's the big difference?"

The head of the Japanese steel plant politely turned and said, "There is not one big difference, but we do have one or two suggestions..." He then proceeded to list 124 ways the manufacturing plant could improve! An example was this...

When the blast-furnace doors opened to let a steel ingot roll out, the Japanese doors opened two inches less than the UK doors. So less heat was lost and it took less time (and money) to heat the furnace back up again. It wasn't much, but over time the saving was worthwhile. Added to the other 123 examples, the changes made a profit.

The moral?

Stop looking for the one big thing that's wrong with your business or even your life and realise that sometimes it's the little things that make a big difference.

Don't lose your marbles - Make a positive difference to your life.

I've never been one to get over losing easily. In fact, I distinctly remember pushing a marble up my brother's nose as a dirty faced 8 year old because he beat me at Ker-plunk. Not that I was any good at the game, I just didn't have the patience for it.

Maybe that's what makes losing so hard to take, knowing that you didn't really have the skill to win in the first place and you are just kidding yourself to even try.......

Of course the paragraph above is absolute piffle. However, it is the same message that is played in a lot of people's minds every single time they fail. The truth is, failing should be seen as a positive, a chance to grow, an opportunity. Losing just takes you another step closer to getting it right (as long as you learn from it).

That's a lot easier said than done, I hear you cry, and you're right, but that doesn't mean we should stop trying. I can think of many things I've 'lost' throughout my life; football matches, card games, driving tests, job interviews and that special first date with Claire Martin in class 4c. At the time they all affected me in their own little way (particularly Claire Martin in class 4c, but I don't want to go into that right now), there was nothing fun about the loss and there shouldn't be. What matters is what happens afterwards.

Henry Ford once said "Whether you think you can, or you think you can't, you're right".

When I first read that quote I think I re-read it five or six times. It's not the easiest statement to make sense of, but it's one of the truest things I ever read. It sums up, for me, the fact that so many of us allow our beliefs to become our drivers and eventually these drivers become 'us'.

Stop and think about yourself and how many restrictive beliefs you have developed that are stopping you from really achieving what you want to in life. Go on, do it, stop, right now...and think.

Now consider where those beliefs came from. How much truth do they really hold? Now, now, don't start making excuses, or backing up the data with weak support...truly consider the facts of the matter. I would like to be so bold as to suggest there is not a lot of real factual evidence to back up your claims at all.

The good thing is, it's not too late to change, you just have to want to bad enough. So give it a go. It may feel uncomfortable at first, you may start to feel those old beliefs creeping back into your head. Blow them away, dust down the cobwebs of negativity and believe in yourself once again. I know you can do it and you need to know it too.

You see, I know that it works, I did it for me. I shrugged off my old beliefs and started afresh. I still fail, but I learn and move on and if people don't like the new positive me...I stick marbles up their nose.

Take a look at 'Make a Positive Difference to Your Life' a course developed by the Trainer Bubble team. The feedback from trainer's that have used it has been inspirational. It's only £53 for the complete course materials.