How great it would be if one day soon we discovered that we worked our way right out of our job and into a better one! Suddenly spending most of each week at a job would be more exciting than the agony of collecting a paycheck. If only it would happen.

It can and does happen every day to people like you and me. Every day someone wakes up and heads off to work to find that they no longer have to do the job that gets a paycheck. Instead they have been moved or promoted into a job that has some meaning, and feels good walking out the door after the day is done.

The most important part of improving any work situation is creating and following a plan for your working future. Creating a plan to move from point A to point B at work keeps out work distraction and tracks how well the plan is working. Update and modify the plan as needed.

In general do work you are supposed to be doing, and any extra work that is important to your Boss when you have free time, and skip the rest. One of the biggest stumbling blocks holding people back from being selected for raises  or promotion is not doing work which is important to your Boss. Your Boss not only signs off on your time card every week and manages your performance, your Boss also has influence on your working future.

Your Boss generally expects you to accomplish a specific list of tasks and some general tasks too. These primary tasks should be the focus of a day at work. Doing your best can have a big payoff. Performing a task that is not important to your Boss while neglecting primary responsibility leaves a lasting impression with your Boss, and it is negative.

Become an expert at your job if possible. In most cases there is always more to learn about your job. If you are not an expert on your job, ask your coworkers about those things you do not know about your job. Dig down into the details. Most people like to show off how much they know, so finding a willing audience is a breath of fresh air for them.

Look for smarter, better, or faster ways to accomplish tasks. As the workday progresses, imagine other ways of doing the work. Whether any ideas really are faster or better, is not as important as the process of thinking about how the work is done and can be done better.

As technology changes there is are always possibilities of identifying new ways of doing the same old task. If the new way makes the task faster or better capture it, and discuss it with your Boss when the opportunity is there. All it takes is one second in a workday for a flash of insight to help you step out of the crowd and into the limelight.

Manage your relationship with your Boss. Perception is important to your Boss. Your Boss may only have a general idea about what kind of worker you are. Make sure the perception your Boss has of you is as polished as it can be. Show up for work a few minutes early and stay a few minutes late. Talk with the people on other shifts. Speaking with people who do the same work at a different time, may know something worth knowing.

A few  minutes a day invested in making friends across shifts can have unexpected benefits. If nothing else, more people get to know your name, and may share important  information with you, as you share information with them.

Just as you should leave your work at work, leave your personal life at the door too. It is much better to keep conversation general, and keep your personal life personal. All of your Coworkers have conversations with your Boss too. Once something personal is shared, there is no way to recall something that should not have been said.

No matter the result of any calendar period, making and following a work plan, lay the foundation for the future. Skills are honed, knowledge is gained, and new skills are developed that may help in landing a new job at a different company. Nothing is wasted at work except time. Make the most of work time, and let that time create new options for your working future.

I asked for, received, and paid for my coffee, and walked to a small table in the corner. The boys walked through the entrance, and the boy who appeared to be the oldest walked up to the counter where he was asked by the person running the counter if she could help him.

“Do you still have one dollar drinks?

“Yes, any size drink for one dollar.”

“I would like a large soda and three straws.”

Noticeable lack of manners on the boy’s end of the conversation, but that is another post. The boy was given his large soda cup and three straws. He paid his money and joined his friends at a booth to share their drink.

For about thirty seconds all was well with the boys. Suddenly one boy says loudly that he does not want any more of the soda because one of the other boys spit in it. Of course it was denied by both of them, and the accuser reaffirmed his accusation of spitting in the shared soda cup along with a name and pointed finger.

The questionably guilty boy stated he was not spitting into the soda. He was blowing bubbles, as he always did with his soda. The third boy sided with the accuser, stating how that is wrong to do that when they all three were sharing a soda. He finished saying he did not want any more soda either, pushing the cup to the bubble blower.

Both offended and defensive, the accused bubble blower did not know what to do. He had a whole soda to himself, but his friends were angry with him. They were telling him how they spent their money on a drink for all of them, and he ruined it by blowing bubbles into the soda and getting spit in the soda. The guilty boy, not being able to think of a way out of the dilemma, stood up and walked to the soda machine where he poured out the soda, and threw the cup away.

While this may be a short story of a small event concerning three young boys sharing a soda, there are valuable pointers and tips that may be gleaned from this situation.

The boys had a plan which was mostly successful. They applied previously tested and beneficial problem solving techniques to their small group. The boys had learned to cooperate getting to the fast food place, which was over one-half mile from the closest housing, and across a busy six lane street, which is at times no small feat in itself.

The boys had cooperated pooling their change to buy a shared soda. Arriving at the restaurant, the boys used sound teamwork techniques in finding a spot on the building where their bicycles could all be locked together. They behaved as expected once inside, with two of the boys going to a booth, while the third ordered their drink. They each had their own straw to drink from.

Up to this moment the boys were working as a team. They probably have been in each others company long enough they knew what to do without thinking about it. Each knew his role and each of them perhaps was pliable enough to exchange leadership roles and direct activities as needed.

Where their plan unravelled was in the actual drinking of the soda. The soda was the ultimate prize. All their planning, working together, and coordination was accomplished for this single goal of having a cold drink on a hot day for as little money as possible.

What the boys failed to plan for was how they would enjoy their soda jointly. Their planning and teamwork fell apart at this moment. They had not previously discussed their expectations of each others drinking habits before buying the soda. Each of them thought the other two would drink in a manner they all would find acceptable. As a result, their plan was not accomplished and they all lost something in the process.

Often we find ourselves in the same situations in our own life. We each have goals or end points of some type we are always working towards, wether business or personal. We flesh out our plans and start putting them into action. We make small adjustments and tweaks as we go. If we planned well enough, and we enjoy a little good fortune we arrive at our goal. Now what?

People who have achieved a long range goal, and then lost it shortly thereafter are all around us, all we have to do is look. Couples marry, and between the husband and wife they are working three jobs to afford the things they want for their life. Then they separate because they have grown apart becoming strangers.

Successful business people who spent years building their business lose it over something that has nothing to do with running a business. Each week we may hear or read of someone wins a lottery or receives a substantial amount of money, only to wake up broke a few years later.

It is important to have a plan no matter how vague it may be. It is vital to have a plan that includes the end point in it. Whether the end point is sharing a soda, working towards a future, or building a business, it is as important to plan through the process of achieving the desired result as it is taking the first step of turning an idea into action.

There is a general division of labor, that is sex, educational, and job based. Terms are used to define the types of labor are used as a rough indicator of work expectations. The terms are “Blue Collar”, and “White Collar”, define what you do for a job, and how you do it.

If you do physical work for a living you are considered a ‘Blue Collar’ worker because you wear work clothes and do physical labor. You know your job as a portion of a larger project. You require some direction and some level of supervision to be successful in your job.

If you have a college education or smart and lucky, you work in an office and you managed your own work or projects. Someone is your boss, but has little day to day interaction with you about your work. You are considered a ‘White Collar’ worker if you meet these criteria. You know what your job is, how to it, and you alone are responsible completing your work.

Growing up from young child to adult, people around you change their expectations of you as you grow. It is almost like a change from blue collar to white collar worker as you mature. As a child you are usually doing something because a parental figure told you too, and doing that something because it needs to be done. As you grow, you do more on your own because you know they need to be done.

Expectations in the work place, social circles, and families are both formal and informal. There are tasks you must complete, and certain behaviors are expected from you. In your social life, your family expects good manners, and your respect for each of them. Your friends expect you think like they do, and to be there for them if they need your help.

Informal expectations are harder to define because they are not talked about nor obvious. In a business setting, a company has policies in place that determine how employees are expected to conduct themselves, and solves differences. These are written down somewhere and everyone working for the company is expected to know them and follow them.

Informal business expectations may on occasion appear to conflict with formal expectations. For example, there may be a formal company expectation of how problems are solved. This may involve a formal process of creating a system of problem definition, all possible solutions, mapped out better solutions, leading to a best solution. Informally, the correct solution may one that is decided over a beer after work, or a weekend basketball game.

Knowing what informal expectations in your work or social group are and following them is important. Informal expectations may mean publicly supporting decisions out of your control while privately disagreeing with them. You company expects you to meet certain standards of dress, behavior and language. These are formal expectations and are written down and talked about.

Completing certain family chores necessary for family unity and happiness without being told once you reach a certain age become informal expectations. Breaking one or more of these expectations and conflict is sure to follow. If you are young adult newly living on your own, new to the workplace, or joining a new group, learning both formal and informal expectations makes your day go better.

When phrases like these are uttered, someone is generally given a free one time use pass. They are forgiven or excused for not knowing. Used more than once in a while, the utterer is not well thought of.

For a few people, these phrases and others like them, are over used excuses. While exceptions occur, exceptions should be the exception and not the rule.

What is your common response when asked why you are or are not doing something? Are you one of the few, guilty of uttering not being told, or not knowing? Do you find yourself uttering these phrases a little too often?

Not knowing, is a sign or symptom of more going in the background than the few words each phrase contains. No one told me, for example, has hidden meanings other than the obvious one. No matter where you work, no one has a job to make sure you know what you need to know after you are trained.

When something changes in your workplace, some form of communication is used telling you what has changed. If you hear yourself using these phrases more than once in a long while, below are some ideas you can use to ensure you rarely utter them again, if ever.

The key to knowing is to be proactive. Being proactive is a very effective tool you can use in your work and personal life. Being proactive, you always learn or know about changes that are important to you.

One of the best ways to be proactive is to pay attention. Some way, somehow in your place of work, there is a system in place of how information is passed on. Learn how important information is passed on.

Find out if  your company uses email, a bulletin board, a formal shift meeting, or the person you relieve is supposed to tell you. Make your first job of the day reading, listening,or asking about: “What is going on, anything new today?”

Asking a simple question like this and actively listening to the answer will save you from ever uttering a hollow excuse again. Once you get used to reading, and asking questions, you will know what you need to know. You will know about any changes, and you will look sharp, and become more valuable at work.

Occasionally something changes and you really had no way of knowing. Instead of reaching for a new way of saying you did not know, or were not told, you can use a much more powerful tool.

You can say: I read, listened to, or checked for changes, and there was nothing posted, sent, or mentioned. I asked ‘somebody’ who I took over from, and they did not mention any changes.

If the power of response escapes you, go back and read the first paragraph of this post and compare the two responses. Which reply would you rather give, and which reply would you rather hear? There is a lot of power in words used correctly.

If you are new on the job, and you truly did not know, be honest about it. Follow up honestly with a good question. “I was not aware of this, how and where do I find out about these changes?” Phrasing your reply like this, you will be way ahead of others, who automatically fall back on those old, worn out, ‘I didn’t know’ type phrases.

Now you know how to be on top of your job and your life, you can identify how important information is not being passed on to you. If you find that there is no formal way information is passed on, suggest a way! Using your new proactive way of being, suggest a new or better way of passing on information or changes. Think of a method that is easy and everyone see, hear, or read and let someone know in a professional manner, who can make it happen. It may get you a raise!

Sun Tzu’s writing is a good asset for business because it lays a foundation a business can follow to thrive and survive in their appropriate market(s). Sun Tzu’s, “Art Of War” provides a focusing lense leading to success for any size business. It has been said that Sun Tzu and Niccolò Machiavelli are all the only business partners one needs for business success.

Unfortunately these business partners have found themselves being used in areas where they are ineffective and self defeating. In arenas of friendship and cooperative work towards a common goal, Sun Tzu and Machiavelli ruin more friendships and joint efforts than they help.

Some people in todays overly competitive society have discarded appropriate and accepted forms of personal interaction and instead create for themselves a world of thinly disguised guerilla warfare and subterfuge.

Competition holds a valid place in business. Healthy competition between areas of a business helps competing groups reach a higher level than would be possible without competition. Competition among employees in the same work group, where some are waging war against their coworkers to promote themselves is destructive for the group and the parent company.

Utilizing Sun Tzu and Machiavelli for whole life management is not only destructive, it is dangerous. It destroys friendships, relationships, and families, leaving one isolated and alone. Family life and friendships are just that. Friendship and family life is a place where one can go to leaving the outside world behind.

Life is a series of battles and struggle, but as with an army, there has to be a place where one can go and relax and recuperate. A place where one can be themselves without worrying beyond good manners about what is happening around them.

For anyone living a life comprised of total personal war and continuos competition I suggest a new direction. I propose, “The Art Of Friendship”. Create a life where the Art of Friendship can survive and thrive makes everyone more effective in other areas of their life.

The Art of Friendship is a way of dealing with people around you who share your interests, either business or personal and benefits everyone by making everyone more effective and prosperous. Instead of planning assassinations of coworkers or friends who’s interests are a little too close to our own, look for ways to work together and share in the glow of excellence instead of the the false glow of simply winning.

Allowing those around you to work jointly towards a common goal, is not only more personally satisfying, it is powerful. Instead of working as a single entity, having more people to work together towards the same goal increases the chance of success, and reduces failure from something not considered by an individual.

These days to many people see themselves as a lone warrior out battling the forces against them. What they are really doing is creating is a vacuum, where everything that could be accomplished with help can not be done because no one is willing to risk helping.

Same as a single stick being easily broken, whereas a tied bundle of sticks can not, working together in friendship and trust creates environments where everyone wins more than any individual can alone.

Business in many respects is a game of chess, consisting of moves and counter moves. Although chess is played by one individual competing against a second individual, the individual pieces on the chess board are acting as a team with a common goal. The complete team of chess pieces wins the chess match, not an individual chess piece. Try working with your coworkers and friends instead of trying to better them, and see what you can conquer as a complete functioning team, and not a single chess piece.

There has always been a type of manager that most people do not like, and yet they are successful. They can be identified easily because you never know what they are about to do in the next second. I remember the first person with this type of management I actually worked with was in the military. He was my Squadron Commander, and by all accounts he was quite successful. There was quite a grade difference between him, and those at my level. He was quite friendly, and affable, but talking with him was like walking on proverbial eggshells.

You had to be very careful with him, because the slightest improper remark that you never even noticed until he reminded you who owned your world, had you on the immediate defensive for a harmless comment. You found yourself trying to defend something said that needed no defense, because he decided it was somehow inappropriate. For a few very tense moments, your immediate future was very much undetermined.

I was watching the history channel this last weekend. They do a series named Gangland, and that is where the mystery was solved for me. One of the men on the show mentioned that he was told to study the classics, especially Niccolo Machiavelli. I never heard much about Machiavelli except a mention in some odd book here and there. This week I decided as I was book challenged I would brush up on Niccolo Machiavelli.

It seems he is a whole new aspect in the management arena. All by himself he determined an optimum method of management that had the most direct results in the shortest and least painful amount of time and effort. It is an adoption of Niccolo Machiavelli that these odd but interesting people use to control their empires, no matter how large or small.

What makes these people unique is they are successful because they are focused on their own success, without any concern over those around them, above them, or below them. As an example, Niccolo Machiavelli watched Ceseare Borgia carve out his own little empire. Borgia had used some mercenaries which was common at the time to quell unrest in a province recently taken under his control.

The officer in charge of the mercenaries did his job so well that unrest over the loss of the kingdom was quelled in record time. An unexpected outcome however was there was new unrest over the brutality and violence of the mercenaries over the previous few months. Borgia realized he was about to lose his newly won territory, and had to act quickly and decisively.

Ceseare Borgia called the mercenary commander to his headquarters out of the province for a meeting. Four days later the officer’s body, now in two pieces, was found in the province’s town square where it was left for weeks for all to see. Machiavelli realized Ceseare Borgia was a person who would do whatever had to be done in order for his goals to be achieved. He watched others at least as ruthless as Ceseare Borgia, and developed an appreciation for their abilities to get their way. No one or nothing was important enough, or loved enough to be a hindrance to their individual desire.

It has been was written about Niccolo Machiavelli, he would commit murder and sleep soundly if it improved his long turn objective. Not many of us are willing to go to those extremes for our wants to be met. Having the world, or your part of it fear, despise, and hate you, is not something most people aspire to. But when you come in contact with these people who do not act quite right, look a little closer, and ask them how they sleep at night. You might be in for quite an experience if you pay close attention to them.

Like the woman who started making those trinkets that go on those nice spongy shoes, and later sold what became her company for an amazing amount of money. The immigrant families in the poorest part of my city, who now own their own business. They probably started selling in public places, struggling to keep their dream going.

Tunnel vision is my problem. It is tunnel vision that keeps me from seeing everything these people went through before success arrived at their doorstep. I never saw the times when they cried in frustration, or were harassed by the police, or slept in the cold because all their money was going into making their future. I never saw that part of their life back then, I just see where they are now.

I can not see what they saw a long time before. I never had that burning desire to run my own business no matter what obstacle got in my way. I was never interested in seeing if I could take something, add some value to it, and sell it to someone else who thinks they were getting a deal.

I was in Korea a number of years ago. There was a young couple there who made very pretty wooden boxes. They were not the most elegant, but they were made with care. They wanted fifty dollars for the one I wanted. I have no doubt it was worth fifty dollars, but it was not worth that much to me. I told the couple I would pay twenty dollars. I saw them at least once a week in the month I in Korea. Every time I saw them, they said fifty dollars. I said twenty, and they scoffed and spit as they said no. As I was getting on the bus for the last time before I left their country, they said twenty five. I said no, twenty was my offer, I would pay no more.

They cursed at me, spit, made faces at me, and sold me the box I had wanted for a month, for a mere twenty dollars. I almost felt guilty, because I knew the profit they would be making was not very large, perhaps only a dollar or two at most, and that would not cover their time in making it, polishing it, and making it look so pretty. Yet they sold that box to me. They knew if they did not sell it to me, they would have a very hard time finding another buyer with cash money. We only showed up in Korea in those numbers for one month out of the year.

That is a big difference between people who have their own business, and myself. I never would have sold that box to me. They knew they had too, to keep their business going another day. I would have lost my business to my ego, my pride, or my business ignorance. I bet they are wealthy store keepers by now. They are wealthy, savvy, and hard to do business with sort of people. They deserve it too, because all those years ago, they knew what they had to do to be survive another business day, and even though they hated me, and what they were forced into, they did it anyway.

They have business vision, and I have business myopia. If I met them again today, I would gladly give them the thirty more dollars they asked for all those years back. I understand now, and they helped me to understand that day at the bus stop. I really enjoy the homemade burritos, and specialties I come across now and then. I hope they are all successful with their vision, and I remain satisfied with mine.

And I am in a pet store paying $.60 cents a can for cat food made from venison because it is cheap compared to other flavors, and the cat’s like it! I did a Google search on the words, ‘dead deer landfill’, and the probable national numbers of government disposed dead deer are mind boggling by any stretch of the imagination. Of course as things go I could not find anything worthwhile on that search for Illinois, but I found some numbers for the states of Connecticut, New Jersey, and New York. The rest of the country’s daily deer kill can be imagined from those numbers.

One insurance company referenced, estimates about 101,000 deer are killed each year in the states of Connecticut, New Jersey, and New York! There is a problem with wasting disease in some states around the United States, so cutting the numbers I found in half, that still is over 50,000 dead deer that could be used for cat and dog food.

I started wondering why those animals are not turned into pet food? Why is there canned cat and dog food in pet stores all starting at $.50 or higher a can, and a titanic number of pounds of deer meat that could be made into pet food just wasted? Some areas and states are paying high fees to have deer carcasses disposed of because there are too many dead deer to go into landfills.

Guessing that the usable meat on average from even those 50K dead deer is 50 pounds an animal, that works out to 2,500,000 pounds of possible high protein pet food thrown away in those three mentioned states alone! I ran it across my little calculator twice, because that is such an amazing number, an estimated two million five hundred thousand pounds of deer meat wasted each year in just three states. Wow!

The can size I buy for $.60 is six ounces, but for the sake of simple math, let’s pretend it is five ounces. That comes out to roughly 833,000 cans of cat food. 833,000 cans of cat food at sixty cents a can comes out to just short of a cool half million dollars! There has to be some sort of profit in there somehow? That is just from three states! Once that figure goes across the major deer road kill states in the United States…well you get the idea.

The same idea can be applied to the more distasteful animal killings in the world. If we are legally killing a species of animal just for its fur, or some other part of it, why can’t they be transformed into pet food? At least they would not go to waste completely. I am not advocating the killing of any animals only for their fur, but it happens, and we should make the most of it we can.

Here in the Southwest, there are companies that buy used cows (dead cattle) from stockyards and holding pens. They manage to make a profit and they are paying for a cow carcass that is no longer useful for human consumption. I sure am not an expert on business, and I am not sure my math is all that good either, but the concept is there, and I am sure someone could figure out how to make a profit at it?

It sure does seem like there is some money in road kill deer pet food for someone where a pet food cannery exists? Or maybe I don’t have a clue, let me know?