4 Keys to Short-Circuiting Stress - Guest Blogger

Today I'd like to welcome AmyK Hutchens as our guest blogger. I figured anyone who had tips on dealing with stress would be helpful to you folks in today's business world. This post is a great complement to the Building Resilience post Belinda Gore wrote here previously.  Everyone please welcome AmyK.

For every six minutes you experience a high state of negative stress it takes your immune system six hours to recover. That doesn't stress you out, does it?

Experiencing a rotten, lousy, no good, stressful day creates a chronic cycle that wears your immune system down, leaving you exhausted, sick and feeling even more stressed. The goal, however, isn't to get rid of stress... our brains are hard-wired for it, and we actually need some stress (called eustress) in order to function. The goal is to short-circuit the negative cycle.

Stress has been around since the first human tried to light a fire and failed, only to have his girlfriend show him how it's done. Telling your brain that "not having enough time in the day" does not equate to "being eaten by a saber-tooth tiger" doesn't work. Attempting to convince your brain that the wooly mammoth in front of you is really just your boss or your mother-in-law is next to impossible. Your brain doesn't distinguish the difference between the two. You've got better odds teaching your brain that the saber-tooth tiger is actually a house cat and that your mother-in-law really doesn't care that you can't cook.

Seems simple. It is simple, it's just not easy, especially when your mother-in-law sighs every time you look at your cookbook.

Stress starts in the brain and then spreads throughout your body. The part of the brain that processes your emotions also controls your immune system.

Ever experience a stressful week and then get a chance to take a few days off only to find yourself nursing a cold while on vacation? Within seventy-two hours of a significantly stressful event your body manifests some type of physiological symptom. It's as if you internally vent on your way home, your brain hears you and empathizes with you, and then gives you a migraine, or acne, or both! Really, your brain was just trying to prove you right, you are stressed, so voila, your body now proves it too!

Twenty percent of the oxygen of every breath you take goes straight to your brain. When we're stressed, one of the first things that changes in our bodies is our breathing - it gets shallower and we take in less oxygen...so right now just breathe. Take a deep breath ...inhale slowly, exhale slowly and repeat. Your brain thanks you, and, it will think more clearly for you, more rationally, thus preventing you from throwing that cookbook at a certain someone.

The mere thought of the holidays sends some people straight into stressed-out orbit.

The ubiquitous themes of time, not enough of it; money, not enough of that; food, way too much of that; and relationships, pleasing everybody, can cause extra anxiety.

This year, give yourself a present first: the ability to stop the stress cycle early, before it sends you to bed. And while it may seem like a great place to escape your boss and mother-in-law, there are better ways to spend the holidays.

Short Circuit the Stress Cycle

1. Prioritize & simplify. Reducing stress is not about creating balance it's about getting focused. Balance is a myth. Let's get real - when it comes to life activities there is no such thing as balance, only priorities. If you strive for balance you'll only add to your stress levels, not reduce them, but if you change your priorities, your focus, you will immediately start reducing your stress and feel more in control of how you utilize your time.

Successfully dealing with life's pressures, demands, and hassles means you need to appropriately respond and manage the tasks at hand in order of priority. Create a list of what you value and need to accomplish over the next two days. (Don't forget that YOU should and need to be on that list.) Assign each priority a chunk of time and then live within the parameters of that scheduled list. Follow up that time-framed list with another list of new priorities or re-prioritized activities. Every two days (or week) you can create a new list that outlines and accounts for all your responsibilities.

Simplify one thing each day. It may be a priority that you serve your family dinner tonight. It's not a priority that you cook it. You can pick up take-out, or pull something out of the freezer. Choose one activity each day and find a way to reduce the time it takes, or the energy it requires of you to complete it.

2. Place yourself in time-out. The purpose of putting a toddler in time-out is to re-set her attitude and improve her behavior. (If only we could use that with our colleagues.) Take some time to be silent and reflective, even if it's just 3-5 minutes. There is scientific proof that doing so can decrease blood pressure, pulse rate, and improve blood circulation. By removing yourself from a stressful environment or giving yourself a moment to biologically shift, you aid your immune system in getting back to healthy. A few deep breaths while you're in time-out is an added bonus.

3. Get a giggle. Laughter reduces your stress hormones and literally changes your body chemistry. Humor releases endorphins and antibody enhancers which aid your immune system. Schedule 30 minutes to watch a funny sitcom or read a humorous book. If 30 minutes just doesn't exist today, then give yourself a five minute giggle and watch a youtube video. There are many short clips of truly funny comedians and silly people who will definitely give you a smile that will last awhile.

4. Put it in perspective. Changing your perspective, your thoughts, is the most effective tool we have for reducing our stress and it's the least used tool by people when they're experiencing stress. When stressed out individuals scream, "I don't have five bleep-ity-bleep minutes to watch a YouTube video!" there is one thought, one shift in perspective that helps a lot. "It's only five minutes. Big bleep-ity-bleep deal." There are 10,080 minutes in a week. Take 5 of them, so the other 10,075 minutes are more peaceful, more positive, more meaningful. Typically, upon hearing this news, these frenetic, time-obsessed totally stressed out individuals stop holding their breath and suck in a large volume of oxygen. It's a great start!

The objective isn't to fight circumstances. You're not insane, just stressed. Sane people know that arguing with reality only creates more stress because reality always wins. Let it win, and let it go. The goal is to change your perspective to less painful thoughts. Your boss may still growl and snarl, your mother-in-law may still sigh, but wouldn't it be wonderful if you handed her the spatula and said, "I'm so glad you're great at cooking. Please, by all means, my kitchen is su kitchen." And with that, you have not only changed your perspective, you've simplified your life, and given yourself a thirty minute time-out to go watch that sitcom you've been wanting to watch all week. Life is good.

- AmyK Hutchens, Founder and Intelligence Activist, AmyK Inc., is a speaker, business strategist and executive coach. She is best known for helping business leaders capitalize on how the brain and human perception filters work to help them be more effective in business and their personal lives.

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Hate Presenting? That's Okay - They Hate Listening to You

This might sound mean but we don't want to hear you present. The thought of you inviting us to your 2 hour presentation on "Budget Variances and Optimized Value-Added Opportunities for Synergies" makes us want to barf. Why? Because we're terrified of watching you present.

I'm going to be a little snotty in this post (okay... maybe a lot snotty). First, you kind of expect that from me. Second, if I'm nice and polite, you won't listen. I'm like your best friend who tells you you've been drinking too much and wearing lampshades too frequently. It's not pleasant news but it's definitely constructive and helpful.

Let's break it down. There are three reasons we don't want to hear you speak. Your presentation is awful. You're boring and stiff. You talk down to us. Because of that, we hate you.

I know presentations are the lifeblood of every corporation. Without PowerPoint you guys would shrivel up and blow away. The thing is, you don't have to be so terrible at it (although part of me is very thankful it's such a rampant problem otherwise our Structured Thought and Communications Course wouldn't be in such high demand).

I won't go into why it's critical for you to get better at building compelling presentations and having powerful meetings. If you haven't figured that out yet, you need to stop reading this blog and head down to McDonald's and pick up an application. I will go into why we think you're awful, boring, and condescending. And don't worry, I'll offer some suggestions on how to fix the problems. Here goes...

Your Presentation is Awful

If I had a dollar for every time someone put up a slide in 8 pt and said "I know you can't read this from there but let me explain..." I would have enough money to pay Dr. Evil's ransom. Even worse is when you CAN read the part at the bottom that says "Slide 18 of 84."

I'm not going to be nice here: your "presentation" is an amalgamation of 84 pages of crap you threw together just so you can show everyone how hard you've been working. The deck lacks a compelling story. There's no "so what?" embedded in it.

Solution: craft a short, compelling story that focuses on THE NEEDS OF YOUR AUDIENCE. What do they care about? What's their hot button? How can you push it and get a reaction from them? If you do a great job of targeting their needs and telling them how you're doing so via a crisp story, you'll end up with a much shorter and clearer presentation. Read this post for more guidance on getting to the "so what?" in a compelling way.

One mor awfeul thing about your presntartion: you misspel stuff and use the wrong words. Those red squiggly things under the words? Their they're to show you incorekt spelings. Take the extra 5 minutes to profreed your presentation. It's worth it. I've harped on this before a long time ago in another post. Check this out for some additional no no's on how to right.

You're Boring and Stiff

Okay Mr. Roboto. We know you're a corporate guy and need to look "professional" in front of the team. But professional doesn't have to mean you speak in a monotone, lack passion, or present like C3PO. I'm not advocating you become a Chris Farleyesque motivational speaker but you have to inject some of your personality into the presentation.

It's okay to make people laugh (unless you're presenting on factory fatalities and your company's poor safety record). You can let them see you're passionate about your work. You have a personality. I assume people will like it. Let it shine through. When you go all "corporate" on me I want to shove a pen in my ear. A really long pen capable of puncturing my brain stem.

Solution: Presenting is about connecting. It's not about PowerPoint. Sometimes it's okay to go naked and present without a presentation. Absent doing that, try getting your audience excited. How do you do that? Talk about topics THEY find exciting. Speak their language. Present on topics THEY care deeply about. If you do, you'll find they engage in your subject much more rapidly.

You Talk Down to Us

The next time someone busts out the polysyllabic consultospeak on me I'm going to throw a binder clip at them. And not one of those tiny binder clips. I'm talking about the mondo Texas-sized ones. When you try to impress us with your big words, you come across as pretentious and confusing. When you do that, we don't listen to you (but that's fixable).

Even worse from a "talking down" standpoint is reading to us. When you read to us, you insult us. You're turning your back to us and reading verbatim from your slides. It tells us you don't trust our ability to read and it conjures up memories of Pappy telling us bedtime stories. Unless your presentation is about Where the Wild Things Are or a Dr. Seuss classic, this is bad mojo.

The only good thing about you reading to us is you have your back to us and you're preoccupied with the reading. This means you won't notice us about to stab you in the neck with a letter opener while you're focused on your slides.

Solution: use simple words. Speak in simple sentences. It's easier to understand. I know a CEO who says "if it has a staple in it, I won't read it." Translation: he craves simplicity. Get the jargon out of your presentation. It will make it easier to understand. It also makes you seem like less of a pretentious ass.

As far as how to stop yourself from reading to us, tell us where to focus, then shut up. Highlight one or two important points on the page. Focus us. While we're busy reading, watch our reactions. Our facial expressions will tell you if we're tracking or if we're confused. If we're tracking, move along. If we're confused, have a discussion about the source of confusion.

Presenting doesn't have to be hard. Notice I didn't cover a ton of "platform skills" in the above. I've focused more on crafting the story, understanding the audience, and choosing your language deliberately. If you do those three things then go have a conversation with someone (vs. presenting to someone) I guarantee we won't murder you.

If your organization needs help with these challenges, drop me a line. We can fix the problem.

- Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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5 Steps to Entrepreneurship With Zero Risk

I'm sick of people asking "Do you know how crazy you are for making the decision to go out on your own as an entrepreneur and taking on all that risk?"

I've barely taken ANY risk as I've pursued my entrepreneurial ventures. You can take this (almost) risk-free approach too if you plan carefully and deliberately.

First, let's dissect the kinds of risk you typically take as an entrepreneur then we'll get into making entrepreneurship (almost) risk-free.

There are a few discrete types of risk you'll take as you set forth on your own: financial risk, career risk, brand risk, and lifestyle risk.

Financial risk: you have the potential to blow it all. Or you can simply run out of cash and face foreclosure. This happens when you build a business that can't sustain the cash demands you'll face as an entrepreneur. I recently explored this risk in the 4 traps that destroy entrepreneurs.

Career risk: you can derail your career progression because you spend a few years out of corporate America pursuing your dream of building www.BoogerSculptures.com (by the way, that URL is available in case you're interested...).

Personal brand risk: you become known as the guy who "couldn't cut it" as an entrepreneur.

Lifestyle risk: your family hates you because they forget what you look like since you're working 94 hours a day. You also become such a stress bomb that everyone around you develops a nervous twitch.

Now that I've scared off the lily-livered posers from pursuing the entrepreneurial dream, I'll tell all you real want-to-be-my-own-boss types how to de-risk entrepreneurship:

Step 1: Build Your Platform. This morning I gave a budding gonna-be-an-entrepreneur-some-day grad student bizarre advice: go get a job in corporate. He thought the Starbucks guy had spiked my coffee.

My reasoning? You'll understand your future customers from the inside out. Many entrepreneurs sell their products/services to big companies. If you know how big companies operate, what their challenges are, and how to navigate the organization, your venture will be more successful.

I spent many years in corporate (too many... and I'm never going back). Now thoughtLEADERS provides services to some of the biggest companies in the world. My corporate background is tremendously helpful in that regard.

There's an added bonus to having a solid platform. If your venture does fail, you have a solid resume and background to fall back on. You can go back to corporate and get another job if you've built up solid credentials before you set out on your own. This is how you solve for career risk and personal brand risk.

Translation for me: if thoughtLEADERS goes under, I have a strong enough network and solid enough career background that I can find another job. It might not be an optimal job but it will at least pay the bills.

Step 2: Build Your Cushion. The biggest risk you'll face as an entrepreneur is you'll run out of cash before you realize your dream. Running a business isn't cheap. You have to make investments before they pay off. That takes cash and time (two things you might not have a lot of when you start out - again, check out the traps that destroy entrepreneurs and my perspective on cash).

Start building your financial cushion NOW. When I set out on my own full-time, I had built up some cash reserves to enable me to make it through 18 months of operations. I knew my cash burn and planned for it.

I also knew exactly how much runway I had to make this thing take off (as well as when I'd need to bail on it if it wasn't working). Granted, I would have had to raid my portfolio if things got tight (which is never a good option) but nonetheless I had some cushion. This is a big part of solving for financial risk.

Step 3: Build Your Business. Sell something people want. Listen to the market (and remember: YOU ARE NOT THE MARKET!). If you can't clearly identify the problem you're solving AND explain how your solution creates value, you shouldn't be starting a business.

You must have a clear product definition, sales plan, marketing approach, and all the other great things that go into a solid business plan. If you ever come pitch me your idea and say "my business is awesome because I have no competitors because no one has figured out how to make money in this market" I'm going to laugh at you. Where there's competition, there's demand. You just need to know how to compete BETTER than the other guys. Find that differentiated edge.

A solid business helps solve for financial risk as well as lifestyle risk. If your business is doing well, you don't have to work so many hours to keep it afloat. You can also actually take a vacation or two.

Step 4: Build Your Transition Plan. When you start your business, you might want to do so while you're still employed. I'm NOT advocating doing entrepreneurial things on company time. I am advocating doing it in the early mornings, lunch hours, weekends, evenings, etc. Write your plan. Do market research. Gather data and feedback. Pilot your product. Ensure there will be a market for your stuff before you turn in your resignation.

I ran thoughtLEADERS off the side of my desk for almost 4 years before I took the plunge full-time. And even when I did go "full time" I had a part time consulting gig lined up to generate cash flow while I focused a larger portion of my time to building my "real" business.

Now that the thoughtLEADERS business has been built, I've been working hard on another new startup called TiXiT off the side of my desk (which is a significant amount of time). I'm sure once that venture gets all the way off the ground I'll end up pursuing another.

Step 5: Love What You Do. I know many of you secretly hate your jobs. You have bosses telling you what to do all the time. News flash: as an entrepreneur, NO ONE tells you what to do ergo you have to motivate yourself to work. It's a lot easier to motivate yourself to drive your business when you can't wait to get at it every day.

If you build a business you don't love, you'll fail. Period. I'm lucky - I know what I love to do. I love teaching. I love selling. I love thinking about leadership and talking to all sorts of brilliant people about it. I love pontificating on my blog. I DON'T WORK ANYMORE - it's not work when you love what you do.

Be thoughtful before you head out on your own. Build. Plan. Think. Love. Your venture's chances for success go up exponentially if you do. And a successful business is the best form of risk mitigation I can think of.

- Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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5 Keys to Being an Outstanding Team Member

This post is courtesy of Maureen Metcalf (one of our thoughtLEADERS instructors). Enjoy her perspective. Here's Maureen:

It is not enough to be an exceptional individual contributor; you must also work effectively with others. Even super heroes work together just like Batman and Robin.

A key differentiator for professional growth is how well you work with others. We can all think of times where we could have accomplished a task easier alone but still needed to work with others. We can probably also see where there was some benefit to the organization by our working with someone else, like they got to learn from us and from the experience.

I worked with a client who saw himself as the expert at everything he did. He was frustrated by working with teams because it got in the way of doing the real work and no one knew as much as he did. This team stuff slowed the work down and frustrated him. He also thought he should be promoted because he could certainly accomplish the work more effectively than anyone around him.

If only he knew and focused on the 5 key behaviors that would have made him a better team member.

From his perspective, he was forced to work for leaders who were not as competent as he was. From where he sat, his leaders had all kinds of stupid requests and changed their minds regularly. They could not pick a path and stick to it.

He was a great individual contributor but got a complete FAIL for team effectiveness and it was getting in his way. He was not moving forward and others disliked working with him.

He remembered when he liked going to work but that time had long passed. He was frustrated and unhappy and did not know where to turn to fix things other than find a “better” company with “smarter leaders” to work for.

What he missed was HE was the problem.

He would not likely find a company where he could show poor personal skills and be surrounded by great leaders who saw every situation the same way he did.

He could have been much more successful if he had the willingness to learn the 5 key components that impact our ability to work with others effectively. These skills can be learned and practiced. Had he done so, he could have been a stronger contributor and a better leader. These key skills are:

Self awareness – I know my strengths, weaknesses, drives, values and impact on others. I know when to ask for help.

Self management – I manage how I behave considering how it will impact others. I act professionally even when frustrated.

Motivation – I do what is required even if it will not be an immediate benefit to me.

Empathy – I understand others have emotions and I try to respond to what they need to be successful.

Social skills – I build rapport with others to move the project forward to accomplish its goals.

After developing solid technical skills, we are measured on our ability to accomplish tasks with and through others. Our education often stopped with learning how to do the technical aspects of the job without teaching how to work well with others.

Some call these soft skills and discount them because they are “touchy feely.” The research indicates that you must be technically competent and also interpersonally competent to advance in a leadership role.

Perhaps if he had taken the time and effort to build these capabilities within himself, he would have been much more satisfied with his work environment.

How are you relating to others? Are you working on a team that is not as effective as you would like? What are you doing to contribute to the dysfunction? What can you do to improve?

- Maureen Metcalf at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

Maureen is the President of Metcalf & Associates, Inc., bringing 23 years of business experience to the table as she helps professionals grow well beyond their own expectations. She is recognized as an effective leader who demonstrates operational skills coupled with the ability to analyze, develop, and implement successful strategies for profitability, growth and sustainability. She's also a member of the thoughtLEADERS team. Read more of her work on her blog.

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Want a Powerful Business? Take Your Own Medicine

You've all been to the doctor at some point. There's always that moment of truth where he tells you to change your bad habits, eat better, and exercise more. It all makes sense and is sound advice.

But how likely are you to follow his advice if he's wheezing it out because he weighs 350 lbs. and you keep getting distracted by the piece of Ho Ho hanging off his lower lip? Not so much, right?

As a trainer, coach, and communicator I dispense more than my fair share of advice and guidance. A lot of it even makes sense. Occasionally. But there's something I find more difficult than just about every other aspect of my job: taking my own advice.

The weird thing is I regularly advise leaders on how to improve their businesses yet I sometimes get lazy about doing the same exact things I tell them to do. Why do I demonstrate this shortcoming? Maybe it's pure sloth. Maybe I run under the misguided belief that all the things I advise others to do I must naturally do myself in my own business dealings.

Then one of my friends proves me wrong. When you surround yourself with incredibly smart people, they tend to ask some really smart questions. Needless to say I get asked smart questions quite frequently. If you stop and listen to those questions though (either from others or the ones you'd ask yourself if you were dispensing advice to you) you can make your business exponentially more powerful. Here's how:

You Learn from the Best: YOU

You're good at what you do. That's why you do it. You're a leader in your field. Your customers probably pay you a decent amount of money for your time and talent.

What would you pay for someone else to provide such expert advice on how to improve your business? A lot, right?

Well guess what - YOU'RE FREE! If you'll simply build time into your schedule to improve your business instead of focusing 100% of your effort on driving your customers' results, the payoff can be huge.

Example: I was recently teaching a strategy session and pounding on the importance of having a compelling vision for the organization. I pushed folks hard to realize the vision can drive dramatic shifts in performance if it's compelling enough.

One of my colleagues, Alan Veeck, asked me "so what's the vision for thoughtLEADERS?" Stone silence. I made something up on the spot. It wasn't compelling. I made an excuse that we're a small business so it wasn't that important to have a compelling vision because all the team members are highly motivated. Wrong. I looked dumb. Big time dumb.

Alan offered up "Our vision is to have our training be delivered to leading organizations around the world on a daily basis." Said more simply, the sun never sets on thoughtLEADERS' training (to steal a page from the imperial Brits).

Guess what? We're looking at opportunities differently because of this more global focus. We're evaluating how our business model needs to change to support such audacity. And it's changing for the better. Why? Because Alan served up a big heaping tablespoon of our own medicine.

A Brand is a Promise. Promises Require Consistency

You're out there selling a message to the world. All your goods and services are based on that singular message. But what happens when there's an inconsistency in that brand? It undermines its value and selling power.

Imagine a company billed itself as the greenest purveyor of staplers on the planet. Everyone gets excited about these greener staplers and buys them for the less harmful effects on the planet even though they cost $187.50 each.

Then one day the 20/20 story gets out showing how Green Staples, Inc. is not using their own staplers at corporate headquarters but are instead using the much cheaper model from their rival, Planet Destroying Staples LLC. How is that going to go over?

Taking your own medicine can create consistency in your business. We all know we're much more likely to buy a product from someone who uses it themselves as well. I'm not just the Hair Club president, I'm also a client...

EXAMPLE: we teach people how to communicate more logically and clearly. I wrote a crappy email the other day. It was a humongous blob of text. There was no structure to it. No flow. No core message (sorta like some of my blog posts...). Luckily, before I hit send, I reminded myself we sell services related to structured thought and communications.

I took a few extra minutes and put structure to the email. I cleaned up how it was written. I made the core points stand out clearly and concisely.

I received a very positive response to that sharper message (it was actually a proposal for some new work RELATED TO OUR COMMUNICATIONS TRAINING). I know it's a simple example but it makes the point.

So today, take a moment and reflect on what your business is about. Understand what it is that makes you great at what you do. Then throw a critical eye to how you manage and lead your organization to see if you're putting into practice all the things you tell the market to do.

If you do, great. If not, get to work.

- Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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Do You Know the Difference Between Leadership and Management?

I recently had the honor of being asked to provide my perspective on the difference between leadership and management as a contributor to a great document called Lead(or) Manage. The architect of this work is David Burkus over at LeaderLab.

Here's my contribution to that great work (my entry is on page 14 of the PDF) but you HAVE TO go read the rest of it - the perspectives therein are fantastic. You'll get a great taste of fantastic leadership perspectives from folks who are exponentially smarter than I am.

This is deliberately a short blog post because I want you to use all the time you save to go download and read the rest of the document here. I encourage you to share this post with your friends and colleagues so they have access to the same great content you do.

So here's my take on the difference between leadership and management:

It’s NOT Paradoxical – It’s Definitional

The difference between leadership and management is actually quite simple. You manage things. You lead people. It’s amazing there is so much confusion and writing on this point.

Management is task-focused. It’s short term. It’s a series of checklists and “to do’s” that ensure the work gets done. It’s how we execute tasks to achieve a specific desired outcome. It’s taking actions to hit a budget number or deliver a project on time. Said most simply, it’s the movement of personnel, materiel, and tasks with an exact set of results in mind.

Leadership is people-focused. It’s the words said and actions performed to inspire something deep within another. It is the demonstration of a belief that others come before you and your only interest is their best interest. Leadership entails articulating a vision of something larger than all who are involved and helping those
involved understand their role in achieving it. It’s providing the spark that fires someone’s drive to go take on seemingly insurmountable challenges because they believe in the desired outcome to the core of their being.

Leadership and management work hand in hand but truly are entirely different concepts.

So that's my 0.02. What do you think? What do you think about the other perspectives in the LeaderLab document? Please share.

- Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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3 Steps to More Cash: If You Want a Raise, Plan Now and Ask Later

The bad news is, last year economically sucked. The good news is, this year seems to be sucking less. There are signs of life out there in the economy. People are starting to crawl out from under their rocks and spend a dollar or two. Portfolios have recovered somewhat. This might be the year to get that raise.

The problem is, if you're not planning for that raise right now, you're almost guaranteed not to get it later.

Raises are uncomfortable topics. Why? Because your boss is immediately in a position where they have to delicately say "no" which inherently tells you you're not worth what you're asking for. This dynamic occurs even if you're doing a great job and the reason she can't give you a raise is because budgets are locked down.

It's also uncomfortable because you're going into that conversation expecting that nauseating sense of rejection just like the junior prom.

So what are you to do? How can you increase your chances of getting a little more cash this year especially in light of how brutal last year was? You have to plan for the raise now and ask for it later. There are three simple steps in this process.

Step 1: Planning Now

To get a raise, you have to demonstrate you're creating significantly more value than they're paying you for. A good rule of thumb is 10x. You should strive to drop 10x your compensation to the bottom line of the company. If you're a sales guy making $75k, you'd best be dropping $750k to the bottom line if you want to be seen as a solid contributor.

If you're itching for a raise, you need to layer that 10x lens on the raise too. If you're looking to get a bump of $10,000 per year, you should be looking for ways to improve profits by $100,000 per year.

Before you go whining to me that you don't have a P&L position, I'll tell you you do. In theory, every action within the corporation is designed to improve shareholder value. If you're in HR, figure out ways to reduce turnover, improve retention, or improve the quality of your hires. If you're in IT, look for ways to reduce costs, improve reliability, or increase feature functionality. Wherever you reside in the company, understand the linkage between your role and the bottom line.

This is part of the planning. You have to understand how the actions you plan on taking generate incremental value. Now that you understand that linkage, you have to lay out a plan of the new actions you'll take to improve profits more than you did last year. Spell out those initiatives, define success metrics, and get a plan in place.

Once you have that, go to your boss with that plan and be sure you position it as "here are all the INCREMENTAL things I plan on getting done this year to deliver MORE value to the organization." You're setting an expectation that you're overdelivering on your objectives. This is a critical step because on the back end when you're asking for more cash, you're going to bank on these "extras."

Step 2: Execute

Do I really need to explain this one? Be sure to hit your plan on these incremental initiatives. 'nuff said.

Step 3: Ask

After you've delivered on some of these programs, it's time to swallow hard and go to your boss to make your case for more cash. First, prepare your pitch. Lay out all the extra stuff you've done and the value you've contributed to the organization. Second, do your homework. Understand where the company is financially and if it can afford to give you a raise. Asking for cash if your company is struggling can be the pinnacle of stupidity.

If the company can afford it AND you've delivered the goods, go to your boss with your case.

"Hey boss, I'd like to discuss the POSITIVE impact I've had on the organization so far this year. As you recall, we discussed all the EXTRA things I was going to do as part of this year's plan (see step #1). So far I've done a great job delivering on all of those and they've already contributed $100,000 in value to the company."

"Yep. It has been awesome. I remember you signed up for those things and you've done a great job delivering on them."

"I'm glad to hear you agree. Given my contributions and the fact that last year was pretty lean from a bonus standpoint as well as the fact that the company is doing better now, I'd like you to consider giving me a raise that is reflective of the added contributions I've been making. I believe I've generated substantial value and will continue doing so going forward. I didn't get a raise last year because the economy was tight but it seems like we can afford to give me one now. What do you think?"

See how that works? Deliver value THEN ask for money. It's hard to argue with facts and results (especially results that were agreed upon early in the year). It's still early in the year. You have time to get some ideas on paper and commit to them. You have the balance of the year to deliver on them. If you do, you're dramatically increasing your chances of having a nice holiday season later this year.

Get crackin'!

- Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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