Stop || Pause > Play >> Fast Forward

Leading a multi-million dollar organization brings some tough decisions. When value drift gains momentum, it's time to stop what you're doing, pause the messaging and programming that contributes to the drift.

This means stopping your sales efforts which may contribute to attrition. It might mean starting from scratch. It often means looking at a different industry for inspiration. Maybe it means building a radical new service for each of your major customer segments. Sometimes it means a new business model.

It's 4am. If it wasn't a Sunday morning, Mike McLaran would be getting ready to head to the gym for a workout. He joked on his 53rd birthday that he was 35. That was less than a month ago.

After working with Mike at the Salem Area Chamber of Commerce for a decade, I got to know some of his ways. I call them McLaranisms. Here are some of my favorites. Some of these are things he actually said, while others are my interpretation of how to be McLaranistic. I've already had to update this list five times now, as you McLaranizers remind me of others. Here's a Prezi version I've presented on stage.

God has given you a certain number of exclamation points to use in your lifetime. Once you use them all, you are un-friended, filtered, deleted, un-followed, un-subscribed and permanently muted.

This doesn't apply to your social posts about your kid's home run, but it certainly does apply to business. I frequently give folks a hard time for over-using exclamation points, mostly because they deserve it. Here are some examples.