It’s Good to be The King

Elvis

On Saturday night, I was The King. The picture above proves it.

The Australian Glass and Glaziers Association celebrated at their annual conference with a Gala Ball that was themed as “Viva Las Vegas”. The Platinum Sponsors Viridian and G James got in to the act and created a Little White Chapel as well as extra theming including our own Vegas sign with flashing lights. One of the delegates even dressed up as one of the guys out of The Hangover.

For me, not only was I dressed as Elvis but I played the role the entire night This included presenting the awards as him (extra cheeseburgers and all!) and singing a bit of one of his songs to close the night off. The reason this is important is that it was more than just dress ups. Looking the part only gets you so far. You really need to BE the real deal.

The same can be said for what you do. Dress up, turn up and BE the person your role needs. Whether it is a professional role, a role you play in the community or a role in your family, you can’t just LOOK the part you need to ACT and BE the part as well.

Don’t worry, it’s OK if you don’t do it well, make mistakes or don’t quite hit the goal you have as long as you give it all you got.

If you give it everything then you can’t help but succeed. Then you too will know why it’s good to be the King!

Soothe The Beast

Music soothes the savage beast.

You know it’s true. Think of the times you have been “beast like” (angry, grumpy, sad… you know the feeling) and then a fabulous song comes on and you get a better perspective on the world.

Not only does music soothe YOUR savage beast, it can also soothe the beast of others.

It can soothe the beast of unemployment, poor health, loneliness and a sense of “not belonging”.

“But How”, I hear you ask.

Well Sing for Good is the answer. Sing for Good is a project run by the charitable organisation Creativity Australia. Creativity Australis supports people in need via their With One Voice program. For the last couple of years they encourage people to grab a friend (or three or 20) and record a video of themselves singing. This then gets loaded to their website and the world votes.

It is a fantastic initiative and I am an Ambassador for this year’s event. (So all correspondence should be to Ambassador Warwick!)

As an Ambassador, I wanted to be sure that I entered as well. You can see my entry here.

Can I encourage you to visit their website and find out all about what they do?
Then keep revisiting as more and more acts add their videos.

Don’t forget, you too can grab a few friends, sing a song you love and enter yourself. It is so much fun.

Thanks for helping soothe the beast!

Will You Sing For Good?

I have the honour of being an Ambassador for the Sing For Good program. It is a fun and easy way to contribute to people who need it simply by creating music. Here’s a song I sang earlier (I’m the bald dude up the back on the right):

There is a common saying that “music soothes the savage beast.”

Often the savage beast is the thing between your ears! The modern world can be quite stressful. Whether you are driving in peak hour, dealing with an inbox loaded with email or simply trying to manage a house full of family members, it is easy to get overwhelmed. This is where music comes in.

Now while listening to music is fabulous, performing it yourself gives far more benefits. Personally, the resonance in my body when I sing is as relaxing as a massage. You can feel the tension slip away as you keep singing. You also have to be completely present. You have words, notes and timing to consider all while tuning in to what others around you are doing as well.

Do you sing?

Maybe you don’t sing in a choir like me. Maybe there are a few of you who get together in a garage and bash out a few tunes on your guitars, keyboards and drum kits. Maybe you harmonise in the hallways or echo chambers at a train station. Maybe you sing in the car with the radio blaring loud as you drive along.

How good does it feel for you? It doesn’t matter how you sound it is the act of performing that feels fabulous and makes you feel fantastic. There is a natural high you get and in that moment, the rest of the world does not exist and all your troubles float away.

Singing is ~~good~~ great for the soul!

Why not share your gift? Why not show others how you can Sing for Good?

The Sing for Good program is very simple. You just have to sing with at least one other person and then upload your video to the Sing for Good website. Visitors with then vote and donate based on your video and the videos of other singers. This then raises funds for all the great work the Sing for Good program does.

There are several categories of entries and winners are NOT selected on talent alone. The key is to participate.

How does that sound to you? Something to sing about?

Keep an eye out as I will be part of several videos to help spread the message. Check out the website to find out how easy it is to enter and have some fun with your friends.

It all starts on 1st August so check it out.

Come on … let’s Sing for Good!

Wonderful Way With Words

I have just returned from a week in Washington DC where I spoke to a “standing room only” crowd who laughed at all my jokes and got a great deal out of my session. (This made me very happy!)

While I was there, I had a look around some of the monuments and galleries. The Hirshhorn Gallery of Modern Art had an installation from Barbara Kruger (the photo above.) It was fascinating and showed a wonderful way with words. She used some quotes of other people and some observations of her own to challenge you and your perspective. These quotes were printed on pieces of vinyl and pasted all over the room, escalator, floor and wherever there was a surface.

With todays “text speak” and web lingustic “shortcuts”, the power of language can be lost. When you don’t get the reaction you are after or need who’s responsible?

What are you doing to ensure you can truly tap into the power of words? Is it reading the classics? A word a day calendar? Maybe even just stopping someone when they use a word and you don’t know what it means to discover how you could use it.

Communication is so important and I wish for you to have a wonderful way with words.

Where’s Your Head At?

Greetings from Washington DC! I am over here speaking at a conference with only about 2,000 people!

While here I received an email from one of our tribe asking:

“I wonder your thoughts. A person I know said that he thinks it’s wrong to tell people/youth they can do what they want to do, be whatever they want to be.

He thinks it gives them a goal they can never reach, or a dream they can never fulfil, if they dream too big, or hope too high, they’ll never achieve it and be full of grief and hopelessness.

I say, dream as big as the stars and then have as much fun as you can getting there. Who’s right?”

You know the good thing? You are both right!

Henry Ford famously said, “Whether you think you can or think you can’t you are right”

So by this person telling anyone, “Don’t think too big, play a smaller game, you will never make it” they will make it true. AND they will be surrounded by people who think smaller, are self limited and typically unsatisfied and grumpy.

But amazingly awesome people like YOU who say “Anything is possible, dream big and strive towards it” create fabulously positive people! Let’s be honest, they may not make it, but they chance that they will make it is far higher. Maybe they won’t make their goal but they will make it far closer that the person who listened to the person saying “don’t try” and they will have one hell of a ride along the way.

I like to think that we are building a better world by talking about what’s possible not what’s impossible.

In Washington President Kennedy said, “We will go to the moon.” He didn’t say, “We’d like to but it’s too hard, too expensive and we may not make it.” Just recently, a satellite flew past the furtherest “almost” planet Pluto.

“We will go to the moon” has taken us much father than “that’s really hard and it may not happen.”

So what about you? Where is your head at?

How Embarrassing

I am ashamed and embarrassed. It’s not me, it’s him.

I am travelling to the USA next week and I have to own up to being an Australian. They will laugh at me. Well, not at me directly, but at me for having such an embarrassing and out of touch Prime Minister.

I recall teasing my American friends when they had George W. I never thought they would have the chance to return the favour.

Somewhere along the time he seems to have forgotten that the government is put in place BY the people and FOR the people. He and his government are our PUBLIC SERVANTS we are not theirs.

Simple logic dictates that coal is limited and solar and wind are unlimited, so why would you stop the latter in favour of the former.
We have not learnt the lessons of previous governments mistreatment of powerless innocents. Again WE treat them poorly and without respect in a way that will DEMAND an apology in the future.

Our government spends so much time fighting the opposition (regardless of which party is in power) that they don’t have time to govern or have the energy to create a magnificent future for us all.

It is time for a change.

A change in PM would be great but the change we need is in how our government operates. The government is NOT there for the minority with the money and the influence. The government is there for those with little or nothing. It is there to protect those that need it, provide for those who need it and support those that need it.

I want a leader who creates a long term vision for our country so great that subsequent leaders can’t help but follow it also. I want an government that supports the country regardless of whether the opposition agrees with them or not.

I want a leader with enough substance that they do what is MORALLY RIGHT regardless of what impact it had on their financial support.

I want PEOPLE to matter more to the government and I would love for our leaders to get in touch with how life really is for the population and not those living on allowances.

So what can I do?

I have signed petitions, I have clicked like and I have tried ignoring the politicians but still I am ashamed, embarrassed and angry.

The time is ripe for change. Bring it on.

Give ‘Til it Helps

Often people say, “Give ’til it Hurts”, but I am more of a fan of “Give ’til it Helps.” It doesn’t just have to help them, it can also help you!

Recently I saw on Facebook (so you know it’s true) that volunteerism had declined. So I thought I would check it the research.

The Volunteering Australia website informs me that while more people are volunteering, they are doing it for a smaller amount of time. Young adults in particular have reduced the amount of hours they spend volunteering.

The great thing the research said is how good it is. Not just for the recipient, but for yourself as the volunteer.

Volunteering gives a measurable increase in:

Happiness
State of well-being
Overall state of mental health
Level of sleep
Self-Worth

Unfortunately, the volunteer rates a far lower in the city when compared to rural volunteering (34% vs 41%). Volunteering has also decreased for community services and emergency management.

From personal experience, professional associations are also declining in numbers of members and numbers of people willing to do things or give their time.

What about you? Do you volunteer? While we seem to get busier and busier, the health benefits for volunteering are outstanding and the costs are minor – it’s cheaper than therapy and almost as good for you.

Why don’t you look at how you can volunteer? It could be as simple as helping paint a friend’s room or patting dogs at the local dog shelter. It is amazing the benefits you will get.

Quite simply, Give ‘Til It Helps!

Are You Leaving Signs?

There are certain signs everywhere. Some are easy to recognise and others take a little more effort.

The sign above was a little something I left for a friend. Let me explain.

We rented our friends weekender at the beach very last minute and we knew that they had other guests coming after us. I needed to let my friend know that we had cleaned her place so well that her next guests would be impressed.

What better way to show that than folding the toilet paper. She even had a laugh when I texted it to her.

What about your team mates, customers and family? What little signs are you leaving them?

These little signs can speak absolute volumes. So are you leaving signs?

Have You Got A Secret?

This is Ron Gottlieb.

He is the CEO of Ricky Richards, a manufacturer and wholesaler of industrial and commercial textiles and they are the platinum sponsor of the SpecTex 2015 trade show.

Also, he has a secret.

Ricky Richards are doing something very different for their industry. They have an exciting new industry partner. Click on the image above to see a three minute video where Ron talks about it and reveals the secret.

What was really cool was how they announced it. Over the past few weeks Ricky Richards has been posting images on their social media sharing how they have a “special announcement” and that you need to come to the trade show to find out what it was.

Their email footers have also been encouraging people to come and find out “the secret”. So the industry has been abuzz with this secret and many have come to the trade show to uncover it. But you had to go to the trade show to find out what it was and from there they have released it to the market place.

The secret is a great one. They have partnered with Melanoma Institute of Australia and are committing to significant donations on an ongoing basis. There are some real synergies between the companies and it not only helps Melanoma Institute but also Ricky Richards’ clients in the selling of their products.

What about you? Have you got a secret? Can you “reveal” it in a way that attracts attention?

What’s It For?

So many people work hard to make a living but in the process they forget to have a life.

While work is definitely enjoyable and fulfilling, it is dangerous to make it the major cornerstone of your life.

Success is defined in so many different ways; fiscally, emotionally, spiritualy, visually, physically, socially, and randomly. So why would we try and meet all of these needs at the one place?

A recent conversation included the statement, “my work is my hobby.” This is a lie.

It is a self-deception to help justify the commitment to the job or the number of hours worked. It is important to have a hobby outside the workplace to let the mind reinvigorate, let the body refresh and let the spirit get reinspired.

So what’s your hobby, the thing that you do just for you?

If you don’t have one, then you have to ask yourself, “What’s it for?”

Well That’s Different!

My gorgeous wife and I were thrilled to be part of our friend’s wedding on the weekend. She is Sikh so the ceremony and formalities were very different to the western ones we are used to.

Your head must be covered (and there are bandana’s at the door if you need)
You must leave your shoes at the door (most people had bare feet)
It is the bride who waits at the temple for the groom to arrive (and yes, he was late!)
The temple reserves the pride of place for the holy scriptures (that’s it under the pink cover that the holy man is reading from)
The groom walks around the holy centrepiece connected to his bride by a long red cloth and she follows behind him. (This was done five times during the ceremony)

It is by experiencing different lifestyles and cultures that we remove our ignorance and fear. We get to have an appreciation of what is important to others and understand who they truly are. You may not agree with their choices or wish to make them yourself, but you get to understand them more.

There is a lot of fear in the world, fear of lifestyles, culture and different life choices, a strong fear of people who are “different” to us.

We would make great progress in eliminating those fears simply by spending time with those people. Not judging them by OUR standards but learning what are THEIR standards. We may be surprised at how similar they are to our own.

The same can be said with that person in the workplace who you just don’t understand. What can you do to understand them better? Maybe their approach is not wrong, just different.

There is a lot to be said for getting to know someone and understanding that their way is not right, not wrong, it’s just different.

Do You Deserve Good Service?

This is Rachael and Erin at the Virgin Australia lounge in Sydney.

As a person who travels quite a bit, I have earned access to the lounge. This week as I was travelling home from Sydney to Melbourne, I asked whether it was possible to get an earlier flight. They were able to get me the flight two hours earlier which was fabulous for me. Naturally when I asked, I was pleasant, cracked a few silly jokes and was even a bit playful. I figure they have a busy job, at the very least I could be nice.

They said to me, “If only all of our customers were like you.” I asked what did the “other” customers do and I was amazed at their response.

Some customers demand (demand, not ask for) an earlier flight and when they are allocated a middle seat they refuse to take it and get huffy.
Others in this situation tell (again, tell not ask) them to move someone else out of an aisle seat so they can have it
Some customers will demand an upgrade to business class because they are Gold, Platinum, tired – whatever excuse they think will get one
Some customers grab a couple of mints out of courtesy bowl without even making eye contact (ok so that’s not too bad)
Then they told me on several occasions that customers will walk past and empty the entire content of the mint bowl into their bag (and the bowl is pretty big)

While flying I have also experienced some pretty atrocious behaviour in how flight attendants are treated by fellow passengers as well. By no means is this poor behaviour confined to the airline industry. Most of us have stories of very poor behaviours from people who are looking for customer service.

Do you deserve good customer service?

Personally, I do not believe the customer is always right, but they are always the customer, but do you really think you are helping your situation by being rude and obnoxious? In many situations the person giving service is paid a fairly low amount, is fairly young (so may not have developed some of the resilience to deal with highly emotional situations) and deals with issues all day long.

So here are some guidelines on how to get far better customer service by acting in a way that deserves it:

Smile – it makes a huge difference
Be pleasant – sometimes you won’t get your way and it is not completely (or sometimes even partially) due to the person you are dealing with and that is no reason to not be pleasant.
Express dissatisfaction with a situation not with a person – once you make it a personal attack it becomes much harder to get a mutually satisfying situation and it is frequently some time later by huge regret at what you said.
Know there are more customers than just you – really, taking ALL THE MINTS is not considerate of others, it is the same with demanding all the attention of the customer service person when your situation will not progress and there are others to serve.
Have a healthy perspective. Is it REALLY that important? If I didn’t get an earlier flight, I would still get home just two hours later. Really, would that be worth flipping out over?
Ask for more but be ok if you don’t get it – I will frequently ask for an upgrade whether I am flying or renting a car. Often I get a better car, sometimes I get an exit row, twice I have been bumped up to Business Class or Premium. I usually ask in a friendly, joking kind of way. But I feel for the person behind the counter when people “demand” an upgrade because “Don’t you know who I am?” Intimidation is not a good strategy for service.
Have fun. Customer service people are human too. Typically their job is repetitive, a little dull and they tune out. If you use their name (no doubt they have a name badge), have some fun with them then it makes everyone feel better and you never know how they may look after you.
Smile – I know I mentioned it to start with but it is too important not to mention again. So many people forget to do this. They get so swept up in their own importance, their own problems and their own thoughts that they forget to smile. If you do nothing else, smile and I am certain it will make a difference.

If you can do these things you will be far more deserving of good customer service and you are more likely to receive it. It is not rocket science. In many cases it is simple courtesy and expressing your humanity. But it is forgotten far too often.

So do YOU deserve good customer service?

I Need Help

Hey All – I need a favour.

I am creating a new website all about success and I need some photos to put on that website. Now I was going to get some stock photos and then I thought – hey I know loads of successful people.

So what I need are photos that you own and are willing to give me permission to use on the front page of my new website. For the top 10 photos (as voted by me) I will give you an amazing super duper prize as well as feature you in my upcoming podcast.

Your picture has to represent “SUCCESS” and while you and I know your family are successful, I don’t need any family portraits. I am thinking achievements, awards, holidays, goals, etc etc. But please feel free to use your own definition of success.

The ultimate resolution will be 1600×700 so think long and skinny (like me lying down!!)

Feel free to spread the word.

Simply email the image(s) to me warwick [at] warwickmerry dot com with a bit of an explanation to submit your entry.

This is a competition of skill and not luck (so I avoid any gaming laws). Judges decision is final. Fun level is high. Entries to be in by end of June 2015.

The Super Duper Prize for Top 10

Profiling on the upcoming Success podcast
A recording of the Get More Fun CD
Copy of the One Page Marketing Plan and One Page Business Plan templates
Link to your website in Credits Area
Link to your website when they click on the image
My eternal gratitude

Doesn’t that sound great?

I will also put all entries on a gallery page with a link to your website.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Success is Smart (and Brave)

I spent last week hosting the Manufacturers Pavilion at Austech15, a trade show for those in the manufacturing sector.

You can check out some interesting observations and videos from the show (including the 3D printed push bike) here.

The summary from hearing the likes of Google’s head of Sales Engineering, the CEO of Committee for Economic Development in Australia, CEO of Innovative Thinking, CSIRO’s head of Additive Manufacturing (3D Printing), Director of AusIndustry and Dean of Engineering from Deakin University is very simple – BE BRAVE.

Too many firms in our manufacturing sector (and from my experience in many others as well) struggle to move from business as usual. This is not new, this is not unique and worst of all, it is not unexpected!

This article in Forbes from 2013 talks about it and in particular refers to the Sigmoid Curve which first came to my attention in the early 1990s. A quick Google search brings up many images, theories and case studies to supports its application.

Yet still we ignore it.

One of my clients has dedicated half of every Monday to work on the strategy of their business so they do not get stuck in the day to day of their business. By looking at what the industry offers, what the issues are and what roles they want to play, they are shaping their future not responding to it.

Success requires bravery and it requires us to be smart as well. What clever edge can we take advantage of? What unique approach will put you in front?

Once you know this, be brave and work for it.

Manufacturing is Dead, Long live Manufacturing.

At the Austech 2015 Trade Show and there was a lot of talk about manufacturing, as you would expect. But there was a lot of talk about the death of manufacturing in Australia.

Based on the empirical evidence at Austech, this is clearly not the case. Manufacturing is strong in Australia, but we are focusing on the negativity not the success stories. Some of the stories heard at the show prove that there are some fantastic companies doing amazing things.

It is fair to say that Automotive Manufacturing in Australia is in decline, but the feeling is that this is not a bad thing. The margins were extremely tight, the demands were high and the profitability was very low. Remove of the government rebates and financial incentives and it would be difficult to find profitable manufacturers in the mainstream automotive industry.

So what are the success stories?

One company, Lovitt Technoglogies based in Melbourne is a first tier supplier to Boeing in the aeronautical industry – among other things, they manufacture tail pieces for 737s and other equipment for the FA8 Super Hornets.

Another company based in Dandenong, Volgren is manufacturing buses made of aluminium. They they are more expensive than importing a traditional steel bus but because they are made of aluminum – which no other company does – they are lighter to run and that they are more cost effective, so the total cost of ownership is lower. What they are also doing is starting to export these buses to Japan.

We have another company called Tomcar making an urban utility vehicle that was originally made in Israel, but the owner of the intellectual property could not get them made to the specification he wanted, so he started having them made in Australia. They are now exporting them and selling them to the US Defense Force.

In fact, throughout the course of Austech Tomcar were searching for local suppliers to increase the Australian made content of the vehicle. Current the Australian made content sits at around 60% and their target is to lift it to 85%

There are some amazing success stories in the Australian Manufacturing Industry if we choose to look for them.

The significant shift for Australian manufacturing is that we are moving out of commodity manufacturing – mass production. Our labor costs become prohibitive to be able to afford to do that, but what we do have is the ‘smarts’.

Clever manufacturing is where the future of Australian manufacturing lies. There is no reason why we can’t manufacture high specification, high quality products that we can then sell to the rest of the world.

Both Roger le Salle from Matrix Thinking and Professor, the Honorable Stephen Martin, CEO of CEDA, stated at Austech that this is the future for Australia. One of the questions they asked is that instead of looking to Switzerland and Germany for high specification products, why can’t we manufacture them here?

We have a history of clever innovation and we have proven that time and time again. From farmers who invented the ‘stump jumpers’, which were ploughs that would jump over stumps to secure plastic bank notes and WiFi, Australia has created some amazing inventions.

David Lake, MD of ATTAR mentioned that his team were able to create some non-destructive testing processes that were previously thought impossible to do and by creating a unique team structure and management style within the business, continued to get significant innovation from his team.

Australia has some amazing universities and technical resources.

The CSIRO have recently created Lab22. They invested a significant amount on the latest in additive manufacturing equipment, typically referred to as 3D printing. Industry can access this equipment and CSIRO’s expertise and you don’t have to make a significant outlay. You can rent this Lab for some prototyping or looking at how you might be able to use additive manufacturing processes in your own business.

Australia has the ‘smarts’, we have the opportunities and we have the capacity. All we need is manufacturers who are willing to look beyond their current business to see what the future holds.

Now is the time to fully embrace being “smart manufacturers” looking for the niche, looking for the high specification product you can export to the rest of the world.

This kind of manufacturing would be ideal for our new submarines. Many visitors to Austech felt it was outrageous that our current Government is not letting Australian companies even bid for the manufacture of these submarines. There may well be politics involved, but it is important to know that we do have the ‘smarts’ to be able to do this – and we are a clever and lucky country.

Be confident that our manufacturing industry is recalibrating not disintegrating.