There’s a brain function that most of us have that I call AMS. AMS stands for

• Assumption: We think about something we’re going to do or say and decide what the outcome will be.
• Manipulation: Then we do or say it in a way that forces a given response or action.
• Self-fulfilling prophesy: This brings us full circle to back to the original assumption and we then say to ourselves, “I knew this would happen if I did/said [whatever].”

This can be a good thing when you think how much you can accomplish, the objections you can overcome, the minds you can change to flow in synch with your own and many people do use it this way (think the power of positive thinking, actualization, etc.).

But the kicker is that for some reason we tend to indulge in AMS far more often when we expect the worst.

I’ve found that AMS is a frequent contributor, if not the actual basis, for many of the miscommunications and misunderstandings that happen both in and out of the workplace.

It’s easy to say stop doing it, but how do you stop words and actions that aren’t even on a conscious plane? By heightening your awareness and bringing them up to conscious level.

• First think about the response you want and be sure that it passes a reality check;
• then think about the response you expect and see how closely it matches your want;
• if they aren’t in sync make whatever adjustments are necessary and revise your presentation accordingly.

The reality check is a critical part of the process because there’s no way to finesse an impossible outcome. If your want doesn’t pass then you need to adjust it and not use AMS as the excuse for not achieving/doing it.

If you’re getting the impression that I think it’s all in your mind—I do. At much as ninety percent of any subject is how you think about it—conscious, objective, self-aware thinking. It’s amazing how often people start by doing, and when that doesn’t work, they try thinking—kind of like the old joke, “When all else fails, read the directions.”

So although thinking may be the key to working smart the most brilliant thinking in the world is worthless without that minimum ten percent action that makes it happen.

Have you ever noticed how often your friends lead/wheedle/cajole/beg/push/drag-you-kicking-and-screaming into trying new things? Especially things that aren’t your thing! Scott Allen, whom I dearly love, over at Linked Intelligence is such a friend. Scott did all of the above and finally got me to start blogging, join the LinkedInBloggers yahoo egroup, recommended me to b5, taught me great ways to use LinkedIn (now I just have to DO it) and now tagged me for the current game of meme. That means I have to come up with seven random things about me that you probably don’t know, would find interesting and that I’m willing to share. The first two are easy; it’s the third that keeps sticking. OK <deep breath> here goes nothing…

1. I’m a Luddite wannabe. This is pretty hilarious considering that I run my company online and I’m content webmaster for both VC Taskforce and my own company.
2. I’ve never visited Facebook, MySpace (other than to register my email address after I read that they were being hijacked to use there) or Twitter and my infrequent YouTube visits are the result of links sent by my friends. I’m so far out of pop culture that I might well be from another planet.
3. I love to talk on the phone. Feel free to call me and say hi (866.265.7267), just please remember that I’m on Pacific time—5 am calls do not float my boat!
4. My first name is deeply buried; my middle name is Michael, hence Miki. In elementary school, when it was still spelled Mickey, they always assigned me to boys’ gym class, but I was too young to appreciate it. I changed the spelling with the rise of the Mickey Mouse Club (I really do hate that song).
5. For some unremembered reason I studied cosmetology, but after getting licensed realized that I couldn’t stand working with women all day (I’m older than you think and had nothing in common with the general run of beauty shop patrons back then—for which I’m eternally grateful), so I worked instead for a funeral home making dead people presentable for viewing. Believe it or not, the great State of Colorado required a full cosmetology license to do this.
6. I sold dune buggy kits, built, and occasionally raced, my own buggy, and even helped in the manufacture. We used layered sheets of fiberglass that were hand rolled to avoid air pockets and ended up a quarter of an inch thick, unlike the Corvettes of that era where the glass was chopped and blown into one side of a mold and then the sides were squished together. I loved demonstrating ours to skeptical buyers. I’d take a hammer and pound as hard as possible on the metal flake finish, and then let them do it. Try that on a Vette sometime.
7. When I lived in California I had eight aquariums ranging in size from 100 gallons to a custom-built 20 gallon room divider tank that was only six inches deep. I inherited my first aquarium from my nieces. What I didn’t know at the time was that they’re similar to rabbits—they multiply if you’re not careful. When I moved I donated it all to Steinhart Aquarium in San Francisco.

Of course, the best part of playing tag is when you get to do the tagging. OK, guys, you’re it!

Buddies at b5

• Darlene @ Interview Chatter
• Geoff @ Knuckle Curve
• Celine @ Pimp Your Work
• Liz @ Successful Blog
• Brian @ Copy Blogger

And two very cool outsiders

• Raven @ Raven’s Brain
• Wendy @ eMoms as Home

While Lao Tzu provided my all-time favorite summing-up of leadership, it’s Goethe who is the basis for my leaders DO attitude.

He said, “What you can do or think you can do, begin it—boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.”

Isn’t that a terrific thought? Whether you’re effort is focused on leading yourself or leading others to a new/different/enhanced outcome you need to DO, if you only think and plan and then think some more you could easily end up doing nothing and going nowhere.

No, you’re DOing won’t be perfect, you’ll make mistakes, need to backup or go around to avoid a hurdle, but guess what? Even if you had thought and planned for years your DOing still wouldn’t be perfect.

Just as living organisms grow and change, plans need the same ability. Trees bend in the wind so that they won’t break, just so your plans require enough flexibility to deal with the winds of society, change and outside events.

Flexibility doesn’t mean selling out the focus of the plan, i.e., your purpose; it does allow you to shift to avoid a head-on collision that could destroy everything, thus accomplishing nothing.

Nobody is prescient, that’s why even though smart companies do their long-term plans in detail, they know that they’ll shift, be tweaked and change over and over in response to many factors, both global and local.

So why plan at all if it’s going to keep changing? For the same reason you use a map when going from one location to another. Sure, if you want to drive from San Francisco to Cincinnati you could just head east and ask along the way, but that wouldn’t be very efficient. It’s better to plan the trip even though you know that you may need to change course due to construction, storms, detours, etc.

So the next time you’re wondering if you should keep planning or get started, remember Goethe’s words and start DOing.

I received a very irate email taking me to task for saying (in yesterday’s post), “I think that people still prefer their own comfort zone (whatever that might be) and probably always will—the goal is to expand it, since eliminating it is highly unlikely…” After removing the expletives the gist was that as a person supposedly teaching leadership why was I condoning closed-minded attitudes, even bigotry?

Short answer, I’m not, but I’m a realist.

Long answer, I’ve always believed that it’s great to work for an ideal, but you have to function in the real world and the real world is populated by people and people are a long way from ideal—additionally, my ideal is very likely not your ideal, so who chooses? What I consider close-minded or bigoted is very likely another person’s passionate belief—to me there is no “right.” Even when I’m violently opposed to the thoughts expressed, I remember S.G. Tallentyre’s (not Voltaire) comment, “I may disagree with what you have to say, but I’ll fight to the death for your right to say it.”

Back to practical.

I first wrote about comfort zones in a column I used to write for Microsoft Development Network (msdn) in 1999 (Hiring in Your Comfort Zone) and the idea hasn’t changed a lot.

Our comfort zone is where we all prefer to do things. People want to spend their time with people like themselves. This isn’t about simple labels, such as race, religion or gender, which are more society’s labels. Our own subjective labels have more to do with schools (Harvard, Stanford, Wharton, Cal, etc.), specific professions (not fields), companies (think McKinsey), compensation, attitudes, clothes, etc. It’s how we choose to connect, because, true or not, Yale grads believe they have more in common with other Ivy League alums than with Cal or Columbia. Doctors hang out with doctors, usually those with the same, or similar, specialty or employer, but rarely with nurses or radiology techs. We like enough knowledge commonality so we don’t feel ignorant, but can still learn; we like to be with our “equals.”

It all boils down to, “people like me” (PLM).

And that may be fine in our personal life—but not so fine in our professional life, especially not for managers responsible for hiring. The broader the PLM definition the longer it takes to become noticeable, but it’s usually there if you look for it.

The long-term cost to companies is high. This is especially true when there’s a change in management, since the new person’s PLM rarely matches her predecessor’s.

• When the choice is between the best applicant and PLM, PLM usually wins out, slowly lowering the quality of talent.
• PLM homogenizes the staff; reducing diversity of both thinking and thought (methodology and result) and it’s that diversity that supplies strength, creativity and innovation.
• PLM wreaks havoc on retention efforts and often drives out legacy knowledge.
• PLM hiring may affect just one part of a company or create a ripple effect, e.g., lowered innovation slows product development delaying delivery, crimping sales and keeping the company from achieving its revenue goals.

All of this and much more is the product of a PLM mindset and the narrower the mindset the worse the damage.

Back to what I said at the start, I’m a realist and I do not believe that it’s possible to truly eradicate PLM from your MAP (mindset, attitude, philosophy™) more often it’s driven underground making it harder to recognize than when it’s overt.

I do believe that the definition of PLM can be expanded, since MAP is not, or should not be, carved in stone. Rather, like you, it’s vibrant—living, growing, and changing as you live, grow and change.

And, as always, it’s your choice.

Until a few years ago, I lived in Silicon Valley and still read the local papers. An article in yesterday’s SF Mercury News details the follow-up study by UC Davis on the lack of gender diversity in the executive ranks of high tech companies.

“But most frustrating of all, said Nicole Woolsey Biggart, is that California companies have shown little improvement over the past three years that Davis’ Graduate School of Management has conducted the study.”The numbers are abysmal,” said Biggart, the management school’s dean. “What has absolutely dumbfounded me is we look just like the Industrial Belt. We don’t look any different to me. That is the big shock.”

I’m not quite why it’s a shock. California may be progressive, but it’s still populated by people and people haven’t changed all that much—they’re still more comfortable with people like themselves; the number of women with tech degrees hasn’t changed much—just because you’re an avid user doesn’t mean you want to work under the hood; and social programs that off-load, or at least ease, the life concerns of women (and men, for that matter) haven’t improved—for the most part, safe child and elder-care are still luxuries beyond the means of most workers.

But the really interesting reading is found in the comments that run the gamut from total agreement to complete dissent. If the topic interests you, take the time to read them, not just the article.

As for me, I think that people still prefer their own comfort zone (whatever that might be) and probably always will—the goal is to expand it, since eliminating it is highly unlikely; to be an executive today means having graduated at least ten years ago and been offered the mentoring, grooming, opportunities and promotions all during those ten-plus years, which was/is unlikely given my first point; and the social arrangements in this country are abysmal.

The point I was trying to make yesterday was lost in the example I used to make it, so I want to clarify.

I said that I had identified three universal functions, lead, manage and sell, that people at all levels DO in the course of daily life and asked readers if they agreed and to add others.

Having done this same exercise when working with clients I expected a different response, but as I said, I chose an example that doesn’t work in writing. Generally, communicate is suggested as an added function, but the focus was more often to disagree with lead and sell, since many staffers felt they couldn’t lead, since they weren’t managers, and the non-salespeople, especially engineers, were adamant that they not only didn’t, but couldn’t, sell.

The point is that these three functions have been swathed in enough mystiques that most people believe that they don’t do them, especially lead and sell, when, in fact, they do them daily.

You sell every time you convince someone to do what you want them to do and you lead every time you take the initiative instead of waiting for someone else to do it.

But people seem hesitant to use the language of sales or leadership to describe what they do unless they’re in that profession or already at a certain level in the organization and that holds them back from growing. We humans have a habit of assigning value to acts based, to some degree, on the language used to describe them.

I’m not suggesting that you use this language for bragging efforts, but you should use it inside your head when you’re analyzing what you did. For instance, if you’re an engineer who, after thoroughly researching the subject, presented a compelling argument to your boss for buying a new piece of software or equipment and it was purchased as a result, then you sold it; the same is true when your idea of a place for lunch or the movie to see is chosen-you sold it. Or as a junior member of a team you take the initiative to research something that you think will contribute to the success of the project, even though it’s not your responsibility, then you’re leading. As to managing, most people realize that to get anything done anywhere in their life requires various management skills, but they’re still hesitant to use the language.

On October third I quoted an interview Steve Roesler had with a long-time CEO who was “…quite adamant about building people through experiences and letting them-and the organization-determine their capabilities as a result.” The CEO said, “I realized early on that I didn’t learn anything about leading until I tried to lead something. Only after I examined what had just happened and my part in it did I learn anything. Books and workshops gave me a way to frame what I had learned as well as some language to go with it.”

And that’s what you want to do. Examine what you DO daily, including the little things, to determine when you led or sold or managed and then use the correct language when thinking about or discussing it.

In today’s world, whether living loud or barely functioning, every person in every country leads, manages, and sells every day of their lives.

And I do mean everyone, from the very top—heads of state, financial barons and CEOs—to the homeless druggies living on skid row.

Look at each from a functional point of view.

Lead means “to go before or with to show the way” and you probably do that at least 50% of the time in your daily life.

Manage means “to be in charge.” You can be in charge of various things at various times, but you are always in charge of yourself.

Sell means “to persuade or induce someone to do something” which is what you do when choosing a movie, putting your kids to bed or convincing your boss about X.

Now let’s look at these three functions from the viewpoint of the homeless druggie, whom we’ll call Sam (short for Samuel/Samantha, the male pronouns are for convenience), since they are most often looked at from the other end.

Sam has a vision of endless free drugs and a haven that supplies all other needs in which to enjoy them. He leads himself in a survival exercise every day of his life, supporting his habit, finding food and shelter, and avoiding the pitfalls and terrors of the street; on some days he hangs with others who decide to invest in his vision and follow his lead. Sam acts as his own logistics/facilities manager; as CFO he is constantly raising funds for his enterprise and he handles all purchasing decisions. He is constantly selling, whether that means convincing passersby to donate to his cause, social services to let him be or the police that he didn’t do whatever.

From watching myself and others and through my reading these three functions, in their broadest sense, seem to embrace everything we humans do.

Should other functions should be added?

What do you think?