Don't Read this Blog Post!... Fruit Forward Focus

Couldn't resist? Well, there's good reason. Read on.

I've always described my favorite wines as being "fruit forward"....California Zins, Australian Shiraz's, New Zealand Sauvignon Blancs (specifically when blended with Semillon), White Bordeaux (also Sauvignon Blanc blended with Semillon) and my absolute favorite, Amarone, are good examples (actually, I'm fond of pretty much anything from the Valpolicella region).

Admittedly, to describe my favorite wine style as "fruit forward" is a cop-out. After all, wine is fruit. But, wine tasting lexicon can be confusing and many of the tasting reviews are lost on me. (I don't know what a black currant looks like, much less how it tastes.) The fact is, I don't really know how to accurately describe my favorite wine style, I just know that I prefer a wine that, to me, tastes "fruity".

Master Sommelier Andrea Immer offers some insight. In her book, Great Wine Made Simple, Andrea confirms that "fruity" is often a catchall term that is used as a synonym for "sweet", "soft", or "approachable". It's not "fruitiness", per se, rather the type of fruit that matters. On one end of the fruit spectrum are "lean" fruits such as lemons and on the other end are "luscious" fruits such as mangos. I prefer the latter. As it turns out, my wine style preference is more about lusciousness, not fruitiness.

All this time I've been missing out on the chance to discover some really great "luscious" wines because my focus has been misplaced.

One of the most important roles of a leader is to make sure that the collective energy and attention of an organization are properly focused. Focus is a powerful tool that can be leveraged to make progress or that can become more of an anchor, holding people and organizations back.

Simply put, you get what you focus on.

Too often I've found that people and organizations focus on fixing problems (i.e. looking backward) rather than reaching an end goal (i.e. looking forward). I'm guilty of it myself. I sometimes spend way too much time thinking about what's not working versus focusing on what IS working and trying to get more of it.

This requires a new mindset but the good news is that there are some very easy ways to make the shift. My favorite is one that I picked up from Enlightened Leadership, by Ed Oakley and Doug Krug, which they call The Framework for Continuous Renewal. This framework represents a series of focus choices that can be utilized to effectively harness the attention and energy of people and organizations. The Framework consists of:

1. Celebrating small successes

   Cover via Amazon

2. Extensively researching what you are doing to generate these successes
3. Continually clarifying/re-clarifying in great detail your specific objectives
4. Helping all parties (employees, customers, partners....) to understand the benefits of achieving the objectives, and
5. Continually searching for what you could be doing more of, better or differently, to move closer to the objective

In fact, next time you encounter a problem, instead of asking "what happened and why?", simply ask, "what can we do more of, better, or differently in order to achieve the desired outcome?" The mindset shift will have begun.

Oh, and could that have been the reason why you decided to read this blog post? The title said not to read the blog post but since the focus was on "reading the blog post", that's exactly what we got!

After all, you get what you focus on.

"Success....My nomination for the single most important ingredient is energy well directed."

Louis B. Lundborg, Former Chairman, Bank of America