FOCUS EXECUTION

Publication of Leadership Resources (M) Sdn Bhd • March 2004 

KDN: PP9925/5/2004 

The Real Leadership Challenge: 

Top-to-bottom 

Part 1 of a FranklinCovey White Paper 

FOCUS and EXECUTION 

7 Habits® Personality Profile 

Top-to-bottom FOCUS and 

EXECUTION – Part 1 •2 

Personality profile: Joe Wong 

of Times-Lite Electrical 

Engineering Sdn Bhd •6 

Time: What is it? • 8 

I believe training pays •10 

Training calendar •12 

“I have read Dr Covey’s book 

over and over again since 

then, 29 times at the last 

count! It’s a beautifully 

written book and it has 

certainly changed the way 

I look at the world.” 

Joe Wong, Managing Director, 

Times-Lite Electrical Engineering 

the Compass: March 2004 • 1

The Real Leadership Challenge: Top-to-bottom 

Part 1 of a FranklinCovey White Paper 

FOCUS and EXECUTION 

During the current period of economic slowdown, it is 

natural to assume that business leaders are focusing 

on their organizations’ highest priorities and 

following a “straight and narrow path” toward profitability. 

However, new statistics suggest a much less focused 

performance at the worker level: 

_ 

_ 

49% of corporate workers feel 

totally overwhelmed by daily tasks 

and unable to accomplish all of 

their priorities. Yet, these same 

workers also believe that only half 

of their work time is spent on 

activities linked to top corporate 

priorities. 

65% of corporate workers feel a 

lot of pressure to produce more 

with less. 

Yet, 69% of workers also believe they 

possess more creativity, resourcefulness, 

intelligence, and talent than their current 

job allows. 

Then consider overall corporate 

performance. A recently published Bain 

& Co. study revealed a broad gap between 

what companies hoped to achieve 

and what actually occurred. The study 

tracked the performance of 1,854 public 

companies during the 1990s, a prosperous 

decade by anyone’s standards. At the 

beginning of the decade, more than 90% 

of these companies established annual 

revenue and profit growth goals of at 

least 5.5%, relatively conservative for the 

period. By the year 2000, only 13% or 1 

in 8 of these corporations had even 

achieved the 5.5% growth while earning 

their cost of capital 1 . 

So, how should business leaders 

interpret the paradox of high employee 

stress yet low employee focus and 

utilization? High profit and growth 

projections yet low financial performance? 

Could it be that business leaders, in 

their efforts to re-organize, re-capitalize, 

and re-engineer, have lost their ability to 

focus, execute, and get the job done? 

The Failure to Execute 

In a June 1999 Fortune cover story titled 

Why CEOs Fail, Ram Charan 2 noted that 

in 70% of cases, disappointing company 

performance stemmed from faulty 

execution, not flawed strategy. In his 

recent book, Execution: The Discipline of 

Getting Things Done, co-authored by 

Larry Bossidy, Charan declares emphatically 

that while big goals are 

important,"unless you translate big 

thoughts into concrete steps for action, 

they’re pointless. Without execution, the 

breakthrough thinking breaks down, 

learning adds no value, people don’t meet 

their stretch goals, and the revolution 

stops dead in its tracks. What you get is 

change for the worse, because failure 

drains the energy from your organization. 

Repeated failure destroys it." 3 

As Ram Charan notes, a poorly 

executed goal can have a domino effect 

on future execution. When leaders set 

goals that are not achieved, when manag- 

Execution is about 

creating a group of 

shared priorities and 

channeling the combined 

passion and energy of a 

workforce toward the 

few things that would 

make the biggest impact 

on the organization. 

ers make promises that are not kept, 

when teams fail to realize their committed 

objectives, people lose their enthusiasm 

and willingness to stretch. Employees 

feel like they are not adding value, or 

worse, they feel betrayed and demoralized. 

Ironically, while leaders are trying 

to get their organizations "to do more 

with less," employees at all levels 

typically express that they have more to 

give – talent, creativity, resourcefulness, 

intelligence, and ingenuity—than their 

jobs require or even permit. And simultaneously, 

company executives complain 

that they need more from their people 

than they are getting. 

So how do business leaders foster 

better execution? Is it just a matter of 

discipline and management control? Not 

at all. Execution is about creating a group 

of shared priorities and channeling the 

combined passion and energy of a 

workforce toward the few things that 

would make the biggest impact on the 

organization. How do leaders tap into the 

skills and insights of their managers and 

work groups to first identify the top 

initiatives for the organization, cutting 

through a multitude of competing secondary 

diversions? And how do leaders 

empower work groups to allocate both 

their time and resources toward achieving 

that limited set of goals, setting aside a 

broader and potentially more "comfortable" 

list of activities that are competing 

for their time and energy? 

The Challenge of Focus 

When organizations align intense focus, 

passion, and collaboration around a 

limited set of goals, amazing results can 

happen. However, as seen in the earlier 

statistics, corporate focus and coordinated 

execution is not the norm in corporate 

America. 

In a recent FranklinCovey study, 

information workers defined a good day 

as answering e-mails and voice mails in 

2 • the Compass: March 2004

the order received, attending meetings on 

time, and keeping the IN box and OUT 

box in rough balance. Another study 

revealed that 49% of employees spend 

only half of their time at work focused on 

activities or endeavors linked to the 

company’s most important priorities. And 

interestingly, the same study showed that 

direct supervisors believed that only 28% 

of employee activities were linked to the 

organization’s highest priorities. One 

supervisory level higher, this assessment 

dropped to only 20%. In summary, people 

are processing large quantities of information, 

are feeling maxed out, yet they 

are not perceived as contributing to the 

best of their potential. 

What can leaders do to change this 

unfortunately all-too-common dilemma? 

The Execution Challenge: 

Analysis and Causes 

In the fall of 2002, FranklinCovey 

teamed with Harris Interactive to administer 

an xQ Assessment to over 11,000 

respondents representing executives, 

managers, and front line workers in 10 

functional areas in 10 major U.S. industries. 

Representing the "Execution 

Quotient" of organizational performance, 

the xQ Assessment is a set of 30 

questions that measure the extent to 

which people 

(1) understand the organization’s 

highest priorities, 

(2) know what they are supposed to 

do to achieve them, 

(3) are passionate about those 

objectives, 

(4) stay focused on them, and 

(5) work collaboratively and creatively 

together to accomplish 

them. 

In summary, the xQ Assessment 

analyzes what Larry Bossidy and Ram 

Charan call the "execution gap," the 

difference between what organizations 

commit to do and what they actually 

accomplish. 

The results of the initial national 

assessment are both depressing and 

encouraging—depressing because they 

are so uniformly and concretely poor, and 

encouraging because they identify 

achievable solutions to this pervasive 

problem. The overall results of the study 

show that only 21% of respondents 

agreed or strongly agreed with the 

statement, "My organization consistently 

achieves its most important goals." In 

other words, only about a fifth of America’s 

information workers believe that 

their collective efforts result in their 

Putting energy into 

things that make some 

difference distracts full 

focus from the things 

that would make a major 

difference. 

organizations actually achieving the 

primary reasons they are in business. 

The results of the xQ Assessment 

identify eight overarching reasons why 

managers and work groups do not 

achieve their organization’s most important 

priorities: 

Dynamic Graphics 

1. Lack of Clarity – work groups do 

not always understand top 

corporate goals 

2. Insufficient Commitment – work 

groups do not always agree with 

top corporate goals 

3. Poor Translation – work groups 

may not be translating corporate 

goals into how they spend departmental 

time and resources 

4. Insufficient Discipline – work 

groups do not always stay on track 

in an environment in which 

internal and marketplace distractions 

abound 

5. Insufficient Enabling Structures – 

work groups may lack the necessary 

systems and structures to help 

them achieve top goals 

6. Insufficient Collaboration – work 

groups may not have a broad 

enough perspective to identify 

opportunities to collaborate or 

the motivation to collaborate 

with others 

7. Low Trust – the organization may 

not have the culture of trust 


equired to share information and 

foster collaborative efforts against 

a shared set of goals 

8. Low Accountability – the organization 

may not have a culture that 

holds employees accountable, both 

top-down, bottom-up, and peer-topeer 

None of these eight execution gaps are 

"burning insights" to any executive or 

manager who has thought deeply on the 

subject. However, armed with their 

enterprise’s unique xQ data, leaders of 

all organizational descriptions can narrow 

in and focus on their organization’s 

biggest execution gaps. Then they can 

implement solutions that improve their 

organization’s performance - significantly. 

The Execution Challenge: 

Five Solutions 

Here are five specific focus and execution 

solutions, guided by the xQ Assessment 

results. Obviously every organization’s 

approach to meeting its unique challenges 

will differ. However, a concentrated effort 

toward addressing the causes of 

underperformance in these five categories 

should produce increased organizational 

focus, increased execution, and ultimately, 

increased financial performance. 

Solution 1: AGREE ON 

A FEW "WILDLY 

IMPORTANT" GOALS 

Perform an experiment. In your next 

executive meeting, have each 

individual list the organization’s 

top five priorities in order of importance. 

Then compare notes. How consistent are 

the responses? When requesting the top 

five priorities, how many different 

priorities are cited by the team of 6–12 

managers or executives? How do the 

rankings or priorities compare? 

CEOs assume that other senior 

executives share their understanding of 

corporate goals. A McKinsey study 

revealed that when top executives in 

companies were asked to name the 10 

highest priorities, the five top executives 

listed a total of 23 goals and only two 

appeared on more than one list. This 

divergence widens dramatically when the 

same exercise extends to middle managers. 

The previously mentioned xQ 

Assessment provides additional data on 

the organizational focus issue: 

> Only 28% agreed that their 

organization focuses intensely on 

the few, most important goals. 

> Only 43% said that their organization 

clearly communicated its most 

important goals to employees. 

> Fewer than 25% could name their 

organization’s top three priorities. 

Even at the top, it’s hard to get 

agreement on the most important objectives. 

When asked the open-ended 

question, "What are your department’s 

important priorities?" managers will 

typically list 12 to 18 items. But what is 

wildly important? What single behavioral 

change would make the biggest difference 

in achieving the department’s or 

work team’s most important objective? 

Out of the many "important" goals in 

any organization, agreement on a few 

"wildly important" goals has powerful 

benefits. People can get their minds and 

energies around three or four things, but 

not 10 to 15 or more. Identifying and 

organizing activities around a critical 

few, wildly important goals provides 

people with purpose and hope. It is 

energizing. Employees realize their 

personal dedication to a few significant 

goals can make a genuine difference. 

The complexity of too many goals is 

overwhelming to an organization. As Jim 

Collins noted in his book Good to Great, 


"The enemy of great is good." 4 Putting 

energy into things that make some 

difference distracts full focus from the 

things that would make a major difference. 

Clearly the first need for improving 

corporate performance is to identify and 

communicate a few wildly important 

goals at every level of the organization. 

The goal alignment process should avoid 

the trap of top-down imposition of goals 

except at the most overall strategic level, 

and instead involve managers and 

employees in determining key goals for 

management review, refinement, and 

action plan development. 

Solution 2: 

TRANSLATE GOALS 

INTO SPECIFIC 

ACTIVITIES AND 

MEASURES 

As noted earlier, many employees 

feel overwhelmed and pressured 

to produce more with less. Yet it 

is not clear if what they are doing is the 

best use of their time. In the xQ 

Assessment: 

_ Only 27% agreed with the statement, 

“My organization’s most 

important goals are translated into 

the goals of my work group.” 

_ Only 25% agreed, “The goals of 

my work group are translated into 

individual goals.” 

_ Only 28% indicated that they and 

their manager jointly decide what 

they need to do to achieve important 

goals. 

The execution gap may be the 

greatest in highly complex, loosely 

defined occupations that can have a 

significant impact on the bottom line. In 

1995, a Harvard Business Review article 

analyzed the relationship between worker 

productivity and job complexity. The 

article noted that some occupations, such 

as commissioned sales, required the 

worker to make far more decisions or 

choices in executing his job function than 

other more routine occupations, such as 

cooking in a fast food restaurant. Consequently, 

the greater choice occupations 

were considered more complex than the 

more limited choice occupations. The 

article further noted that the greater the 

number of choices a worker made, the 

greater the potential for productivity 

variance between top and bottom performers, 

since more personal discretion 

and decision-making was involved. 

Many organizations have experienced 

this productivity/individual choice 

relationship even within the same functional 

area. One sales organization found 

that top-performing sales people generated 

significantly better results than 

lower sales performers, not because of 

training, selection criteria, or management 

supervisory style, but rather because 

of the way top performers defined 

their work and how they spent their time. 

Top performers focused on spending 

face-to-face time with key decision 

makers on major accounts, while lower 

performers tried to get any appointment 

possible. Top performers were better able 

to translate their sales goals into personal 

behaviors that helped achieve those 

goals. 

RITZ-CARLTON HOTELS 

The Ritz-Carlton hotel organization 

understood the relationship between 

corporate goals and front-line behaviors 

and built systems that brought the two 

together. Their overarching strategic 

objective was 100% guest retention. 

Survey interviews and management 

analysis showed that intensely personal 

service was the key to guest retention. 

However, the challenge was to translate 

“intense personal service” into the 

activities and behaviors of hotel staff. 

To create intense personalized 

service, the front-line personnel who had 

direct contact with customers needed to 

gather and record information on individual 

preferences and needs. Normally, 

the job of housekeepers is to clean rooms. 

And yet the housekeeping staff is also 

perfectly positioned to obtain certain 

specific information from guests. Ritz- 

Carlton management redesigned the job 

functions and activities of the housekeeping 

staff to include gaining information 

from guests on a variety of preferences 

and needs, conversing with guests on a 

series of specific subjects, inputting the 

data obtained into a computer system, 

and related activities. The criteria and 

system for hiring housekeeping personnel 

were altered to reflect these new responsibilities 

and activities. Desired activities 

for maids would extend beyond cleaning 

rooms to include language and conversation 

skills, computer training, and a 

personality that made guests feel comfortable 

in talking with staff. 

Human Resources, Information 

Technology, and other systems were 

refined to support the new behaviors and 

job requirements driven by the goal of 

100% guest retention. This intense level 

of customer service contributed to Ritz- 

Carlton winning the Baldrige Award 

twice. 

Think what it would mean to an 

organization if all day, every day, people 

understood the top corporate goals, fully 

supported those goals, understood how 

their particular roles contributed toward 

those goals, and spent 80% or more of 

their time focused on activities that 

advanced the achievement of those goals. 

(To be continued) 

Following this issue, look out for 

Part 2 of The Real Leadership Challenge 

Solution 3: 

Engage The Hearts And Minds Of People 

Solution 4: 

Re-Engage People Regularly To Stay On 

Track 

Solution 5: 

Build A Culture Of Collaboration And Trust 

1 

Chris Zook and James Allen, Profit from the 

Core, (Boston: Harvard Business School 

Press, 2001). 

2 

Ram Charan is a highly sought advisor to 

CEOs and senior executives in companies 

ranging from start-ups to the Fortune 500, 

including GE, DuPont, EDS, and Colgate- 

Palmolive. He is the author of What the CEO 

Wants You to Know and Boards At Work 

and the co-author of Every Business Is a 

Growth Business. Dr. Charan has taught at 

both the Harvard Business School and the 

J.L. Kellogg School of Management of 

Northwestern University. 

3 

Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan, Execution: 

The Discipline of Getting Things Done (New 

York: Random House, Inc., 2002), p. 19. 

4 

Jim Collins, Good to Great: Why Some 

Companies Make the Leap and Others Don’t 

(New York: HarperCollins, 2001). 


7 Habits® Personality Profile 

Joe Wong 

Times-Lite Electrical Engineering Sdn Bhd 

Joe Wong is managing director of Times Lite 

Electrical Engineering, a highly successful 

Kuantan-based company that he started in 

1989. The company supplies electrical 

component products to the oil and gas 

industry, an industry that Joe has been 

involved in for the last twenty-four years, 

having worked off-shore and on-shore 

before becoming his own boss fourteen 

years ago. 

Very much a self-made man, Joe started 

working at the tender age of fifteen, and has 

this to say, "I came up in life the hard way, 

but I am grateful for what what I have received in return 

along the way. I believe I have a lot to give back to the 

community, especially people in my team and in my life." 

Joe is happily married and has three sons – the two older 

sons are in Form 1 and Form 3 respectively, while the 

youngest son is 5 years old ("Latecomer," chuckles Joe). 

The Compass caught up with him at his office in 

downtown Kuantan recently. 

When did you first come into contact 

with the Seven Habits®? 

It was in 1996, a time when I was a bit 

down in my life in terms of business. I 

had lost a lot of money and I had almost 

lost everything as well, including my 

self-confidence. Robert, my partner at 

the Robert Lam English Language 

Center, told me about Dr Covey’s book, 

The Seven Habits of Highly Effective 

People® and said, "Joe, you should read 

this book and see how it can help you." 

I went out to buy the book and the 

rest is history. I have read the book over 

and over again since then, 29 times at the 

last count! It’s a beautifully written book 

and it has certainly changed the way I 

look at the world. During my first reading 

of the book, I discovered why I had been 

successful at times and why I had failed 

at other times. I finished the book in 

three days – couldn’t put it down at all! 

What was it about the book that got 

you hooked? 

…many things, but the most powerful 

concept was that of taking the inside-out 

approach – the timing could not have 

been better, as I was really at my lowest 

ebb at that time. I thought about how my 

business had started and how we had 

been climbing, climbing, climbing 

upwards all that time. We became so 

successful and suddenly, "pommmm" – 

everything crashed, came down, flat. The 

book allowed me to look at my mistakes 

– I had started out by taking an inside-out 

approach but like many people who get 

carried away by success, my approach to 

doing business started to become more 

and more outside-in and outside me! 

Instead of looking to people who were 

more creative and people who could 

voice opinions different from mine, I 

became surrounded by yes-men. The 

book showed me what I had done right in 

1989 during the first phase of my business. 

I realized there and then what I had 

to do next. 

After I finished reading the book 

on the third day, I went back to the office, 

called for a meeting and told my people I 

was going to change. I issued them the 

challenge that it was now going to be a 

case of "Win-win or no deal". These 

were people who had been with me since 

the day I opened shop. I told them that 

there would be great sacrifices ahead and 

that if they could not accept it, I would 

understand if they wanted to resign. 

Imagine telling this to your team at the 

time you needed them the most! Luckily, 

everyone stayed on. I guess I did have a 

very high emotional account with these 

people. From then on, I have always 

used the inside-out approach, with special 

emphasis on principles and the character 

ethic. 

Do you have a favorite Habit? 

Yes, Habit 1 – Be Proactive. This is the 

Habit that starts you off on the right 

footing. Without being proactive, you 

can’t expect to be effective with all the 

other Habits. It is the key to achieving 

your private victory. Together with 

Habits 2 and 3, Habit 1 helps us as we 

journey on to our public victories using 

Habits 4, 5 and 6. 

Which Habits do you find easiest and 

most difficult to practice? 

Once you start practicing the first three 

Habits, you know that you are already 

practicing the character ethic. Add to that 

the fact that you are in alignment with 

principles, and the reality is that you will 


tend to make sure that whoever you are 

dealing with will also win. In that light, 

the easiest Habit to practice would have 

to be Habit 4: Think Win-Win. When you 

feel more compassionate, and you get 

into more sharing and giving, Think Win- 

Win just comes to you naturally when 

you deal with other people, especially if 

you have started right with Habit 1: Be 

Proactive and also Habits 2 & 3. 

The most difficult Habit to 

practice (after Habit 1, of course) is Habit 

5: Seek First to Understand, then to be 

Understood. To be able to seek first to 

understand before seeking to be understood 

is such a rare quality nowadays. I 

always tell my people that if you can 

master this Habit, you will never go 

hungry. Remember what Jack Welch said 

in his book about 70% of success being 

about people and only 30% about market 

and product? The real reason behind a 

person being successful in the public 

realm has to do with having good and 

effective interpersonal skills, which can 

only come about if you have strong intrapersonal 

skills. You have to know 

yourself before you know other people, 

and that brings us back to the effectiveness 

of the inside-out approach and the 

importance of being proactive. 

Tell us about significant changes in 

behavior that have come about at your 

company as a result of assimilating the 

Seven Habits® as your core philosophy. 

Offhand I can think of two. How we go 

about doing our work has definitely 

changed. You see, in our line of business, 

we entertain a lot. Most of our clients are 

from the multi-nationals. You will 

understand that some of them are pubgoers 

and socially active, and we had felt 

we had to do some of our entertaining at 

these places. Well, we re-examined our 

values and re-aligned ourselves to 

principles and cut that down. And you 

know what, we found that we could still 

get our business without having to go for 

a beer with them till 4 o’ clock in the 

morning! We realized that they respected 

us for that too. 

The other change that is visible is 

in the way we treat each other at the 

company. We have become more like 

friends rather than co-workers. We have 

learnt to value differences. The company 

culture also underwent a change for the 

better. Instead of having me as the 

obvious leader and the rest going "yes sir, 

yes sir", I told them that they all had a 

right to their views and I encouraged 

them to voice out whatever they didn’t 

like or didn’t agree with at the forums 

provided. Now, whenever we have our 

meetings, nobody is afraid anymore to 

voice their concerns and even to take 

responsibility for mistakes because the 

atmosphere is so open and friendly. 

Were there corresponding changes in 

your personal life? 

Oh yes, The Seven Habits® changed my 

life forever. Prior to practicing the 

Habits, I have to admit I was a very 

domineering father and husband. I used 

to go home and demand that things be 

done only in a certain way. My son can 

tell you how bad-tempered I used to be if 

things were not done my way. After 

reading the book, I woke up to the fact 

that this was all very one-sided. I realized 

how lucky I was to have a great wife who 

didn’t complain at all. She had been so 

“nobody is afraid anymore to 

voice their concerns and even to 

take responsibility for mistakes” 

patient with me throughout and I knew 

then I would have to change. Since 

becoming a Seven Habits® practitioner, I 

have learnt to value and treasure differences. 

I have learnt to become more 

caring and more patient. These days, 

whenever I feel disappointed or upset, I 

just take a drive and go somewhere else, 

maybe have a cup of tea, cool down and 

give myself an opportunity for reflection, 

and then go back and try to look for a 

more synergistic solution rather than a 

self-centered one. 

I really believe in the concept of 

Habit 7: Sharpening the Saw. Thanks to 

The Seven Habits®, I felt encouraged to 

be principle-centered and improve and 

develop myself in all fronts. I have taken 

up meditation. I meditate almost daily, 

something that I have been doing for the 

past four years. 

Thanks for sharing so much with us, 

Joe. In conclusion, do you have any 

words of advice for beginning Seven 

Habits® practitioners? 

Start by focusing on and practicing Habit 

1 all the way, even if it takes you a whole 

year. I believe that if we fail to internalize 

the importance of all that’s associated 

with Habit 1: Be Proactive, we will not 

be able to understand about the character 

ethic, about being principle-centered and 

about the law of the harvest. I wish them 

all the best as they begin The Seven 

Habits® journey. 


Time: 

What is it? 

By C F Wong 

"Dost thou love life? Then do 

not squander time, for that’s the 

stuff life is made of." 

These words have been attributed 

to the famous American icon, the 

late Benjamin Franklin. 

Inspiring and thought-provoking, I 

believe. These days, everything is 

changing so fast, and traffic jams seem to 

be an accepted part of city living. We 

tend to live and go faster, faster and 

faster. As a leader at our level, if we are 

not reflecting along the way, we might 

not be able to leave a legacy of memories. 

If we persist on going faster, faster 

and faster, who knows we might be 

leaving a legacy of tragedy or if you 

prefer, comedy - hopefully, not a legacy 

of damaged relationships and broken 

bodies. 

Time is a complex subject, what 

more managing it. To make things simple 

but not any simpler, we can look at time 

management as managing events in our 

life. If we cannot manage, we can always 

strive to influence and adapt these events 

within our own circle of competence. 

What is an event? 

When we get up in the morning, 

taking a warm shower is an event, having 

our breakfast is an event and driving to 

work is an event. Spending or investing 

time in an important relationship is an 

event. The death of a loved one is also a 

painful event as we reflect in our 

memory. These events consume and 

distract our time and focus. In a way, they 

can also be our "FOCUS Breakers". Most 

of these events require our personal 

presence and time. We cannot empower 

someone else to do it on our behalf. In a 

way, our physical presence in such events 

is in congruence with our values. 

Each new day, we are blessed with so 

many exciting events in our life. The 

thought of deciding and choosing to 

spend our time on each event compared 

to the other, at times agonizes us. To say, 

"YES" to some events, means we have to 

say ‘NO" to others. In the final analysis, 

sometimes events we say "NO" to can be 

more important in our lives. As an 

example, saying ‘NO’ to our children’s 

birthday celebrations and ‘YES’ to that 

visible project we are managing. 

So! How can we increase our skills 

to choose and execute events in our lives 

better? 

Let’s explore and share some ideas 

together. 

On a beautiful summer afternoon, 

back in January 22nd, 1999, my family 

and I stumbled on a restaurant called 

Planet Hollywood in Sydney, Australia. 

As we waited for our food to be served, I 

started to observe the posters of popular 

film stars that were used to decorate the 

wall of the restaurant. It did not take long 

for me to spot a picture frame that was 

different from the others. Inside it was 

just a piece of white paper with some 

handwritten words. The title said Bruce 

Lee’s personal hand written letter . 

Let me reproduce the words of that 

letter, supposedly written by the legendary 

Bruce Lee himself: 


Peter Steiner / cartoonbank.com 

Dated: Jan 1969, Bruce Lee’s personal hand-written letter 

"I, Bruce Lee, will be the first highest paid oriental 

super star in the United States. In return, I will give 

the most exciting performance and render the best of 

quality in the capacity of an actor. 

Starting 1970, I will achieve world fame and 

from then onward till the end of 1980 I will have in 

my possession $10,000,000.00 

I will live the way I please and achieve inner 

harmony and happiness." 

My intent of sharing this letter is to 

highlight one of the learning lessons we 

can infer from reading it. In his short life 

on this planet, the late Bruce Lee did 

manage to focus and execute his plans, 

goals, purpose, passion or mission in his 

life, whatever words we are comfortable 

using. 

If we are investing our time and 

energy on events we are passionate about, 

it is possible we will have no time to 

spare on events that do not contribute to 

our goal or purpose in life. Events we are 

passionate about are events we will be 

likely to focus on with emotional energy 

to execute. Execution is a word relevant 

to today’s world of business. 

Robert Slater in his book "Saving Big 

Blue" quotes Lou Gerstner, IBM’s former 

CEO, who defines execution not as going 

to meetings, convening task forces, 

debating issues, studying opportunities 

and escalating problems, but instead as 

closing deals, calling on customers, 

shipping products, meeting and exceeding 

targets. It is not about working harder 

or for longer hours. It is about working 

on the right things, the ones with the 

highest marketplace impact. 

In our working world today, it is 

business as usual for us to be asked to do 

so many things or events with so little 

time. Is it possible for us to focus and 

execute? If we can influence and adapt to 

the events we are facing, is it possible 

that we can be more focused and execute 

our right things? 

Perhaps if we are MAD enough to 

look for a solution to help us focus and 

execute, we can increase our skills to do 

so. In a way, the solution lies within us. 

In one of her books, Laurie Beth 

Jones wrote about the story of Candy 

Leitner, the woman who started the 

organization "Mothers Against Drunk 

Driving", or MADD. This woman had 

complained to legislators that a convicted 

drunk driver with a previous history had 

killed her teenage daughter and walked 

away unscathed. Nobody listened to this 

grieving mother. Candy Leitner did not 

just take her grief home and cover it up. 

She organized a group of mothers called 

MADD and set the media fields on fire. 

Wow! I guess she was focused with 

enough emotional energy to execute and 

make a difference. 

What time is it? Time: what is it? 

MAD enough? Check out our website at 

www.franklincoveymalaysia.com 

Perhaps we can explore and discover a 

solution to help us focus on and execute 

our important events in life. 

C F Wong focuses on and executes 

important events at FranklinCovey Malaysia 

as its senior consultant. 


... right training, for the right people, for the right reasons ... 

I BELIEVE 

TRAINING PAYS 

By Dr. D. H. (Dee) Groberg 

People often ask, "How much does such and such training cost?" The answer 

should be, "Nothing. It pays." Of course to have training pay, it has to be the 

right training, for the right people, for the right reasons, positioned and given 

in the right way and at the right time, and nurtured in the right way. 

Because I have had personal experience in working in many organizations, both 

large and small, and have even created and managed my own companies, I can speak 

from personal experience. Looking back I can say that all else being equal, when the 

companies that I have worked for did extremely well, I believe it was because of 

effective training. And when they did not do well, effective training could have solved 

the problems. That’s why I say that if done right, I believe training pays. 

The real question then, is, "How do you do it right?" Or, "What is effective 

training?" Here are five criteria that I believe effective training must meet: 

1. Was it enjoyable to the participants? 

In other words, did they 

like it? 

2. Did they learn what was taught? 

Did they gain new information, 

tools, motivation, etc.? 

3. Did they apply what they learned? 

Did they take it beyond the 

classroom into their real life? 

4. Did applying it make a positive 

difference? Did it make them 

more productive, better communicators, 

easier to get along with, 

more focused on the things that 

really matter? 

5. Did it endure? Was it more than 

just a splash in the pan? Did it 

continue and even grow in use? 

If the training meets these criteria, it 

could be called "Effective Training." But 

now the real challenge comes: How do 

you measure the training against each of 

the above criteria? And there’s the 

difficulty. And here are some ways that I 

have learned over my career to insure that 

training will meet these criteria. 

In my work experience, I have both 

trained and managed training for many 

organizations over the last 40 years. And 

my view of training and how to make it 

pay and measure the results has changed 

over the years. Originally, I looked at 

training very simplistically: you just DO 

A TRAINING NEEDS ANALYSIS and 

then provide the training that the needs 

analysis points to. The problem with this 

approach was that people often appeared 

to need much more training than was 

practical to give. And even the training 

that was given often didn’t "stick." Even 

though they might have enjoyed it, they 

didn’t learn it and/or they didn’t use it. 

Of course we could just blame that on the 

participants: "They’re lazy, undisciplined," 

etc. But that didn’t get us the 

results we were looking for. So it wasn’t 

effective training. (And, of course, the 

needs kept changing, and different 

training fads would come and go.) That 

took me to the first major change in my 

view of training: TRAINING THAT 

ISN’T APPLIED USUALLY ISN’T 

WORTH DOING. AND WHETHER OR 

NOT IT IS APPLIED IS AT LEAST 

PARTIALLY THE RESPONSIBILITY 

OF THE TRAINER. 


Taking more responsibility for the 

application of the training seemed to be 

simple: use relevant examples in the 

classroom, have follow-up activities 

afterwards, etc. Unfortunately, the results 

of doing such things were disappointing. 

Taking more responsibility for the 

application of the training turned out to 

be more than just using relevant examples 

in the classroom, or having followup 

afterwards—although these are both 

important. Taking more responsibility 

involved managing what I call the 

"dynamics" of training. The "dynamics" 

of training involve all of the forces that 

act either positively or negatively on the 

training. UNDERSTANDING THE 

DYNAMICS OF TRAINING AND 

GETTING THEM TO WORK FOR YOU 

INSTEAD OF AGAINST YOU 

TURNED OUT TO BE AN IMPOR- 

TANT KEY TO EFFECTIVE TRAIN- 

ING. 

At first the obvious way of increasing 

the likelihood that the training was 

learned and used back at work was to get 

the management more involved. Management 

turned out to be the most 

important dynamic of training. Management’s 

involvement might include having 

the managers select participants as a 

reward for their good performance, (as 

opposed to giving the participants the 

feeling that they needed to be "fixed"), 

follow up afterwards by discussing what 

the participant had learned, how they 

were going to use it on the job, etc. 

Surprisingly this had little impact in 

increasing the effectiveness of the 

training. Managers were often too busy 

to do the follow up and saw it as something 

else they had to do on top of all 

their regular workload. So in most cases, 

selection was arbitrary, and the follow up 

just didn’t happen. 

Then came the big breakthrough, a 

breakthrough that would insure that any 

training would be fun, would be learned 

and applied, and would produce results 

that would endure and even grow over 

time. This breakthrough was to LINK 

THE TRAINING TO SOMETHING THE 

COMPANY AND THE EMPLOYEES 

ARE CURRENTLY TRYING TO DO 

ON THE JOB. Then they see the training 

not as something else they have to do in 

addition to their regular work, but as a 

way of helping them do what they are 

already trying to do, but making it easier, 

more efficient, and more enjoyable. It 

would ensure that all the five criteria 

above are met, and that training really 

pays rather than costs. I call this "positioning." 

I also recognized one aspect of 

training that was also at the core in 

assuring that it endured. That is: WORK- 

ING WITH THE PERSON FROM THE 

INSIDE OUT. It turned out that the only 

training that really stuck was training that 

changed the person, the individual. As 

obvious as that might seem, I have only 

seen a half a dozen or so training programs 

that really accomplish this inside 

out approach, and do it effectively. 

Finally, training that really "takes" is 

often training that can be broadly used in 

many aspects of a person’s life. When 

someone can see that what they are 

learning applies equally at home, as at 

work, with friends as with co-workers 

and customers, they immediately value it 

more. One way to accomplish this is to 

have the TRAINING BASED NOT ON 

JUST "PRACTICES," BUT ON "PRIN- 

CIPLES." Because principles are 

universal, natural laws they can always 

be used. There are very few training 

programs that I have seen that focus on 

timeless, universal principles. Most 

focus only on specific and limited 

practices. 

For the past 14 years I have been 

focusing on teaching Dr. Stephen Covey’s 

"SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY 

EFFECTIVE PEOPLE®." One reason I 

have focused on this is because I feel it is 

one of the few programs that meets all of 

the criteria of an effective program. And 

I have seen concrete and specific results 

both in individuals, work teams, families, 

companies, and other organizations that 

have used them. I have seen individuals 

become the catalyst for great change in 

their organizations by living the Seven 

Habits®. I have seen a 15 minute 

application of just one habit bring in 

multi-millions of dollars to a bank. I 

have seen a manager use the Seven 

Habits® as a catalyst to launch a strategic 

initiative in his company. 

Because the Seven Habits® helps 

individuals become more effective and 

more balanced in all areas of their lives, 

in addition to becoming more productive, 

they also tend to become more loyal to 

the company that provided the training 

for them. They see the company as 

valuing them as individuals, not just as 

cogs in a machine that produce results for 

someone else. Such loyalty and dedication 

produces better results. 

Selecting and implementing effective 

training – training that pays, not just costs 

– is not easy. It requires effort and 

understanding. But by using the above 

guidelines and by understanding what it 

took me 40 years to learn, you can better 

select appropriate training, and position it 

so that it helps people do what they are 

doing anyway, (but do it better and more 

efficiently). And, if the training is based 

on principles, you can have the confidence 

that it will "stick" and make an 

enduring contribution to both the individual 

and the company. 

Dee Groberg is an associate consultant at 

FranklinCovey Malaysia. He will be 

facilitating the Seven Habits of Highly 

Effective People® program from April 5-7 at 

the Hyatt Subang and from June 7-9 at the 

Mandarin Oriental KL. 

The Compass is a quarterly newsletter 

published by: 

LEADERSHIP RESOURCES (M) SDN BHD 

Suite 5.02, Level 5, PJ Tower 

Amcorp Trade Center 

18 Jalan Persiaran Barat 

46050 Petaling Jaya, Selangor 

Tel: 03-7958 6418 

03-7955 1148 

Fax: 03-7955 2589 

Email: covey@po.jaring.my 

info@franklincoveymalaysia.com 

Homepage: 

http://www.franklincoveymalaysia.com 

Do you have comments, anecdotes, 

reflections and experiences to share 

regarding living the Seven Habits 

principles? We would love to hear from 

you. Please contact us or write to us so 

that we can publish them in The 

Compass. 

LEADERSHIP RESOURCES (M) SDN BHD is 

the exclusive licensee for Franklin Covey 

programs and products in Malaysia and 

Negara Brunei Darusalam. 


PUBLICPROGRAMME 

CALENDAR April – August 2004 

Trainer 

Dates 

Duration 

W hat You Will Receive 

Fees (RM) 

The 7 Habits of 

Highl 

ighly 

Effective People® 

(Claimable under 

PROLUS or SBL–KHAS 

Scheme) 

Dr Dee Groberg 

Presenter/Consultant 

USA 

April 5-7 

Hyatt,Subang 

June 7-9 

Mandarin Oriental, KL 

August 2-4 

Hyatt,Subang 

2 1/2 days -Participant Manual 

-Franklin Planner 

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective 

People book, Living the 7 Habits 

book and 3 CD Audio 

-2 tea breaks & 1 lunch for each full 

day 

RM 2,950 

The 7 Habits of 

Highl 

ighly 

Effective People® 



Scheme) 

VS Pandian 


Malaysia 

CF Wong 


Malaysia 

April 19-21 

Crowne Plaza Riverside, 

Kuching 

May 17-19 

Hyatt,Subang 

3 days -Participant Manual 


The 7 Habits of Highly Effective 

People book, Living the 7 Habits 

book and 3 CD Audio 


day 

RM 2,250 

CF Wong 


Malaysia 

July 12-14 


businessThink 

(Claimable under SBL 

scheme) 

CF Wong 


Malaysia 

& 

V. Sitham 


Malaysia 

April 6-7 


2 days -businessThink 

Participant Kit 

-businessThink book 

-businessThink book CD 


day 

RM 1,850 

7 Tabiat Orang 

Yan 

ang 

Amat 

Berkesan® 



Scheme) 

Mohd Radzi Zainal 


Malaysia 

April 19-20 

Hotel Equatorial,KL 

June 28- 29 

Hyatt, Subang 

August 16-17 

Armada Hotel, PJ 


-7 Tabiat Orang Yang 

Amat Berkesan book and 

Supplementary Note 


day 

RM 990 

4 Roles of 

Leadership 

eadership 



Scheme) 

CF Wong 


Malaysia 

April 20-22 

Hyatt, Subang 

July 19-21 


2 1/2 days -Participant Manual 

-360-degree profile 

-Principle Centered Leadership book, 

Living the 7 Habits book, 3 CD Audio 

& Juggling Thuds 


day 

RM 2,250 

Focus & Execution: 

The 4 Disciplines 

of 

High Performing 

Team 

eams 


scheme) 

CF Wong, Mohd 

Radzi Zainal & 

Kim Yeong 


Malaysia 

May 11-12 

Hyatt, Subang 

2 days -Participant Workbook 


-3 CD Audio 

-Execution book 


day 

RM 1,950 

Creative and 

Rationa 

ational 

Decision Making 


scheme) 

Andrew Sng 


Singapore 

May 25-27 

Hyatt, Subang 

August 10-12 




day 

RM 2,750 

Organizational 

Learning 

& 

Systems 

Thinking 


scheme) 

Michael Goodman 


USA 

June 21-23 



-The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook 


day 

RM 2,950 

For registration or enquiries: Call 03-79551148 or 03-79576627 

12 • the Compass: March 2004 

Printed by Ideal Colour Press Sdn Bhd, 3&5 Jalan 7/155 Bukit Jalil Integrated Business Park, O U G 58000 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

FOCUS EXECUTION

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