The Shay Group

What Is The 4th Quarter Mentality?

If you have spoken with me you probably already know I'm a rabid Patriots fan. Clearly the Patriots practice for putting everything together in the 4th Quarter. They act as a team--with a sense of urgency. But there is motivation and then again there is burning desire. That group carries a flaming torch.

In corporate sales the 4th Quarter is about making the numbers for the year. It’s about corporate profitability and sometimes it’s about company survival. Gary Walker, EVP of Channel Sales & Operations, CustomerCentric Selling expressed it this way:

"You can’t approach this fourth quarter as business as usual. You have to approach the remainder of this year with a sense of urgency. Here are some steps that you can take with some suggested dates: Re-grade your existing pipeline using the Pipeline Grading Form. Who are your real fourth quarter opportunities? When: Now! Take control of your sales pipeline. When: No later than November 1st … “.

On a wholly different tack; one of my heroes from history is the Carthaginian General Hannibal Barca. Hannibal took his army of an assortment of nations and war elephants over the Italian Alps, in the dead of winter. He did this to completely surprise his state's mortal enemy Rome. Hannibal successfully waged war on Roman soil for twenty years, without reinforcements of troops or supplies. He was asked about the Alps march and the impossibility everyone imagined it to be. He said "We will either find a way, or we will make a way". He had sworn to his father that he would always be Rome's enemy. He kept that promise. His was a burning desire.

In much of my recruiting work, I have helped to staff start-up companies. They operate often on a shoestring budget with a small staff. They routinely bring wholly new creations in predictive analytics for healthcare, novel approaches to semiconductors, e-commerce aggregations of products from around the world, completely new systems in inventory control, etc. But the founder and founding team's vision is expansive and revolutionary. To stand with these tech giants is wholly inspirational. The mental leaps they make in connections of technology are astounding. They play for "all the marbles". The founders and their mighty team (if small), know great passion. They have a true 4th Quarter Mentality. They know how to stretch and reach and do the very nearly impossible.

What makes heroes? Do they have no fear? Or is the truth really that they experience fear like all of the rest of us? No, they feel fear and just go right through it. "Motivation, Determination" as the Marines say. The 4th Quarter Mentality is within you and me. We simply need to access it. Yes we definitely need to learn and train and develop the right skills. But then when its time to go all out -- we find the right mojo and make the impossible happen. Let's Be Heroes!

A HIRING MANAGER’S DREAM

Over and over, the Hiring Managers I speak with ask for individuals who can be characterized as Team Players. Normally, I like to write my blog pieces totally from scratch. But I found that John Scorza writing for SHRM (Society for Human Resource Management) did a bang-up job in covering the points I needed to express. A Team Player’s three essential virtues are: *

Humility. Humility is the most important virtue of the three. Great team players, Lencioni writes, don’t have big egos or concerns about status. They are quick to point out the contributions of others and generally don’t seek attention for their own. They define success collectively and not individually. People who are not humble are unable to be vulnerable or build trust and are incapable of engaging in honest conflict.

Hunger. Hungry people are always looking for more, according to Lencioni. More to do. More to learn. More responsibility. They rarely have to be pushed to work harder because they’re self-motivated and diligent. They’re always thinking about the next step and the next opportunity. People who lack the virtue of hunger won’t achieve results.

Smarts. In the context of teamwork, Lencioni writes, being smart is not about one’s intellectual capacity. Instead, smart team players have good common sense about people. They tend to know what is happening in the group and how to deal effectively with others. They ask good questions, listen to what others are saying and stay engaged in conversations. People who aren’t smart in this regard will create unnecessary problems, especially when involved in productive conflict and holding people accountable for their actions.
Those three traits combined in one individual -- along with the critical skills and experience needed for a given hire, clearly are a Hiring Manager’s Dream. When you meet that individual; deliver him/her a strong and timely offer. Don’t let much time pass. Such individuals are fairly rare and hard to come by.
Cheers
Gary Silver

blog.shrm.org/blog/3-essential-virtues-of-the-ideal-team-player
Patrick Lencioni recent work The Ideal Team Player: How to Recognize and Cultivate the Three Essential Virtues (Jossey-Bass, 2016), “a leadership fable”

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