by John Paschall

How good are you at “flea training”? 

Seems like an odd question in an electronic magazine from the Better Business Bureau…unless you own a flea circus, I suppose.  Actually, the way you answer that question will play a critical role in how successful you are at managing your most important asset – your employees, your team, and ultimately how successful you are at growing your business and making it better.

All of you who have been in supervision for any length of time have quickly figured out that the only way for you to achieve your individual goals, your company goals, and to get everything done that you are responsible for, is to get it done through the work of your team. Thus keeping them motivated, enthusiastic, and inspired is key to that work getting done.  Here is where being an expert at “flea training” is critical.

Many speakers, including Zig Ziglar, have used the “flea training” idea in motivational circles for years.  As I understand it, if you put a group of fleas in a jar and close the lid, the fleas will immediately begin to jump and jump and jump and will hit the lid over and over and over again.  Eventually, however, the fleas will instinctively adjust their “jump” so that they no longer jump high enough to hit the lid.  If you then take the lid off of the jar, the fleas will not jump out because they have trained themselves to jump “just so high”.   They are actually then not even capable of jumping out of the jar.  Ok…interesting story you say, but what is the relevance to my employees?

When most of us were very young, say five or six years old, we had a dream of what we wanted to be when we grew up – President of the United States, NFL quarterback, famous actress, a ballerina, firefighter, policeman, etc.  Even when we got a little older we still had a dream, maybe to write a book, or climb a mountain, or to achieve some great accomplishment in life.  This is the human version of jumping and jumping as high as we can – like the flea.  But along the way, we stubbed our toe, hit our head, or had some sort of disappointment in life that caused us to lose sight of our dream.  Maybe someone told us, “You’ll never achieve that, you better set a more reasonable goal.” This is the human version of hitting the lid repeatedly.  Eventually, we adjust our “jump” or expectation so that we will not hit the lid, because it hurts – the disappointment or disillusionment of not realizing a dream hurts.

As master flea trainers, you and I must help our employees and those around us to realize that in life, there really is no lid on the “jar” – except the one that we place on ourselves.  We must become the one to motivate, inspire, and retrain those around us to become motivated from within and help them to begin jumping out of the jar.  They must realize that they CAN achieve the goals they have set for themselves and their company by believing in themselves and continuing to try, continuing to jump.   We must be the ones not to tell someone where to get off, but show them how to get on.  We must be the ones not to see through people but to be the one that sees people through.  

There are some very famous examples of “flea trainers” throughout history: Abraham Lincoln, Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, Helen Keller, Walt Disney, and Vince Lombardi, among others.  Study their life history and you will see that they each eventually learned to become motivated from within, to continue jumping until they began to jump out of their “jar” and how to motivate those around them to do the same.  Think of the impact they have had on our world by learning this concept!

Being that master flea trainer is essential in helping your employees to believe in themselves, to begin accomplishing the goals they have set and that are set for them, and for helping you to achieve all those things that you are responsible for.  So the next time your team member comes into your office and tells you that they “just can’t do it” (maybe even today) – picture that flea hitting the top of the lid.  Then show them how to take the lid off and begin jumping out of the jar – show them how they CAN complete the task and achieve the goal. 

Being a master flea trainer…one of the most important roles you play in your position as a leader.  Let’s make it a point to begin working on our own training and those around us today.  Have a great day and keep building your “Better Business”!