Charles Gupton

Charles Gupton

Being Responsible, Responsibly

Taking responsibility for a mistake means more than saying “I did it, but it wasn’t my fault,” when finally backed into a corner.  Accepting responsibility requires not shifting blame to another party but taking the necessary steps to make amends.

You witness examples of people not taking responsibility on a regular basis, don’t you?

Your doctor performs an unnecessary exam that you’re charged for without telling you until you get the bill. He tries to deflect responsibility but still expects you to pay the bill.

A co-worker commits to getting some key information for a project you’re responsible for, but doesn’t come through. She says “I got caught up with another project.” But you’re still left in the bind.

A friend lets some gossip slip out that hurts another relationship dear to you, but refuses to correct the mistake, leaving you in an awkward position.

In every case of shifted responsibility, an action was taken – or not – that leaves you in a difficult situation. The offending party, seemingly, walks away unscathed.
We have all experienced the wasted time and frustration dealing with the unwillingness of some people to ever step up and own their responsibility for screwing up.

But when clarity of thought resumes, the question to ask is: “In what situations am I overlooking my responsibility to take responsibility?”

Charles

What Distinctives Make You Distinctive?

A number of years back, I ventured into the area of personal portrait work. I wanted to apply the storytelling approach I took with commercial assignments to the world of family portraits. My venture was not the raging success I wanted, partly because most folks couldn’t picture themselves doing something that wasn’t just like what their friends were doing.

To dig into the story of a family, I would ask a number of questions to give me insights into how we could capture a portrait that was distinctive to them. Although the answers that were most revealing led to better portraits, many people could not come up with anything distinctive about themselves or what their purpose was.

In one particularly alarming case, a mother came back to me several days after our meeting. She was angry that, “There are no activities that bind our family together because we’re four people living in separate worlds all wanting to go our separate ways!” Initially, her wrath was directed towards me for asking the questions that revealed an unsettling truth. But a couple of weeks later she called, grateful to have finally addressed an issue that was leading to a divorce.

What is even more unsettling is the number of business owners that I talk with who don’t know their distinctive purpose or reason for being either. Rather than dig into the uncomfortable process of discovering their story, they simply ignore the process and go about their business using the standard operating procedures that everyone else in their field is using. Yielding to peer pressure to be like, and look like, everyone else.

Most people are looking for a new set of tools, or life-hacks, that are going to give them an edge. But any improvements that are based on technology or a formula are also available to their competition.

The only distinctive that sets you apart is your unique story. Your history, world-view, and vision. Telling that story to the world allows your potential clients, employees, and partners to connect with you in a way that they never can with anyone else.

It’s your distinctive story that moves you from being a commodity in your market to being a competition of one.

Charles

 

Striving Towards Happy

For all of my adult life, I have been a “striving” person. For the most part, I still am. By striving, I mean being discontent with where I am and actively pursuing my next goal. Early in my career, I was striving to build a business and my career. As it has been with many of my peers in the creative and communication fields, the last several years have been spent striving to rebuild a career and a business.

But the coin of discontent, of striving, has two sides to it. The positive side of discontent is that it moves us out of complacency. The two motivations for change are (1) to move towards something that will lead to more pleasure and (2) to move away from a situation that is causing us pain. One or the other must prevail in order for us to divorce ourselves from our current habit.

The negative side of discontent is that, by definition, when we are discontent, we’re not happy. Because I’ve spent the bulk of my life in the mode of striving to become, I’ve seldom been “happy” with who I’ve been. I believed happiness was far over-rated. But not so much anymore.

I am coming to believe that happy people can be more productive people. Thoughtful, happy people are generally more focused on who they are and the process of what they’re doing. Strivers focus primarily on what they’ve not yet gotten done. When you are busy with striving, it is easy to confuse activity with accomplishment. It’s difficult to be happy when you are focused solely on your forward motion and never on the joy of your accomplishments along the way.

What’s your take on it?

Charles

Are you Hoarding Fear?

Over the last couple of years, as Linda and I have moved in the direction of creating short films for companies, we’ve encountered a fair amount of underlying fear from business owners who need to be telling their stories. But their fear is holding them hostage.

Fear of trying something new. Fear of uncovering their own story about why they do what they do. Fear of spending money in an uncertain economy. Fear that cripples them from growing and using their abilities to be more productive and profitable.

During the same period, we have been more deeply involved with elder care for several relatives. We’ve seen parallels that are unsettling when people are unwilling to address fear and make necessary adjustments before those changes are no longer as helpful to them.

I have an aunt in Charleston, S.C., who is being placed in a nursing home this week. When her husband, Tony, died twelve years ago, her life virtually stopped. She wanted no changes in her life to occur. When her refrigerator stopped working several years back, she refused to allow it to be replaced because Tony bought it. Her washer and dryer were in an outside storage room that she could barely manage to access but she refused to move them in the house because Tony had put them there when he did the laundry. She wouldn’t allow his pickup truck to be moved from under her carport so that it could shelter her and her car in inclement weather even though she is extremely handicapped.

Some of the trash, mixed with new purchases, stacked in my aunt’s home as a result of hoarding.

Knowing that she would become increasingly more disabled,we tried, without success, to get her outside help to prepare her food, clean her house, and take care of her physical needs. Because she’s a hoarder, trash piled up. When cat litter boxes were no longer emptied, feces and urine filled the house. Although Social Services was called several times, we were told there was nothing they or we could do.

When she fell recently, a concerned neighbor called the police, who finally got Social Services involved and got her home condemned. She was placed in the hospital until her placement into the nursing home.

Her greatest fear was to be forced to leave her house. Had she been willing to make the emotionally uncomfortable but incremental changes to maintain her quality of life, she could still be in her home. And in better health. Her “story” of distrusting other people – friends and relatives who love her – exacerbated her fears and paralyzed her life.

My aunt is an extreme case. Reality TV shows feature people like her so that viewers can think, “I may hold on to my particular comforts or fears, but I’m not that bad!”

Maybe not. But the fears that hold you back are not allowing you to grow your life or be of service to people around you. Fear causes you to keep your attention on you.

I work in the business of telling stories for businesses because I believe the stories we tell have the power to launch us forward. I want to uncover and shape stories so that people can reach their potential for helping others (and making a profit). But I’ve come to understand that I can’t help anyone who is unwilling to stop being a pack rat holding on to fear.

Are there fears holding you back today?

Charles

Negotiation Starts With Value

The most important element in any negotiation process is defining the value of what is being exchanged. Without a clear understanding of what you have to offer and its value to the person you’re communicating with, the negotiation process will quickly become frustrating.

The challenge for many commercial artists/photographers is that they are artists first while the “commercial” aspect unfortunately takes the back seat. The mindset of many artists is that it’s acceptable to be under compensated for their work, hence the description “starving artist.” And what you do is an extension of what you believe.

If you are struggling with the negotiation process, take a look at these two aspects— the value of what you offer and your relationship with money — and think about where you stand. In her book, “Overcoming Underearning,” Barbara Stanny writes: “Psychology is to money what an engine is to a car. Whenever you’re stalled, that’s the first place to look.”

Although “looking under the hood” may be disorienting and the last thing you want to do with your time, negotiation is simply a process of exchanging beliefs about value.

You can’t transfer a belief you don’t have.

Charles