Tag Archive for cops

Do You Have What it Takes to Make Important Split-Second Decisions?

July 23, 2012 Achieve Success Academy No comments

imagesCA5CPZRJ Do You Have What it Takes to Make Important Split Second Decisions?The better your skills and critical thinking are, coupled with training and quickness, the more prepared you will be to make sound split-second decisions.~John R. Salkowski

Making Split-Second Decisions, Do You Have What it takes?

Making split-second decisions in life and in business is a requirement. There are several important factors that must come together in order to accurately and quickly articulate your present situation. Your knowledge, experience, education, training, intuition, confidence and common-sense are all factors that play an important role in making split-second decisions.

When you are called upon to make a split-second decision what happens? Do you freeze? Do you panic? There are situations, such as life or death, which we may be encountered with where you cannot afford to freeze or panic. Split-second decision making requires all of the above factors to come together in order to make the right decision.

There will be times that you will be faced with an important decision where there is no room for error. You must make the right decision at the right time to avoid a catastrophe. Here are some examples: avoiding a car crash, pilots with mechanical failure, military combat, Police Officer faced with an armed and dangerous suspect or anything else requiring immediate decision making. You may think these examples are extreme but let me tell you this, if you are not prepared when that time comes, you are dead on your feet. You will be required at one time or another to make a blink of an eye split-second decision in your life.

Making split-second decisions requires “razor sharp” skill sets. You must continually work on your skills to better prepare for the “blink of the eye” split-second decision. What better way to prepare for situations such as this is to face real problems, facing the risks, making irrevocable decisions head-on. Stop avoiding these situations. Making important, split-second decisions separates the successful from the unsuccessful, leaders from the followers, etc. You get my point. Below, I will put split-second decision making into perspective for most of you.

Most likely everyone reading this has a child or a loved-one that they cherish. What better way to teach that person to make important decisions that could possibly affect the rest of their life is by honing your skill sets on making important, critical, blink of eye split-second decisions. We, as parents cannot be with our children 24/7. There comes a time when we must allow them to spread their wings and fly solo. What better way to prepare yourself for that moment in time is to face your most important decisions head-on so you can teach from example.

I’m John R. Salkowski, Founder of AchieveSuccessAcademy.com, Entrepreneur, Retired Cop, Survivor of PTSD stemming from a shoot and kill robbery incident, Expert on Leadership, Success, Overcoming Adversity & PTSD, Author of 3 books; Leadership in the Line of Duty: 50 Leadership Lessons for making split-second decisions from a Cop who’s been in Life & Death situations, Leadership in the Line of Duty: Success Thoughts and Quotes for Leaders and Nothing But Net: Top Secrets to increase your bottom line, Health, Wealth & Success.

Copyright © 2012. Achieve Success Academy™. All Rights Reserved.

 

 

 

 

You Can Do anything you want if You Believe You Can

March 2, 2012 Achieve Success Academy No comments

Everything Passess At Par, Temporarily; Truth Alone Remains Permanently~Napoleon Hill

“You Can Do It If You Believe You Can”

Are you self-confident? Do you believe in yourself and your abilities? You must because no one else will. It all starts from within you. With out self-confidence no one can become an efficient leader or take the self initiative in any great undertaking without the belief in yourself.

The Power of Initiative

There is no security on this earth, there is only opportunity~General Douglas MacArthur

Initiative and Leadership go hand in hand. Leadership is essential for attaining success and Initiative is the foundation upon which Leadership is built. Initiative is as important to success as the wings to an airplane.

Initiative is that rare quality which impels a person to do what ought to be done without being told to do it. This is what Initiative is to me. Do you possess this quality? You must because it’s paramount to your success.

A powerful example of initiative is found in one of the greatess successes of all time. Founders of Microsoft Bill Gates and Paul Allen. Two individuals that were so obsessed with programming the computers we have today that they thought of nothing else.

A great philosopher once said, “Initiative is the passkey that opens the door of opportunity.”

Becoming a Person of Initiative and Leadership

What helped you over the great obstacles of life was asked of a highly successful man? The other obstacles, he replied.

Are you a procrastinator? The habit of putting off until tomorrow what should have been done yesterday, last week, last month, last year will hold you back from true success. You will not accomplish anything until you eliminate this deadly disease of procrastination.

Would you like to know how to overcome procrastination? This, well-known and scientifically tested principle is called Auto-Suggestion. I want you to copy this formula, put it in a conspicious place in a room where you will see it upon retiring for the evening and arising in the morning.

If you do this, this will start forming a habit of you taking action each day that will carry you one step closer to attaining your Definite Chief Passion or DCP.

Here is it: The Lesson for Eliminating Procrastination

I know that procrastination is a deadly disease of all who want to become leaders in any undertaking and I will eliminate this very bad habit from my personal being.

1-Doing that one thing each day, that very something that ought to be done without anyone telling me to do it.

2-Finding that one thing that I can do each and everyday that I have not beeen doing that will bring value to others without exceptation of reward or payback.

3-Sharing this habit with at least someone in your life that you trust of the value of practicing this habit of doing something that ought to be done without being told to do it.

The muscles of the body become strong with repeated use. Understand that the habit of Initiative also becomes strong with repeated use. It takes only 21 days to make or break a habit. You CAN DO THIS!

I’m John R. Salkowski, Founder of AchieveSuccessAcademy.com, Retired Police Officer, Survivor of PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), Author, Speaker on Leadership, Success and Overcoming Adversity.

I can reached via email at John@JohnSalkowski.com

Copyright 2012 Achieve Success Academy All Rights Reserved

 

 

 

Top 10 Must Have Characteristics of a Great Leader

February 21, 2012 Achieve Success Academy One comment
A good objective of leadership is to help those who are doing poorly to do well and to help those who are doing well to do even better~Jim Rohn
Do you have what it takes to be a great leader? I bet you do. I believe everyone can attain the great qualities and characteristics needed to be an effective leader. The objective behind being a great leader is this: Helping people and/or organizations who are doing poorly to do well. Helping people and/or organization who are doing well but want to get better. The whole idea of great leadership is to get results. To bring them to a whole different level of success.
The task of leadership is not to put greatness into people, but to elicit it, for the greatness is there already~ John Buchan
Being a great leader means bringing out the best in people. Everyone wants to be the best they can be. It’s our job as leaders to do that. We need to find and focus on the strengths of people not their weaknesses.
In my previous career of Law Enforcement, I was surrounded by good and bad leaders. The good leaders focused on making people better while the bad leaders would focus on making people worse. It was astounding to me that the bad leaders would come to work everyday and do nothing but negative leadership. What do I mean by negative leadership? They would focus on the mistakes of people. Instead of making them learn from their mistakes they would punish them and never give good advice and/or training to make that person better. They would lie in wait like a lion hiding from a zebra getting ready to attack. This would happen day in and day out. Just waiting for their people to make mistakes. Being totalling reactive instead of proactive. They would focus on the negatives and not the positives in people. This type of leadership is a sinking ship. This will make any organizations morale go into a tail spin. And if you were ever part of an organization withe horrible morale, you know exactly what I mean. If you want a successful organization, no matter what industry, you need to have great leaders that focus on the strengths and not the weaknesses. To learn, grow and achieve results a great leader must focus on making their people successful by focusing on their strenghths.
Leadership: the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it~Dwight D. Eisenhower
Here are the TOP 10 Must Have Characteristics of a Great Leader:
1) Be a Role Model- You must lead by example. You should never ask someone to do something that you wouldn’t do yourself. You must be seen by your people, and the public as being an expert in your field and an expert in leadership.
2) Have a Mission-Leaders know what their mission is. They know why the organization exists. A great leader has a well thought out (often written) mission describing the purpose of the organization. That purpose need to be descriptive, clear and understandable. Every employee should be able to identify with the mission and strive to achieve it.
3) Have Vision-Where do you want your organization to go? A vision needs to be descriptive enough to encourage people to imagine it but concrete enough for followers to see it, understand it and be willing to climb onboard to fulfill it.
4) Be Goal Oriented-How is the organization going to achieve its mission and vision and how will you measure your progress? Like a vision, goals need to be operational that are specific and measurable. If your output and results can’t be readily measured, then it will be difficult to know if you have achieved your purpose.
5) Have Integrity- Do the right thing all the time. Not sometimes but all the time.
6) Be Passionate in all you do-You must love what you do. You must want success for the organization and the people more than you want the air you breathe.
7) Be Compassionate-Successful leaders are comfortable relating to other people; they easily create rapport and are more extroverted than they are introverted. These factors help leaders seem approachable, likeable, and comfortable in their position. Those qualities contribute to staff wanting to interact with their leader. They also help motivate employees to do a better job. When workers can relate to their boss, they believe that their boss is more concerned about them, with their performance, and with their output. Furthermore, they believe that they can go to their boss with problems they encounter on the job without fearing consequences for not knowing how to resolve issues.
8) Great Communicator-It does little good to have a strong mission, vision, and goals if the leader cannot easily and effectively convey his ideas inside and outside of the organization. He must regularly be in touch with key individuals, by all forms of communication. Of course, the best way to ensure other people receive and understand the message is with face-to-face interactions.
9) Be Inspiring-Employees need someone to look up to for direction, guidance, and motivation. A great leader needs to be that person. Nevertheless, there are times, when many employees need the boss to inspire them by word or action.
10) Be Ambitious-Nothing builds a picture of success more than achievement, and achievement is the number one factor that motivates just about everyone across all cultures. When employees see that their leader can lead and direct, has a clear vision and attainable goals, and actually gains results in a timely manner, then that person’s credibility increases throughout the organization. Great leaders must modestly demonstrate their skills to give their constituents valid reasons to appreciate and value their efforts.
I’m John R. Salkowski, Founder of Achieve Success Academy, Leadership Expert, Author, Speaker, Entrepreneur, Retired Police Officer and PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) Survivor.
I can be reached via email at John@JohnSalkowski.com
Copyright 2012 Achieve Success Academy All Rights Reserved

Achieving Success: Is PTSD Paralyzing You? Here Are The Top 13 Tips On How To Cope More Effectively.

January 31, 2012 Achieve Success Academy One comment

Difficulties strengthen the mind, as well as labor does the body. Seneca

What is PTSD? 

Everyone is different. Therefore, everyone reacts differently to different experiences one encounters. Researchers suggest this disorder affects 5% of the U.S. population or 13 million Americans. By contrast, 3% of the population have cancer. It is expected that 8% of the U.S. population will suffer from or experience some form of PTSD in their life time.

Once associated mainly with the horrow of combat, PTSD has stretched to take in more frequent swerves along life’s road such as car crashes, house fires, sudden death of a loved one, witnessing a disaster. PTSD has broadened the model of mental illness to cover disturbances set off solely by external events, outside the mind. Anyone can be vulunerable.

PTSD has always existed, however we are hearing more and more about it with our returning heros. Hearing the experiences they are going through.

So how does PTSD affect us? I know from personal experience that PTSD caused me to distance myself from everyone, family, friends, co-workers, social events, caused me to isolate myself in all situations, caused me to have nightmares, anger and irritability issues, confusion, difficulty concentrating, flashbacks, suicidal and homocidal thoughts, thoughts of relieving pain with alcohol and drugs. I stopped being the fun-loving, happy go lucky, over-achiever I was. My life stopped dead in its tracks.

Below I wish provide you with some positive and negative coping methods. You obviously want to stay away from the negative ones. I did myself a major disservice by staying quiet for over 5yrs. I internalized everything which was causing me to implode. My life was like an airplane that instantly lost its rudder and was heading for earth in a nose dive. Don’t allow this. If you follow these steps, I assure you, you will overcome the adversity you are faced with. Your life will soon ascend to greater altitudes, which in turn means greater success, happiness, loving relationships and living a more meaningful, fulfilling life that you so deserve.

Look up and not down; look forward and not back; look out and not in; and lend a hand. E. E. Hale

Positive Coping Methods

* Learn as much about PTSD as you can. Do not avoid it.

* Talk to others that you trust and admire for support.

* Talk to your Physician about PTSD.

* Practice relaxation methods and techniques. Relieve your stress with exercise.

* Increase positive activities. Do things that give you joy.

* Stay away from and stop watching negativity. Turn off the Television (News) and pick up and self-help book that will assist you in becoming a better human being.

* Set positive goals for yourself. Example: To read a book a week, to surround yourself with positive, successful people.

* Take prescribed medication to tackle PTSD. Listen to your Doctor.

* Join a PTSD support group

Negative Coping Methods-STAY AWAY From

* Use of alcohol and drugs to relieve your pain. It only enhances it!

* Social Isolation

* Continued Avoidance

* Anger-Like Isolation

Be the change you want in your life. Focus on being a positive role model for your children, support group, co-workers.

You can do this! You can accomplish anything you put your mind, heart and soul into. If I can do this, so can you.

I’m John R. Salkowski, Founder of Achieve Success Academy, Retired Police Officer, Survivor of PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), Leading Authority on Conquering your fear, overcoming your adversity, achieving greater success in your life, Speaker, Entrepreneur and Self-Made Man.

To contact John, email him at John@JohnSalkowski.com. To invite John to speak at your next engagement please enter speaking engagement in subject line.

 

Copyright 2012 Achieve Success Academy All Rights Reserved