Well, as a business advisor, consultant, and entrepreneur—Man, do I wish I had known about Illuminate the Negative sooner! It’s a simple methodology that has boosted the effectiveness in just about every aspect of my life, personal and professional.

The precipitating event to this realization came while watching a Disney video with my daughter, Jenna. The dancing bear sang, “You’ve got to ac-cen-tu-ate the positive and e-lim-inate the negative.” Great advice for my daughter, great advice for me, and I lived by that credo for years. All the tapes and books I read seemed to echo the same message, often in a different form, but very similar none the less—the positive should be accentuated and the negative should be eliminated.

Here’s what I noticed. Too many people considered the best way to eliminate the negative was to IGNORE it, not deal with it, sweep it under the rug. Well, I guess that might work temporarily to make us feel good but it does nothing but put the problem off.  Eliminate does not mean Ignore.

Then it hit me. A critical question: Why are some of my client interventions so much more effective than others? Why do some learnings and systems take hold and prosper for the long haul and others’ benefits, while some, though significant and pleasing, slowly fizzle out over time?

The answer became abundantly clear. Those who had lasting results not only focused in on Accentuating the Positive but they also focused in on Eliminating the Negative—by addressing the negative. And, before they eliminated it, they illuminated it. They didn’t ignore it, they shined the light on it and took a good, hard, solid honest look at it. Sort of like a tumor where you need to first study what’s causing it and feeding it, and where it’s infiltrated. You don’t just cut it out (eliminate it) without first studying it (illuminating it).

It seemed that the real winning individuals and teams were willing to do the work of addressing those ‘thousand-pound elephants’ in the room—the negatives—while others simply and painfully ignored them.

“I didn’t want to be labeled a negative person so I just didn’t bring it up,” was commonly experienced. Well, I have news for those well intended people. There’s nothing POSITIVE about ignoring NEGATIVE influences and allowing them to live and grow at the expense of all involved.

High performing people, teams, and organizations are solid enough in their core beliefs and values to allow people to bring up the obstacles that need to be faced; whether they can solve them immediately or not. Just knowing about them, keeping them on the radar, and planning to deal with them as resources allow, creates a culture that will lead to personal and professional excellence.

Frequently, just bringing the issues to the table is all that is needed- sort of like how the vampire dies when facing the light of day…the solutions are often relatively simple when illuminated and eliminated.

You can do this. Better yet, you can create and foster an environment around you that does this. One that allows for, dare I say—ASKS for—the addressing of the negatives impacting our lives.

For example, a billion-dollar client of mine is known as perhaps the largest purveyor of pizza in the world.

The negative? Well, the negative hadn’t been addressed. So when the negative was illuminated, here’s what we found. Customers were in a hurry to get something for dinner by 4:30 p.m. They really didn’t know what to order, but felt pressured to decide quickly so they simply took the easiest path and ordered from any coupon they could find.

After illuminating that situation, we began to see solutions.  We hypothesized, ‘what if our order takers were more sympathetic to customers’ needs and time schedules? What if they became problem solvers and actually gave customers suggestions? What if they treated them as if they were calling into a crisis hotline and tried to understand their problems and urgency? How could we train our order takers to say and do what truly would help customers and, in turn, help build lasting customer relationships?’

The results of the changes made were spectacular. Sales went through the roof, and repeat sales did too. It seemed that the customers responded very well to the ‘problem-solving, crisis- hotline’ mentality. It was a big winner. 

First we Illuminated the Negative, in this case customer stress and uncertainty. Then we illuminated the order-taking process and found that the employees were not attuned to their potential role as problem solvers. Finally, we acted to Eliminate the Negative by arming employees with good customer service skills and teaching them to be aware, sensitive, and positive about solving customer problems at hand; a process that would not have been possible if they only had focused on the positive—MORE COUPONS!

If you are not succeeding in any aspect of your business, don’t be afraid to dive right in and find out why. Don’t pretend a problem doesn’t exist. Problems aren’t terrible. We can learn from them, and we can improve our leadership and people skills by facing and solving problems; and hopefully increase the bottom line as well. 

If you are not achieving your desired success, there IS a reason. Be an investigative reporter and dig deep for the negative. Talk to your customers, employees, vendors, and competitors; ask questions and take notes. Listen with an open mind and evaluate what you have learned.  

What did you learn about your reputation? Do people feel you are honest? Do they want to do business with you? If not, why? If it is something about you, don’t be hurt or mad. Do what it takes to change. Accentuate your positive and illuminate your negative.  

What did you learn about how people feel about your products, your employees, and your customer service? Did you find out what you are doing right and what you are doing wrong?

I hope that your employees are an area of your business where you can accentuate the positive but, if not, illuminate the negative and find out what you can do. Unhappy employees will not talk favorably about you or your business, and can deeply damage your reputation. They will not care about you if you don’t care about them. Give them the proper respect, praise, and training.

Milton Hershey, the famous chocolate maker, knew the value of his employees. He built beautiful homes for them to live in, a transportation system to get them to and from work, schools for their children, and even a park with amusement rides and a swimming pool. He knew his dream of making chocolate would never have come true without good people to help him, and he accentuated them.  Illuminate the negative: no people no chocolate. No affordable homes no people.

So, here are three of my greatest tips for success: