The Need To Manage

There is management. There is micromanagement. There is the laissez faire approach to management (my personal favorite - more on that below.) And there is what I think of as The Need To Manage.

The need to manage happens when you have a competent, experienced team, and there isn't much for managers to do in the way of coaching them. Of course, no one wants to feel unneeded, so the managers manage or micromanage or worse, mismanage, what needn't be managed at all.

I have found myself on the managed side of this equation and I can tell you it's demotivating. Don't tell me what I already know just because you have no value to add. If you are a manager looking for an opportunity to manage, build your own value. Make yourself better so you can make those you manage better.

Laissez Faire basically means hands off. It's a wonderful thing. If you hire well, train well, and support your staff effectively, you may enjoy the fruits of your labor, only getting up from your lawn chair when trouble arises.

Pretty boring, huh?

How about... hire the right people. Train the people to be their best. Guide them as necessary. Train yourself and increase your own value so you can train them and increase their value.

The Need To Manage is real. Don't fight it, but understand that the most important function of a manager is to add value to his team. You're success as a manager is measured in the success of your people. Their results, good or bad, are a reflection on you.

Work on you... so you can work on them.

Let me know how it goes.


Adolfo Jimenez is an executive coach, entrepreneur, book club nerd, and family man living in Hollywood, FL. He is the owner of www.levelomacaron.com 

You can find him at https://www.instagram.com/adolfo.jimenez/

The Secret Law of Attraction?

A lot has been said about the law of attraction. Most of what's been said is nonsense. The thought that thinking about something will make that something happen or appear is quite simply bullshit.

This is not to say you shouldn't think about your goals. Hell, you should obsess about them. How else will you achieve them? But don't expect things to happen because you think about them.

I have a friend who is a talented writer, filmmaker, editor, etc. He could be a Hollywood start director and producer. But he's lazy. He thinks about his dream career all the time. He's watched more movies and knows more about movies than anyone I know. He watches every TV show. He knows the bios of the directors and actors.

But he's waiting for Hollywood to magically appear on his doorstep. He will wait until the end of his days. That type of thing doesn't happen. Ever. Not even in the movies.

You can attract success and blessings by working hard toward them. Like attracts like. If you work hard, create and exploit opportunities and create successes, more successes will become available to you. Then, all you have to do is pick them up.

Think positive, but know your thoughts are just a map. You have to get off your butt or nothing will ever happen.



Adolfo Jimenez is an executive coach, entrepreneur, book club nerd, and family man living in Hollywood, FL. He is the owner of www.levelomacaron.com 

You can find him at https://www.instagram.com/adolfo.jimenez/

Who Are You?

Who are you?

Not your name. You.

When people see you, what do they see?

What is your brand?

These are questions everyone in the business world needs to answer. Whether you are an entrepreneur or you're selling cars or driving for Lyft or Uber, you need a brand.

I am a creature of habit. I go to a rotation of restaurants near my office for lunch. There are two in particular that I visit once a week. The waitresses know my name and they know what I like to eat. I'm not special. I'm sure they do this for every one of their regulars. They've branded themselves as being better than other servers. I'm sure their pay reflects this fact.

These ladies have branded themselves. Shouldn't you? What do you want to be known for? Do you want to be just another car salesman or do you want to be "My Guy down at the Chevy Dealership?" Do you want to be a dental hygienist or Britney, the amazing young lady at my dentist's office?

Decide who you want to be and resolve to become that person. Share your journey with the world and you are taking your first step toward branding yourself.

Let me know who you become.


Adolfo Jimenez is an executive coach, entrepreneur, book club nerd, and family man living in Hollywood, FL. He is the owner of www.levelomacaron.com 
You can find him at https://www.instagram.com/adolfo.jimenez/

Round Up The Posse

Jim Rohn said you are the average of the five people you spend the most time with. That might be a scary thought. But it's also a thought that can open you up to all kinds of new possibilities.

I spend a lot of time with my wife. This is good because... well, she's my wife. Also, she and I are of the same mindset. We work hard. We share the same values. We encourage one another. What else do I need?

Now, throughout the course of my day I come in contact with scores of people. Some are my colleagues, some are my clients. I try to approach every interaction with the greatest amount of positivity I can. I try to learn from everyone I meet or spend time around. If this possibility doesn't exist, I coach them and try to add value to their lives. If that's not possible, I limit contact.

I have friends I care about deeply who want to go to lunch with me a couple of times a week. I limit it to once a month. There are two reasons for this. The first reason is that I often work through lunch. The second reason is that they will ruin my lunch with their complaining and I don't want to fill the second half of my day with negativity. Why poison my mind when I still have work to do and money to make?

Drive time is reserved for phone calls to family and to audiobooks. I see no point in listening to news. It only brings me down or pisses me off. I'd rather spend drive time listening to books and improving myself. I occasionally listen to some music when I feel the need to decompress. The folks at CNN and Fox ain't part of my posse!

The craziest thing I do is drive in silence. I'll do this once or twice a week. No music, no books, no calls. Just the sound of the engine and my thoughts. Try it sometime. It's therapeutic.

All of these things are better than being in the presence of people who bring me down. They also allow me to populate my posse with people who are successful like Gary Vaynerchuk or Jim Rohn or even George Washington.

Try any of these techniques and let me know how it goes.


Adolfo Jimenez is an executive coach, entrepreneur, book club nerd, and family man living in Hollywood, FL. He is the owner of www.levelomacaron.com 
You can find him at https://www.instagram.com/adolfo.jimenez/

In With the Good!

I wake up around 5:20 every morning whether I like it or not. I've always been an early riser. I can't help it. It's who I am. I do not bound out of bed the moment my eyes open.

This is an older car. It takes a little time to warm up.

Once my eyes are defogged and my mind is clear, I get to work. I usually post a thought for the day on my Instagram and my business Instagram before too long, I don't just post a random thought, I try to make this thought my guiding principle for the day. I look for an opportunity to share the thought, aside from posting it online. I put it into practice. I lead by example.

One of the advantages of starting my day this way is that I immediately point my thoughts in a useful, productive direction. If I started my day reading news, hearing about death and war and other joyless crap, my day would be miserable.

I speak from experience.

My name is Adolfo and I'm a bad-news-oholic. It's been seven years since my last news binge.

Start your day with a positive, constructive thought. Do it every day until it becomes habit.

Let me know how it goes.




Adolfo Jimenez is an executive coach, entrepreneur, book club nerd, and family man living in Hollywood, FL. He is the owner of www.levelomacaron.com 
You can find him at https://www.instagram.com/adolfo.jimenez/

It Only Happens Once

Today. You get one crack at it so it'd better count. Feel free to waste the day. Not a problem for anyone else but you. Just as you own your successes, you own your failures.

There is one question I ask my coaching clients: What are you doing today to make yourself better? It's a simple question. You don't need to improve by 100% every day. No one is capable of that. But making little changes every day, replacing bad habits with good ones, is really all you need.

If you're out of shape and haven't exercised in years, you can't wake up tomorrow morning and start training for an Ironman Triathlon. But you can take a walk around the block. If you eat greasy fast food three times a day, you can replace one of those meals with a salad. Maybe a bowl of oatmeal or some fruit for breakfast.

Today only happens once and while you do have another shot tomorrow, you're going to run out of todays sooner or later so why waste a single one of them?



Adolfo Jimenez is an executive coach, entrepreneur, book club nerd, and family man living in Hollywood, FL. Adolfo owns www.levelomacaron.com and other businesses.
You can find him at https://www.instagram.com/adolfo.jimenez/

Don't Tax Don't Spend

The smoke has cleared and we stand on the rubble of a demolished civilization. Millions have died.

We are in ruins. Mothers roam the streets, starving babies in their arms, begging for a drop of milk or

a crumb from a rich man’s plate.

They are shooed away. Oftentimes, they are shot for sport and their children are fed to the rich man’s dogs. In the ruins, hildren play with rats because they have no toys. Eventually, when the play is no longer an adequate distraction and the hunger is too great, they eat the rats. In one horrific action, they lose their toy… and their innocence as they learn that in this new world, you have to kill in order to stay alive. We live in this horror because you got a tax cut. I hope you’re happy. Bastard.

Yesterday, the US senate passed the $1.5 trillion tax cut bill. Several companies like Boeing, Wells Fargo, and AT&T among others reacted by giving their employees bonuses and raising their minimum wage to $15. That’ll kill a baby like nobody’s business.

The right is jumping up and down. The left is crying over this latest end of the world. Libertarians are shaking their heads wondering when the duocracy will address the real issue: spending. Nothing matters if we don’t cut spending. We run deficits every year. We have more debt than we’ll ever be able to pay. Giving us back some of our money doesn’t hurt anyone except the beast that feeds on our money. This beast is known as congress. They take our money to fund pork barrel projects in their districts and they act as if they’re doing it out of the kindness of their hearts. They point to these projects every 2 or 6 years and say, “Look what I did for you. Send me back to Washington!”

The tax cuts are a good thing. Spending cuts would be an even better thing. Cutting short the careers of these tax-and-spend demagogues would be the most effective way to tame the deficit and keep taxes low, but they wouldn’t vote to get off the gravy train. They know the debt doesn’t matter because it’ll be here long after they’re all dead. They know the only thing that matters is reelection. The only thing that matters is that you keep writing that check so they can keep spending it like the reckless fools they’ve proven themselves to be. Tax cuts threaten their existence and so they fight. The question is whether you’ll fight back.

Here’s how you fight back:

• Write your member of congress and tell them to cut spending and then go get a real job.
• Vote against the incumbent - whoever the incumbent happens to be.
• Run as a libertarian and disrupt the entire system.