“I’m always disappointed when people don’t live up to their potential. I know that a number of people look down on themselves and consequently on everybody who looks like them. But that, too, can change.” ~ Maya Angelou

A lot of attention has been given over the years to the art and science of measuring organisational performance. From balanced scorecards, to OKRs, to KPIs and KRAs. In accounting terms there are even more terms and measurement methods that you, most of which focus on how effectively a company can use its assets to generate revenue… But very little attention has been given to organisational potential.

I think this is a major oversight.

In management terms, when we think about our employees, our team members, even ourselves, we’re interested in not only how they currently perform – whether they meet their objectives – but also whether they have potential to grow and achieve even more. Many organisations (though probably not enough) try to identify their high potential employees so that their development can be fast tracked… something usually nested within the domain of the HR department.

Why don’t we care about organisational potential in the same way?

Surely it matters as least as much – if not more – than current performance?

What if you knew your organisation was only reaching 40% of its full potential? Wouldn’t that change the way you thought about strategy? About investment? About product development? About marketing?

To be fair, for-profit organisations will have an eye to potential markets. They will know their ‘market-share’ and likely see their potential in terms of the ability to reach a higher percentage of ‘available’ customers for their products or services… as though customers are empty vessels waiting to snap up your fantabulous product… if they only knew about it!

The reality is more complicated though. Consumer decisions are increasingly driven by more than whether or not the product does what it says on the can… with massive increases in interconnectivity and lowering barriers to entry for new players in your industry, they can shop around… and they can use their values to drive their decision making. Are you as sustainable as your competition? Are you as strong on diversity and inclusion as your competition? Are you leading the way in making positive change in the community you operate in? Are you influencing your sector to lift its game? Is your supply chain squeaky clean? If you can’t answer ‘yes’ to these questions, and others like them, then chances are some of your competitors can…

So achieving the dizzying heights of mass market penetration might not be as straightforward as increasing marketing expenditure or getting the right influencer to share your product on Instagram…

And besides, as Simon Sinek points out in his latest book, The Infinite Game, is that even the point?

Organisational Potential is something that I’m wanting to delve into in more depth. I think we’re missing the boat with lack-lustre organisations achieving mediocre things… What do you think?

I have been learning to play Minecraft with my six-year-old son. I embarked on this exercise because I wanted to be involved with him, I saw it as an opportunity for us to do something together that wasn’t “driven by mum”, and I wanted to understand what the game entailed to ensure I was supporting him to make good decisions about online games. For those of you familiar with the game, you’ll know that there are essentially two main ‘modes’ of gameplay: you can create or compete.

In Creative mode you have unlimited resources to build to your heart’s content – if you can dream it, you can build a blocky square version of it. And importantly the bad-guys won’t hurt you. You can fly, and you don’t die from falling, lava, drowning etc.

In Survival mode, the bad-guys will attack you, you have to collect the resources by expending your time and energy, and using existing resources to obtain more efficient means of obtaining resources. You have to walk or run everywhere you go, so distance becomes an obstacle, and you need to have your wits about you.

You can technically switch back and forth between the two modes, but once you go into Creative mode you can’t earn any of the in-game achievements. Essentially, you’ve cheated.

My son almost exclusively wants to play Creative. I almost always prefer to play in Survival mode. Why is this?

Fighting and (Inevitably) Dying is Stressful for Some

Even though the game allows you to ‘re-spawn’ an unlimited number of times, Mr Six hates dying. He finds it physically stressful. He starts freaking out. I think, in part, that’s an age thing. As we get older we become more comfortable with our decision making skills, our risk assessment criteria and our ability to ‘build back’ to where we were. We learn that (with the obvious exception of actually dying, most things are recoverable.

Great leaders make it safe for their organisations to take risks. To innovate. To push the boundaries of the constraints they face.

“There are risks and costs to action. But they are far less than the long range risks of comfortable inaction.” ~ John F. Kennedy

Setting and Striving for Objectives

Unless you set yourself a mammoth building task, or any of the very clever ‘constructions’ that automate mining or farming and so forth, Creative mode doesn’t really have much in terms of concrete objectives. I have built covered tunnels so my son can move completely unharmed between villages, and we’ve built a version of our own house in Minecraft. But the lack of resource constraints kind of takes the fun out of it for me. There’s not much need to problem-solve.

In Survival mode, by comparison, you have to break big tasks into a number of discrete, quantifiable stages. If you want diamonds, for example, you need to mine down to Level 12, and then create a ‘method’ for mining that increases your chances of finding diamond ore. If you want obsidian, you have to have a diamond pickaxe. If you want to build a portal to the Nether (not sure why you would, but never mind that!) you need obsidian.

To achieve big things in survival mode, you set objectives, and then break them down in to measurable tasks… while not forgetting to eat, sleep and manage risk. This matters to me but not to Mr Six.

Great leaders can enable us to achieve mammoth things.

“When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don’t adjust the goals, adjust the action steps.” ~ Confucius

Comfort in Repetitive Tasks

Sometimes, when I’m trying to relax, I really enjoy monotonous, repetitive tasks that don’t require much thought. I find it almost meditative. In both Creative and Survival mode, I have found numerous ways to ‘zone-out’ while playing. It could be mining, it could be gardening, it could be building, it could be felling trees.

Mr Six, unsurprisingly, doesn’t have much attention span for repetitive tasks. So I tend to get allocated these tasks. Often he’ll log out and do something completely different until I’m finished. Provided I stand up and stretch every so often, I can get lost for five hours or more getting enough diamonds to craft a set of diamond armour for him so he can be completely impervious to the bad-guys that are never going to attack him in Creative mode anyway!

Great leaders understand the need for down time. For periods of rest. For the importance of pacing. It can’t be all-go all-the-time.

“Relaxation of the mind from work consists of playful words or deeds. Therefore it becomes a wise and virtuous man to have recourse to such things at times.” ~ Thomas Aquinas

Communication and Teamwork

Mr Six is what I like to call ‘freeform’. There are no rules when he plays. I’m building a house, and he spawns a Snow Golem into the middle of it, which then proceeds to leave snow and snow balls everywhere. (Not to mention making the otherwise passive Creepers explode in the dining room!) Hilarious!

This is really hard when you’ve set a task with clear objectives.

I’ve established a method for comprehensive mining with no missed sections in the mine… he just points in a direction and heads off, then needs to be rescued from a lava pool.

Communication helps a lot! We agree the objective, we divide the tasks. When I can, I explain why I’m suggesting a certain approach. I ask him if he can think of a better way. I try to make sure we’re on the same page. It helps a lot!

Great leaders know that teamwork requires great communication. And they know they play a key role in ensuring that communication happens.

“The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.” ~ George Bernard Shaw

When you stop and look, there are opportunities to reflect on your leadership practice everywhere. The key is having the mindful presence to do it, and to do it consistently.

Everyone is writing about love at the moment. I have no idea why – but I thought I might add my ten cents worth…

Organisational hierarchies create power imbalances that knock off people’s equilibrium. If you met someone, in your social circle who appeared to be struggling, you’d reach out. You might offer an ear, or a hand.

And, if it turned out to be a problem you could help with, you almost certainly would.

Yet, for some reason, when aspiring managers, become actual managers, the power seems to go straight to their heads. Unfortunately, though brain imaging is yet to prove this hypothesis, the area of the brain where power resides, overlaps strongly with the area previously occupied by humanity, compassion and empathy.

New managers start second-guessing themselves about what they can and can’t say, and start believing that every conversation with a direct report (other than a routine one-on-one) has to be scripted and run past HR in advance.

'If you spend too much time thinking about a thing, you'll never get it done.' ~ Bruce LeeClick To Tweet

Well I have good news.

There’s a much easier way.

Just love them.

Not in a Valentine’s Day sappy or a “not appropriate at work” kind of love, but as brotherly or sisterly love. The kind of love you have for your kids…

In fact that’s quite a good analogy.

When your kids mess up, you let them know because it’s your job to do so. You are responsible for helping them become the best adults possible. You guide, you encourage, you develop, and yes, sometimes, you discipline.

Because. That’s. The. Job.

And your other job? Well, at work, it’s to love your employees. To guide when you can, to encourage, to develop, and yes, sometimes, to discipline.

And when it comes from a place of love, you don’t need a script, because your heart already knows what to say… but more importantly, because when you come from a place of love, everyone around you can see it. So even if you muck it up and say something you wish you hadn’t people will likely forgive you… because you did it with love.

Love is all you need.

If you think you’d benefit from bringing a bit more love into your work-life, you might enjoy our Virtual Coaching network. Join today – you’ll love it!

Leadership is all about creating order from chaos.

'Chaos is inherent in all compounded things. Strive on with diligence.' ~ BuddhaClick To Tweet

My son has far more Lego than he needs. I didn’t have Lego as a child – I may be compensating. Anyone who has more than a couple of Lego sets in their home knows how quickly entropy occurs: the pieces get mixed up… the buildings and vehicles have pieces knocked off or added… there are pieces that nobody knows where they came from… and yes, the occasional clattering sound has been heard going up the vacuum cleaner (oops!).

From that point onwards, rebuilding the fire station (as per the instructions) becomes frustrating, time-consuming, if not almost impossible.

Yet, sometimes, that’s exactly what’s called for…

The same is true of any leadership situation you might find yourself in. The environment is complex, the market is fickle – they only want the fire station, not the police station or the firetruck or the fire crew training depot – and they definitely don’t want you to hand them a box full of pieces saying: “the parts are all in there somewhere”…

No. Your task is to help create some order from chaos. To take all the seemingly unrelated data: current state, client expectations, employee aspirations, skills, capabilities and resources, and to make the impossible seem possible all while ensuring that everyone has the information they need… and the tools and resources they need… to be successful.

Most people don’t like change and they don’t like uncertainty. And when they are being bombarded by data, with no apparent coherence or logic, their natural response will be to run away… to stick to what’s known… what’s safe.

That’s where you come in. Your job is to make sense of the incoherence. To explain it to others in ways they can understand. And to create an environment where it is safe for them to figure out what to do about it.

It’s all about the mindset…

When you are a victim, you give away your power. I’ve long held the view that people with a victim mindset make very poor leaders.

This is why.

A victim works hard to make their circle of control and their circle of influence as small as possible. That way, other people are to blame. Their efforts to make their influence and control as small as possible mean that virtually everything is uncontrolled and unable to be influenced – at least by them.

What does this do for the people they lead? It confirms the chaos. It exacerbates the disorder. And it breeds more victims.

On the other hand, great leaders expand and clarify their circles of control and their circles of influence. They engage in sense-making. They create time and space to reflect and grapple with the uncertainty.

As a consequence, their teams feel more secure and more optimistic. They feel better equipped to step into the unknown, and they operate in an environment of psychological safety… where it’s OK to ask questions, where it’s expected that you’ll seek reassurance when it’s needed, and where failure is an accepted (and encouraged) aspect of doing the job.

None of this necessarily means that leaders like chaos any more than anyone else… it just means they have developed tools and systems for coping (and thriving) in it. They can embrace complexity because they know it’s the only way to go…

All of which means that the best leaders appear to effortlessly – even magically – create order from chaos… and their teams wouldn’t want it any other way.

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'I have just three things to teach: simplicity, patience, compassion. These three are your greatest treasures.' ~ Lao TzuClick To Tweet

My guess is that you’re a pretty talented person. You have skills. You figure things out. You work hard to do the best job you can. And if you’re anything like me, you can’t help but notice that there are people around you who aren’t pulling their weight. They might be slacking off, ‘phoning it in’… or they might seem genuinely incompetent. No matter how many times you offer them some advice, show them how to do it, or even pitch in and give them a hand, it just doesn’t seem to sink in.

Why is it that you show up, work your backside off, and strive every day to do the very best job you can, yet there are others around that seem to go out of their way to make things more difficult and muck it all up?

This can be a very tempting mental trap to fall into, after all, you know how hard you are trying.

But here’s one thing I know to be true: Nobody comes to work with the intention of doing a bad job. Everyone is trying to do the best they can with the tools – knowledge, wisdom and systems – at their disposal.

So why does it seem like we’re so much better than everyone else? How can we learn to cope with other people’s apparent incompetence and how can compassion help us become more patient and tolerant?

Why am I so much better?

There are a couple of things going on that make it seem like we are much better than others. The key word here being seem.

The Dunning-Kruger Effect

The Dunning-Kruger Effect refers to the phenomenon that most of us rate ourselves more competent than is mathematically possible. For example, 88% of drivers believe that they are better than average at driving.

Interestingly, the less competent you actually (objectively) are at something, the more likely you are to overestimate your ability.

Here’s a great video explaining this:

Another useful resource on this topic is Insight by Tasha Eurich.

So, conclusion is… you might not be as great as you think… I’ll let you figure that out.

The False Consensus Effect

Now this one is pretty interesting too. We tend to overestimate the extent to which other people believe/know the same things we do. This is evidenced by experiments that ask people to make subjective observations from a scenario, and then to state what percentage of people would come to the same conclusions. Participants overwhelming believe that most people would agree with them (even when the actual experiment shows otherwise).

There are a couple of possible explanations for this.

First, we do tend to spend time with people we know quite well and who actually do think a lot like us – like family members, and close friends. So in our immediate circle of influence, this is probably true.

Second, we are very familiar with our own values, thoughts and biases – after all, we think about them inside our own heads! And because we think about them more often than the alternatives, we assume they are more common, and we spot the evidence of information that confirms our beliefs (this is known as Confirmation Bias) all over the place.

Coping with incompetence

Sometimes, in spite of all the ways that our brains try to trick us that we’re awesome and others aren’t, we might be genuinely better at something than those around us.

Yes – that can be frustrating!

What can you do about that? Nobody wants to be frustrated at work!

Start with compassion

I’ve never met anyone – even in some of the most challenging circumstances – who was trying to be bad at their job. Whether it was serving customers, engaging with stakeholders, selling services, or writing complex documents, everyone wants to do well, and be seen as competent.

So start with compassion. Say to yourself: “this person is trying really hard to do their best, even if it doesn’t seem like it”. Say it five times if you have to!

Then ask yourself some useful questions to figure out what might be needed to help move forward.

• Does he know/understand what the task is?
• Does he understand the standard expected?
• Has he received adequate training?
• Do I understand the task he’s been asked to do? (Sometimes another agenda is at play that you aren’t aware of)
• Does he have the practical tools required to do a great job?
• Could there be something going on in his life right now that is distracting him, or making it hard for him to deliver the expected standard of work?
• What can I do to help him succeed?

And perhaps most importantly…

• Am I actually as great at this as I think I am?

Once you’ve spent some time contemplating the answers to these questions, I promise you, you’ll feel less frustrated, and have a clearer idea of how helping this person might actually be you doing a better job… at least a better job than you thought you were doing…

After all, as Robin Sharma said:

So what are you waiting for?

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'He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else.' ~ Benjamin FranklinClick To Tweet

There are always excuses available to you. Always.

If you fly regularly, you’ve probably noticed that there are lots of things that the flight crew – both those inside the cockpit and outside it – do consistently… the same way… every time. There are checklists and shiny big signs and flags on things reminding people what to do.

Part of the reason for this is that analysis of plane crashes consistently shows that it isn’t just one thing going wrong that causes an accident. There are contingencies and safety mechanisms that readily deal with the one small thing that goes wrong. Those checklists and procedures are designed to pick up as many of them as possible…

Lots of small things need to go wrong for a modern commercial flight to crash. Lots. If you want to look at an example, check this report on the Air France Flight 4590 (Concorde) crash.

And just like complex machinery, organisations have many organic, dynamic parts in them, any of which can go wrong on any given day. And all of which have minds (and attitudes) of their own.

So if you’re looking for an excuse, I guarantee you can find one. Probably more than one.

He did this, and she did that. They forgot to do this. So-and-so didn’t show up for work that day…

It’s seductively simple to blame somebody else. And sometimes, it’s even justified!

Exploring three different perspectives, here’s why you mustn’t.

Perspective 1: The Person Being Blamed

Imagine yourself, for a minute, in the shoes of the person you blamed. Regardless of whether or not the blame is justified by the facts, it makes you feel pretty lousy, right?

When someone you work with blames you for something, it destroys trust. You aren’t going to feel inclined to go out of your way for that person – quite the opposite. You’ll avoid working with them, you might bad mouth them to other colleagues. You certainly aren’t going to think of them as a great leader.

If it happens often enough, your engagement drops, and it might even begin to feel like you are being bullied.

Now I know what you’re thinking… surely a great employee will take it on the chin and lift their game? Isn’t this exactly the sort of feedback they need to shape their career?

No – blaming somebody for something going wrong at work isn’t the same as providing constructive/corrective feedback in a one-to-one setting. By definition, blaming someone means you’ve told others. This is counterproductive, and there are much more effective ways to provide feedback, if that is your intent.

Perspective 2: A Person Witnessing the Blaming

If you’ve blamed someone for the error, you’ve told someone else, possibly in the presence of others as well. So what do these ‘third-parties’ infer from their experience?

If it is a peer, or sub-ordinate, it’s not that different to the perspective of the person being blamed. Suddenly a whole lot of people don’t want to work with you or for you. They know that you’re capable of throwing them under the bus if you feel it serves your needs… that you don’t take responsibility for the results of your team.

They interpret your actions as being self-interested… driven by self-protection or self-aggrandisement. It doesn’t matter much which of these it is – neither are associated with exceptional leadership.

If it is only your boss you told? Well, if she’s a decent leader, she will either see it immediately for what it is – making excuses – or she’ll take it at face value, but have slightly less respect for you moving forward… possibly in a way that she can’t quite put her finger on.

If she’s a poor leader, she’ll probably commiserate, and jump on the excuses bandwagon with you… you’ll briefly feel better, but it won’t last. This is the sort of boss that will throw you under the bus if she sees the opportunity, and you know it… so tread carefully.

Perspective 3: Your Perspective – Laying the Blame

This is where it gets really interesting.

Even if you lack self-insight completely (which I’m sure you don’t) the feeling of significance you get from making someone else your excuse is likely to be short-lived at best. Because deep down, you know it wasn’t the right thing to do.

Furthermore, you deny yourself an exceedingly valuable opportunity.

The opportunity to learn something new.

When something goes wrong, regardless of whose fault it was, there is always something else you could have done differently to avoid the situation unfolding as it did. Always.

Maybe it was providing greater support and mentorship to someone you delegated a task to. Maybe it was prioritising your time and attention differently. Maybe it was escalating your concerns earlier. Maybe it was in selecting someone for the task who wasn’t yet ready. Maybe (though this is rare) it was not doing it yourself…

Outcomes are always the result of numerous decisions and actions. Review them. Figure out how the situation could have been averted.

I promise you’ll learn something.

Taking Responsibility: What to do Instead…

So what should you do instead?

Take responsibility… even when you aren’t responsible.

I admit, there is risk here. If you have a lousy boss, they’ll look no further than your acceptance of blame and it will end there.

However, most bosses aren’t this bad.

More importantly, your team members and colleagues will know that they contributed to the mess. They may even believe they were entirely culpable… When you take one on the chin for them, as the manager responsible, they will grow in their trust of you, their engagement will increase, and they will go out of their way to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

If you do need to sit them down to provide some feedback, chances are they will take it more seriously, and be more likely to learn from it.

And you will gain a reputation as being someone people want to work for and with – and who they want to get it right for, because they won’t want to let you down.

For more on this topic, check out Responsibility: It’s Never Someone Else’s Fault (Even If It Is)

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'You need to be really great at your job. You need a strong network of peers, and you need a strong network of mentors.' ~ Caroline GhosnClick To Tweet

They say it’s lonely at the top.

They also say it isn’t. Or it shouldn’t be.

Most of the people who say it isn’t are senior execs who haven’t cracked CEO yet, or Founder CEs running their companies like communes (I don’t mean that as a bad thing, by the way).

If, however, you are employed in the position of Chief Executive (or Executive Director or whatever) there are facets of the job that are your burden alone to carry. There is nobody behind you to catch the one that gets through.

Just. You.

Not Arrogance or Ego…

Please be clear, I’m not speaking here about seeming to have all the answers – that’s a fool’s game. Nor am I talking about having no-one to share your mistakes or vulnerabilities with. I make – and have – plenty of both, and I discuss them with people I trust – regardless of their position or status.

That’s like saying “I’m the boss. I have to appear big and strong and certain, and I can’t let anyone else know I have no idea what we should do next”. That’s exhausting – not lonely!

…But Accountability

No, I’m talking about the unique and previously unfathomable sense that you are ultimately responsible for tens, or hundreds, or even thousands of people’s working lives… and the consequences of these for their families. That you can bump into a major stakeholder at the supermarket, or the park with your kids, or when you’re sick, or grumpy or sad. That you are always on. I spoke about this with Hayley Collins in her Podcast last year.

People who have been in this job will know exactly what I’m talking about. The moment you are sitting in the chair, and you realise “there is nobody else”.

People who haven’t will think I must be exaggerating – or it doesn’t sound that bad – but they won’t get it.

Even people who have acted in the role don’t get to enjoy this experience. As one of my direct reports said to me when I returned from an overseas trip where she had been acting: “I knew you were coming back”.

My Virtual Mentor Support Team

While you do get used to this feeling, I’ve decided this year to try a new approach to it.

I’ve created a team of virtual mentors. People who I admire and respect. People with a decent body of written or spoken material to delve into. People who demonstrate facets of the leader I hope to be.

I’ve always been an avid reader. But I tend to synthesise what I learn into an increasingly comprehensive multifaceted dynamic world-view. Academics, they say, know more and more about less and less. For me, the more I learn and read, the less separate everything seems to be – the more interconnected the world becomes.

This is great. It’s usually a strength. Except it doesn’t work well for new knowledge that doesn’t yet have anywhere to ‘plug in’ (that I’m not ready for yet) AND while it gives me great intellectual and theoretical understanding, it doesn’t necessarily translate into practical application. For example, I know that Benjamin Franklin had a number of daily rituals that enabled him to be highly productive, but I’ve never specifically put them into practice to see if they work for me!

So I’ve selected a virtual mentor team, and I plan to devour their written and spoken material, and deliberately take notes and experiment with their habits and practices to see if they help me. Even if it’s just to remind me that highly successful people are still just people!

So who are they?

• Brené Brown
• Eckhart Tolle
• Eleanor Roosevelt
• Hannah Gadsby
• Maya Angelou
• Seth Godin
• Simon Sinek

During this year, where it might be interesting, I’ll share some insights, reflections or revelations I have with you. I’m going to update my website to have a bit more about these fantastic folks, and in a coming post, I’ll share how I selected them.

Who would be on your Virtual Mentors Team?  Flick me a note – I’d love to hear!

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'Your success and happiness lies in you. Resolve to keep happy, and your joy and you shall form an invincible host against difficulties.' ~ Helen KellerClick To Tweet

There is a great deal of irony in the human desire to see New Year’s Day as an opportunity to begin again: to turn over a new leaf… to renew… to resolve to be different.

The irony stems from the fact that it is our own egoic brain (and in some cases our collective egoic brain that gives importance and significance to the first of January in any given year. But other than the ability to say “I’ve been doing this all year” or to share a conversation with someone else about New Year’s resolutions and how long you kept them, there is nothing fundamentally different about this morning than there is about any other morning. 1 January doesn’t magically grant us more resolve than we had yesterday!

Except that we bestow upon it a sense of renewal… of restoration… of magical power.

And perhaps, that is enough.

Chip and Dan Heath think so, and their data back it up… We choose to do significant things on significant dates – perhaps because we think those things will consequently be more likely to succeed. Joining the gym, getting married, quitting sugar or smoking or drinking… All likely to happen on a date with significance.

Yet, when you analyse random events – chance encounters, natural occurrences – they fall relatively equally across all the days of the year.

I honestly cannot remember the date I met my husband. It was in May 1999 – but I cannot tell you more than that. Babies are no more likely to be born on 1 January than any other day of the year (with the exception of a date in late September… about nine months after 1 January!)

So why do we bestow such significance and power on some dates and not on others?

I think, perhaps, because it takes matters out of our hands. If people are capable of giving up a major vice – like smoking – on 1 January, they were able to give it up equally successfully on 31 December. So why didn’t they? Because they believed the significance of the date – and possibly the collective momentum of scores of other people doing the same thing at the same time – would help them. Would strengthen their resolve…

And therein lies the rub.

Resolve is internal to you. It isn’t something granted to you by the calendar.

If it’s worth doing, decide to do it.

Regardless of what day it is.

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'Each project, I suffer like I'm starting over again in life. There's a lot of healthy insecurity that fuels this stuff.' ~ Frank GehryClick To Tweet

Regeneration

When I published my book in June I was exhausted. I felt like I’d put all my best ideas and work out on the table… laid it all bare for everyone to see… and yet I knew in my heart of hearts that wasn’t true.

Still, I lost my mojo.

I procrastinated.

Probably I secretly hoped that my book would be a runaway best-seller and I’d be shot to instant super-stardom (it didn’t and I wasn’t).

Or maybe I genuinely needed to recharge creatively. If so, that’s quite interesting. I know more about myself than I did before.

Work got busy. Mr Four became Mr Five and started school. Our routines changed. Seasons came and went.

But I’m still here.

Obligation

What was interesting was the sense of obligation I felt to those who read this blog. I was worried about those who might be waiting for the next post. For those I’d made commitments to – who’d invested time in me and the work.

But what’s been nice is that I’ve learned three things:

• You all coped perfectly well (calm down Rebecca’s ego – it’s not all about you!)
• Commitments can still be kept… better late than never
• I coped perfectly well too!

Picking Up Again

It’s OK to take a break. Sometimes you need to.

But I’m also glad to be back. I don’t think this blog will be quite the same now – hopefully it will be better. Wiser, maybe?

More real and more clear?

I feel more connected with what I can help with, and who I can help. Less about me, and more about you.

…Like Old Friends

They say true friends can go years without seeing one another, and pick up exactly where they left off…

Well it’s been six months. Thank you for being so patient with me. I hope we’ll see a lot more of each other in the coming year.

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The following text is an extract from More Than This: Your Heroic Quest to Find Inspiration, Intent, Impact and Insight 

I want to teach you what I’ve learned about kick-starting your life. I want to give you the tools you’ll need to build and sustain massive momentum. And I want to help you create and achieve the kind of impact that you’ve always dreamed you’d make – irrespective of whether you’re the executive assistant or the chief executive.

I’ve noticed that most people constrain what they are capable of based on what they see happening around them. Most people are resigned. They are resigned to the fact that politicians are corrupt and aren’t trying to fix the problems occurring in the country. They are resigned to the fact that climate change is inevitable and cannot be influenced by human effort. They are resigned to the fact that some people are just bad, and will do bad things no matter what happens. They are resigned to the fact that some people have to sweep the streets and empty the rubbish bins and mop the floors. They are resigned to the fact that there are so many problems in the world that there’s no point trying to do anything about it.

When did you give up on your dreams? And what brought it about? And more importantly, how do you feel about it now? Are you relieved? Does it remove the pressure? Or is there just a little bit of you that resents the fact that you’ve ‘settled’ for less?

We talk about people leading their lives, but we dismiss what leadership means in this context. It’s almost like ‘leading a life’ is some lesser form of leadership – or not leadership at all.

I want you to change that thinking right now. You are the chief executive of you. Nobody else can hold that role. And you shouldn’t let anybody else hold that role.

We live in interesting times. A quick scan of the world headlines and it’s plain to see that chasms are opening up within society that seem unfathomably deep and unbridgeable…

Previously impenetrable boundaries are being crossed with ease…

Simple slogans are winning out over facts with alarming regularity…

Leadership matters in many ways. It matters for the ability to see a better future, and to share that vision with people. It matters for the ability to nurture and grow others. It matters for the ability to foster innovation and growth. It matters for the ability to inspire others to be the best versions of themselves.

But leadership matters most when it overcomes the temptation to reduce complicated things to catchy slogans, and when it enables people to understand and engage with wicked problems in new and creative ways.

Now I don’t (just) mean positional leadership – like managers and CEOs. I mean leaders in the broadest sense – leaders of movements, leaders of people, leaders of ideas, leaders of change, leaders of impactful lives.

There are a multitude of problems crying out for solutions: from climate change, to famine, to civil war, to inequality, to human rights abuses, to corruption, to nuclear arms proliferation, to drought, to child abuse…

If you have ever looked at these problems – or problems like them – and thought “I wish I could do something about that”, then this book is for you. This book will help you find the inspiration to reach out and tackle that big (or modest or small) problem you care about. Then it will help you turn that inspiration into actual intent.

A decision to do something.

Then it will give you the tools and skills to impact change in the world. Not just because you can, but because you must. You, your family, your friends and the world, need you to.

Great leaders revel in the challenge of reconciling two apparently irreconcilable ideas, because they know that is where the creativity happens.

Great leaders embrace the grey areas between polar opposites, because they know life is seldom black and white.

Great leaders explore the murky complexities of important issues, because they know the devil can be in the detail.

Great leaders critically examine slogans and by-lines to see whether they pass the sniff-test, because they know that salespitches leave out the most important features in a bid to appeal to our emotions.

Great leaders recognise that by simplifying things to their barest essentials, we lose the essence of what made them important in the first place.

Leadership matters because sometimes long-held conventions are no longer sufficient to protect our institutions and systems from tearing themselves apart.

Please don’t misunderstand me. I’m not saying complexity is good and simplicity is bad – I’m saying it’s never that simple.

I fundamentally believe that all people have the potential within them to achieve greatness. There are plenty of things in the world to worry about – and some of them you can do something about. Actually many of them.

But only if you’re prepared to not do something else.

For the rest, have hope and optimism in your fellow human beings, and get on with making the very best of the cards you have been dealt. Within that hand lies the power to make a real difference – to your life, to the lives of your family and friends, and to the lives of millions of people all around the world.

Let’s get inspired, set our intention, and impact the world for the better!