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David D’Souza’s post the other day (http://ddsouzadotcom.wordpress.com/2014/04/23/the-productivity-problem/) got me thinking……
Last week my husband was away with work so it was me and the kids for a few days on our own. Things ticked along nicely. Yes, they argued sometimes, or course, but mostly things ran pretty smoothly and we had a good time together.
Not that I’m advocating violence but this is a fantastic coaching approach to reframe a situation and instigate future-focussed positive action….
Are you Simba, needing to learn and move on from something?
Or could you use this story in your work?
I’d love to hear what you think.
The power of Disney!
I read a great story by Doug Shaw yesterday (http://stopdoingdumbthingstocustomers.com/communication/what-did-you-do-before/) which really resonated with me.
The last few weeks have been really busy. Preparing to handover my old job, getting ready for new life, attending a couple of fantastic coaching courses, organising the kids’ birthday parties, the usual household stuff, oh, and the draw of the phone, as Doug so poignantly wrote about, constantly there with the many channels and so much great content to read!
Inspired by Neil Morrison’s recent post on why HR should hate change (http://change-effect.com/2014/03/24/why-hr-should-hate-change-just-a-little-bit-more/), it reminded me of a true change story I heard a couple of weeks ago from someone from a large organisation.
This is the story from her persepctive…..
[Photo Credit en.wikipedia.org]
Saturday was a big day for us – we went to see The Lion King at the Lyceum in London! This was a delayed Christmas present that various relatives had contributed to and we were all very excited – the kids’ first normal train ride (i.e. not a steam-train-on-holiday ride), a trip to the theatre, a night in a premier inn – that always makes their day!
There are two little people in our family.
We have a strategy – keep them safe, feed them healthy stuff (mostly!), help them grow and develop to be their best selves
We have expectations of their role – we’re clear on what counts as ‘good’ or ‘unacceptable’ behaviour (be kind, don’t hit!), we ask them to do certain things (like polishing their own school shoes on a Sunday night – a cosy hangover from my memories of my own childhood!) and we try to be consistent with these expectations so they know where they stand
Towards the end of last week I was starting to think there’s a lot in the world of twitter & blogs that bemoans the sorry state of work, people, leaders…..(including some of my own tweets and posts!).
Of course, being challenging of what we see around us is an important part of growing, changing and improving so that we create an always-better future. But I started feeling that I wanted to switch into a more positive mode for my next post. And, as if by magic, my inspiration came from going to see the Lego movie this weekend!
The other day Christopher Demers blogged about advice and consent in HR and the need for us to accept that our advice won’t always be taken on board, but that advising is our role. If you want to lead and run the business then go do that.
Interestingly, the next day on the radio, I then heard thoughts about advice and that we’re inherently not very good at accepting it. We either hope it reaffirms what we already thought the answer should be, or we just plain ignore it! Look at all the ‘we told you this would happen…’ that’s going on around the flooding. Or, taking it to really old skool levels, Adam ignoring the advice from God not to eat the apple!
Driving home tonight, amongst the throng of rush hour traffic, I watched the many people who stay bumper to bumper. Not leaving an inch lest some ‘cheeky’ driver from a side junction jump in ‘their’ space. How very dare they!! Even if actually all that driver wants to do is cut through to their route on the other side of the queue.
So, our right brain is where our creativity comes from isn’t it.
Well, turns out, no!
When we were with Doug Shaw the other week in our #artforworkssake session, Noel Gray had a go at drawing with his pencil in his left hand (he’s normally right handed by the way!) and he was pretty pleased with the results. He mused about whether it was because he had lower expectations of what he’d be able to do so he was able to draw more freely. And I suggested maybe there was something going on with switching to a different side of brain activity…..