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"The longest journey is the journey inwards."
Dag Hammarskold

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Good morning fellow leaders and influencers. I hope the sun is shining metaphorically and literally in your part of the world right now!

I had a most interesting meeting yesterday with a fellow faculty member at CUSOURCE, www.cusource.ca yesterday. We were meeting with two other colleagues from the CUSOURCE team, doing some early design thinking for a virtual conference later this year. One of the other colleagues, a member of the senior team wondered aloud about "doing something on conflict resolution?" My fellow faculty member, Michelle Manary, http://www.reframehr.com said, "I've been finding that the first step in conflict resolution is actually to get over yourself." The three of us laughed out loud! She was so right.

Where I went with her comment was that all too often conflict or difficult conversations are made all that more challenging by our internal conversations and our history. So for example, before I have the "difficult conversation" I've more than likely rehearsed and rehearsed the conversation in my own head, or in front of the mirror, playing both roles myself. I can create quite a narrative about how awful the other person is, and how they are being mean to me; all the while, playing both the part of the hero, me, and the part of the villain, them. Or suppose, someone says something to you that triggers you. How much of the trigger is actually based on previous experience, and has nothing to do with the instant case. For example, I used to be kidded about not being able to find "anything" in the fridge as a kid, largely because I was looking in the same place and if it had been moved, I couldn't "see" it. So if someone kids me about the same thing now, I can feel the frustration building and if I'm not thinking I can be hurt by the jibe. What I have to remember is that the joke from the person now has nothing in their mind to do with the joke when I was a kid. And I'm not alone, we all rehearse, we all have history. And one of the first places we can go to have really powerful conversations, to seize the creativity of much conflict, is to get over ourselves.

If you need to have a conversation with someone, and there is a possibility of conflict, don't over-rehearse. Get clear about what is going on for you and if you want to know what is going of for them, ask them. Don't imagine what is going on for them, don;t go and ask their friends, or your friends, go and ask them. And if you are triggered, one of the first places to go is to ask yourself, 'am I being triggered here that is actually about my history, and not this person r this conversation. In short, we can all be far more successful in conflict if we each get over ourselves!

May this week we each find an opportunity to have a better conversation with another person, and not ourselves.

Good morning fellow leaders and influencers, I hope this note finds you well.

What a past few days! I’ve been co-facilitating an amazing conference in Saskatoon called CUNextGen 2013. About 65 young leaders (under 40) from credit unions and related organizations across Canada, from St. John’s to Victoria, gathered to explore leadership and strategic thinking, and to connect with each other. At the risk of sounding trite, I have great confidence in the next generation of leaders in this country; smart, engaged, reflective and filled with humour. I spent most of my time in awe of the brilliance in the room.

My co-facilitator was my friend and colleague Kim Andres http://www.andresconsulting.ca/ . One of the (re)learnings for me was once more the importance of questions in our work as leaders. Kim explained that the idea of a ‘servant leader’ was helpful whether working with your boss or with the people who report to you; asking them questions to clarify, to dig deeper, to engage, and in particular to support strategic thinking by asking the “right question?” By the end of the conference there were a great laughs when a participant would make a statement and one of his/her colleagues would call out from somewhere else in the room “why is that important to you?!”

One of my contributions to the conference was a session on “Signature Presence” and “Personal Branding” (see the work of http://www.mboexecutivecoaching.com/ and http://www.forbes.com/sites/glennllopis/2013/04/08/personal-branding-is-a-leadership-requirement-not-a-self-promotion-campaign/  and http://www.thecoachingproject.com/associates/carol/   ) The session really became a giant “group coaching” session, as my focus on how to build a signature presence and or a personal brand was actually to explore, you guessed it, questions! Here are just a few of the ones with we engaged:

• What is the one most common piece of positive feedback you’ve received over the past 2-3 years?
• Why do you think it is important to be good at that?
• What is the number one problem you were born to solve, or the number one question you were born to answer?
• What are you best at?
• What is your passion?

We found that by exploring these individually and then in consultation with someone else, sometimes, someone you know well, and others with someone who does not carry any baggage with you at all each of the participants got some clarity about who they were and what was important for them.  I invite you to consider answering these questions yourself over the next few weeks.

May this week we find some great questions.

Good morning fellow leaders and influencers, I hope this note finds you well.

I love music, pretty much all music. Rock, Pop, Baroque, Choral, you name it, I listen. I’ve even been known to take a taste of Hip Hop, which is growing on me! A couple of evenings ago a friend and I went to see Jane Coop http://www.janecoop.com/ performing some of Brahms’ shorter piano pieces. It was an amazing evening. The final set of the evening was a trio; piano, clarinet and cello, and  it  was such a gift to watch and listen to three masters of their craft collaborate. A couple of thoughts have been present for me since that evening.

First, how important it is that we maintain the idea of mastery. A shadow side of social media, of instant access to information and the wide distribution of information; all of which are on balance good things, is that every voice is equal. Yes, I did just write that a shadow side of our time is that every voice is equal. There are very important times in our lives and communities where that is vitally important; elections for example. And at the same time, it would not be good to have each of the audience members in the concert on Tuesday evening jump up on the stage and ask Jane Coop to shove over, as they wanted to play chopsticks. Now, that said, a teacher of mine, Juanita Brown http://www.enlightennext.org/magazine/bios/juanita-brown.asp  says that “during any gathering or presentation the collected wisdom in the room is exponentially greater than that of  the person standing next to the PowerPoints.” That is correct in my experience, but she is referring to the collected wisdom, not the wisdom of each separate individual. Collectively, the 200 or so people in the intimate audience to listen to Jane Coop could probably, if magically transformed into one musician play as well, or even better  than Jane. And Jane’s expertise was an absolute joy to experience. In our organizations, especially in contemporary organizations where hierarchy is often eschewed, and the pyramid is flattened; both of which are good things, we run the risk of falling into a trap that simply because I have access to the internet means I have access to “expertise”. An expert in a particular area and I may well have access to the same information, but her ability to interpret, to vet, to play with, to challenge that information is much greater than mine. And as decision makers we don’t necessarily simply bow to the experts in the room, but we must pay them heed, we must give their opinions greater weight than non-experts. And of course, if I am an expert, I need to remain an expert, learning everyday, practicing my craft everyday and staying at the top of the game, simply to maintain my credibility. Simply having 25 years experience is not enough, I need to have 25 years of practice everyday to maintain my expertise.

Secondly, and this was noted by my friend, it was amazing to watch the collaboration between the three experts during the concert. They were not only playing, they were listening attentively to each other, their eyes moving constantly between the instruments, the music and each other. In fact there were moments I observed where all three were moving in unison, leaning forward, then back, then forward again. And as they struck the final chords, their smiles were infectious,  they were having fun. As leaders, and especially leaders who might have expertise in particular areas it is important to note that simply because I am an expert in say financial management does not mean my expertise creeps out into other areas. Jane Coop is a master on the piano, and might be able to play the equivalent of chopsticks on the cello, but she sticks to her area of expertise and then collaborates with an expert on the cello; recognizing, honuoring and playing (both figuratively and literally). The same is true in the most effective teams, the financial management expert is given her voice, and so is the chief people officer given his. The VP operations plays a part, but not the whole symphony. The challenge of leadership might be summed up nicely in the role of the conductor; how do you keep a group of experts in their fields playing together? A simple and profound answer is, keep them challenged. There’s nothing like a performance to keep us at the top of our game!

May this week we each keep practicing our areas of expertise and playing with others to make amazing music together.

Good morning fellow leaders and influencers, I hope this note finds you well. It is an absolutely beautiful day in Vancouver, and the beach was packed last night; it was actually a summer evening!

I enjoyed a wonderful dinner and stroll with a friend last night, and our wide ranging conversation was fun, invigorating and direct. I am grateful for it. And that gratitude has reminded me about how important thanksgiving is for us as members of our communities and organizations. And then, fortuitously, I came across an article in the April issue of Harvard Business Review about “the two most important words.”  http://hbr.org/2013/04/the-two-most-important-words

There is something almost trite about talking about the importance of a thank you; and as we approach Mothers’ Day here in North America, I note that it was most likely our mother, or another influential woman in our early lives who taught about “please and thank you’s”.  Thank you is in our social DNA, and yet, how often do you hear it? How often do you use it? And perhaps most importantly, how often do you actually mean it?


The 19th Century Swiss philosopher and poet Henri Frederick Amiel  famously wrote;

“Life is short, we do not have much time to gladden the hearts of those who travel the way with us, so be quick to love, make haste to be kind.” It struck me late last night that we might add a phrase, ‘Life is short, we do not have much time to gladden the hearts of those who travel the way with us, so be quick to love, make haste to be kind’ and be thankful to those who have gladdened your heart.

You’ll find productivity increasing, a healthier workplace and a thriving team. You’ll also find that your dis-stress level decreases, your angry outbursts less frequent and your relationships stronger and more vibrant. Not too shabby from two little words. Oh, and thanks again for a lovely dinner and walk last night my friend, my heart is gladdened.

 

Good morning fellow leaders and influencers, I hope this note finds you well. The rain has returned here, but summer is just around the corner!

I love the CBC, especially the radio programing and now podcasts are a big part of my travel regimen. This past Sunday morning, on his show, Michael Enright interviewed Al Gore, the former Vice President of the US about his new book, “The Future.” Intrigued, I bought the e-book within 24 hours. This is an important book for all of us as leaders. It’s not a fluffy, astrological look into our future. It is rather a sober and well-reasoned look at the forces at play in our world that are driving some likely future outcomes. I find it actually a very good description of the emerging zeitgeist. And for strategic thinking for leaders, it presents some interesting scenario perspectives. 

Gore argues that there are six drivers at work (and I’m quoting these from the publisher):

1. Ever-increasing economic globalization has led to the emergence of what he labels “Earth Inc.”—an integrated holistic entity with a new and different relationship to capital, labor, consumer markets, and national governments than in the past.
2. The worldwide digital communications, Internet, and computer revolutions have led to the emergence of “the Global Mind,” which links the thoughts and feelings of billions of people and connects intelligent machines, robots, ubiquitous sensors, and databases.
3. The balance of global political, economic, and military power is shifting more profoundly than at any time in the last five hundred years—from a U.S.-centered system to one with multiple emerging centers of power, from nation-states to private actors, and from political systems to markets.
4. A deeply flawed economic compass is leading us to unsustainable growth in consumption, pollution flows, and depletion of the planet’s strategic resources of topsoil, freshwater, and living species.
5. Genomic, biotechnology, neuroscience, and life sciences revolutions are radically transforming the fields of medicine, agriculture, and molecular science—and are putting control of evolution in human hands.
6.  There has been a radical disruption of the relationship between human beings and the earth’s ecosystems, along with the beginning of a revolutionary transformation of energy systems, agriculture, transportation, and construction worldwide.

Now, that’s a pretty big mouthful, and I’m sitting here thinking, yikes, what do I as leader do with this?

Here are 3 questions that I think will serve us all well:

1. What is our organization’s or my team’s relationship to Earth Inc. and the Global Mind? Or what are the possible impacts in the coming years on our group in a much more holistic world? How many of us for example are checking the labels of the clothes we own or the clothes we may be buying after the tragedy in Bangladesh?
2. How is our organization plugged into your local community? As much as we are inextricably connected to Earth Inc and the Global Mind, alternative economic models, including ethical products and services are growing  http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/11-008-x/2011001/article/11399-eng.htm   and locally operating small businesses account for just under 30% of the nation’s GDP http://www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/061.nsf/eng/02722.html In other words, we appear to live into the old phrase, “think globally, act locally.”
3. What is our relationship to businesses in medicine, agriculture, energy, transportation or construction?   As these vital industries change, are we keeping up with those changes? What knowledge do we need to catch up on? Are those businesses shifting away from the models to which we’ve been accustomed, a la “Who Moved My Cheese” http://www.spencerjohnson.com/Book-WhoMovedMyCheese.html

Our experience of the world is changing, what we had assumed to be normal might be obsolete. All of us as leaders need to keep a “weather eye” on Gore’s observations. On Earth Inc. and within the Global Mind, we are really becoming a global village, and as anyone with any village/small town experience knows, what happens at one end of town is soon felt by the other end of town.

Greetings from Brandon, Manitoba. I’m working with a credit union here, and at some level, it is kind of like coming home! Good people, provocative questions and trying to make a difference in the lives of people and communities. Just the kind place I love!

Last week was also a homecoming; the Connecting4Community Conference in Cincinnati. It was a great conference, and of course, catching up with my ‘tribe’ was a highlight. It was great to connect with old friends, renew and forge new friendships. And, there was an interruption; a shift occurred in the midst of the conference that had a deep and profound effect on a number of people. Ironically, Walter Brueggemann, one of the invited speakers had just finished a fascinating exploration of the importance of interruptions and disruptions for the health of leaders, communities and organizations. The instant interruption had to do with the process and the pedagogy we were using. As important as the content of the interruption was, the fact that it happened, and in the way that it happened was what struck me. You see, I was triggered. I became very angry. As much as I was concerned about the impact the interruption on friends, I was also hurt and angry myself. And I knew enough to do some soul searching; to explore the trigger and my response. I realized for example that in my family of origin interruptions were considered very, very rude. My father would have been appalled at what happened. And so somewhere in the complex of my reaction was that part of me that is my father. I was left with the question; did I want to be my father, or did I want to be me?

Now before we go too deeply into pop psychology, a very dangerous tack on any day, I hold up what Dr. Brueggeman had been talking about; the importance of interruptions. And I realized that while I might have intellectually agreed with him, at a very deep level, I didn’t like interruptions in my happy little world! I’ve since been wondering about the balance in leadership between (a) the importance of momentum, commitment, making a choice and sticking with it, forging ahead through difficult terrain, and (b) the importance of hearing opposing voices, making adjustments or even changing course based on new data, the dangers of complacency and out-dated paradigms. I recall a story from my father’s working life that describes this to a tee. He worked for Air Canada for some 35 years. And in the late 60’s or early 70’s he was talking to an old family friend who did some traveling in the US. (I remember sitting in the room listening to this fascinating exchange between these two adults) An American air carrier had just recently introduced movies on their transcontinental flights and this family friend was very excited about this new technology. My Dad said something like “we have thought about this, but our belief is that what people really want is good food and good service, so we won’t be introducing movies on our airplanes.” The balance between momentum, commitment and forging ahead and hearing opposing voices, and changing out-dated paradigms. It is clearly interruptions that move us forward, that introduce new and challenging thinking into the mix, and that disrupt our happy little world. I should also note that my Dad was instrumental in preventing Air Canada from purchasing Super Sonic Transports (SSTs) like the Concorde, because of a number of factors including the environment. So obviously standing your ground can be the right choice. The important thing is to engage with the interruption, not to dismiss it out of hand, not to simply sit in your happy little world.

And I for one know how difficult that can be. May each of us be interrupted this week.