See a moment. Take a moment. Give a moment.
Cross country humor
Originally uploaded by jcgr.
Is speed an asset or a liability in your line of work?
It all depends.
In cross country, as the shirt says, it’s essential. In driving, it can be a serious liability if it puts self and others at risk.
What are the qualities that lead most directly to success in your line of work – even if they might be liabilities to someone else, in another circumstance?
Working with a still-new company the other day, I was leading them in a graphic facilitation exercise to get their short- and long-term plan together on one “page” (well, a butcher-paper size page, for starters. We distilled it from there).
I could see at some point these accomplished people who were used to excelling individually were freezing as they tried to excel, together, in the face of what they felt but did not yet see in the challenges ahead.
Seeking venture funding soon, they felt the pressure, and were a bit overwhelmed by the challenge, the charge, the change. In an effort to unfreeze them so their best ideas could get through, I paused.
“Release yourselves from the expectation that we’ll achieve perfection in an hour,” I said. “We won’t…perfection takes a little longer.”
I could see the group loosen up, relax, move around a bit to settle in more comfortably in their chairs. It was a fresh start, if nothing else. They began to joke around and laugh a bit, and our work flowed much more easily from there.
Getting their best ideas out, and finding the common ground underlying their greatest strength and power, collectively…that was our work of the moment, and maybe even, the day.
And through that fresh and more relaxed but focused work together, we ran circles around any similar previous attempt.
Inner beauty
Originally uploaded by jcgr.
There are days or weeks (and sometimes months) when the best source of strength is digging deep, looking within.
As your week gets well underway, remember to tap your own reserves. Draw on the strength from within.
Setting goals so that they inspire rather than discourage, is a game, even an art, unto itself.
Think of the goals for college football teams. You can shoot for the golden ticket of a national championship, but is it realistic with who and where you are, as a team, at that point?
I’m a Cal fan, among other things, and I watch the dynamics now as the loss of the two most recent games – both highly unexpected – brings out the less patient side of Cal fans. They’ve become accustomed to performance exceeding dreams, and now reality is setting in with results that are something less.
Still, the Golden Bears could end the season 8-2 (whether they will remains, yes, to be seen). But an 8-2 season? In years past, the fans would have been ecstatic…and now, many are disappointed.
Spoiled? Perhaps.
The goals and expectations for a football team, like sales goals, may be realistic (and aggressively so) so that they inspire more than might have been possible.
But goals and expectations can be so high they immobilize. They can frighten and freeze performance so a team achieves far from their best, and produces even less than they might, with less attention.
Goals can inspire – or immobilize.
What are your goals doing for you?
Are you achieving more, or less, because of what you expect?
Pause for a few minutes sometime today to briefly review the week.
Notice, when you do:
- Your favorite moments, and why they were
- The things you’re proudest of, and again, why
- The mistakes you made and in this case, notice which turned out to be amusing (yes, some do) and which were most helpful to inform something in the future.
Hope your week ends well – there’s still time for it to.
Hurray! Rain!
Originally uploaded by jcgr.
Precious raindrops arrive to bring out future growth and beauty in the San Jose area.
A good Monday, all.
Here’s how a famous few through the ages see the importance of truth:
All truths are easy to understand once they are discovered; the point is to discover them.
- Galileo
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
- Oscar Wilde
If you tell the truth you don’t have to remember anything.
- Mark Twain
Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
- Steve Jobs
Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted with important matters.
- Albert Einstein
Cafe…where?
Originally uploaded by jcgr.
Location, location, location, they say…and what worked in the past…well, the game can change.
What has changed about the game you’re in, in a business sense?
What do you expect, moving ahead?
And looking at the future with your wildest imagination, what do you realize could change (for better or worse…both can happen)…even though you do not expect it now?
It’s easy to focus on differences, the things that can split a group apart.
Harder, sometimes, is finding common ground, the source of your strength, a team’s “home base,” the place you can return when you need fresh energy, replenishment, growth.
The attention, the energy, and the fear teams feel in finding out they often have big differences can blind a group to the “samenesses” that give them strength.
This is where they can return – to their common ground – when they’re being pushed around by pressures and forces outside that could make them fail. Those “samenesses” include common values and goals, shared history, inside jokes, and often much more.
What are the common things on which your team forges its bond, and finds its source of strength when the pressure’s on?
I opened a small book the other day, and randomly picked a few items to read:
“Be humble.”
“Make use of anything life happens to bring your way.”
It instantly reminded me of the gift of humility that life presents each of us at times. A little embarrassment can be a good thing. At a minimum, it keeps you grounded, which usually has positive results.
If you’re a leader, that is particularly the case.
I could tell you lots of stories about the healthy servings of humility that have come to me through the years. Two pop up immediately. One involved a yoga class where all I could do was laugh at myself, so many times, for so many reasons.
A second involved mascara…in a snowshower almost like a cold rain…as I did freelance photography in a big stadium filled with college football fans.
Let’s just say that I had wondered why so many people were staring at me as I walked from the sidelines of the field…all the way up a loooong flight of stairs…in front of hundreds of people…to the restroom on the stadium’s upper deck.
I turned the corner into the restroom, took a quick, presumably cursory glance at myself in the mirror. But what was staring back at me? A face stained with rivulets of runny mascara draining down the full length of my cheeks.
All I could do at that point – as is often the case when humility comes one’s way – was to laugh at myself, wipe away the rivulets, and carry on.
Did I go back out on the sidelines, in front of all those people who had surely laughed at me when I looked like something left over from Halloween on this early November day?
I did.
There are things you only understand when life whacks you upside the head in little – and big – ways, when you have to pick yourself up again and get back in the game.
Leadership takes humility. Lots of it. Often. Liberally applied.
When life drops a good dose of humility on your head or at your feet, don’t get stuck in pride or embarrassment, wondering who saw what happened, thinking they’re talking about you or laughing at your fate.
Just laugh at yourself and say, “Thanks. I probably needed that.” Get ready to go again, remind yourself of your goal, your plan. And yes, get back in the game.
What, by the way, was the last good dose of humility that life offered you?
Did you have a good laugh at yourself, and move beyond it well to a better day?
