Attitude is all

Geoff Roberts change, choice, flexibility, perception, selection

attitude changes everythingI make no apology for using someone else’s words today – Charles Swindoll seems to say it all…

“The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude to me is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failures, than success, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, gift, or skill. It will make or break a company…a church…a home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past… we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the string we have, and that is our attitude. I am convinced that life is 10 percent what happens to me and 90 percent how I react to it. And so it is with you… we are in charge of our attitudes.”
Charles Swindoll

Trying harder is not the answer

Geoff Roberts change, choice, opportunity, strategy

snake painted on eggI am walking along holding an egg in my hand when suddenly I manage to drop it and break it. Do I tell myself “Hold onto the egg more tightly” or do I find a better way of carrying the egg?

Does a stressful event start a cascade that ends up making even you more stressed?
When someone in authority challenges you or corrects your behavior, do you to push back and make the behaviour worse?
Does a failure set you on a path to more failure?

These questions seem philosophical or even paradoxical, but in fact I think they get to the heart of why some people succeed and others don’t. We can choose to create (virtuous) cycles that move us up or endure (vicious) cycles that drag us down.
A policemen hassles a teenager who is acting up. The teenager escalates. The cop escalates. Someone gets arrested – and you can bet it isn’t the cop!.
A sales call is going poorly because the prospect doesn’t perceive the salesperson is confident. She responds by becoming even less confident. No sale.
A mistake is made. The stakes go up. Rattled, another mistake is made, and then again, until failure occurs…

James Bond is a hero because the tougher the world got, the cooler he got. Symphony conductors don’t endure the pressure of a performance, they thrive on it.

If being a little behind creates self-pressure that leads to stress and then errors, is it really suprising that you frequently end up a lot behind.
Customer service falls apart when mutual escalation or non-understanding sets in. Management falls apart when power struggles or miscommunication escalate. Education falls apart when students respond to poor exam results by giving up.

Someone who gets better whenever he fails will always outperform someone who responds to failure by getting worse. This isn’t something in your DNA, it’s something you can learn or unlearn.
The useful response to ‘failure’ is not to try harder, to buckle down and grind it out. The response that works is to understand the nature of the cycle and to change it from the start. You must not fight the cycle, you must transform it into a different cycle altogether. It’s a lot of work, but less work than failing.
When the snake pushes you to recoil in fear, that’s your cue to embrace the trembling fear and do precisely the opposite of what it demands. This won’t work the first time or even the tenth, but it’s the path to an upcycle, one where each negative input leads to more productivity, not less.
Carry that egg in a bowl.

Are you Browsing or Seeking?

Geoff Roberts choice, flexibility, focus, opportunity, selection, time management

browsing
I am one of those people who sometimes challenges stereotypes and this is one of those occasions. This man is happy to admit that, on occasions, he just loves shopping. I would like to talk about that phrase “on occasions”. In my head, there are two types of shopping – firstly those occasions when I am quite happy just wandering around window shopping and possibly coming across something that interests me that I might or might not buy. Secondly there is that sort of shopping when I am going out to buy something specific and that is when I become a man on a mission.

The first type of shopping I am browsing, the second I am seeking. When browsing, the pleasure is in browsing in itself and not necessarily in making a purchase. When seeking, the pleasure is finding an item that meets my needs (and there is even greater pleasure in finding something that exceeds those needs).

So, how is it for you? Do you wander through life with no particular aim in mind, perhaps picking up the odd gem on the way but generally letting whatever happens happen? Or do you set out every day with specific aims and goals in mind, with your brain primed to look for opportunities and your body ready to take action on those opportunities?

There is certainly room for both of these approaches, however my challenge to you is to be clear which you are doing when and to be certain that you are doing the right one at the right time. If I want to buy a pair of shoes, it is no good me going to a food store and if I want the pleasure of just wandering, visiting a carpet warehouse is likely to be limiting my pleasure.

Without a vision and without goals all we can ever do is browse; indeed, without that vision and those goals operating in the background we might miss major opportunities whilst we are browsing. Once we are clear what it is that we want we can actively choose whether to go and explicitly seek that or just put it in the background whilst we are browsing in case some opportunity comes up. Living a life without goals is a bit like being a tumbleweed, blown where the wind takes its, trapped in some windowless corner and slowly decaying until point at which it disintegrates and is spread to all corners of the wind.

Which is relevant to your quest for a new product or business or job or mate or project worth working on…
If you’re still looking around, making sure you understand all your options, getting your bearings or making sure you’re well informed, you’re most probably browsing. You missed the first, second and third waves of the internet; you missed a hundred great jobs and forty great husbands.; you missed the deadline for that course and who knows what else while you were just browsing..

Quit looking and go buy something.

Does what you are working on excite you?

Geoff Roberts change, choice, flexibility, focus

excited child

If someone asks what you are working on, can you give them an answer that truly excites you?

I hope so, for if you cannot then surely you are frittering away your limited time here. Why would you want to spend time other than by being excited – boredom is boring!

What is your personal Dream – for 20, 30, 40, unspecified years ahead? Do you even have one? I do – I could draw it for you but a few words will give you the gist of it. I am living in a house overlooking the ocean in one direction and the mountains in another; the weather is generally warm to hot although there is enough rain to keep the beautiful garden green most of the year; I share the house with my wonderful wife, some kids, some friends and some people who have come to study with us and use our library; we travel extensively sharing our insights into personal and self-development with others…and so on. What excites me is anything that helps me get closer to that dream.

No matter what your job is, no matter where you work, there’s a way to create a project (on your own, on weekends if necessary), where the excitement is palpable, where something that might or will make a difference is right around the corner.

Hurry, go do that. Go do it now, before it’s too late!

No risk, no reward

Geoff Roberts change, choice, flexibility, opportunity, Risk

risk is realityHow often have you heard the phrase no risk, no reward?

When I was at school I was quite good at chemistry, well ahead of the class. I vividly remember one practical lesson when the chemistry teacher, a wonderful man called Dave Hudson, took me aside and explained that he was going to give me a different practical to complete compared to everyone else in the class. He said that it was extremely difficult but that he believed I could do it. It turned out to be a fairly complex procedure, using some dangerous chemicals. However, I pulled it off much to my own surprise and quite possibly to the chemistry teacher’s. That practical lesson could well have been the moment that catalysed my future career. A brilliant teacher took a risk and allowed me to learn that I was capable of much more than I had so far showed. I blogged earlier about fear and anxiety in learning and this is clearly linked to the concept of taking risks. Risk creates anxiety, anxiety opens the possibility of learning.

So my challenge, whether you are thinking of personal development or the development of those with whom you work, is to think about the amount of risk you take in your daily life and to push the boundaries a little. How often have you not asked (the boss, your colleague, your partner…) because you fear the wrong response? Will surely the worst that can happen is that they say no and if you don’t even ask then there is no possibility of them saying yes.

So next time you really want to try something new, go ahead and do it – I might even suggest that you don’t even ask, just go ahead and do it because it is easier to ask for forgiveness than permission and, moreover, you are much more likely to get it.

Positivity is infectious

Geoff Roberts change, choice, flexibility, focus

I met a colleague of mine, Chris Edwards, in Leeds yesterday. Chris has overseen a fundamental transformation and improvement of education throughout Leeds over the last 10 years and is now out on his own looking for opportunities to help the world. I always find my time with Chris inspirational – he is irrepressibly positive and upbeat, his favourite word is “brilliant” and his belief in people, especially children, is awesome. We talked a lot about beliefs and how the beliefs that parents embed in their children can either help or hinder them.

I would never dream of telling my four-year-old granddaughter that the picture of a tree that she has just presented me with looks nothing like a tree and that she cannot draw. It seems almost intuitive to me that constant negative messages are likely to leave her believing that she is no good and lo and behold she will be no good. Chris tells me that there is some research that shows that the lowest performing children have parents who give them eight times as many negative messages as positive and the highest performers have parents who give them eight times as many positive messages as negative.

If this makes so much difference the children, then why not adults as well? If you work with anyone, and you don’t have to manage them you simply have to work with them, then perhaps you might like to check how often you praise them versus how often you give negative feedback. Yoou DO give feedback don’t you?

And what about yourself? What about that self talk that constantly goes on inside our heads? Is yourself talk supportive or destructive? Do you believe in yourself? Do you believe that you can take things on and do a good job or is everything too difficult? Self belief is all-important. As Henry Ford once said

whether you believe you can
or you believe you cannot
you are probably right

Believe in others, believe in yourself and be sure to give yourself and others great feedback.

Metaprograms – Towards or Away From

Geoff Roberts change, choice, flexibility

Donkey with stick and carrotIn yesterday’s post I thought about whether or not we see the world as full of problems to avoid or opportunities to take. I also mentioned that there was a link to metaprograms dealing with Towards or Away From motivation.

I have spent a lot of my career dealing with change at both corporate and personal levels and can now easily recognise two different types of thinking when faced with change. There are those who look at situations and can readily list all the problems that we currently have and perhaps how the change might be able to help solve them – their motivation is to move away from problems. On the other hand there are those who will look at the situation and will be primarily motivated by the wonderful bright new world into which we are sailing – their motivation is primarily towards the future.

Away From or Troubleshooting thinking is great at identifying what is currently wrong, what might go wrong in the future and how we might prevent previous problems recurring. Those who process in this way tend to be risk averse, to excel in a crisis situation and to be good at making contingency plans. Because they are so good at this, there is a risk that sometimes they identify problems that aren’t actually there and fight fires that don’t exist or don’t need putting out. They can slow down change and sometimes this is helpful because the towards thinker can become a bit gung ho.

Towards thinking is typified by the person who still smiles even when they are up to their neck in the crocodile filled swamp. This type of thinking is extremely future focused, concentrating on achieving goals and positive thinking. However these thinkers can be so enthusiastic that they overlook actual or potential problems and pitfalls and need an away thinking colleague to complement their approach.

Perhaps you will do both of these, although experience indicates that it is rare for someone to excel at both types of thinking, or perhaps you sit closer to one end of the scale than the other. Remember that both types of thinking are helpful, the towards thinking provides the enthusiasm and drive to move forward and the away from thinking provides the caution necessary to avoid the towards thinker falling down a dirty great hole that they just didn’t see because they were focusing on their goals.

So here’s the exercise – think of a change that you would like to make. Now list two or three current problems that the change will solve and one or two potential pitfalls that you will need to be aware of. Next list three or four compelling reasons for making the change, three or four improvements that will be recognisable once the change has been made. Using both types of thinking gives you a more comprehensive view of the situation.

Do you see problems or opportunities?

Geoff Roberts choice, flexibility

Mug with writing "problem or opportunity"I got a very short e-mail from a colleague first thing this morning; all it said was “Can I meet you for a coffee this morning?” Now this colleague is generally very upbeat and positive, so what was it that resulted in my first thought being “I wonder what’s wrong?” Perhaps it was the sparseness of the e-mail; perhaps my recent history with the organisation for whom she works (which has not been happy) predisposes me think of problems rather than opportunities; perhaps I even have a broader disposition to believe that people are more likely to contact me when things are wrong than when they are right.

I admit to being a bit of a Mr Fixit, whose first thoughts on being presented with a problem are often “Do this, do that, do the other” rather than “Well what do you think the options are?” A constant challenge of my, and no doubt others, coaching practice is to avoid this tendency to offer solutions and simply to sit and listen, asking good questions and reflecting the opportunity to solve the problem back to the client.

It turned out that the meeting presented both a problem and an opportunity. A problem because we are losing another key member of staff, and opportunity because its offers the chance to re-examine our management structure and the roles and responsibilities of the senior staff in the organisation.

Today’s challenge to you is to think about your default position when somebody contacts you or makes an announcement. Do you default to thinking about all the problems, challenges, all of the negatives about the situation? Or do you default to thinking about the communication more positively, looking for opportunities and believing that what you are about to hear has the potential to be all for the good?
There is a link back to last week’s topic about metaprograms because a further pair of metaprograms relate to whether or not we tend to move away from pain or move towards pleasure. I will write about this “Towards/Away From” pair of metaprograms in a future blog.

Pick Your Battles

Geoff Roberts choice, metaphor, strategy

There once lived a great mathematician in a small country village. He was often called by the local king to advice on matters related to the economy. His reputation had spread far and wide. So it hurt him very much when the village headman told him, “You may be a great mathematician who advises the king on economic matters but your son does not know the value of gold or silver.”

The mathematician called his son and asked, “What is more valuable – gold or silver?” “Gold,” said the son. “That is correct. Why is it then that the village headman makes fun of you, and claims you do not know the value of gold or silver? He teases me every day. He mocks me before other village elders as a father who has failed to educate his son. This hurts me. I feel everyone in the village is laughing behind my back because you do not know what is more valuable, gold or silver. Explain this to me, son.”

So the son of the mathematician told his father the reason why the village headman carried this impression. “Every day on my way to school, the village headman calls me to his house. There, in front of all village elders, he holds out a silver coin in one hand and a gold coin in other. He asks me to pick up the more valuable coin. I pick the silver coin. He laughs, the elders jeer, and everyone makes fun of me. And then I go to school. This happens every day. That is why they tell you I do not know the value of gold or silver.”

The father was confused. His son knew the value of gold and silver, and yet when asked to choose between a gold coin and silver coin always picked the silver coin. “Why don’t you pick up the gold coin?” he asked. In response, the son took the father to his room and showed him a box. In the box were at least a hundred silver coins. Turning to his father, the mathematician’s son said, “The day I pick up the gold coin the game will stop; they will stop having their fun and I will stop making money.”

Sometimes in life, we have to play the fool because our seniors and our peers, and sometimes even our juniors like it. That does not mean we lose in the game of life. It just means allowing others to win in one arena of the game, while we win in another arena of the game.

We have to choose which arena matters to us and which arenas do not.