Category: Uncategorized

What you don’t do

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

We think in life about what we have done and it’s influence on who we are. The flip side is what we don’t do. What we don’t do defines us just as much.

What we didn’t do: the conversation we wanted to have, the followup we missed, the extra effort we could have made, the thought we overlooked, the ideas we never shared, purpose unmet, and the plans left unfulfilled.

What we can’t do: the skills we haven’t yet learned, the practice not yet perfected, the knowledge unknown, the bias & privilege we can’t see, the conflicts avoided, the sponsorship we missed, the advice unheard, and the deadline that’s gone.

What we won’t do: the values we will keep, the choices rejected, the beliefs unquestioned, the paths abandoned and the changes embraced.

Not all of what we do we control. Some opportunities depend on others. Some moments are so deeply held that they don’t feel like a choice. Whether we control it or not, what we don’t do affects us and deserves attention.

The Purpose of Procrastiwork

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

Procrastiwork is a term coined by Jessica Hische to describe the work you do when you are avoiding the work you should be doing. This blog often forms a part of my procrastiwork. I love the opportunity to work out loud, to clarify my ideas and the conversations that are spun up from these blog posts. I learn so much from my procrastination that it can be quite addictive.

Jessica Hische’s point in coining the phrase is to point out that procrastiwork is a great hint to the work you should be doing. If you choose that work, it speaks to you. I’ve experienced the power of finding purpose in the work. This blog is a big part of my personal purpose of making work more human and it was through posts here that those ideas were surfaced from my work.

Procrastination can be purposeful if you ask yourself the right questions. Work out loud on the work you do to avoid work. The repeated process of transparency and reflection will help you find insights as to purpose.

The Diversity of the Change Agent

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

Change agents aren’t all alike. Organisations that fail to embrace the diversity of the change agent fail at change.

Change agents are a diverse bunch. 

Organisations tend to lump them together in an ‘outsider’ bucket. When change agents don’t think & act in the way of the majority then it is assumed their different way is shared. Yet change agents often find collaboration challenging when they don’t understand that a common desire for change can be driven from diverse motives and methods. 

Adam Morgan of eatbigfish describes 10 challenger narratives in The Challenger Almanac.  These narratives that give a sense of the diversity of motivations and approaches to change: 

  • People’s Champion – standing up for the exploited or overlooked
  • Missionary – ethical or ideological advocate 
  • Democratiser – challenging elitism and exclusivity 
  • Irreverent Maverick – the provocateur 
  • Enlightened Zagger – the deliberate contrarian 
  • Real & Human – advocating for the human 
  • The Visionary – transcending current ideas 
  • The Next Generation – improving fitness to the future
  • The Game Changer – rewriting the rules
  • The Feisty Underdog – battling the winners 

Few change agents fit cleanly in one narrative. Often many narratives will be woven into a unique personal approach. There are plenty of opportunities for conflict as to the objectives and methods in the diversity of narratives. 

Change agents and the organisations that seek to foster their work need to concentrate on building connection as to what is in common. Ideological debates and fractious debates as to approach can illuminate the diverse paths but they tend to delay action. 

Change agents need to embrace the action of others, learn from diverse perspectives and leverage alignment of narratives. Broadening the toolkit of change benefits both the change agents and their organisations.

Mastery takes Time

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

Before we connected the world in an instantaneous network, we understood mastery takes time. Now we often forget that we can’t leap to learning.

I’ve had many conversations recently where people have wanted to move quickly to mastery. Stakeholder expectations are high. Everything else is available at the push of a button. Where’s the shortcut to mastery?

Mastery takes learning. Remember the apprenticeships of the pre-industrial era were seven years long. Seven years lifted you to journeyman practice. A lifetime of learning and teaching others lifted you to master.

While access to information has changed, we have not necessarily transformed the pace at which we learn by putting skills into practice. We can find best practices easily but using them and moving to mastery is something else

Mastery depends on context. Mastering your particular purpose in your domain is unique to you. Your practice will be in a specific domain. Other’s practices may not fit. Discovering this context, purpose and clarifying the domain can take its own time.

Mastery takes continuous practice. Mastery is the ever continuing quest to learn, experiment and improve. Mastery is the domain of next practice. Practice takes time. We like to hear sorting superstars talk of their success. We often fail to focus on the decades of dedicated practice that makes that brief moment of mastery.

Our obsession with speed can mean we devalue the slow. That is a mistake when it comes to mastery. Mastery is something we have a lifetime to practice.

Change Management Institute – CMI Disrupt Conference 11-12 November

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

The following Q&A was prepared for the CMI Disrupt Conference in Sydney and London on 11-12 November

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Conference Speaker – Simon Terry disrupts

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What does the future of change look like?

The power of digital disruption is in its power to leverage learning at scale and speed. If we consider our stakeholders as individuals, who we work with and learn from, things change radically. We need to start to apply these new ways of working throughout our organisations.

Are we being replaced by robots?

Automation and mechanisation have been disruptive throughout human history. But in the past, people were only considered inputs to production. But now we have real alternatives. Enabled by digital tools, we can focus on creativity to realise human potential. That’s shifting the game, from one of simple mechanical efficiency to human effectiveness.

How do we change our approach?

Start small. Start now. Start at the edges, with change agents, positive deviants inside and outside the organisation. Look out for rapid and dynamic influences which force change. Adapt and be accountable. Work with and through your people.

JOIN the conversation on Twitter #cmidisrupt

The Network Always Subverts the Hierarchy

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

Human relationships are flexible and driven by shared information, influence, trust and other personal dynamics. These dynamic relationships will subvert any formal fixed hierarchical relationships.

We see the fixed relationships of the hierarchy. We obsess about their nominal power. What we don’t see is how the network wins slowly through human relationships. Networks of information, influence and trust shape how the hierarchy behaves:

  • Want a positive decision from the CEO? You know who to lobby to influence his or her opinion.
  • Want to know why some customers can get what they want? Look for their networks and connections into your organisation and into competitors.
  • Why do all employee emails leak within minutes? Look for the gossips and informal relationships outside the organisation.
  • Want to know why some are promoted over others? Look for the networks of previous experiences, trusted relationships and reputation helping careers along.

As soon as a new hierarchy is created or control processes are tightened, human nature starts subverting its effect in the name of relationships of information, trust and influence. The rational slowly yields to the relational. The network wins in the end because it leverages the human social process of decision making. 

Fighting the influence of networks makes life less human. Embrace them as a part of any hierarchy.

Partisan

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

‘Noun: strong supporter of a party, cause, or person…adjective: prejudiced in favour of a particular cause’. Oxford dictionary

Increased connection can bring us together with diverse others. However, they can also make it easy to find and form cliques with those who think like us. Networks can make it easier to be partisan.

The difference between the two outcomes comes down to our willingness to test our ideas and to learn. If we seek confirmation of our views from networks, we will find a niche of other like minded folk to act as echo chamber. The reinforcement we receive runs the danger of causing greater disconnect from reality as we become surer in our beliefs.

If we want the benefits of networks to make us more effective we must be prepared to learn and put our beliefs out for testing in action. Networks that simply confirm our knowledge and beliefs will rarely add value other than a smug sense of satisfaction. We will rightly question the value of participation.

We need to be open to new facts and new experiences in the network. If we respect the views of others and seek to understand, we may not change our opinions but we will be open to changing our prejudices and remaining connected to others and reality.

The Self-aware Self

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

A key part of the value of the quantified self is awareness. We know how to coach ourself when we give ourselves enough purposeful attention.

I’ve been travelling for work recently. Being away from home has put out my usual diet. I just didn’t have my usual options or as much ability to cook. Feeling the effects, I decided recently to start tracking my meals using the Fitbit app. I wanted to know what I was eating.

There were three quick lessons from this experience:
– the Hawthorne effect works: just being aware I was recording my meals ( with no cheating) helped me make better choices.
– after a few days I realised I didn’t need to know the data. If I concentrated on what my body was telling me, I knew whether I was hungry, when I had enough and what I shouldn’t eat. If I listened closely to those messages I could make better decisions without data.
– I enjoyed eating more, because I noticed what I was eating.

A big part of the value of the quantified self is helping us become more self-aware. We all benefit when we step out of busy distracted mode. There can be great value in novel insights from data. Usually, our problems are much simpler. We don’t need machines to tell us things we know but don’t do. We need to learn how to be more present and how to better coach ourselves.

Break Patterns

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

Humans are a pattern making species. Give us a chance to do something twice and we will make a pattern of it. These patterns influence how we see the world. Rote pattern following causes us to miss opportunities and insights. 

Break your patterns. You will discover a new world. 

Walk a different way. Reorder your icons. Adopt a new habit. Change your diet. Start from a different perspective. Ask a new question. Change the order of steps or drop one. 

Break patterns can be disconcerting and uncomfortable. That feeling is called learning. 

The biggest threats and opportunities are in the grey where the patterns no longer apply. Test yourself there it is where you add most value.