Writing

Lessons for and from J: an #otherie

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

This morning I had to get an early cab to the airport. My driver’s name began with J and he is a 29 year old looking to make a living and a better place for himself in the world. J and I spoke all the way to the airport. We exchanged otheries. There is no photo so you will need to settle for a thousand words of what I learned. Remember this all came about because in my otherie, I concentrated on what I can give.

J showed interest in me first. He wanted to know what I did. When I said I was a consultant, he wanted to know my history, goals and how I built my consulting business.

In return, I asked what he was trying to achieve over the next 5 years. J drives a cab to make some money but want to do more. He already runs a truck and driver for furniture deliveries and wants to build that business. He’s had success with online advertising on Gumtree and wants to do more. His customers are a great source of referrals. J wants to have paid off his house by age 45.

We ended up in a wide ranging conversation about entrepreneurship, learning, hard work and creating your own luck. We both saw the value of a simple approach to building business:
– focus on finding and talking to customers
– build networks to generate additional connection to customers and to referrals
– recognise that ‘doing the same thing and expecting a different result’ is the definition of insanity. Be prepared to make changes.
– Focus your changes on small simple steps that are tests of new ways of working.
– Do more of what works. Change what doesn’t
– Ask yourself ‘what can I do more, better or different?’ Keep trying new things.
– Most of all, recognise that luck is when opportunity meets preparation. Be alert and be prepared.

That advice might be simple but we often need to be reminded to focus on the basics. I need that reminder often. J liked the focus on seeing simple steps as a way to do more and do different.

J is excited. He had a few new ideas to try. I was excited because I was reminded of the power of coaching and simple practical advice.

That’s the power of the #otherie.

2015 is the Year of the #Otherie

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

Photo: Very happy with myself in my selfie to end 2014.

#Selfies ruled 2014

2014 was the Year of the Selfie. We took photographing ourselves to new lengths during the year. Selfies were taken around the world.  Many were taken with and by celebrities. Selfies were photobombed by royalty. Some even chose some of the year’s worst disasters as a moment to share their image. We even created the selfie stick to take better photos of ourselves.

We love our own image. We know it well from our relationships with cameras and mirrors. Our self-image helps us shape our relationship with the world and the selfie was undoubtedly part of that relationship. One has only to look at all the photos of people holding smartphones before mirrors on Instagram to reflect on the significance we invest in sharing a good self-image. These images are as carefully curated illusions as the pages of most lifestyle magazines.  The competition of selfies invites me to remember the useful adage about self-image: “Never compare someone else’s showreel to your cutting room floor”.

Sadly, we often forget to invest the same time and effort in others around us.

The Year of The #Otherie

What if we made 2015 the Year of the Otherie? Instead of focusing our attention and sharing on ourselves, an otherie would focus our sights on the other relationships in our life. I am inspired by the ongoing focus on the person-to-person economy of Jonathan Anthony.  Jonathan is a great proponent of the selfie but he also stressed the opportunity to engage with others deeply. We are who we are not just because of our self-image but also because of those around us.  

Understanding others help us to be more human and better leverage the new opportunities of our network economy.  It also helps us to improve our own self-image.  Internal thoughts are no match for the creative and energising potential of purposeful and personal dialogue with another. We see ourselves better through the lens of another person’s eyes.

What would change if we started to take a good hard look at the others around us? What if we focused on their self-image, their worldview, their experiences and their goals? A selfie is an momentary blast of image. An otherie will be the foundation for a growing dialogue and relationship between two people.

Go out and take an otherie, a photo of someone else. Make it a basis for a conversation about their worldview, their goals and their self-image.  Share what you learn, add your #otherie tag and step by step we will turn 2015 into the Year of the Otherie.

I look forward to sharing an #otherie or several here as the year progresses.

Back human potential

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

Management has challenges on its hands. The traditional pillars of management are breaking down as David Holzmer recently outlined. At the same time the demands on management increase. In seeking a new course we need to engage the creativity of human potential. After all, human potential got us here in the first place.

We must remember in the tens of thousands of years of history of human culture the industrial model of activity covers only the last roughly 150. Industrial management models have been enormously productive and transformed our society. However, it has been at the cost of valuing process over personality. As the industrial model frays we have an opportunity to experiment anew with new more human ways of working.

Reading Mark Pagel’s Wired for Culture has reminded me of the power of the diverse potential of humanity. However to engage this potential we must allow people the latitude to express diverse talents and solutions. Pagel makes the point that:

‘…social learning is to ideas what natural selection is to genes. Both are ways of picking good solutions from a sea of variety’.

We must engage people to experiment with the potential of autonomy, purpose and mastery. We will need people to do this in large numbers, in diverse ways, using diverse talents and with sharing of practice to enable connected social learning. From these approaches new adaptations will be found. There won’t be an easy linear recipe. However, human creativity given its freedom is a powerful problem solving engine.

Organisations go to great effort to hire the most talented employees and to align them to the goals of the organisation. Why not let them use those talents to adapt and change the system? Perhaps it is time to trust in the potential of those well chosen people to create new and better ways of working. Better still connect, enable and hold people accountable for this creativity. Supply the adaptive leadership to help them realise even more.

Back human potential. It is the future of work.

What were they thinking?

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

I go looking for a leadership echo chamber when I hear that question asked about a decision. Inexplicably bad decisions are the product of logic of leaders disconnected from reality.

The corporate ‘yes man’ has been much derided. Leaders who surround themselves with sycophants know and deserve what they get. In exchange for ego support, they will find no challenge to their ideas, even the dangerously bad ones. However, most people are aware of the danger of ‘yes men’. The derision of the ‘yes men’ pushes sycophancy underground into a more subtle form of danger.

The echo chamber of leadership is a more subtle danger to organisations. An echo chamber may not say yes immediately. There may be extensive debate and analysis. However debate is structured within the defines of the logic and information of the leader. Those who would disagree or might introduce additional information know or learn to stay silent. Tragically many leaders hear later, ‘I knew it wouldn’t work but I didn’t say anything because you clearly wanted it’.

An echo chamber may have debate but it will carefully reflect the pros and cons inherent in the decision already made. Without the ability to extend the discussion, a bad decision will not be challenged and may even be strengthened by this groupthink. A group with limited goals and strong focus in discussions may not see how far their actions are from common sense to their stakeholders. In many cases, busy with the challenges of achievement, the group may not even be aware of how limited their considerations were.

Silence the echo

The simplest way to change the dynamic of an echo chamber conversation is to introduce new information from outside the group into the discussion. That new information may be new language, a new point of data, a new argument, more time for reflection or the perspective of an external stakeholder. Asking the group to step outside the logic of their decision and see it from an additional perspective can help breakdown the echoes of the leader’s thinking.

Another important challenge to the echo chamber is to ask people to explain the logic for the decision in the simplest language. Strip away the internal jargon and the internal logic also is more easily exposed.

A critical role for any leader in an organisation is to bring in fresh external perspectives to decision making from the system in and around the organisation. Network connections can help offer this additional perspective. Inexplicable decisions are a symptom of this flow of information becoming a stale echo chamber. The role of leaders is to watch for these reactions, extend the networks and change the group discussion.

Treasure the precious relationships

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

We are relationship busy. Life is short. Communication technologies fill our lives with more people than ever.

Weak network links enable us to do extraordinary things. Strong relationships help make us the people who do extraordinary things.

Strong relationships listen and seek to understand us. Strong relationships push, challenge and make demands of us. Strong relationships support, care and give.

Relationships become and stay strong through time and effort. In a world of buzzing connections, relationships not growing stronger are fading away.

Don’t let the demands of life or the swirl of relationships interfere in your effort to connect with those who matter to you. We cannot leave our strong relationships to circumstances or chance. Build your strongest relationships as you work to create your future.

Treasure your precious relationships. Give them a gift of your time and attention. Your strongest relationships help make you who you will be.

What do you demand?

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

The ladder makes demands. To rise the ladder, you must fulfil the demands of your rising positions. 

Prosperity makes demands. To grow your prosperity, you must fulfil the demands of growing resources. 

Endeavour makes demand. To succeed in your endeavours, you must fulfil the demands of expanding activity. 

Life makes one demand. Make the most of your limited time, precious relationships and scarce attention. 

Hierarchy, prosperity and endeavour are abundant. Human time is scarce

Demand a little time for yourself. 

The misery of anticipation

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

More human misery has been caused by anticipation than the events that were feared. Stop bringing forward the pain.

This morning I caught a commuter train. Aside from the aesthetic misery caused by anti-graffiti fabric on the seats, the other noticeable thing was how glum a Monday morning work crowd can be.

We all know why work might make people glum. Engagement of employees is remarkably low. However, none of the people on the train were yet at work. They were glum because of the anticipation of the work day ahead. They could have been enjoying their last moments of freedom.

Stress is also a consequence of anticipation. Stress is a present concern about future events. We bring forward the pain with our anticipation.

Anticipation is a positive when it enables us to act and avoid negative events. However that demands we recognise the source of the anticipated pain and get on the job of avoiding it.

If anticipation is causing pain, either do something different or accept that the present moment is better than you think.

Change didn’t work? Work the system consistently

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

The industrial era left management thinking with a fervent belief in the value of transactional interventions. If a linear process needs a different outcome, make a change. The impact should be immediately visible and then you can move on to the next change.

When you start to talk about systemic change, especially involving people, matters get more complex. The future of work is one such example. Change in the future of work often involves many people and systems in organisations. Make a transactional intervention in this situation and nothing can happen or perhaps something happens for a while and then fades as the system reasserts itself. Our work systems are designed to consistently absorb transactional shocks and then stabilise. Remember the system is not broken; it is working exactly as intended.

Culture is one example of these stabilising forces in the system of organisations, particularly for future of work behaviours. Culture is an expectation of how people will behave. That expectation shapes the way we work and does not change on one transactional intervention. Culture does not change until the individuals in the organisation form a new expectation. New sense making won’t happen until there has been persistence, leadership and reinforcing changes elsewhere in the system.

Instead of a linear process where transactional change leads directly to a measurable change in work we have a situation where interventions lead to new practice and to new sense making and that sense making drives new behaviours and better mastery of the practice that sustains different ways of work. The delays, the sense making, the need to learn and master new practice and other forces in the system all make the impact of a transactional change to culture difficult to measure & unlikely to be effective. At best, the relationship is complicated. At worst, it can be hard to draw any relationship at all.

Work on the system consistently

To foster accelerated change in the kind of complex systems faced by those changing work practices, you need help the system participants to form a new sense of the way forward:

  • don’t be wedded to your change. Ask those in the system to define, design and do the work. 
  • do you have enough system participants engaged in your changes? Those you leave out may hold you back or be key to wider complementary changes. 
  • help the system participants move from changing things transactionally to working on the whole system. Help them to see a bigger picture. Ask them to own and work the bigger change themselves and to draw others in.
  • reinforce change and work with the participants to ensure that the work on the system ensures beyond a transaction. Find the other influences in the system that impact change and include them in the work. 
  • be consistent and allow the time for issues to surface and communities to mature. Unrealistic expectations can lead to counterproductive perceptions of failure or at least difficulty.

Champions play a critical role in this kind of systemic change because they are inside the system. This position gives them impetus, influence and insight to help build an enduring new sense of the change. Champions can work in and on the system consistently.

Work with complexity

Posted on by simongterry in Uncategorized

If your work is not engaging with complexity, then someone is currently automating, outsourcing or offshoring it. In fact, the boundaries of simplicity are always being expanded. The challenge is to learn to work to tackle the real complexity of our environment and obstacles. We must embrace the real challenges of our work, but this doesn’t always mean we have to work in more complex ways.

After centuries of pushing for simplicity in work, many of our organisations and leaders aren’t ready for the challenge of dealing with complexity. Afraid of what can’t be turned into a process, any complexity is ignored. We are masters of reduction because our organisations are allergic to complexity. We see complexity as a source of unnecessary cost & delay that interferes with efficiency and create undue complications. We focus on the need to avoid working with complexity as if it were the choice to work in more complex ways. Again and again in organisations we are told ‘make it simpler’.

Much of our modern complexity is imposed by our environment and challenges. Our obstacles are the real work we do. Much of the simple, process & rule based work can and will be done by machines. We don’t necessarily need to work in complex ways but we must work with complexity. Anne Marie-McEwan recently wrote a post highlighting the need to focus on complexity in the future of work. Other thought leaders like Harold Jarche, John Hagel, Stowe Boyd and Dave Snowden have been exploring complexity as the domain of the future of work. Uncertainty, networks and ever increasing technical challenges push more complexity at us.

Humanity brings complexity. As we make our work more human and acknowledge wider circumstances and relationships then we need to be working with changing goals, circumstances and rules. Networks shift us from linear approaches to areas where cause and effect can be far more uncertain.

Working with complexity doesn’t have to be complex. In fact often the simplest practices are the most effective when the complexity of our circumstances overwhelm us. We may still use simple practices like experimentation, learning from practice, working out loud, engaging others in meaningful conversation, coaching, leadership and influence, customer service or design, but their application calls for judgment, sense making and expertise in dynamic environments. We also need the simple human skill of learning together. These practices are simple to describe but they are hard to practice because they work with complexity and take the best of our humanity.

Learning from the shared practice of bread making

Posted on by simongterry in Learning, Life & Career, Working out loud

image

Tonight I started making a new loaf of bread. The one I made this morning is gone. As I began I reflected that what once terrified me as a mysterious challenge has become a practice I can tackle with confidence. Mastery is still a long way off, but the practice has its rewards.

Making bread is a simple practice but one with remarkable options for complexity. The simplicity begins with ingredients. There are only four required – flour, water, yeast and salt. However each of these is a natural product and yeast is a living organism. Variations in flour, temperature and vitality of the yeast interact with the practice of kneading, rising, shaping and baking to introduce complexity. Additional ingredients, processes and time spin bread off in other complex ways.

The complexity means there is a lot to learn and learning from the practice of masters is invaluable. My first loaves were flat and inedible. My own starter was weak, I lacked a grasp for developing the structure of the gluten and I was unaware of what to do when my following of recipes went awry, usually through some minor error of mine.

Here’s a few examples of how I learned from studying the practice of masters:

  • My master sourdough recipe came from the Fabulous Baker Brothers with accretions from all my reading. 
  • A sourdough course at the Brasserie Bakery gave me a better hands on appreciation of kneading and a better starter. 
  • I learned about letter folds to improve the dough from the recommendations of many recipe books. 
  • The Bourke Street Bakery’s Bread and Butter Project cookbook introduced me to a new effective kneading technique for the amateur
  • No knead recipes helped me to understand time and wet dough was my friend and trained me in the ability to plan a loaf ahead.
  • I worked out how best to slash and steam loaves in my home oven from the advice of others and my own experiments. 
  • Reading widely on styles of bread helped hone my confidence to build my own recipes and fix those that drift off track. Particularly useful were The Bread Bible, the Italian Baker, Nordic Bakery and Local Breads 
  • I have become a keen watcher of bakers at work from my lock pizza store to videos online.

If you reflect on the diversity of these influences, you will understand that my loaves aren’t copies of anyone of these sources. They draw from each in different ways, often at different times.

Complexity means each person needs to develop their own unique practice to leverage their opportunities and meet their own needs. There isn’t always a simple to follow recipe when techniques need to be learned. Experimentation is required to make sense of the practice and to make our own changes to make those practices suit.

However, we don’t do that learning and experimentation alone. We stand on ‘the shoulders of giants’ if we connect and learn from those masters around us. However, I can only learn from others if they are prepared to work out loud and share their approach. That working out loud is not all a free gift. I have paid for courses, a library of books and bought a lot of bread in my quest to learn.

The practices of the Responsive Organisation are far more complex than bread making. They involve the purposes, concerns and perspectives of many people in pursuit of common goals with agility and an external focus on customers and community. Sharing and building from our shared practice will help all of us to develop success. Working out loud fuels this learning and connection.