Friday 29 June 2018

Economics that's actually good for everyone

I've just finished a study of this wonderful book.

It was on my top 21 list of books I recommend before I completed reading it!

I first recommended Kate's great work in this review of her TED talk.

On many occasions I have written about my deep desire to see economics back as part of society, rather than society being part of economics.

This book charts a very doable path to put economics back in it's place meaning an economics that's actually good for everyone whereas the current farce of a system means only 1% benefit.

The following diagram beautifully illustrates the past and the possible:
Below is Kate's full doughnut economics model:

This book is an enjoyable and inspirational read. I particularly loved how Kate tells the story of the shambles of the current financial system and what's possible by casting all the elements as players in a Shakespeare play.

Here's my top 21 recommended reading list. Glad to add Kate's book to this list:

Around the time I was writing this post I read the following in my Financial Times alert email. Who will be next?

GE booted from the Dow after more than a century

After more than a century in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the industrial conglomerate General Electric will be replaced by pharmacy chain Walgreens Boots Alliance when trading begins on June 26.

“General Electric was an original member of the DJIA in 1896 and a member continuously since 1907," said David Blitzer, chairman of the S&P Dow Jones Indices’ index committee.

"Since then the US economy has changed: consumer, finance, health care and technology companies are more prominent today and the relative importance of industrial companies is less."

Wednesday 27 June 2018

Performance management is a sure sign of poor leadership

A quest I have been on for more than 25 years is to get rid of performance appraisals and performance management which I believe is an oxymoron.

This great article from First Round Talent quotes Patty McCord the former Netflix employee known as the woman behind their famous culture deck.

"Humans hate two things: being lied to and being spun.

Both are manifested in the popularization of ‘performance improvement plans,’ an HR tool for blocking lawsuits and documenting bad behavior, not actually raising work standards. In McCord’s opinion, too many managers offer performance improvement plans to employees who they know will fail — either because they think it’s the law or they simply don’t want to be mean."

There's a better way. I call it performance leadership. Read more about this in my recent performance leadership essentials post.

A particular tool I use with my clients to help them to become remarkable at performance leadership is pictured below. You can download it here.

Be remarkable.
Ian

Monday 25 June 2018

Follow a change process

I'm currently presenting and hosting a series of master-classes as I complete the writing of this final book in a trilogy.

Learn more about the master-classes held in Ballarat on the fourth Wednesday of every month.

This post is the Follow a change process chapter of the book.

In a nutshell

Change management for me is one of the three great oxymorons in business. The other two are strategic planning and performance management.

Change and performance can’t be managed. They can be led. Your strategy and your execution plan are joined at the hip however they are both very different and must be determined individually.

To lead change we need a change process. Mine is pictured below. This was addressed in the Appreciative Leader handbook. There are several exercises in the companion resources web page to the handbook that will help you to master this process or develop and master your own. You'll find a a link to this companion resources web page here. 


The key to success in following a change process is three-fold:

1) asking the right questions of the right people at the right time for them,
2) listening intentionally for their answers, and
3) understanding and utilising the power of silence.

The comparison models below are taken from a LinkedIn article by innovation guru Dr. Amantha Imber. Access her original article via the companion resources web page.

Perhaps the most famous change process of all is Joseph Campbell’s The Hero’s Journey. Pictured below is one version of this:


3 recommended actions

1) Meet with your team this week and schedule taking the actions relevant to the above change process that are at The Appreciative Leader handbook companion resources web page. You’re looking for the Appreciating what is (Sparkenation 15) and 'Shifting from reality (what is) to Possibility (What Can Be)’ (Sparkenation 16) exercises.

2) At a to be scheduled team meeting discuss other uses of the change process or whether or not you should create and use your own process.

3) Choose a theme song for team meetings and always play it at the start of every meeting to get into the state right for the team. Encourage team members to choose songs and regularly change them.

Recommended Deep work

1) Ready and apply in your own best way my ebook ’19 Really Useful Techniques for making difficult conversations history’.

2) Read and apply in your own best way my ebook ‘The great questions remarkable leaders often ask’

You’ll both these ebooks via the companion resources web page.

3) Decide together as a team how you will incorporate the teachings of the above ebooks in your own best way to uplift your culture.

Be remarkable.
Ian

PS In the last 3 blog posts we've explored one area from each of the three sections pictured below. Here's a pulse check to see where you're at and where you could move to in the 3 areas:


Friday 22 June 2018

Collaborate

I'm currently presenting and hosting a series of master-classes as I complete the writing of this final book in a trilogy.

Learn more about the master-classes held in Ballarat on the fourth Wednesday of every month.

This post is the Collaborate chapter of the book.

In a nutshell

Every problem/challenge in our world today (and in your life) is a human one. Every solution has relationships with other humans at heart.

My friend and colleague Keith Abraham says: “Achievement is never an individual activity.”

And it’s literally about matters of the heart.

As reflected in the compete with yourself exercise to change an outcome/results we must modify/or change intention, feelings, thoughts, behaviours/actions. Intention and feelings are the fertile ground and ploughing, the hard work!

“Most of us think about ourselves as thinking creatures who feel but we are feeling creatures who think, and we live in a society that values what we think over what we feel”
Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, a leader in the world of neuroscience.

There’s a link to a great TEDx talk by Jill at the companion resources web page under Action 2 - Collaborate.

The other side of the compete with yourself coin is collaborate.

At the heart of collaborating of course is relationships. To improve/sustain highly valuable and mutually rewarding relationships we must change or modify how we contact, connect, establish/sustain common ground or shared-view and demonstrate commitment with other people.

3 Recommended Actions

1) Write down your greatest collaboration or relationship story and one where you failed. Who will you become and what will you do next to better live the lessons from these experiences?

2) Review the seven special steps to successful collaboration on pages 99, 100 of Changing What’s Normal with your team/performance partners and explore changes/modifications you could make to your relationships. The seven steps are available for your convenience at the companion resources web page. 

3) a) Review your diary for the past month. Are more than 75% of your actions some form of communication or conversations with family, friends, colleagues and stakeholders? How could you better invest your time and energy to build and grow high value mutually rewarding relationships? b) Choose a theme song for collaboration and play it regularly to get into the state right for you.

Recommended Deep Work

1) If you have not yet watched the compete/collaborate video and started to make the compete with your yourself and improve relationships exercises part of your routine then now is a good time to start You'll find this at the companion resources web page. 

2) For your business/organisation staying in touch with customers/clients and continually adding value to the ways you delight them is fundamental to remaining relevant and successful. Explore with your team how you could better utilise the contact-connection-common-ground-commitment as a service-sales-experience and value adding cycle.

3) What is a major collaboration you have thought about however not yet acted on? Who will you become and what will you do next to better turn your thoughts into reality?

Be remarkable.
Ian

"You lead best when the best version of you, leads the best version of us."
Matt Church

Wednesday 20 June 2018

Compete With Yourself

I'm currently presenting and hosting a series of master-classes as I complete the writing of this final book in a trilogy.

Learn more about the master-classes held in Ballarat on the fourth Wednesday of every month.


This post is the Compete With Yourself chapter of the book.

In a nutshell

We start comparing ourselves to others very early in our lives. Doing so is a journey to dissatisfaction, unhappiness and mediocrity.

We are all unique. We are not comparable to anybody else.

Not a single duplicate in the 100 billion lives that have walked planet earth.

The quest is to become the best version of our one-of-a-kind selves. This means we must continually compete with ourselves.

3 Recommended Actions

1. Create a profile of what the best version of you looks like on one page

The following will be helpful as you create a picture of your best you.

Remarkable people don’t bully others.

Remarkable people don’t show their lack of intelligence by being violent towards others.

Remarkable people respect views and opinions that are different to theirs.

Remarkable people are passionate and persuasive yet never arrogant enough to think and act as if their way is the only way.

Remarkable people have ditched dogma and instead lead by example.

Remarkable people are not attached to their ideology, belief system, or political party bias, instead they debate ideas and then collaborate to achieve what really is good for humanity.

Remarkable people have roles not jobs. They understand that jobs are part of roles and that all roles are about relationships and delivering value to others as perceived by them.

Remarkable people are candid and authentic. They say what they mean and mean what they say.

Remarkable people promise big and deliver.

Remarkable people do their deep personal work and show it through their acute self-awareness, and therefore their willingness and ability to be highly aware of others.

When remarkable people are in the room, they’re in the room (thank you Nigel Risner).

Remarkable people share powerful stories, the kind that others can see and feel themselves in.

Remarkable people co-create cultures of candour where elephants in the room are named, and closets are absent of skeletons.

Remarkable people tell the truth as they see it, yet never in ways that are a put down of others.

Remarkable people ... Please insert your thoughts.

Now create your one page. Start with putting your name on the top, today’s date and the heading I am remarkable when

To help you to live your one page choose a theme song for competing with yourself and play it regularly to get into the state right for you.

2. Write down what you stand for

Below are two examples to help you, my own and my client Jamie Wilson.

What I stand for - Ian Berry

The changes I want to see and influence happening (thanks to Seth Godin for the concept) are:

Homes, workplaces and third places where it’s standard practice for people to feel heard, understood and appreciated. Therefore I stand for:

1) People being willing and able to have the candid, convivial and compassionate conversations essential for other people to feel valued, live values and deliver value.

2) Every person having continuous opportunities to be the best version of themselves and to do work that is meaningful for them and highly valuable for others.

3) Leaders inspiring, reminding and persuading others to be and do as above.

What I stand for - Jamie Wilson

I stand for OUR People, OUR Team. Our people should not be managed, they should be lead, guided and encouraged to prosper, achieve and be their best.

Business objectives are achieved as a consequence of individuals achieving their objectives

We need to manage processes, procedures, policies, practices and systems to ensure our people can deliver their and our objectives

I stand for OUR culture. A culture that everyone invests into and leads from example and owns their unique piece of it

I stand for communication improvements across all areas of the business. We are the BEST at what we do, lets not let this bring us down

I STAND FOR EVERYONE IN THIS ROOM. TOGETHER EVERYONE ACHIEVES MORE

Now go create your own. Clue: What you stand for is the change you want to see/make happen.

3. Develop and stick to a one page for your rituals or standards

You can download my one page here (See link just under Action One - Compete With Yourself).

Use it as a guide to create your own.

Recommended Deep work

I love the concept of deep work by Cal Newport. Read about it via this link 

Below are 3 areas I recommend you focus your deep work on

Regularly transform yourself by undertaking the compete with yourself exercise which you will find at the companion resources web page.

Discover, unleash and enhance your own and other people’s gifts. I believe this is the number one role of leadership.

Get better everyday at engaging in candid, convivial and compassionate conversations with fellow humans.

Should you not yet be familiar with the Enhancing Your (Their) Gifts concept you’ll find links at the companion resources web page. 

You will also find there content to consider about conversations. It is key from a self-leadership perspective and therefore competing with yourself that you master all conversations in the meaningful meetings matrix you'll see at the link. Visit this web page now to access these resources that will assist you as you undertake your deep work.

Do Your Work.

You might take the actions I recommend. You might not.

The key will be, not what I say or recommend, rather what you hear yourself say to yourself, who you become and then Do Your Work.

The words Do Your Work are inspired by the Steven Pressfield book Do The Work, which is about overcoming resistance. Steven believes, and I agree, that the pain of running away from doing what we know we should is greater than actually doing the work!

There’s a link to Steven’s book at the companion resources page.

Be remarkable.
Ian

Monday 18 June 2018

Law of the Farm Leadership aka fully human leadership

I'm currently presenting and hosting a series of master-classes as I complete the writing of this final book in a trilogy.

Download the prologue to this book.

The book uses the law of the farm as an operating system/process. I sometimes refer to this as Law of the Farm Leadership aka fully human leadership.

The law is tailor-made for success in today's world that is dominated by disruption, distraction and data challenges.

Be remarkable.
Ian

Wednesday 13 June 2018

Great questions remarkable leaders often ask (complimentary ebook)

This picture and one of the comments that accompanied it caught my eye as I was completing research for the ebook below.

Computer skills should complement human skills. 

Computers are good at answers, but humans are better at questions.

Source of above.

Your thoughts?

I believe that most of the talk about AI, AR and technological advances in general need to be viewed very carefully because hype, hyperbole and just plain lies rule.

And then there's the greed factor. Many of the people creating software and technology are just greedy (and unethical and immoral) bastards driven only by self-interest.

The future in my view is about how well technology and humans work in harmony. Your thoughts?

My continuous quest is to be a better human. 

My latest ebook (pictured below) is another in my offerings to help you to be the best version of yourself in your own best way. 

Please download ebook.


Be remarkable.
Ian

Monday 11 June 2018

One remarkable way to stop robots taking your job

I love the work of Corporate Anthropologist Michael Henderson. He concluded his May 2018 ezine with the following:


By loving Michael means:


To ensure robots never take your job be more loving.

Be remarkable.
Ian

Images taken from 'Will Robots Take Over Your Job? Vol. 8 by Michael Henderson.

Friday 8 June 2018

Leadership is not about having followers

The headline of this article "lets kill leadership", and the fact that it was from London Business School attracted me. I agree that the kind of leadership the author Jules Goddard refers to should be eliminated!

Yet I see a very different kind of leadership gathering momentum. And a very different kind of management too.

In my work with clients I inspire and encourage leadership as the art of ensuring people feel valued.

There's nothing in the above about followers, control, hierarchy or any of the many dark sides of leadership.

Leadership that ensures people feel valued must be supported by management.

I define management as the practice of ensuring it's simple for people to deliver value.

There's nothing in the above about managing people or change which is conventional wisdom that I believe is actually unwise. Management in the 21st century is about processes which includes policies, procedures, practices and systems.

Leadership and Management as defined above are underpinned by culture.

Culture is about what it means to be human. Typically culture is defined as the way we do things around here. For me this is only part of the story.

Culture is Who Before Do. It's what I call Fully Human Leadership.

Leadership, Management and Culture have changed. Have you?

Be remarkable.
Ian

PS Please contact me should you like some help. We can work together with you applying the proven model below in your own best way.


Wednesday 6 June 2018

Wise Men Say ...

I've put a new presentation | master-class together.

Would the men in your business value a unique opportunity to upgrade their communication, conversation and presentation skills?

Learn more and get in touch with me.

To see where you're at and where you can move to in each of the areas pictured above please complete the pulse check here.

Be remarkable.
Ian

Monday 4 June 2018

To change reality we often have to change perception first

I recall a meeting with a prospective client 5 years ago as though it was yesterday.

He had been referred to me. After exchanging pleasantries he said: “I have to tell you up front that as a general rule I don’t have a high regard for consultants.”

I asked “What kind of consultants?”

“What do you mean” he asked.

I replied “In my experience there are two broad kinds of consultants, those who have solutions they think will fix all problems, and those prepared to work with you in bespoke ways that lead to the discovery and execution of your own solutions. I am of the latter kind.”

A different conversation proceeded than what might have been. To change reality we often have to change perception first.

Be remarkable.
Ian