Integrate!

If you're a leader then lead. If you're a leader and aren't ready: Watch out. If you're a leader and try to hide: Forget about it. You've been found. You can run, kid, but you can't hide. Leaders don't know how. When I was in my early twenties my brother and I dreamed about a life style management centre that we would run one day. We were so excited. I don't know about him but I seemed to take it seriously. I remember sitting down by the lake day dreaming about being a part of a group of people that were just successful. Not trying to be but just were. Linda and I had our second annual HOPE symposium this fall. My dad just died of cancer and the day was very difficult. And I was glad that it was there for me when I most needed it. You see, I am a part of a group of people that just are successful. If fact one could argue that these people all have at least one thing in common. Me. Linda and NLP Canada Training Inc. Let me introduce you to: Robert Fi...

Have you ever handled a situation brilliantly, only to find yourself shaking afterwards? Maybe there's a scene that plays over and over in your head while you search for the words you wished you had said. It's not that you handle conflict badly. You handle conflict well. It's the aftermath that's a killer. I had this discussion recently with another facilitator. Like me, she was able to handle conflict in the room. Like me, she hated it and wondered if there was a way to be more confident, more balanced, more able to handle the conflict without paying the price. Maybe there isn't. Maybe part of the price of leading - as a trainer or facilitator, as a manager or executive or team captain - part of the price of leading is the slightly sick sensation that follows conflict. The feeling that comes when you can't shake the idea that there was something you could have done better, something that would have outframed or out-manoeuvred the conflict. But it's ent...

The other day my business partner said that I am a healer. She said that I love to support learning by tending to the well being of other people. The funny thing about that, is, that my belief about that can be shifty. There are days when I look at people and I see what needs to be done and have very little patience for people that can't perform to their potential because they are "unwell". I have friends that hold executive positions in organizations and I watch them roll their eyes when an employee is "under too much stress" to be doing what they are suppose to be doing. Over the years there are many things that I have learned. They don't roll their eyes because someone is unwell. They genuinely care about their people. The rolling of the eyes is an illustration of frustration because of the inability to see the invisible lines and solution to help. In most main stream businesses, a state of un-health or dis- ease is hidden. The causes are even more hidde...

I just finished reading Mojo by Marshall Goldsmith. One of the exercises that caught my eye was the personal mission statement, mostly because Goldsmith recognizes how often this is a bad exercise and insists, nonetheless, that there is value in doing it well. I work with a partner, so I am reflecting here on my mission, his mission and our mission. I am an artist and what I create are situations that enhance learning. This does mean I am a teacher, but there are teachers who are not artists - teachers whose central mission is to teach. Mine is not exactly the same. I create learning situations in the way that a painter creates paintings. My training partner, Chris, is also not primarily a teacher. He is a healer who is extraordinarily adept at discovering the points in a person's history that need to heal so that learning and progress can happen. When we work together, I monitor the correspondence between the process and the people in the process so that learning can happe...

Two experiences this week have me thinking about family. The first was the funeral for a close friend's father, attended by many people from our work community. The second was a party at my house, where young adults gathered to laugh and reminisce about being teenagers. My conclusion from these two very different events is this: our families are the people who show up. We cannot always count on having warm and fuzzy feelings for our families. It's nice when that's the case, but the ups and downs of life make it almost inevitable that we will not always feel close to family. Family will not always support us in the ways we would like to be supported. Family do not always even share our values and hopes. Here's what family always does: it shows up. When you think back through your own life at key events, you begin to notice the people who simply are there. Not so much there when you need them as more simply there where you are. They may inspire you and they may infur...

Is there a group you would like to lead through change? Here's a good place to start: if you want to facilitate change consider a change in the way you facilitate. I often hear "creative" facilitators talk about their "energizers" for a group. This is the kind of technique that seems so completely harmless that it is extremely resilient (think about that: it's easier to change something important and scary than something that seems to have little influence one way or another). Here's the reason they should be changing: even one "energizer" suggests that the task itself is not engaging enough for people to stay energized while doing it. If you are working with a group that cares about what they are doing and has the resources they need to do it, stay out of their way. They do not need energy, although they may need shaking up, reframing, rapport or reassurance. If the group you are working with either doesn't care or doesn't have r...

I was just reading the latest issue of TIME magazine. There's an article on research on how the 9 months we spend in the womb affect our health and well-being as children and even as adults. Apparently, infants in the womb take on many of their mother's issues. The article identified the potential to change this, to make babies less like their parents and more strong, healthy and stable. That sounds like a very good thing. But. . . you probably know someone who feels like she or he grew up in the wrong family, who feels so different from parents and siblings that it is almost inconceivable they are all kin. And that's not good. It's possible that the way we are set up, it is more important for us to feel like we belong to our parents than it is that we achieve optimal physical health. Changing that might have many unintended consequences. We need to believe we belong with the people closest to us. If we are going to make babies different than their parents, we also ne...