Eclectic Change

The Personality Potion

Image via Wikipedia While I was sitting at breakfast this morning, I noticed the book title that my 7 yr old was reading, TreeTops Stage 13 "The Personality Potion" (If you know the scholastic series, you will know that I am boasting because Stage 13 is for 9 to 10 year old.) It was evident to me that here was a blog post if I ever saw one.  So after every one had left for school and work, I sat down to read this delightful book by Alan MacDonald. The story is about a young boy Dann...

Sometimes you really need peanut butter in the house.

My mother used to say:  "If you make your bed, then you have to lie in it."  As a result of this upbringing, I am a bit of a product of "Calvinism". I tend to think that good things won't last and I always wait for the other shoe to drop.   Friends would say I am a glass half empty kind of person.  (Am I using to many metaphors?) My great fortune in life is that my better half lives life with such optimism and positivity it is almost sickening.  (OK, enough with the metaphors except fo...

Rethinking Collaboration

What happens when the objective is clear but the resources and time frames keep shifting?  That is exactly what many of us experienced when we ended up in one location and due to the volcanic ash hovering over most of Europe, we could not travel home or to our next meeting. The news kept reporting how calm everyone was.  I know this to be true.  When I first arrived at the airport early Thursday morning - it was so eerie how quiet it was.  Everyone stood at the departure sign expecting the ca...

Rethinking Engagement

The whole reason I ended up caught in Prague when the volcano ash swept across Europe was that I had been in Olomouc for a day teaching a two hour class to students at the Placky University of Olomouc.  Our topic was Negotiation with a focus on Interest Based Negotiation. If someone where to ask me the most important aspect of engagement I would answer with two things.  (As you know, I hate to be restricted) Alignment Communications The students were engaged and entertained...

Rethinking The Stories We Tell Ourselves

Being in Prague and unable to get home for four days provided me with two wonderful opportunities: a chance to visit the city and take an unexpected mini vacation time to reflect on life, business, priorities and blessings I plan to write about some of my observations over the next couple of weeks. Some of the topics will be: rethinking teams rethinking engagement rethinking collaboration rethinking leadership Today, I want to share with you what I discovered about what is ...

Team Process Skills – Tell me true

Team process skills are probably the one team item that is "discussed" and not pursued the most.  There are a few reasons for this: Image by Robert Higgins via Flickr We think that since we communicate all the time, we will naturally do it properly. There is an assumption that they are "dealt" with in creating the guiding principles. Some of the emotional issues you may anticipate but you really can't relate until it happens. In truth, these are the most challenging types of be...

Encouraging Differences Starts at Home

Everyone wants to be accepted for who they are.  Mothers are great for that.  While they have high hopes for us, the bottom line is that mothers want us to be happy.  Mothers also quickly learn how their children are similar and how they are are different from them.  The good mothers foster and encourage those differences.  I had a mother like, that even though she worried all the time about me. My mother tried hard to manage me . . . she figured out pretty quickly that I wasn't at all like h...

OD Interventions – Future Search

What is Future Search? Future search is a PLANNING MEETING that helps people transform their capability for action very quickly. The meeting is task-focused. It brings together 60 to 80 people in one room or hundreds in parallel rooms. Future search brings people from all walks of life into the same conversation - those with resources, expertise, formal authority and need. They meet for 16 hours spread across three days. People tell stories about their past, present and desired future. Thr...

Is Transparency Always The Right Choice? (Video)

I am the first person to believe that transparency is a good thing. I often preach it.  After reading a respected colleague of mine who does a lot work in the Middle East and Asia, I began to have a few reservations. So here are some thoughts for discussion. I'd love to hear your views. In the above video, I mention the book "Transparency: How Leaders Create a Culture of Candor"  by Warren Bennis, Daniel Goleman, James O’Toole.  You can find a nice little video of O'Toole discussing the b...

The Entrepreneurial Mindset (Video)

Today on Twitter I was personally asked, "When you first thought about being an entrepreneur, what did you consider? What was the best idea you heard?" I had just completed a post on my Assessments Today Blog recommending Daniel Isenberg's post on the Harvard Business Review blog: Should You Be An Entrepreneur? This is one of the best  check list I have seen on the subject.  Of the 20 items, Isenberg suggests that if you score 17, you should consider becoming an Entrepreneur.  I scored 16.  G...