“Thanks to the fundamental legacy my parents gave me, I’m always at home because I’m the same person no matter where I am. It’s that consistent definition of self which has allowed me to get through the tough times, when others were more than happy to try to define me according to their own prejudices. - Sidney Poitier ”
Detroit vs. Pepsi
Detroit in the State of Michigan came into my periphery as it was the home of Motown. Detroit is also known as the motor city - back in the days the Big Three car manufacturers (Chrysler, Ford and General Motors) had their headquarters there. Nowadays, it is the second poorest city in America and famous for D12 and Eminem. Well done to Pepsi for recognising the talent in the city.
Need I say more
Our choices reflect and determine who we are.
Plant the seed of hope
c/o Adobe stock photos
On this journey called life.
Take the good with the bad, the happy with the sad,
Appreciate what you have and let go of what you had,
Always forgive and never look back,
Things change,
Things go wrong but your path goes on.
Hope is not a strategy
I encourage my family, friends and colleagues to be good persons and not waste too much energy trying to prove it.
I encourage my family, friends and colleagues to go where they are appreciated and not where they are just tolerated.
I think our life purpose would be greatly enhanced when we know why we are getting up in the morning.
I encourage you to ask yourself these three questions everyday:
- Why are you working hard?
- Why do you want to succeed?
- Why do you want to win?
Purpose before profits
I recently bought my son a winter jacket and even after looking at Arc’teryx (my second favourite brand) and North Face, our unanimous choice was Patagonia. Patagonia is an heritage brand, famous for their outdoor climbing equipment.
Patagonia have a clear brand identity and knows exactly what they stand for - global sustainability - and they lead from the front. Action speaks louder than words and I always remembered that Yvon Chouinard (founder) said, “Every time we do the right thing, our profits go up.”
Discovery Process
I use the discovery phase to start the relationship and to understand what the customer needs and how I might (or might not) be able to help them. Here's how to run an EFFECTIVE discovery process in just 4 steps:
1) Learn their role and fit,
2) Learn their business milestones,
3) Learn their priorities to achieve those milestones,
4) Learn what they are doing today to get there
That’s the formula and every step starts with learning! Send me an e-mail and let’s arrange a physical or virtual meeting.
We are wired to look for coincidences
Illustration: Joanna Andreasson
I think that we human beings are storytelling machines, we notice things and we have to tell stories about them. For example, perhaps you thought of over 200 people yesterday and maybe one of them called you. I’m sure that in this case you would have paid attention to the coincidence and would not say to yourself that 199 people didn’t call me today. We are wired to look for coincidence, and as storytelling humans we are always looking for that correlation.
I can help
I continuously wonder when will we move away from the socialised metrics of success and embrace internal measures of success. As we create more and more wealth we will have to decide whether it is OK that this wealth is going into the hands of fewer and fewer people. The big question in the not too distant future will be, “Where will our status role models and social hierarchies come from? I do not think they will be the people who have made the most money. Send me an e-mail and let me know what you think.
One of the greatest physicists of the last century
“Never confuse education with intelligence. Intelligence isn’t the ability to remember and repeat, like they teach you in school.
Intelligence is the ability to learn from experience, solve problems and use our knowledge to adapt to new situations. - Professor Richard Feynman”
How do you do that?
I have always been a curious human being! Today, I thought about what it would be like if I were in your body right now.
How would I get frustrated?
What would I picture?
What would I say to myself?
How would I say it?
What tonality would I use?
Is art a cure for curiosity?
Is the purpose of our culture to enable capitalism or is the purpose of capitalism to enable culture? I would like to believe that it’s the latter, send me an e-mail and let me know what you think?
Simple ways to say you care
It is not everyone who wants to lead a deep and passionate life.
It is not everyone who wants to leave the world better for having passed this way.
If you do, here are some simple ways to say you care:
Is there anything I can do for you?
How can I support you?
Do you need my help?
I always have time for you...
You are really good at what you do...
Examining your weaknesses and making them your strength
“The truth may be puzzling. It may take some work to grapple with.
It may be counterintuitive. It may contradict deeply held prejudices.
It may not be consonant with what we desperately want to be true.
But our preferences do not determine what is true. - Carl Sagan
”
Success vs. Happiness
Image c/o Haiku Deck
I have always believed that success will not make you happy if you were not happy before becoming successful. I have never tied my self worth together with my accomplishments. There are many people who believe that happiness is over the next mountain and as long as they conquer that next thing or achieve that next milestone - then, that’s going to bring them happiness. In reality, if you are not happy before success, you will not be happy after achieving success.
I think happiness comes not from those big moments that you anticipate, but in the little joys of life, for example, the pleasure of walking in the park and observing the colours of the leaves; the joy of creating a morning smoothie, etc. Happiness comes from the the small moments, not from the big accomplishments, regardless of what it looks like from the outside.
In my opinion, happiness and success are two different things. Success is based on what I’ve achieved and happiness is based on what I feel about myself and about how I feel about what I am doing. Whenever I attempt to interconnect them, I remind myself that happiness and success give a separate sense of meaning and fulfilment.
My daily affirmation
I am happy,
I am healthy, and
I am strong.
Facts on Friday
The way we change the culture is not by getting a trending headline on social media, I think we change the culture by establishing that people like us do things like this. Culture is driven by media and media is driven by a business model. We all believe that we see the world as it is, in reality we live in a culture and that culture changes what we see.
Even though the world is safer and healthier than it has ever been before, even now during the Covid-19 pandemic, no one believes that is true. What has happened over the past 20 years is that the media business model has dramatically changed, and therefore, the reason that people don’t think that the world is safer and healthier is because the media does not want us to think that this is the truth. The higher powers have decided that society makes the most profit when we are on edge, insecure and feeling insignificant. #justsaying
Teams: Diego Maradona (RIP)
Panoramic/Press Association Images
Football (soccer to my American friends) is the sport that has played the biggest role in my life. Yesterday we lost the most iconic footballer of all time, Diego Maradona (RIP). You can read the obituaries online, but I think every great team should have the following:
Storyteller
Designer
Builder
Magician
Stabiliser
Fighter
Explorer
Dreamer
Mentor
MARADONA
Recruiter
Question: Why me?
What can I bring of experience and competence that can potentially beat a candidate with industry experience?
The love of winning! Sometimes an “outsider” can see a smarter way of doing it as I would have to learn the procedures and performance routines. And when you are learning a performance, you model yourself after the smartest way, which more often than not is also the best way.
Too many of us think the best people are the people who are metaphorically speaking, screaming “look at me” the loudest, and talking down to the rest of us. They are not the best!
The best people are out in the field - doing it - showing you the distinctions, articulating to you about what has worked for them, so you can benefit from their experiences. I think it’s genius to learn from other peoples mistakes, not in a miraculous way.
Too many of us have to learn from our mistakes several times before we really learn from them. Contact me via e-mail for sparring, mentoring or guidance.
