The most basic human desire is to feel like we belong, it’s so powerful. Everything you say and everything you do has to prove what you believe. When you are in an environment where you don’t feel you belong, you seek out anyone who may share the same values and beliefs as you so that you can start to form trusting relationships. This is why I think this cannot be recreated over our computers, it’s our biology as human beings that gives us this ability, and it’s this ability to read each other which has enabled us to evolve. I don’t believe you can replace these human experiences and human feelings over the internet. Contact me via e-mail and let me know your feelings around this topic.
Never admire quietly
Leadership is not a natural by-product of career progression, it’s a skill that takes time, patience, and practice. Mental toughness is often portrayed as determination and persistence, but it can also be viewed by your flexibility and adaptability. When you build a habit of appreciation and gratitude into all you do, you will see a positive impact on team members' motivation, idea generation, and enthusiasm. I think that when your employees feel valued, they are more likely to be more engaged and be satisfied in their work. Remember the best doers won’t always be the best leaders, and the best leaders won’t always be the best doers.
Stating the obvious
I think that marketing and innovation are basically the same thing. This was confirmed after attending “The Great Wine Experience” opening event in Copenhagen, where jazz music, photography (The Uplift Sessions) and delicious wines were in focus. There are hundreds of wine bars in this city, so in reality there are only two ways where you can add value in the marketplace:
a) You can either find out what people want and work out a clever way to make it, or
b) You can work out what you can make and then find a clever way to make people want it.
The money you make is the same regardless of which option you choose, therefore, it’s not necessary to reinvent the wheel and spend thousands of kroner on creating a new concept. Another way is to take an existing concept and this case a wine shop, and then presenting, pricing, positioning and framing it in a completely different way. Natalie and Wilfred have done a wonderful job, and this is just the beginning.
Recognising the agenda
Business leaders are under pressure come up with a corporate purpose and defining your purpose is equivalent of being able to define your organisations North Star. I think to qualify as a “North Star,” a metric must do three things: lead to revenue, reflect customer value, and measure progress. Finding the right answer involves identifying the most authentic and motivating basis for alignment among key stakeholder groups on which the success of the business depends. For example, climate change, workplace safety, diversity, employee well-being (whistleblower platforms), etc. Contact me via e-mail to discuss the possibilities for your organisation to incorporate the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals into your strategy.
The choice is yours
Optimism is a choice.
Happiness is a choice.
Giving back is a choice.
Forgiveness is a choice.
Being honest is a choice.
Spoken words are choice.
Teaching others is a choice.
Showing gratitude is a choice.
Respecting others is a choice.
Living a recommendable life is a choice.
Throwback Thursday
I wrote this back in November 2017 around data.
Big statement as an analogy: “Data is the new oil; analytics is the refinery for the data and intelligence is the fuel.” Data for data’s sake is interesting, with good hypothesis in you’ll get some great information out but with the volume of it, there is no way to go through it without some form of analytics. And there is no way that you can do something unless you are actually the mindset that is willing to think differently from what the intelligence tells you to do, and this may be counter intuitive to what you would have thought. Then you argue with the data and try to get the data to tell the story you want it to tell.
Complacency is rooted in pride
Stock Photo
What was your motivation to get into leadership?
I love sales and being in a leadership position does not change who I am as a person. Whenever I am in a leadership role or even in my younger days when I was in sales positions – I always chose to help my colleagues. I have had the benefit of good education, and I think a good education means that you have gained the ability to think on your own. Every time that I have gone into a leadership role, it was not necessarily something I was looking for, it’s something that I have naturally done. Whenever someone has asked me for help, whether friend or foe, I have always said yes, taking time to listen, articulate and advising on how we can become better as a team. Generally speaking, I have really enjoyed being in a teacher - motivator role, and in my humble opinion I have always excelled in them. I’m fully aware that whenever leaders push excellence, the haters will come out of the woodwork as employers are not fond of change.
The black belt of discovery
What’s the outcome that keeps you moving forward?
Everything in business comes with a cost and sacrifice and it’s not always smooth and easy. I think the road is paved with nothing but potholes and bumps, so you need to have a clear direction to start with, and that’s what a robust strategy will provide you with. First this will give you a direction that you are confident in and then you will be more willing to change and shift that direction. The direction has to have some way to anticipate change and cascade this strategy throughout the organisation. Those of us working directly with customers and witnessing their direct response to new products, services or innovations can then put these responses back into the strategy process.
A metaphor from nature
How do you make your work and life more robust?
There is massive value just taking time away from the office to spend time with smart, inspired people as their ideas and energy will influence you. I think we can use nature as an example for us that life is about rebirth and transformation, becoming exactly who we believe ourselves capable to be. This is not only possible, but inevitable, if we let go of the struggle and speediness, and of the need to become our best instantly and without journeying through several unique stages. Nature’s metaphor releases us from a sense of battling against our circumstances and invites us to rely upon an innate, perhaps universal, order and timing.
“To have the results that very few have, we must be willing to start doing the things that very few are willing to do.”
And the other side
We all want engaged employees who want to deliver, not just for the organisation but also for themselves. We are now seeing more stories about how organisations are getting very hands on about building a bottom-up processes, where teams of employees are working with managers at the customer interface level, helping individual employees work out how they can connect to the corporate purpose. Understanding the dreams of the people in the organisation and how they might be the key to motivating your employees. This will ensure that the organisations purpose is something that their employees can really engage with in a meaningful way, as this helps them as they decide to give their full effort at work.
This is one side of the coin
What does purpose really mean?
Purpose is one of the hot topics for the moment, just like mission and vision were thrown about in the 1990’s. Jonathan Knowles HBR article from March 2022 explained that different organisations use purpose in different ways; some are around competence, some are around culture, and some are around cause. I think all organisations really need to understand which type of purpose is most authentic to them, fits with their strategy and really aligns with their stakeholders. Organisations have to be really thoughtful around what really motivates employees and helps them with that alignment process as you are trying to implement strategy. Pursuing purpose is a good idea but you have to get the right purpose and ensure it’s authentic, sits with the strategy and serves stakeholders.
Moving away from servant leadership
There is so much uncertainty in the world right now so we have to make sure that there is an approach to both respond to change and anticipate what changes may be out there so we can keep re-orientating our direction. What is the D.A.C framework? The D.A.C framework is an alternative to the traditional follower > goal > leadership model. Central to the DAC framework for leadership is the group’s shared belief in how direction, alignment, and commitment can be produced. Direction is the overall group mission and goals; alignment is the necessary coordination of action within the collective group and commitment is the willingness of the group members to put personal interests secondary to that of the collective interest and benefit for your organisation.
Read the room
c/o New York Times
How can you improve the collaboration with your customers, internal stakeholders and colleagues?
The best storytellers, authors and speakers paint pictures giving the audience something they can visualise in their heads. They communicate the central issues of the discussion in a clear, fluent, and precise manner, and when they produce written material it’s clear, fluent, and easy to understand for the recipients. I think communication means both words and emotions, and what’s really powerful are words loaded with emotion. When communication flows with the right messaging, at the right time through the right channels, it can move nations, help people change directions, and establish an ideology for the good or bad.
You’ve got to develop your own style, become a student of style, and do this by not copying any one person. Everyone knows the old classic, “It’s not just what you say it’s also the way that you say it.” Your presentation will become more effective when you communicate with your heart and soul from deep inside with commitment and dedication. Contact me via e-mail to schedule a communication workshop for your team.
It's your presence not your presents
Great communicators all have great presence, 65% of the impression you leave on someone has little to do with your message, it has to do with your verbal delivery, facial expressions, and body language. It’s important to make eye contact 80 to 90% of the time, maintain an open posture and use hand gestures. Take your hands out of your pockets and be animated in your voice and body.
Never forget that you are selling dreams and products because your customers do not care about our company. They don’t care about your products and services, but they do care about themselves, their hopes and dreams, their goals, and ambitions. Your job as a sales professional is to inspire your customers and help them achieve their dreams. Think about how to communicate and articulate the vision behind your products and services, and then focus on your customer’s needs, hopes and goals.
Courage comes in many forms
Some have argued that courage should include overcoming a fear, while others have suggested that fear may or may not be present in the courageous act. Daniel Putnam in his book, “Psychological Courage” from 2004 stated that "courage involves deliberate choice in the face of painful or fearful circumstances for the sake of a worthy goal."
The 6 types of courage
Physical Courage
To keep going with balance, resilience, and awareness.Social Courage
To be yourself unapologetically.Moral Courage
Doing the right thing even when it’s uncomfortable or unpopular.Emotional Courage
Feeling all your emotions both positive and negative without guilt or attachment.Intellectual Courage
To learn, unlearn and relearn with an open and flexible mind.Spiritual Courage
Living with purpose and meaning through a heart centered approach towards all life and oneself.
Throughout my life people with guts have been solving problems, so I think courage is the choice and willingness to confront uncertainty, intimidation, danger, and pain.
Motivational Monday
David Harold Fink (1894 -1968) was an outstanding psychiatrist and medical doctor, and he devised a 30-day programme that will help you realise success. By paying the price to become the person you’ve always wanted to become, you will be in that wonderful minority who lead calm, cheerful and successful lives.
Here are the 6-steps recommended by David Harold Fink:
1. Set yourself a definite goal.
2. Stop the negative self-talk.
3. Stop thinking about all the reasons why you cannot be successful, and instead think of all the reasons why you can.
4. Trace your attitudes back through your childhood and try to discover where you first got the idea that you couldn’t be a success if that’s the way you’ve been thinking.
5. Change the image you have of yourself by writing out a description of the person you would like to be.
6. Act the part of the successful person you have decided to become.
Repeat, and repeat it over and over again. Each time it will become more a part of you until you will wonder how you could have ever lived any other way.
Humans are amazing
I don’t think that lazy people exist, laziness can be caused by a lack of knowledge to complete the task at hand, procrastination, feeling too comfortable to have the job done, and lack of motivation to get started. A man who is self-reliant, positive, and optimistic usually undertakes his work with assurance of success and this draws to himself the creative powers of the universe. It’s a fact that the person who thinks with positive self-reliance and optimism does magnetise his condition and this releases power to attain a goal. Over and over again, we have seen what the mind profoundly expects, it tends to receive. Here, I define success as something that helps others and at the same time makes you feel happy as you are working at it.
You can lead without a title
Leadership is no longer about your position, it’s more about your passion for excellence and making a difference. It’s the execution that takes focus, effort, discipline and patience. In business, if you take care of the relationship the money will follow. If you obsess about giving customers 10 times the value they expect, they will beat a path to your door. That’s what this rule you mention is all about; remembering to wow customers, and teammates, every time you have the privilege to encounter them.
“To have the results that very few have, we must be willing to start doing the things that very few are willing to do.”
An important subject for leaders to study is rationality, I mean being able to correctly conclude a rational, sensible course based on information. As a leader it’s also important to let everybody around you be helpful, but then put that through your own mental computer and make sure what you do is the product of what you’ve concluded based on all the input. I think developing rationality based on all the input is a true sense of leadership.
Courage is a choice
No matter the risk or failures, keep going and never give up, if you never give you must succeed. I think the first part of courage is the courage to start, to face failure and rejection with the great possibility that it will not work out and you will feel embarrassed and upset. And the second part of courage is persistence, it’s the power to keep going, to keep pushing and driving yourself.
Don’t be afraid to disrupt the status quo, and to me, status quo means mediocrity and lack of ingenuity. We are all one action or one decision away from creating a better future and changing an outcome for ourselves. Contact me via e-mail when you’ve muscled up the courage to stand for something bigger than yourself and mean it.
Being aware and open to change
Your brain tells you that you are safe with people who look, think and act similar, this is one of our many and various unconscious biases. These learned stereotypes are very powerful as they are so deeply ingrained into our persona, for example, the biases we all hold around race, religion, gender, power, and privilege structures. Playing on our unconscious biases and fears is the bread and butter of both political and marketing campaigns. In order to ‘judge’ without undue fear, you need to look at your own biases and the fears that sit under them. I think we can overcome our unconscious biases by becoming aware and being open to change.
“Life is too short to worry about stupid things. Have fun. Fall in love. Regret nothing and do not let people bring you down. Study, think, create and grow. Teach yourself and teach others.”
Yesterday morning, I asked a woman if she needed help in carrying her pram (a four-wheeled baby carriage) down the stairs – I have to admit that I would not have asked a man if he were in the same position. I know that my actions were not a problem, they were courteous and friendly but underneath I may have unexamined bias about the difference in roles and capabilities of men and women. Contact me via e-mail and let me know how you deal with your implicit biases.