Posts Tagged ‘authentic’

Dare to be different

Saturday, May 12th, 2012

Someone raised the question the other day “How do you stand out from all the other coaches?“. A very good question but one which applies just as well to many, if not all businesses. I think in this area especially, the answer is ‘dare to be different’. If you are a ‘me too’ coach offering basically a generic service you’ll deliver a certain service and value but you will always be vulnerable to being undercut or replaced. If, however, you follow your own light and are able to harness your own unique talents and insights, you won’t fit everyone, but you will always be authentic and no one can ever be quite the same, so you will have an inherent advantage. Sometimes the best way to stand out in a crowd is just to be you.

I don’t tell my clients what to do, or very often, how to do it, but tend to just offer another way of looking at things, or a different perspective, that allows them to have more and different options. This is often all it takes to ‘unstick’ someone and allow them to once more flow down their path. If at the end of the conversation I hear “Thank you, that was very useful!” I know I’ve done my job.

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Posted in Business Change, Hints, Tips & Techniques, Innovation, Leadership | No Comments »

Making a difference

Monday, November 2nd, 2009

I am engaged in an interesting project that aims to help people and also to help people to help others.  After a couple of sessions we focused in on this idea of making a difference by sharing.  In this web era, everyone has the power to publish their ideas, their experiences and their creative outpourings.   People capture events on their phones and upload them and random snippets of real life are there for all to see.

I feel that the media has created this cult of the ‘expert’; those faces that they drag out to comment on everything from economics to football.  Over the years, we perhaps begin to believe that these people do have access to more knowledge.  However, perhaps we forget that we are also experts, especially in our own lives.  I’m often stunned and humbled by the stories others share, and also gobsmacked by the humbling power of the simple truth when it is shared. 

We all want people to think the best of us and yet, it seems to me, we are at our most powerful and attractive when we are not pretending to be anyone or anything other than ourselves.  Why is it so scary just to show ourselves?

“How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.”  Anne Frank

“Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.”  Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy

 

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Posted in General, Personal Change, Values & Philosophy | 1 Comment »

Galaxy Quest … for real

Tuesday, February 17th, 2009

If you go to GalaxyZoo you can participate in the exploration of the Galaxy.  They are enlisting our support in finding out how galaxies are born.  They work on the basis that there are lots us and they need many pairs of eyes who have a little time to spare.  They have found that non-experts are actually better at spotting new galaxies and interesting patterns than the scientists.  This is because we are innately programmed to look for meaning and spot patterns.  It is part of how we learn to make sense of the world.

We use exactly the same instincts and skills to make sense of our immediate environment.  So when we can’t understand what is going on around us and in particular when we are feeling threatened then we scan for meaning and patterns in the data we can gather.  This is how wives find out that their partner is cheating and how employees are able to see through the corporate gobbledygook and see what is really happening.

This is just one of the many reasons why it is important to send out clear, authentic messages when you are communicating… because people can just tell when you aren’t so it doesn’t serve you.

“There are no whole truths: all truths are half-truths. It is trying to treat them as whole truths that plays the devil.”  Alfred North Whitehead

“Never apologize for showing feeling. When you do so, you apologize for the truth.”  Benjamin Disraeli

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I’m a Celebrity… you can see me!

Friday, November 21st, 2008

About this time of year I am afraid that Cooke Towers impressive media suite is taken over by gaffawing women who cackle with glee as minor ‘celebs’ are tortured for the nation’s entertainment with kangaroo testicles and critters that bite.  I can not pretend not to be rapidly drawn into these so called reality TV shows as I love watching people behave as they do.

The thing that seems so clear to me this year is that people are so very transparent and that the public respond better to those who they feel are being genuine, even if they are being genuinely stupid!  People who play games are judged and tortured for the viewers’ entertainment. 

I know that this is far removed from real life in so many ways but I think our desire to have people ‘be themselves’ is a very deep one, and so too is our ability to see through manoeuvrings.   The thing is, in the world of work, we often don’t get any real choice about who tells us to do what, but we do control how much of ourselves we give in response to them.  Real leaders don’t try to manoeuvre people, despite office politics.  They do what they believe to be right; they tell the truth as they see it and  say how they feel.  We may not like or even agree with these messages but we will be inclined to trust them. 

So rule number 1 of authentic leadership is “Don’t be clever, be true”

 

“If you tell the truth you don’t have to remember anything.”  Mark Twain

“Truth is the most valuable thing we have, so I try to conserve it.”  Mark Twain

“A truth that’s told with bad intent beats all the lies you can invent.”  William Blake

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Inspiring

Saturday, May 31st, 2008

in·spire

v.
in·spired, in·spir·ing, in·spires
v.tr.
1. To affect, guide, or arouse by divine influence.
2. To fill with enlivening or exalting emotion: hymns that inspire the congregation; an artist who was inspired by Impressionism.
3.

a. To stimulate to action; motivate: a sales force that was inspired by the prospect of a bonus.

b. To affect or touch: The falling leaves inspired her with sadness.

4. To draw forth; elicit or arouse: a teacher who inspired admiration and respect.
5. To be the cause or source of; bring about: an invention that inspired many imitations.
6. To draw in (air) by inhaling.
7. Archaic

a. To breathe on.

b. To breathe life into.

v.intr.
1. To stimulate energies, ideals, or reverence: a leader who inspires by example.
2. To inhale.
[Middle English enspiren, from Old French enspirer, from Latin nspire : to breathe.]


The other day I was blogging about the word Conspiracy, and this is another, related word that we bandy around a lot these days, Inspire.

It literally means to breathe in, so either meaning that we give life to something or cause the person to suck in their breath. It is a very vital, physical, emotional phenomenon, rather than just an intellectual one. It literally moves you. In order to move people you have to connect with them; which means that you have to be open and real too.

I find it pretty inspiring when I see people fully revealing themselves and offering it without stint, like in last night’s episode of ‘Beyond Boundaries, Across the Andes“, which I have blogged about before. Here there were myriad examples of people going way beyond their physical limits, working for each other, offering each other their support, their truths, their muscles and, when they had nothing else to offer, their presence.

Inspiration doesn’t come in a can, or off the shelf from some management bookstore. It lives and breathes in the human heart. I’d be interested to hear some examples of real inspiration from you.

“There are no failures – just experiences and your reactions to them.” Tom Krause
“If you can imagine it, you can achieve it; if you can dream it, you can become it.” William Arthur Ward

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Posted in Business Change, Leadership, Personal Change | 2 Comments »