It is not innovation that matters, it is agreement. And we might need innovation to reach agreement.
Yesterday, The Independent published its counter to the Rich List: the Happy List.
Did I miss the happy workplaces? Are work and happiness antithetical?
I am dreaming of a sandwich where the filling appreciates the bread and the bread celebrates the filling.
Have you ever been caught in a situation where you cannot move forwards and you cannot move backwards? It is like getting caught in a traffic jam. If you barge forward, you won’t be popular, and you won’t succeed. If you do nothing, nothing will change.
Now sometimes, we do have to ‘sit tight’. The police are on their way and they will clear the jam bit by bit. It is best to chill.
But sometimes that isn’t the choice. Sometimes if we sit and do nothing, that is where we will stay.
But what if there are cars to the left of us and cars to the right of us; cars ahead and cars behind. What can we do?
Obviously, we have to start just like the police will: with one car at a time. And we have to be strategic.
Did you have one of those games when you were a kid ~ they had 8 squares in a 9 square space and you had to move them around? And at first it looked as if there was no solution?
That is what we have to do: unravel the situation like those games. Move one square at a time. Patiently, and strategically.
This is easier said than done though, particularly when our emotions are involved.
Corporate poet, David Whyte writes about a cyclical pattern in our lives where we come periodically to a place which is ‘a traffic jam’. Our task, in such times, is to find the smallest possible thing to ease, not just ourselves, but everyone around us, out of the impasse.
I have picked FIVE quotations from David Whyte’s poems to illustrate the process.
1. The beginning. “anything or anyone that does not bring you alive is too small for you” (Sweet Darkness)
2. The call. “You are not a troubled guest on this earth, you are not an accident amidst other accidents, you were invited . . .” (What To Remember When Wakening)
3. Reawakening. “When your eyes are tired, the world is tired also. When your vision is gone, no part of the world can find you” (Sweet Darkness)
4. The departure. “Start close in, don’t take the second step or the third, start with the first thing close in, the step you don’t want to take” (Start Close In)
5. Begin the conversation. “”Your great mistake is to act the dream as it you were alone . . . Everybody is waiting for you.” (Everybody Is Waiting For You)
In more prosaic terms, our first step is always to notice we are in a jam, and rather than bluster and curse, consider the best thing to do about it. It is amazing how often we delay this simple first step.
Our second step is equally as hard. We chose after all to be on the road at that time. We didn’t want this result, but after all, we chose to be here, and when think about it, the jam chose to happen when we were there. The jam is an integral part of us and we are integral part of it. We are part of its story, and it is part of ours.
And it doesn’t get any easier. Are we communicating? Or have we taken it for granted that everyone knows that we want the traffic to flow again? Do they think we are just trying to push in? Are we alert to other people who want the traffic to flow again. And can they recognize us? What is it that we do, or notice, that alerts them to our sense of what is possible?
And are we holding back because it all seems too big? If the traffic were to flow again, what would we all be doing in unison, and what would be our part?
And who is really holding everything up? Is it us? Is everyone waiting for us, to pay attention?
Is everyone waiting for us, to start the conversation?
Hat-tip: Sally. Thank you.
UPDATE: David Whyte is a English poet who now resides in Washington, USA. Marine biologist, NGO worker and poet, David Whyte is a resource for anyone who is interested the meaning of work in our time. He writes on our lost sense of meaning and how to recover it by reaching out to all that is around us.
His books and CD’s are available on Amazon.
This link is to one of his rare appearances on YouTube.
Leave a CommentUPDATE: Almost two years ago, I was close to an extraordinary story of psychology during times of extreme stress and despair. This is what I wrote then.
You all know the Zimbabwe elections took place a little while ago – 24 days to be precise. I have been following them closely.
The first weekend after the poll, there was feverish excitement as votes were counted and results were announced (and signed off in triplicate) at local level, polling tent-by-polling tent.
And then silence – no official announcements. Excitement curdled to despair. Moods yo-yo’ed as events unfolded, and as pictures of stomach-turning brutality are smuggled out of the country by brave activists. People have become palpably depressed.
Somebody blew the whistle on a container ship, the An Yue Jiang, who wanted to offload munitions for Zimbabwe at Durban, in South Africa. The dockers’ union, SATAWU, refused to offload. The Anglican church and activist lawyers sought a High Court order to prevent the weapons crossing South Africa. A German bank joined in, hoping to seize the arms as part payment for Zimbabwe’s debts.
Before the court orders could be served, the An Yue Jiang weighed anchor and left in a hurry. The saga intensified as she reported herself to Lloyds as a casualty. People all around the world spent the weekend trying to track the vessel and petitioned both governments. and worker unions to prevent her refueling and unloading her deadly cargo.
Heads of state and political parties have begun to offer support and the citizen action continues, determined not to allow arms of any sort reach Zimbabwe while they might be used against her own people.
People are understandably upset, nervous, anxious, outraged, sickened, indignant, angry. . . negative emotion abounds. Emotion is highly contagious and I have watched myself abandon the gym, eat too much, remained glued to the internet even when little was likely to happen. I have become mildly depressed and I am well fed, I am warm and dry, I am safe. I can walk out my door into the English spring.
The citizen campaign to stop the An Yue Jiang unloading her cargo is compleetely spontaneous. People find the site hosting the bulletin board and join in. When I last looked, there are more suggestions, addresses and initiatives that any one person can support.
I haven’t been able to do a formal count. I don’t know what the churn of people is. I also haven’t counted the number of active and depressed posts. There are still the angry people, but they tend to be newcomers.
Sending one email to your MP might not sound like much but this is the spirit of the age. Five minutes here and five minutes there, and it adds up. A petition to Thabo Mbeki when he arrived at the UN Security Council last Wednesday had 150 000 signatures. Opinion is turning.
More importantly the mood is turning. But emotion is contagious. Moods can turn down as well as up. I was listening to SWRadio Africa this evening. A young lady had called in to discuss her views. Amongst other matters, she discussed the perpetrators of the unspeakable brutalities in Zimbabwe. She believed that people were enticed into taking these actions for small amounts of money or food, or other promises, and they went along it because they were desperate – they had no choice.
When we feel we have no choice, we take the feeling as fact, and are unable to perceive the small alternatives that are open to us. Conversely, as we cheer up, we find choices, small as they are. And as we act, we remain cheerful, improve our objective situation, see more choices, small as they are, and act again, in a positive spiral of hope.
The spiral is reversed awfully quickly, as I have learned sitting safely and snugly out of harm’s way. Our discourse is important. An important principle in appreciative management, a close sibling of positive psychology, is that we move in the direction of the questions we ask. When things are very bad, it is important to ask positive questions. If we don’t, then we stare the predator in the face, and we are, as the saying goes, ‘scared witless’. And for Zimbabweans who like to ‘make a plan’, that is a magnified horror.
If you are able to help, we are open to all ideas. As I write:
Rainer Maria Rilke, translated by J. Mullen
Lord: it is time. The summer was great.
Lay your shadows onto the sundials
and let loose the winds upon the fields.
Command the last fruits to be full,
give them yet two more southern days,
urge them to perfection, and chase
the last sweetness into the heavy wine.
Who now has no house, builds no more.
Who is now alone, will long remain so,
will stay awake, read, write long letters
and will wander restlessly here and there
in the avenues, when the leaves drift.
There is so much talk about Gen Y. Here is the question for baby boomers. How should we celebrate the autumn of our years?
Gen Y will be here one day too. They might also be interested in how to celebrate the house that is ours and to make the celebration of our achievements our very contribution to this new age?
What is your house? How do you celebrate? How does your celebration contribute? How many of us can answer these questions simply?
A long time ago when I was as young and frisky as any Gen Yes, I was furious about the unethical and aggressive behavior of a colleague. I was fortunate to work in an organization where mentorship was generous.
An older colleague (well, he seemed old to me . . . he was about 38 at the time!) said to me, why use an atom bomb when a spear will do? I was young, but I was already wise enough to know that focused behavior has a downside – underestimating side-effects – so thought I didn’t feel like backing off, I did.
The idea of using small, well thought out actions is a corollary of chaos theory – the idea that a butterfly can flap its wings and set off a perturbation that ripples through the world and causes a hurricane in London. The central idea of chaos theory is that
effect is not proportional to the effort!
Sometimes a single small action matters. Use a spear if you can. Here is an example.
Yesterday, I went to bed knowing that the “An Yue Jiang” was anchored off Durban with 3 million rounds of ammunition destined for Zimbabwe. I was sick to my stomach.
Today, we woke to the news that, despite clearance from the South African cabinet to offload these and other munitions and trans-ship them several thousand kilometers across SA soil to Zimbabwe, SATAWU, the South African Transport and Allied Workers’ Union, have refused to handle them. Well, we must see how this unfolds. But I could place a healthy bet that this action has cemented relations between the people of Zimbabwe and South Africa. God be with you!
This is how communities are made. Later generations may forget, but those of us who are here never will.
Thank you, brothers! And thank you from all the people in Zimbabwe.
I learned today with considerable sadness that Galba Bright died suddenly in his office in Montego Bay in Jamaica two weeks’ ago. Galba is known to all of us through Tune Up Your EQ. Born in Sierra Leone and educated in the UK, Galba moved to the UK with Sandra who is of Jamaican descent.
The Tune Up You EQ website is only a year old and was already recognized as the reference site for handy, practical advice on emotional intelligence. Galba was inviting, supportive, welcoming, inclusive, considerate and reliably cheerful. We are going to miss his kind words drawing us into the discussion of emotionally intelligent lives and leadership.
I was so so sorry to hear the news. My heart goes out to his wife, Sandra, and all his family and friends who will miss him dearly.
Nothing is so strong as gentleness
and
nothing is so gentle as real strength.
-Ralph W. Sockman
I love flow. I know some people who think it is great to be in flow, or in the zone, for half-an-hour a day. I am a flow junkie. I go for all 24 hours counting a good sleep as good flow.
But there is something I love more.
That is the rush when you have a crystal clear idea that you know will work and that is, in that instant, so obvious.
What is the name for that?
I know Peter Gollwitzer, the psychologist calls it “crossing the rubicon” – moving from wish to intent.
This corporate anthropologist, studies the use of mobile phones by poor people and travels around the world studying the way phones are used.
Why don’t we study flow a lot more than we do?
Why don’t we study people at work they way this guy studies phones?
Why aren’t we interested in why and when work is blissful and fun?
Why are aren’t we interested in making jobs as enjoyable as Nokia tries to make its phones?
I could do spend all day trying to make work fun and never get tired of it!! Could you? Do you?
2 CommentsThe eminent social scientist Karl Weick once said that social problems are often defined in ways that prevent us doing anything about them.
I have been watching the Zimbabwean elections closely. As facts emerge, I have been listing them on a “secondary” blog.
The situation in Zimbabwe is as dire any conflict in history. Can we move here? Can we move there? It seems the ultimate Catch 22. Whatever we do may create more damage.
I believe however that much of our hopelessness comes from our own representation of what is happening. Could we not, instead, look at difficult objective conditions that require resolution?
Today, people are starting close in, as the poet David Whyte would say.
Today, we are going to do something positive. Today we are going to say thank you. Today we are going to say we are with you. Today we are going to send emails to the President of Zambia who is the current chairman of SADC. Today, we are going to take 3 minutes to write a short, brief, courteous email saying,
Dear President Mwanawasa,
I write to thank you and the leaders of SADC sincerely for convening the extraordinary meeting concerning Zimbabwe and to extend my support and goodwill for a resolution that is satisfactory to all the people of Zimbabwe and her neighbours.
Sincerely,
I am patching in a long excerpt of a post from Sokwanele that gives the email addresses of SADC. Zimbabwe for a positive future.
TAKE ACTION
Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa has called an emergency meeting of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) to discuss the Zimbabwean presidential poll delay. This is the first move by Zimbabwe’s regional neighbours to intervene since the elections on 29th March 2008. President Mwanawasa is the current Chairman of the 14-nation South African Development Community. This is what he said yesterday:
I wish to take this opportunity to commend the people of Zimbabwe for the calm and peaceful manner in which the elections were conducted.
Similarly, I appeal to them to maintain the same spirit of calmness which they exhibited during the elections as they await the results of the presidential elections.
However, given developments immediately following the elections, I have decided, as Chair of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) to call an extraordinary summit on Saturday 12th April, 2008 to discuss ways and means of assisting the people of Zimbabwe with the current impasse as well as adopt a co-ordinated approach to the situation in that country.
Both President Morgan Tsvangirai and opposition leader Robert Mugabe will be attending the emergency meeting.
Support our democratically elected leader and take action.
What YOU can do
You can voice your feelings and SHOUT OUT for FREEDOM. Communicate with key SADC people attending the meeting.
Tell them that Zimbabweans have the right to live in a democratic, free and peaceful country. Tell them your personal experiences and why you want change. Make them understand what it is like to be in Zimbabwe today. Tell them we voted for change, we got change, and we want change now. Speak the TRUTH.
HOW you can do it
Email, fax or phone using the details provided below. Keep your messages real and honest but also short and to the point. Remember: thousands of us will be doing this so they will have a lot to read. Let’s make sure they can read and hear it all!
Be polite at all times. People don’t pay attention to angry messages (look at us: Mugabe has been angry with the people for many years now and we just ignored him and voted him out anyway). Anger does not work.
1. Call or fax or email the Zambian State House with a message for President Levy Mwanawasa:
2. Call or fax a message to President Thabo Mbeki – President of South Africa
3. Call or email Lieutenant Colonel Tanki Mothae – Director of Politics, Defence and Security Affairs at SADC
4. Copy all your emails to this general SADC email address:
5. If you want to attach images to your emails, you can download copies of the photographs at the top of this mailing from the Sokwanele flickr account here:
6. Forward this email to everyone you know and ask them to take action too.
7. Be positive, stay strong, and never forget that we have won.
Alex Deschamps-Sonsino linked yesterday suggesting a degree of jadedness in the design industry.
Rick Poyno wrote this about design conferences. As most of us discover this after going to one or two professional conferences, I thought it might be worth pasting it in here to reassure ‘newbies’ that they aren’t the only ones who have noticed.
“Only rarely at this kind of event will you encounter strong analysis and original new ideas. “Programmers of design conferences often appear to be unaware of the limits of their world view, uninterested in new thinking and practice, and insufficiently confident to address controversial issues,” says Nico Macdonald, one of the most active conference-goers on the British design scene. “Design conferences tend to be aimed at ‘jobbing’ designers, who the programmers think want ‘dog and pony’ show-and-tells, maximizing presentation with minimal explanation and little” . . ?
“Too many design conferences don’t aim much higher than entertainment, escapism and the vaguest kind of hero-worshipping ‘inspiration’ – as in, “I wish I could be a famous designer like you.” What they should provide is unique occasions to concentrate design thinking and propel it to a higher level. discussion.”
The most rewarding conferences are those that succeed in promoting interaction and debate. For that purpose, small and focused is likely to work best.
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