Lifetree – enabling purposeful conversation :

One thing I often hear managers and leaders tell me is that they have been told they need to ‘be more strategic!’ that this is an important development area for them. Often this comes on the back of failing to be selected for a job, or at review with their boss.

Image credit unknown – from web site: http://www.math.hmc.edu/~tucker/math104/resources2.html

Most folks just accept this and don’t inquire on this question. I encourage them to ask their Boss: ‘OK, I understand that you think I need to be more strategic. Could you help me understand that that is and what it looks like from your perspective?’

For more click here.

Great talk by Guy Kawasaki at Cisco Live – apart from the great stuff on innovation, notice his clean, simple and high impact slides that illuminate his talk. He distils the art of innovation into 10 steps:

1. Make meaning
2. Make a mantra (not a mission statement)
3. Jump to the next curve
4. Roll the dice
5. Don’t worry, be crappy
6. Let 100 flowers blossom
7. Polarize people
8. Churn, baby, churn
9. Follow the 10-20-30 rule
10. Don’t let the bozos get you down

for more, including the video of the talk, see Joe’s personal blog here.

Creating some handouts and preparing for a leadership programme Lifetree is facilitating and found this quote in Simon Western’s book ‘Leadership – A Critical Text‘ which has such a resonance to the philosophy of learning that Alan and I have developed for this work together with the client group.

Leadership formation steps back from the grandiosity and the hubris of the Messiah discourse, which aims at the transformation of organisations and followers. Transformation will be a by-product of Leadership Formation; seeking transformation before formation is premature, it reflects (western) societies’ preoccupation with immediate gratification. You cannot buy leadership from a quick course, or a popular manual. Leadership exists all around us, but so much of it present goes unnoticed and it uncherished, at the expense of organisational success and social well-being. It takes time, the right conditions and the right support to nurture the ‘leader within’. The leader within oneself, and the leadership within the organisation, both need nurturing and sustaining. Leadership Formation will reveal many manifestations of leadership that are currently hidden, if we are open to new forms of leadership, like creativity, it will surprise us.

Today’s leaders need to urgently address the question of how to prepare the way for the next generation of leaders; a way that enables leaders to engage ethically, with the whole ecosystem, and with leadership spirit.

for more see Joe’s personal blog here.

In Alistair Harkness’s review of the movie (500) Days of Summer in the (4/9/09) Scotsman, he says this about a moment in the movie:

It’s a beautiful moment that nails the way movies can sometimes penetrate a desire for escapism and get at the truth of a situation, even when you don’t want them to.

Reminds me of why I love movies so much, and appreciate the power of movies such as the Matrix (pic above).

My friend and colleague Alan and I have ’set homework’ for a leadership course Lifetree is facilitating. Unusual homework – to watch either or: The Straight Story, or Twelve Angry Men, and to come to the learning event with what struck you about either of these movies relating to their reflection on leadership and leadership acts. Be interesting to see what emerges from the dialogue.

For more see Joe’s personal blog here.