The script for organisational leaders says we should be focused on strategy, the big picture, the long term. And that’s true. Yet it ignores the chaotic, volatile world we inhabit, the one that sees headwinds and crosswinds colliding at every turn. Stable conditions are almost impossible to come by. So, if everything’s changing, seemingly in...
This brilliant question was posed by the wonderful Louise Hallam and it’s a question that has the potential to take us very deep if we let it. When we think about the various development programmes we attend as leaders we are often seeking new skills, new competencies, new ways of enhancing our leadership impact. What...
Challenging times bring a different energy into our environment – certainly more febrile and tense, and possibly hot-headed. As the pressure increases so does the tension in the air. Nowhere is this more apparent than in our language. Hyperbole infects the things we say and how we say them – often louder and terser. By...
What does our Prime Minister stand for? It was a question a friend of mine was asked earlier this week by one of their friends from another European nation. Whilst I’m not aiming to answer this question about a specific individual I want to put it out there as a challenge worthy of reflection for...
The dictionary tells us that integrity is one of two things – honesty and adherence to a strong moral code and the state of being whole and undivided. This word has often been applied to leadership as has the word ‘authentic’ meaning real and true. When we look around our world today we may struggle...
With so much written about leadership we can all be forgiven for passing on by when another blog or article arrives on this subject. And yet leadership is so vital to our evolutionary success as an individual and as a collective (family, community, business, nation, Humanity as a whole and beyond) that in truth we...
I came across a definition of love the other day that was offered by Burt Hellinger, the godfather of family constellation therapy. It is a definition that offers food for thought in a leadership and organisational context. LOVE = SEEING + DISTANCE – JUDGEMENT This definition of love offers much food for thought and some...
We all live somewhere on the optimism-realism-pessimism spectrum likely depending on our upbringing and subsequent life experience. The daily headlines right now would, of course, challenge even the most optimistic of us yet buying into this ‘doom’ or sinking ever deeper into it isn’t helpful. Tending our thoughts and words is vital right now in...
In a McKinsey article about the book ‘Why Managers Matter: The Perils of the Bossless Company’, the authors, Nicolai J. Foss and Peter G. Klein argue that it’s inappropriate to assume that the call for more self-management, autonomous working and equality of agency is appropriate in improving the performance of an organisation. It caused me...
We all enjoy reminiscing about the past and it can bring much comfort especially when things are so uncertain. Indeed the past can contain many useful pearls of wisdom if we have the ability to stand in an objective space and harvest the value. There are, however, risks with being reliant on the past. By...