<484 words> The other day I saw a wedding video on Facebook. A group of men performed the great and terrifying Maori haka with words especially written for the occasion. Millions have watched the video. Some people felt that the haka was threatening and/or insulting, but no, it is a great sign… Read More »“The Answer to the Problem is Here, Inside You.”
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“Work is nothing but fun – but you get your work done fast – a lot of different people to meet and learn new things – amazing incentives and bonus structure.”
“Great, fun filled environment to work, good balance of work-life and always excited to speak to people on a day to day basis.”
“Coworkers awesome; management not always trustworthy.”
“Great support & work environment; erratic schedule.”
“Good company to work for – they will look after you during your employment.”
These are comments made by Rogers’ employees in the past 6 or so months at www.indeed.com – a job search/placement site. Usually it is disgruntled employees and ex-employees with an axe to grind who leave comments on these kinds of sites. How does this mesh with Rogers’s own performance measures for their call centres?
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The Paris attacks took place the week before I travelled to St. John’s Newfoundland for some training to upgrade my conflict coaching skills. France had retaliated; some Southern US Governors decided to shut their doors to Syrian refugees; Facebook was full of stories of other massacres that had not received the same level of media attention, with powerful allegations of bias and racism; and some Canadians were calling for Prime Minister Trudeau to renege on his commitment to bring 25,000 Syrian refugees to Canada by year’s end. There have been acts of aggression and violence against Arabs and Muslims.
I admit to sharing some of the African anger at the absence of attention being paid to the massacre in Kenya; the genocide that is building in Burundi; the Boca Haram kidnappings in Nigeria; and the farm killings in South Africa; no doubt because I am an African. But, I remind myself that there is no such thing as truly objective reporting. Everybody has a philosophy and a position. If you think Africa is a lost place full of bloodthirsty and corrupt people who are irrelevant in your life, much as the boat people from Syria may be irrelevant to your life in your comfort zone, then you’re likely to shut CNN down if they dwell on it too much. CNN et al will therefore rather tell you about people and places that you can relate to and maybe even care about because you represent their revenue stream.
The anti-Muslim rhetoric that has escalated on social media is valiantly being countervailed by other postings calling for peace, rationality, appreciation of diversity and tolerance. Quotes by John F. Kennedy and Maya Anjou and ancient sages and current religious leaders are being shared and commented on. I swear my laptop gets hotter the more time I spend reading and then biting my tongue as I see the inflammatory stuff that’s out there (not always successfully biting my tongue as my Facebook and Twitter friends well know).
Sometimes when you’re engaged in a quarrel with someone the things takes on a momentum of its own…..The person who blinked first was hurt and puzzled….it became imperative that a peace be brokered in a family that felt like it was falling apart, before it was too late.
I am going to talk about two things that have happened this week. On the face of it they may not appear to be related, but if one moves away from the detail – the ‘what happened’ or the ‘what is’, to the abstract where you might explore themes and lessons learnt, they are very closely related.
Firstly, it is about kitty litter as a tool….
I had just come from a coaching session with a client. This is the second thing I want to talk about. We had been discussing employee engagement surveys….
“I don’t know” is not an acceptable answer. This blog is a simple story about a young consultant who ran out of ideas and said it. And then it is about an unexpected prod and a vote of confidence from an unexpected quarter that not only saved the day but shaped a life.
As I get deeper into coaching a client about her career, increasingly we centre on her values and interests, which brought us to consider ‘hope’ as a factor. What is the taste and feel of her hope? Until we understand that hope is essential to her moving forward in her stagnated… Read More »Hope Is a Strategy (Well, Sort Of)
The corner has been turned on the complexity of leadership. The true skill is in achieving simplicity: Simplicity with the clarity that can come only from a depth of curiosity and reflection. It is true that it is harder to be simple with clarity. It requires regular and full attention. Being a leader surely requires constant and deep reflection to develop and maintain clarity of vision and purpose. It is hard to do that alone.
That is why leadership coaching has become such a precious and sought-after service.