The edge of an idea… of a discovery or just the close of a day? What do you see? Hope your week has been a good one.
Tag Archives: Debra Yearwood
Decisions
Decisions don’t always work the way you intend them to. That’s a good thing, it keeps life interesting and it keeps our imaginations flowing. For instance, the image above comes from a corner of my garden. A huge thorn had started to grow without my noticing. By the time it came to my attention it was covered in buds. I’d like to see the blooms on that, I thought, I’ll dig it up later. Yes I’m like that, weeds are only plants you don’t want.
Well later came and having satisfied my need to see the bloom I headed toward the thorn, shovel in hand. I found a bee on it. No I’m not afraid of bees, quite the contrary. I like bees and they’ve been having a hard time of it lately so it seemed a shame to disrupt this one. So, instead of digging up a thorn I replaced my shovel with a camera and captured this shot. I thought it was rather appropriate for this post.
You see I had a completely different post on decision making planned for this week. It’s a good post and you’ll see it in September. Between now and then I’m going to take a bit of a pause. I have a number of projects underway that are all important to me. This blog is one of them. In an effort to manage all of my projects I wrote several blog posts in advance, but as my fellow bloggers know, there’s more to blogging than writing. The thing is, I simply don’t have time for everything at the moment, so I thought,
- I could put the blog on hold for six weeks
- I could find someone else to manage it
- I could hire a virtual assistant
- I could just keep posting and work late at night to keep up.
I don’t want to do any of those things.
Decisions are interesting things. You don’t always know where they will lead you. Digging up a thorn or taking a photo. Here’s my decision. I’m going to take a photo every week. I can’t promise you beauty, invention or drama. I’m an amateur, amateur photographer but, I will make an effort to share something that caught my eye, attention or imagination. Then I’ll ask you to share what you see, where your imagination lead you in the comments. I won’t always be able to respond here, but I will always read your comments and I very much appreciate them.
See you soon.
Synchronicity, both beautiful and challenging
The term, synchronicity comes from Carl Jung, who first coined the phrase in the 1920s. Jung saw synchronicity as two or more events that are meaningfully related, though they may not be causally related. He first developed the idea while treating a patient who dreamed of a golden scarab. During the session, as she described her dream, Jung found a golden scarab. The insect was rare for that part of the world and the timing was a striking. Jung saw synchronicity as more than random coincidence and noted that it is more likely to happen when we are in a heightened emotional state.
Synchronicity and serendipity are like sisters, similar but not quite the same. Serendipity is the sweet and surprising little sister, synchronicity is the big sister with edge. If serendipity is the coming together of opportunity at just the right moment, providing you are ready to see it, then synchronicity can be opportunity or threat at the best or worst moment. It’s like waking up with a brilliant idea, then finding that your client has had the same idea, but so has your competition.
Synchronicity at the pool could be about a wonderful ballet that defies gravity. Those beautiful twins who are both mirrors and mimics in the water. Synchronicity is the dance of fireflies performed to the music of night creatures. It is also the crowd that becomes a mob.
To what degree we are creatures of synchronicity is unclear, but like flocks of birds or schools of fish we are connected to one another. I think we send things out into the universe and the universe responds. That’s the beauty and horror of synchronicity. If we send negativity and aggression we will find violence and rejection. If we send joy and peace, those things will also wing their way back to us.
My single mindedness at work has helped me avoid pitfalls while those around me stumbled and fell. It has also unnecessarily excluded me. My love of team has had me proudly singing in a choir of ideas and it has caused me to chase red herrings as part of a pack. That’s the challenge of synchronicity, it doesn’t tell us when to follow and when to lead. It isn’t always good though it is often appealing.
The older I get, the less often I find myself engaging in negative collective behaviour. I’d like to think it’s a sign of growing wisdom. More likely, it’s a consequence of my profession. The communications sector forces me to continually scan the horizon. What’s coming, what’s trending, what’s sinking, what’s changing are some of the questions I have to ask on an ongoing basis. When I stop asking, then things like LinkedIn, Facebook and Pinterest show up and change all the rules of engagement. Asking means I learn all kinds of things along the way, some pertinent for now, others relevant for later.
Looking outward on a regular basis also disengages me; it sets me a drift. When strange or counterproductive decisions are made back at home base, that’s what they look like to me, counter productive and strange. I don’t get distracted by the internal culture or prevailing paradigm because I’m not embedded in them.
Strong personal values do the same thing. They ground you, give you a moral compass when things get foggy. They inform your decisions and guide your actions. When synchronicity wants to pull and lull you, your values will provide guidance.
What about you? Have you ever gotten into synch at just the right time? Had an amazing coincidence that left you surprised or inspired? Or have you travelled down a road only to ask yourself later, “What was I thinking?”
Image: Silhouettes – School of Parrotfish (Photo credit: CAUT)
Slow and Expensive
When did I become an advocate for slow and expensive? It was a gradual thing. I don’t really think it was a question of choice, as much as, a rebellion against the alternative, fast and cheap.
For reasons that remain elusive to me, fast and cheap have become beacons for consumers. Fast and cheap food has been a staple for years. Forbes magazine rates McDonald’s as one of the top five brands in the world. But fast and cheap have begun to invade sectors that make no sense to me at all. What is the point of speed dating? Are you looking for a fast talker? What about dating sites that state, with pride, “We don’t waste your time with a lot of questions.”
Hmmm… even if I met a man who had been vetted through friends or family, I’d want him to answer a few questions, but then I think there is value to be had in that four-letter word, time. Yes, call me old fashioned, but I think you get what you pay for and you pay with time and or money for quality.
Which takes me back to fast and cheap. Let’s start with fast. So what’s the rush? When did speed become synonymous with good? Like any Luddite might, I blame technology, or more to the point, I blame our inability to separate what’s good for technology from what’s good for us. Do we think that the speed at which our computers boot up, we move through the Internet, we download movies can some how be extrapolated to apply to the real world?
What if job interviews were a minute long and applications asked only one question? What if we only aged our scotch for a year and all wine was new? Perhaps all steak should be served rare and visits to the doctor to should be marked in seconds not minutes. Slow growing plants like evergreens should be eradicated, while those persistent and pretty dandelions should be encouraged. Education need not take years… whoa! Some things simply take time. As a woman or as a man, do you want to be thought of as fast? Many things are better because they don’t happen quickly.
The appeal of cheap is a complete mystery to me. Cheap has never been a harbinger of value. Cheap is the car sales man in the loud jacket steering you towards a lemon. Cheap is the invasive and cloying scent of cologne purchased for a song. Cheap is the derogatory term we use on the boss that does not pay you you’re worth. Cheap is the umbrella that breaks the first time it rains. If someone called you cheap, would you take it as a compliment? What would you think if it was applied to your work?
Therein lies the rub for me. Cheap and fast may be popular, but it’s not how I want my skills perceived. It’s not how I brand myself. I’ve never wanted to be considered by any of the other meanings attributed to cheap either. I am not shoddy, stingy or heaven forbid, inexpensive. My abilities to assess and respond were not acquired quickly. It has taken me decades of experience, years of research and more failures and successes than I care to count to build my body of professional knowledge. I save my employers and clients time and money because I take my time and apply my years of hard earned knowledge to the challenges they face. In short, what I offer is neither fast nor cheap.
You are no doubt thinking that happier times can be found in more modest approaches. Why not aim to be moderately fast and reasonably priced? Doesn’t that just roll off the tongue? The problem with moderate and reasonable is that they do not capture the imagination. They make me think of mediocre. Even when we purchase things in the mid range, we’re really hoping they are about as good as the higher priced item, but a better price. We all love getting a good deal and I’m no exception.
When promoting a brand you have a few ways to go, you are appealing to a unique niche, you are best in class or you are cheaper. If you are offering something unique, you are not competing on price. If the market is competitive you are left with quality or price. Unless you are willing to fight on price, a war no one wins, then you are left with quality.
Quality is rarely if ever associated with fast and cheap, but it has kept company with slow and expensive.
Which would you rather be, fast & cheap or slow & expensive?
Image: A yacht in Lorient, Bretagne, France (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Running to the future
I was running. Running to work, running at work, running home, running out to pick something up, running to the car, running to the phone and feeling the whole time like I was running out of time. Now I will be the first to admit I was running to a tune of my own creation. Work was busy, but then I like busy, I choose jobs that pose a challenge. I hate pointless busy, but if there is a clear objective, then I feel engaged. The busyness of my “free” time was equally of my making. I like to blog, I like to garden, I like to read, I like to paint and I like visiting with friends and family. There is never enough time for it all, but trying to do it is fun too. Although I was the architect of my time crunch, I was still feeling overwhelmed. It was admittedly a first world problem.
In keeping with that, I thought there must be some first world solutions that would help me to get my work done faster and more effectively. Was there a gadget or gadgets that might ease my way, make things clearer, easier to access, to see, to engage to respond? If I was willing to invest, I was sure there was a technological solution to help me meet my time woes. Here’s what I found.
Simband: To manage the impact stress has on my physical health, I could start with a Simband. It can check my blood pressure, let me know if my heart rate and respiration are normal and if I’ve been drinking too much coffee and not enough water it can let me know where my hydration levels are. It could even keep me safe by noting the amount of carbon dioxide in my blood.
Laptop Beverage Holder: This handy gadget would allow me to keep my coffee close by when I’m tucked away in a corner playing catch up with my blogging activities. It attaches to the side of my laptop so no table necessary. The same applies to any worries that I’ll accidentally kick over my coffee because I’ve placed it on the floor. Of course I shudder to think what would happen if I tilted my laptop the wrong way while it had a cup of coffee attached to it…
Google Glass: As anyone who mentions them in my hearing learns, I love the idea of Google Glasses, the idea, because I still don’t own a pair, but they should be coming to Canada soon. They might afford me any number of time saving features. I could look things up while walking and not risk walking into someone because I’m looking down at my phone. Though to tell the truth, I’ve always been good at navigating with my head down. I’m a veteran reader and when I get into a book, something as mundane as a walk won’t stop me from reading. Still, I can appear less anti-social if I can keep my head up, that is unless people are uncomfortable with my headgear in which case my fear is that I might become known as a glasshole.
Livescribe: This little beauty gives those of us who would rather write than type a time saving break. With Livescribe, your hand written notes automatically become text without you having to take the time to type. The device also records so that the notes you take synch up with what was being said at the time you took them. Think about how easy that would make your life. The only thing better would be voice activation technology; notes could then move seamlessly from sound to your desktop before you leave the boardroom.
Kensington Proximo Tag: This brilliant little device was developed for me. I’m the queen of the lost keys, cellphones and a host of other things. The Proximo allows you to track anything. The fob activates the alarm on your cell phone so you’ll always know where to look. The Proximo tag attaches to your key ring but allows your phone to track it’s location so you’ll never lose your keys again. You can in fact, use the tag for anything you don’t want to lose. Imagine how much time will be saved if I’m not wasting it trying to find lost items.
Do you know any cool little time savers? What time saving devices would you like to have? What about devices gone wrong?
Photo credit: Wikipedia
Pride – Do you love it or hate it?
Pride has a bad reputation. I used to think it was a Canadian thing, but if you look at quotes on pride, they typically come with dire warnings no matter the country of origin. Pride comes right before you fall, fail, fool yourself and f… screw up. Pride is arrogant, egotistical and vain. Pride is lazy, loathsome and generally uninteresting, on and on it goes.
The thing is, I love the sense of pride I had last week when I sent my husband off to Umea, Sweden to present his thoughts on information design to an international gathering. I really like that mildly euphoric feeling that swells your chest and elicits a huge teeth-bearing grin that encompasses your face. I was overcome by a similar feeling later in the week as I watched a play put together by my daughter and her fellow students. The play, a musical production, left me amazed and in awe, at their cleverness, focus and imagination. I was pretty proud of their teacher too.
“I’m so proud of you that it makes me proud of me. I hope you know that.”
― John Green, Will Grayson, Will Grayson
Pride is that wonderful emotion that keeps you focused on your job and attentive to details that know one will ever know you cared about, but will be evident in the work you produce. Pride is such a critical part of the joy we have in our work, that as employees and employers we always have to ask ourselves, are we proud of what we are doing? If not, then what needs to change?
I was asking a colleague to pass along a project she had started to another person and I could see she was not keen on my suggestion. To be honest, she looked crestfallen. When I raised the issue again she said that the project meant a lot to her. She had discovered a solution to a long-standing problem and wanted to see it through to the end. What she said was, “I want to complete this project and know that I accomplished something from start to finish.”
I had been gearing up to gently chastise her for taking on more projects than she could handle, but as I looked at her and reflected on all of the projects that we were managing, I realized that I would be making a critical error if I insisted. She had pride in her work. She quite correctly wanted to do a whole job. We were in the midst of a series of long projects that would stretch out over months and in many cases, years. Her statement reminded me of some basic elements of Lean business practices. In a nutshell, we are more productive and more engaged, more proud of our work when we complete whole jobs.
Imagine getting three people to build a blog. One person would be in charge of content, one in charge of visuals and design and the third would be responsible for the technical function of the website. Now have them build without talking to one another. How do you think the blog might work? Introduce a fourth character, the website owner. Think they will like what they find, probably not. In order for the website to meet the demands of form and function, there would have to be collaboration, a plan and a shared objective. Having pride in your work means investing in the process and the outcomes.
How much pride would you have in your work if you had clever content that was all but obscured by inappropriate graphics and images? What about a beautifully designed blog with rubbish for content or content that was out of step with the design? Better still; imagine how much pride you would have if you had no idea why you were doing what you were doing?
Now you might get the impression that I think pride always a good thing, but that’s not the case, while pride is an amazing motivator, it can also be an obstacle or even a complete barrier to accomplishment. When our pride prevents us from asking for help or taking action when it is required then the same emotion that brought euphoria can become an oppressive weight preventing us from moving forward and achieving success.
“I would always rather be happy than dignified.”
Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
Pride can also make us do things to meet other people’s standards, expectations or acceptance. This is one of the most pointless forms of pride because it requires so much effort and focus for things that mean so little to us. When it’s really out of control it makes us do things that are counter to our own interests, like stay in a marriage or job that makes us miserable.
“Too many people spend money they earned… to buy things they don’t want… to impress people that they don’t like.”
― Will Rogers
So do you love or hate pride most of the time? Does being proud strike you as noble or foolish?
“Image courtesy of panuruang / FreeDigitalPhotos.net”
Why Context Matters
When I was in the ninth grade I was wandering the halls of my high school with three friends. Everyone else was in class, but we had been working on an assignment with a teacher that ran overtime. We should have been heading straight for our next class but instead we were taking a little detour and enjoying the freedom of roaming the halls while they were quiet. We must have been louder than we thought because the door to one of the classrooms suddenly opened and a teacher from one of the older grades stuck his head out.
Being quick thinkers, or maybe more attuned to trouble, David Matthews and I headed for the closest stairwell door. We were slipping through it just as the teacher started calling out to us to “come back here”.
We played deaf and while David and I were making our escape, our friends Diane and Michael were caught and brought into the classroom. The teacher, who was later to become one of my favorites, had a sense of humor and began to quiz Michael and Diane about their tour of the school. As their faces grew redder, the class snickered at their discomfort. Just at the point when they thought he might torture them for the rest of the period came the question they had been dreading. What are your names?
Diane and Michael looked at each other mortified. Had they been with me or with David it wouldn’t have been so bad, but the two of them alone, well let’s just say it was an awkward combination. At their continued silence, the teacher prompted them again to give their names. Reluctantly Diane told him her name was Diane, Diane Ross. There was a moment of silence before the giggles started. Being a blue-eyed blond, Diane wasn’t remotely trying to be funny. The teacher eyed her suspiciously and then turned to Michael. Can you guess what his last name was? Would you believe that, Michael Jackson and Diane Ross had been caught running in the hall?
Now Mr. Caldwell was a teacher with a sense of humor, but he really needed them to give him their names, their real names. Needless to say they were in the principle’s office before the disbelieving teacher, now looking a little sheepish, was finally convinced that the real names of the two blue-eyed children he’d caught were Michael Jackson and Diane Ross.
I laughed hysterically when they recounted the story to me, but what I think is really funny is that Diane kept saying, “It’s Diane Ross, not Diana” as if that should have made all the difference in the world.
On a good day their names were often cause for pause, in the context of getting caught together by a teacher, well that stretches the imagination. Which brings me to my point, context matters. Things that normally seem logical, acceptable or natural can become inconsiderate, stupid and even thoughtless when the context changes.
Consider President Obama taking a “selfie” with British Prime Minister David Cameron and Danish Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt. Normally that might seem cute. President Obama taking a selfie during a memorial service with British Prime Minister David Cameron and Danish Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt, well that’s just rude. The context makes the activity seem outrageous, unless you broaden your view and look at the activity happening around them, people chatting, talking on their cell phones, looking at their messages and suddenly you realize… there was epidemic of rude happening and that was just one aspect.
In the retail world, “Every day low prices” is a great idea. Everyday low prices that mean there will be no more sales in a store that has built it’s reputation on deep discount sales…well that’s just silly. Yet JC penny did just that in 2012. Their then, new CEO, Ron Johnson fresh from a successful tenure at Apple thought he could bring the same approach to the popular retailer that had worked so well at Apple. Rather than inspire customer loyalty the approach sent customers to other stores and share prices diving from $43 to $30 a share. Mr. Johnson is no longer with JC Penny.
On a final note on context, getting my blog out on time is important to me, so posting late two weeks in row is not in my plan. Posting late for two weeks in a row is perfectly acceptable if it means celebrating with my husband the launch of his new blog. If you’re curious, head over to paragraphic.ca. It’s a great read on communication design theory…really, it’s more engaging than that sounds.
Is Music Mind Food?
Who is the invisible conductor that makes our heart beat? How did the ten thousand heart cells agree to a rhythm? From the simple beat of our hearts to complex symphonies of sound we hear from an orchestra, why does music help us think? How can an acoustic pattern help us to learn and grow?
My husband says that music stops him from getting tunnel vision because as each new tune or melody starts, his creative perspective is redefined. Do you remember learning things from songs? For those of us of a certain age and living in North America, we had the joys of School House Rock to teach us everything from how legislation works (I’m Just a Bill) to how adverbs work (Lolly, Lolly, Lolly, Get Your Adverbs Here). I still hum some of these songs to myself when I need to remember the rules of grammar.
We love patterns. The natural world is full of patterns, from the shape of shells to the patterns we see on leaves. We establish patterns in our body and with our body and we are drawn to patterns in our social lives. Have you ever watched the pattern of traffic? We all slow down and speed up for real or imagined reasons together. We will walk in step in a crowd. We comment on it in birds but we also like to flock. Rhythms are sound patterns, they are an audio pattern that we can connect to at a deep level and we not only relate we can relay that pattern. Go listen to Steve Reich.
Music stimulates multiple parts of the brain, bringing them online while we listen. If you start singing, even more, pieces come onboard. Our connection to music and its ability to create new neurological patterns may help us to think deeper. Scientists have been looking at music to see if it could help adults with Alzheimer’s disease. The question they are asking is essential, can we rewire the brain to work around the areas affected by the disease by using music?
Yet, as much as I adore music while I work, I have friends and colleagues who have said they want no music at all while they work. I can appreciate that people need different things, but for me, more often than not silence seems to mock me, creating diminishing echoes that go nowhere instead of ever evolving patterns of thought. When we work together, how can we find a happy medium? The folks at Focusatwill.com say they have done just that.
At Focusatwill.com all of the music you hear has been re-mastered to be heard without you actually listening to it. Huh?? It’s essentially combining the benefits we get from listening to music but getting rid of the distracting bits that make others want to turn the music off. These are the sounds, like the human voice, that prompt our brains to pay closer attention, therefore distracting us from our work. I’ll be honest, I’m not convinced that’s it’s always the way I want to go, sometimes I need to sing along, particularly if the task is a tedious one, but I found the music soothing. I used it while writing part of this post and it’s an interesting approach. I think their solution might be particularly useful if you work somewhere where you can’t block out your colleagues with headphones but music is a menace for some of your co-workers.
What do you think? Is silence golden or where words fail does music speak?
If you’d like to find some alternatives to Focus At will, check out Rainy Mood, Jazz and Rain or Relaxing Beats.
What Exactly Is Your Issue? Four Tips For Better Lobbying
I was on Parliament Hill recently and as my colleagues and I fanned out to share our messages I kept thinking about all the possible outcomes ahead of us. We had the same message to deliver, but personal style and approach can make subtle changes occur that effect comprehension, reception and even perceived objective. This means that when presenting an idea, the question of knowing EXACTLY what you want is critical.
Whether presenting to government, an interviewer or potential client, it can mean the difference between success and failure. If you are unclear about your issue, or do not ensure that your audience is clear on what you want, you may find yourself achieving an outcome you didn’t anticipate. As time management expert Alan Lakein so succinctly put it, “Failing to plan is planning to fail.”
Take for instance the consumer advocate groups that lobbied the Canadian federal government for years on the issue of labelling of cigarette packaging. They asked government to ban or restrict the word “light” from cigarette packages. They were concerned that the use of the word would lead the public to think that these cigarettes were somehow not as bad for them as “regular” cigarettes. In December 2004, then Minister of Health, Ujjal Dosanjh, was pleased to announce that the use of the words “light” and “mild” would be prohibited from use on future cigarette packages. Imagine his surprise, when on hearing his announcement, the various associations in question responded with criticism. It seems that they were actually using the “light” discussion as an example of the kind of wording they did not want used. As it happens their “ask” was a good deal more complex than the use of one or two words, they were quite legitimately concerned about the use of any language or imagery that might be perceived as misleading, this included the use of numbers or coloring. Subsequently, they did not see the change as sufficient.
By February of 2005, a grassroots campaign had been launched to tell government that their announced changes hadn’t gone far enough. The subsequent nature of the relationship between the Minister and the associations following these events can only be speculated on, but needless to say a good deal of engagement would have been necessary to maintain good relations.
Knowing exactly what you want before you initiate anything, from a meeting to a full communications campaign, provides you with a path. Waiting until you are at a critical meeting or juncture is not the time to to determine what you want. Brainstorming in tight circumstances is unlikely to be productive or successful. Its also likely to lead to frustration for you and those around you. If you know precisely what outcome you are trying to achieve, you are also in a better position to spot options or opportunities, it gives you the flexibility to take short cuts that will satisfy your objectives. Knowing what you want means you are also in a better position to anticipate how long the process will take and what you will need to do in order to be successful.
When have you planned and succeeded? Have you been taken by surprise by an outcome? Have you ever failed to plan and subsequently missed an opportunity?