by Susan Johnston | Mar 11, 2006 | Build your own skills |
On Saturday and Sunday, I’ll be one of an
estimated five gazillion women – and fourteen men – who’ll be at the National
Women’s Show (www.nationalwomenshow.com)
at the Ottawa Congress Centre. I’m one of the lucky ones. I’ll have a chair
when I need it.
Six of us, flying the banner of the Ottawa
Coaches, are hosting a booth located just where the Business & Career
section merges with Minding Your Body. It’s a perfect spot, because we’re all
about looking after yourself – in work and in life.
Our mission is to talk to people about
coaching – who we coach, how we coach, what to expect and what you can achieve
working with a coach. Each of us has a different specialty. There’s a
retirement coach, a parenting coach, a work/life balance coach, a leadership
coach, a communication coach (me) and a get-off-the-sofa-and-live-your-life-now
coach.
As we put the booth together today, I was
impressed by how quickly six very diverse strangers had worked so quickly and
smoothly on this project. We had, not surprisingly, taken a coach approach to
the task.
Regardless of the type of people we work
with, or the type of goals our clients have, at the heart of our work are some
fundamental steps that look something like this:
Clarify your intention
You have to know what you want or you can’t
do a thing about it. For the Women’s Show, our intention is to raise community
awareness of coaching and its benefits. We want an attractive and professional
presence with opportunities for interaction. And we want to create an
environment where people feel comfortable asking for a sample session, with the
appropriate coach, after the show is over. Getting dozens of clients to sign up
on the spot is not the intention. This is about waking up a potential market.
Examine the situation
At the Women’s Show, we’ll bump into a lot
of people who might benefit from and can afford coaching yet know little about it.
But evidence suggests they won’t be beating a path to our booth to learn about
it. The show will be noisy and crowded and people will be in a hurry to get
their free food samples, catch the decorating demos, or have their eyebrows (or
whatever) shaped. There’s no way we can do coaching at the booth. But we can
get them to come and talk with us if we give them a reason.
Gather resources
Because someone already had a huge box of
them from another event, we’re giving out fortune cookies. Did you know your
fortune improves when you work with a coach? A big Wheel Of Life chart has
escaped from some other purpose to spark in-booth discussions – and we’ve
created smaller versions people can fill out while they wait in the inevitable
line-ups. Banners, easels, tables all manifested as if by magic as we assessed
what we had and compared it with what we needed. Assuming I remember to pick up
the balloons in the morning, it’s a fine looking booth. (Only my lovely readers
will know that we didn’t hire a booth designer to make an impression.) The
beauty of this step is that, whatever the goal, if you look carefully, you’re
likely to discover you already have the resources to do it.
Take action
Moving from planning to action is the place
where both fun and fear lie. Taking action is pretty much the only way we’re
ever going to get results or have anything to celebrate. Yet fear – often fear
of what others will think of us – can stop us from taking steps that will get
us where we want to be. “To become involved is to reduce your fear,” Susan
Jeffers writes in “Feel The Fear And Do It Anyway.” So I’m involved.
Get results
Getting results follows doing something as
night follows day. It may not be the result you intended, or even the result
you want. That’s when you revisit the earlier steps, using the knowledge you
gained on this round. One of my favourite business quotes comes from Thomas
Watson, founder of IBM, “If you want to increase your success rate, double your
failure rate.”
Celebrate
Eventually, you’ll get a result you want,
which may not be the one you intended. At minimum, you’ll learn something
useful. Either way, it’s something to celebrate. Just what the six of us will be
celebrating after our trade show outing is hard to say. Stay tuned.
by Susan Johnston | Aug 29, 2005 | Build your own skills, Rants, Ramblings and Riddles |
“Be not afraid of greatness: some are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon them.” (Shakespeare, Twelfth Night, Act II, Scene V)
Greatness. What a concept. It’s not something we ponder every day. At least, I don’t. Make that didn’t. Two recent events dragged greatness into my awareness. First, I was invited to contribute to a book called, Become Your Own Great And Powerful: A Woman’s Guide To Leading Your Real, Big Life. There was that great word, right in the title, waiting to be explored, understood, and written about. Second, I began the process of coach certification. Hanging about with coaches, you seldom go for more than an hour without hearing that word. You need to “elecit your client’s greatness,” which, perhaps not surprisingly, you do by “coming from your own greatness.” Apparently it takes greatness to know greatness.
You might say greatness was thrust upon me. Clearly, I needed to understand what this concept of personal greatness is all about. What a great opportunity.
Our Conditioning
Find the word “great” in a dictionary and you’ll get many references to size. It’s derived from and Old English word meaning “thick” or “coarse,” neither of which strike me as being particularly great. Over time, like the word “magnitude” it has come to mean more than “large” and is imbued with attributes of significance and superiority.
In childhood, it was definitely not cool to entertain the idea that there might be something great about oneself. I, and maybe you, learned from peers that to be boastful or “stuck-up” was close to the worst thing in the entire universe. “She thinks she’s so great,” was definitely not a compliment. Trying to fit in and be accepted, our active little egos squashed any efforts by our greater selves to be seen in the world. For many of us, they still do.
That can leave us with a yearning to be more and better that’s at odds with a long-established habit of limiting our own reach. In trying to understand why some of us choose to play small rather than go for it all, I see a kind of modesty that doesn’t really serve us well. It may not even be genuine. True humility is not self-conscious; it’s unconscious. A colleague recently suggested that when we are consciously being humble our ego is in the driver’s seat, trying to control how we appear to others. When we’re concerned with others’ approval, who’s really steering?
Our True Selves
I’m starting to understand greatness as being directed by your true self, not some version of yourself that comes from outside you. I’m not advocating anarchy, impulsiveness or life as an outlaw. Far from it. I’m hoping to unleash that “spark of the divine” in us all. Explore what, by your inner standards, gives you a sense of real peace, real accomplishment, real purpose. It’s a way of being that looks at your world and says, “This is possible – and it brings me to life.”
Greatness is living fully, using the interests, intellect, spirit and talents you were born with in ways that inspire you. Greatness is not about saving the world, though that might happen if we all lived that way.
The first thing you have to do is regognize that you have greatness – current, potential, and possible greatness. We’re quick to point out our flaws, failings, weaknesses, and warts. But ask us about our strengths and we’re speechless. We need to rewrite the stories we tell ourselves all day long, those movies running in an endless loop in our heads.
These new stories will include the great things our true selves are and do and will continue to be and do. And I would suggest we write those stories down, though we may be their only reader. The act of writing can make the stories seem as real as they are, by getting them into the body and onto the page. Burn the stories, publish them, save them, read them – it doesn’t matter. The point is to create them, see them, believe them, and live them.
Isn’t it time to tell yourself the story of your greatness?
++++++
If you’re interested in the book project that inspired this column, follow these links to find the book, Become Your Own Great And Powerful: A Woman’s Guide To Leading Your Real, Big Life and a recording of a radio interview with our editor, Barbara Bellissimo, about writing and publishing a collaborative book.
by Susan Johnston | Aug 29, 2005 | Build your own skills |
I had the good fortune this week to be interviewed for an article about how supervisors can communicate bad news. As a manager, I’ve done a bit of this, and I’ve certainly been on the receiving end. As a consultant, I’ve advised others communicating organizational changes that could be seen as bad news. As a PR student, I’ve done cases and simulations where we’ve closed plants, dealt with explosions and industrial accidents, and fired the CEO. But I did most of this before I learned about emotional intelligence.
In answering this reporter’s questions, I saw the situation through a filter of emotions. As a result, I think recognizing and discussing the emotional component makes communicating less of an ordeal.
Bad news brings out emotions, your own and other people’s. The feelings that emerge, sadness, fear, and anger, are the most uncomfortable of our emotional repertoire. Generations of humans have not learned to deal well with these particular feelings. As children, when they show up, we’re urged by well-meaning adults to “cheer up,” “be brave,” and “calm down.” (One EQ trainer I’ve worked with likes to quote an old family saying, “Stop crying or I’ll give you something to cry about!”) So we learn to suppress, change or hide these “bad” feelings, rather than understand them and use the information they contain.
Emotional hijack
But humans are emotional beings and we don’t stop being human when we get to work. Like it or not, feelings are going to come up, sometimes in unexpected ways. The thinking part of our brain (the neo-cortex) functions poorly when we’re in the grip of emotion. The “fight or flight” portion of our brain (the amygdala) has control. (Emotional intelligence theory labels this “emotional hijack.”)
So when you’re delivering bad news to employees (or anyone else) you need to be sensitive to the emotions. Logic, alone, won’t work. People aren’t thinking clearly; their brains won’t let them.
Good grief!
When bad news hits, a person goes through a process that’s similar to the grieving process. The intensity will vary with the individual and the situation – “No bonus this year” is a lot less intense than “The plant is closing.” But a form of grieving takes place whenever there is change. In her studies of grief, Elizabeth Kubler-Ross observed five stages: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.
As a manager communicating news that will mean a big change for your employees, you can expect them to experience these feelings and behaviours as they try to process the information andwork through their feelings. Only after they work through the first four will they get to acceptance.
- Denial: Employees believe the news isn’t true or won’t affect them. Help them by providing information.
- Anger: Employees feel wronged and may want to retaliate. Tears may signify the frustration of unexpressed anger, not sadness. Help by listening and finding ways they can redirect their energy towards something useful.
- Bargaining: Employees will try to make deals to prevent the unwanted event. Guard against encouraging false hopes.
- Depression: If employees exhibit signs of depression, listen and empathize – and encourage them to take advantage of any counselling available.
- Acceptance: It may take time for employees to reach this stage. Help throughout the process by making yourself available to talk about the feelings and the facts of the situation.
Since most people are unaccustomed to discussing their feelings, especially at work, you’ll probably have to “go first” when it comes to sharing feelings. Admit that you’re uncomfortable but you recognize that there are feelings associated with the news and they are as important as the facts. Invite employees to talk about how they feel. Chances are good that if you talk as one human to another, rather than defending the decision or just stating the facts, you’ll build trust as you move forward.
by Susan Johnston | Aug 4, 2005 | Build your own skills |
I’ll admit it. I talk to myself. I, you, and billions of other humans, have lively internal dialogues taking place nearly all the time. It’s as if we have invisible companions whispering in our ears in all our waking moments. When we talk to ourselves, repeating and re-repeating messages, we are like hypnotists making suggestions to our subconscious minds. What are you programming your mind to believe?
What do you say when you talk to yourself? If you’re like most people, it’s usually not along the lines of, “Wow. That was great. I’m really learning something here.” It’s more likely to come in the form of a judgment.
- “Ouch. That was so stupid.”
- “You are such a loser.”
- “You just can’t do anything right.”
- “This is never going to work.”
Originally, we may have heard these or similar statements from others, who were trying to help us by making us conform or improve, or hurt us by pointing out our flaws. But today, the voice that carries the “No!” message is our own.
Perhaps the most important messages you will ever communicate are the ones you send to yourself. After all, what we believe influences our actions and, ultimately, our lives.
In the sports world, research has suggested that self-talk has a significant impact on athletic performance. I’ve paddled on teams that, based on our physical condition, should have been eliminated in the first heats. But, as a team, we won the psychological race against our nay-saying inner gremlins, and that took us to the finals on the water.
As a singer and public speaker, I’ve seen similar results in my performance when my self-talk sounds like, “I’m well prepared,” “I’m ready,” and “This is going to be fun.”
Over the past few months, I’ve been working to stop sending myself negative messages in my life and my business. I’m trying to erase years of programming and replace it with thoughts that will help me. When that gremlin in my head starts whispering ideas that don’t serve me, I take a moment to acknowledge the thought and ask, “Is this true?” Then I look at the evidince, which is usually nonexistent or, at best, circumstantial.
This process hasn’t made me an enlightened being, but I have lightened up. Without the nagging, doubting, negative messages from my nay-saying inner voice, I can put something more positive into my head, for example, the truth of the situation. And my brain has the intellectual and emotional clarity to make better decisions.
So how do we reprogram ourselves? I’ve heard a few people suggest wearing an elastic band around your wrist and snapping it (Ouch!) every time you have a negative thought. I seem to be able to shut the negative argument off without the pain. I think about the pleasure of being able to work with a functioning brain, one not cluttered with fictional tales that send me back to a mythical territory of strife, struggle, bad luck, and bad hair days.
Some people claim that simply saying positive words can make a difference, whether or not you believe them. For me, replacing negative self-talk doesn’t mean chanting empty phrases, such as “My greatness is amazing,” or ” I’m a money magnet.” It means substituting a positive idea the mind can accept as possible, if not already true, such as, “I’m discovering greatness in me,” and “I offer services people value and pay for.” Some motivational speakers might accuse me of “playing small” with this tactic, but at least I’m playing.
Positive self-talk means:
- You build a better relationship with yourself when you ease up on the negative self-talk and substitute positive messages. Why would it be any different from a relationship with someone else? We prefer to be with folks who make us feel good, not those who consistently tear us down.
- You change your mental environment when you inject positive, believable thoughts. You just cannot stay in Loserville when your brain is willing to entertain that there might be something fabulous about you. (Dare I say “great”?)
- You communicate more effectively with other people when you’re feeling better about yourself. Plus you’re thinking clearly when the inner voice isn’t shouting abuse at you. You may actually be a nicer person.
So how should we talk to ourselves? My reading suggests the following key elements.
- Make it a habit to notice when the “No” voice is talking to you. (You might even thank it for its input and tell it you’ll consider the matter later.)
- Examine the facts of the case. What is really true? Turn that into a statement.
- Start the talk with “I,” not “you.” This lets your brain know you are in control of yourself.
- Use the present tense – “I am” and “I do” and “I have.” (Evidently, if you speak of positive things happening in the future, that programming leads your brain to keep them in the future.)
So talk to yourself. And enjoy the conversation. It may just lead you somewhere interesting – like precisely where you are trying to go.
by Susan Johnston | Jun 22, 2005 | Build your own skills
A few months ago, I bumped into a statistic suggesting that more than 80 per cent of North American drivers think they are better than average. Hmmmmm. Do the math.
This impossible belief seems to apply to communication, too. How many resumes have you seen that claim “excellent communication skills” among the list of awesome attributes? If everyone who claimed to be a good communicator actually was one, would “poor communication” be one of the big employee dissatisfiers that show up in exit interviews? Not likely.
Good communication is the workplace skill people seem to need the most yet demonstrate the least. How does that happen? I think it’s because the communication profession is missing a huge opportunity. Few of us do anything to promote interpersonal communication.
The reasons are many: tradition, the narrow confines of our job descriptions, our bosses’ and clients’ urgent needs, habit, competing priorities, the intangibility of interpersonal communication, and [insert your favourite excuse here]. Organizations lack a sense of what great face-to-face communication looks like, so it’s hard to measure and reward.
Meanwhile, professional communicators are up to their eyeballs in artefacts. Publications, memos, marketing material, financial reports and executive edicts receive lots of attention and billions in funding. Corporate communication departments, advertising agencies, public relations firms, and consultants spend huge amounts of time and energy developing plans, programs, strategies, tools and tactics to help organizations communicate with customers, shareholders, employees, regulatory agencies and the public. IT departments, manufacturers, service providers, and armies of techno-folk are hooking us up with faster, cleaner, more reliable computing and telephone communication devices. But when it comes to face-to-face communication – which still makes up the bulk of daily communication in business – people scarcely give it a thought.
Humans are “hard wired” to send and receive messages face-to-face, yet nobody really teaches us how to do this type of communication well. They teach us other stuff, like declining verbs and using punctuation, saying “please” and “thank you,” and not talking with food in our mouths. Sometimes they teach us to converse in foreign languages, in classes with names like “French Conversation.” But who receives formal lessons in how to conduct meaningful conversation in our own language?
Conversation is something the world just expects us to know. Not studied, not measured, and not well-understood, face-to-face communication is something that, if not quite an unconscious act, seldom receives much thought.
What would happen if everyone gave conscious consideration to their face-to-face communication? The results could be very beneficial to us, as individuals, and to the world.
Making a shift to conscious communication is something we can do that improves both work and life. Are you willing to try it?
Today’s homework: Be aware of your communication. You don’t really have to do anything differently (though this may happen as you become aware). Be aware of how you communicate and how that communication is received. Log it in your journal, if you’re so inclined.
We can start the conscious communication revolution just by paying attention. How cool is that?
