8/26/12 “Summer Vacation”

Good day, team.

This is the final weekend of August. Summer is rounding the bend into autumn, and again the seasons will change. With that change, summer vacation comes to an end. As an adult, I’ve always kind of resented having to work in summer. Those three months off from school at the peak of summer were such a highlight each year. Some childlike part of me still thinks my summers should be spent having nothing better to do than to go out and play. Whether swimming at the local pool with friends, going to camp, visiting relatives at the beach or just hanging out, my childhood summers were always a time to do whatever presented itself each day. What a sense of freedom I felt as I bounded out the door into the morning sunshine, ready to embrace whatever adventures I would encounter on another beautiful summer day!

When I started working full time after college, I realized that part of being a grown up is giving up the freedom of childhood summers. I was so disappointed to discover that I had only two weeks of paid vacation from my job each year. How could I possibly pack all the summer fun into a measly two weeks? On the other hand, who could pay for more time off? I realized I’d taken for granted the fact that my parents had paid for my summer activities. I’d also taken for granted the freedom of those three months of time off each year.

This morning, I thought about all the things I needed to do today — clean the house, shop for dinner, prepare for an upcoming business trip, finish the wash and so on. On most days, I have a to-do list of tasks that fills my time. I thought to myself, “What if I just don’t do any of those things today? What if I go out and play instead? What if I just take a mini-vacation?”

This reminds me of an excerpt from “Walden,” the wonderful book written by Henry David Thoreau. I’ve shared these paragraphs before, but this morning, it seems particularly relevant considering my desire to take time off:

“There were times when I could not afford to sacrifice the bloom of the present moment to any work, whether of the head or hands. I love a broad margin to my life. Sometimes, in a summer morning, having taken my accustomed bath, I sat in my sunny doorway from sunrise till noon, rapt in a revelry, amidst the pines and hickories and sumacs, in undisturbed solitude and stillness, while the birds sang around or flitted noiseless through the house, until by the sun falling in at my west window, or the noise of some traveler’s wagon on the distant highway, I was reminded of the lapse of time.

“I grew in those seasons like corn in the night, and they were far better than any work of the hands would have been. They were not time subtracted from my life, but so much over and above my usual allowance. I realized what the Orientals mean by contemplation and the forsaking of works. For the most part, I minded not how the hours went. The day advanced as if to light some work of mine; it was morning, and lo, now it is evening, and nothing memorable is accomplished. Instead of singing like the birds, I silently smiled at my incessant good fortune. As the sparrow had its trill, sitting on the hickory before my door, so had I my chuckle or suppressed warble which he might hear out of my nest.”

This week, find time to give yourself a mini-vacation. As the long days of sunlight still exist, give yourself permission to go out and play, or as Thoreau did, sit in your doorway in silence and stillness, just being with the moment and whatever it brings.

Have a good week!

Kathleen

Kathleen Doyle-White

Pathfinders Coaching

© Copyright 2012 Pathfinders Coaching, Scout Search Inc., all rights reserved.

8/19/12 “Put It Down”

Good day, team.

This weekend I’m on vacation and I fully intended to notify my subscribers that there would not be a challenge this week. But, this morning, I awoke in the home of our family in Ohio and saw this book on the bedside table. It’s entitled “The Book of Awakening”, by Mark Nepo. I opened the book and this is the first thing I read. This week’s challenge is embedded within.

All Fall Down

“It was a snowy night, and Robert was recalling the time two springs ago when he was determined to paint the family room. Up early, he was out the door to the hardware store gathering the gallons of red, the wooden mixing sticks, the drop cloths, and the one-time brushes that always harden, no matter what you soak them in.

He mixed the paint outside and waddled to the door with a gallon in each hand, the drop cloth under his arm, and a wide brush in his mouth. He began to chuckle in telling what happened, “I teetered there for minutes, trying to open the door, not wanting to put anything down. I was so stubborn. I had the door almost open when I lost my grip, stumbled backward and wound up on the ground, red gallons all over me.” At this point, he laughed at himself, as he has done many times, and we watched the snow fall in silence. I thought of his little story the whole way home. Amazingly, we all do this, whether with groceries or paint or with the stories we feel determined to share. We do this with our love, with our sense of truth, even with our pain. It’s such a simple thing, but in a moment of ego we refuse to put down what we carry in order to open the door. Time and time again we are offered the chance to truly learn this: We cannot hold on to things and enter. We must put down what we carry, open the door, and then take up only what we need to bring inside.
It is a basic human sequence: gather, prepare, put down, enter. But failing as we do, we always have that second chance – to learn how to fall, get up, and laugh.

  • Meditate on some threshold you are having trouble crossing in your life. It might be at work, at home, in a relationship, or the doorway to greater peace.
  • Breathe steadily and look to yourself to see if you are carrying too much to open the door.
  • Breathe slowly and with each out-breath put down the things you are carrying.
  • Breathe freely now and open the door.”

Have a good week!

Kathleen

Kathleen Doyle-White

Pathfinders Coaching

    © Copyright 2012 Pathfinders Coaching, Scout Search Inc., all rights reserved.

    8/12/12 “Team Work”

    Good day, team.

    The 2012 Olympics are coming to a close, so I’d like to write about teamwork for this week’s challenge.

    We hear the word “teamwork” so often that I think we forget how much it affects our lives. When people try to accomplish a common vision, mission or goal, they engage in teamwork. It can be as complicated as the teamwork accomplished by the NASA team members who recently landed the Curiosity rover on Mars or as simple as a group of children on a playground coordinating a game of hide-and-seek. Throughout our lives, we engage with others to work together and achieve.

    During this year’s Olympic games, I’ve been encouraged by the spirit of teamwork I’ve observed among many of the athletes. For example, when the U.S. men’s swim team put Michael Phelps in the last position in the team relay race. His teammates were motivated most by Michael getting another gold medal, which make him the most successful Olympic athlete of all time. If they could get him a good enough lead, then he would have a better chance at winning in the last swim. As Michael said, “I’m so grateful to these guys, they just handed me the best position and without that, we might not have won the gold.”

    I was amazed to watch Jordyn Wieber of the U.S. women’s gymnastic team rooting in the stands for her team within an hour after she found out she wasn’t going to compete in the all-around gymnastic finals. The woman was ranked No. 1 in the world this past year for her gymnastics abilities, yet she didn’t win out over her own teammates to compete in the overall competition. Individually, it was a stunning blow after training her entire life in the sport. But for the sake of her teammates, she rallied soon after the disappointment to cheer them on to victory.

    When working with teams, I often relay the story of Michael Jordan when he first became part of the Chicago Bulls basketball team. Michael was the best basketball player anyone had ever seen. At one of his first practices, he made basket after basket, running circles around his new teammates. At some point, Phil Jackson, his coach, pulled him aside and said that he wasn’t interested in Michael just making points. He would need to become a team player if he wanted to play for the Bulls and that meant often sacrificing making the basket himself to give the ball to one of his teammates. Michael was stunned. Wasn’t it about winning? Yes, Jackson replied, but there is no “I” in team.

    Babe Ruth once said, “The way a team plays as a whole determines its success. You may have the greatest bunch of individual stars in the world, but if they don’t play together, the club won’t be worth a dime.”

    Teamwork is often what inspires us to keep going when we think we can’t. Individually, we may be motivated to beat out everyone else, but we are limited by our personal abilities. However, when we are part of a team, there’s an extra incentive to win, to go that extra mile for our teammates. To be a part of a team, we have to trust that our teammates are behind us and rooting for us, that they want us to win as much as they want to win themselves. There’s that extra bit of encouragement that comes when you hear your teammates yell out, “Come on, you can do it!” that can make all the difference

    At the heart of trust is the understanding that someone is working his or her hardest for our benefit. It’s not completely self-less because when we work hard for the benefit of others, we often get the most benefit ourselves. But the victory is so much sweeter when we can share it with our teammates. It made me so happy to see the U.S. women’s soccer team crying, laughing and hugging each other in a big, joyous, chaotic pile of women on the field right after they defeated the Japanese team for the gold medal. Without teamwork, this never would have happened.

    This week, check in to see how your teamwork is going. Have you had your head down so much that you haven’t been reaching out to your team as much? Maybe you feel like the lone ranger and need to find ways to reconnect with some of your teammates. How about the overall health of your team? Is there suspicion and gossip happening? Or do you see team members being considerate of each other and supportive in working toward a common goal? If someone on the team needs more direction, is there another team member taking the time to sit down with him or her to give support? Do you see someone drifting away from the team and if so, what can you do to help him or her feel more like a part of the whole team rather than just an individual contributor?

    As human beings, belonging to a greater whole is essential for our happiness. The more connected we feel, the healthier we are physically and psychologically. This is your week to do a team check. Take a look at your team, whether at work or home. Are you a healthy participant? What can you do to ensure that your team will continue to thrive?

    Mia Hamm, the great American women’s soccer player once remarked, “I am a member of a team, and I rely on the team. I defer to it and sacrifice for it because the team, not the individual, is the ultimate champion.”

    Have a good week!

    Kathleen

    © Copyright 2012 Pathfinders Coaching, Scout Search Inc., all rights reserved.

    8/5/12 “Business and Busyness”

    Good day, team.

    This week’s challenge comes from the Harvard Business Review blog. I’m sharing the post, “Is Busyness Bad for Business?” written by Susan David, who is the founder and co-director of the Harvard/McClean Institute of Coaching and a member of the Harvard faculty, in its entirety:

    “Michael is busy. For weeks he’s been rising early and getting home late. As division head, he’s used to the budget season bringing strain. But this year he’s been running the numbers — doing his ‘real work’ largely outside normal hours. His days are filled with meetings, often without clear objectives, and the invitations just keep coming in. To make matters worse, he’s been asked to complete seemingly redundant paperwork and grapple with ever-changing spreadsheet columns. The constant activity is taking its toll.

    “Many of us can relate to Michael. The New York Times recently featured an essay in which writer Tim Kreider critiqued today’s ‘crazy busy’ lifestyle as unnecessary and destructive — a smokescreen designed to hide the fact that ‘most of what we do doesn’t matter.’ The piece received hundreds of comments and was in the ‘most viewed’ list for quite some time. He clearly hit a nerve.

    “But what should organizations — people like Michael and those who manage him — read into that conversation? Is busyness bad for business?

    “The answer isn’t a simple yes or no. While Kreider argues that we need a bout of idleness to get inspired and work more effectively, there is evidence that workers benefit from busyness. Take an experiment in 2010 by professor Christopher Hsee at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Hsee’s team found that people who kept themselves occupied rather than waiting idly after a test felt happier. Interestingly, participants in the study were not likely to busy themselves unless they could justify the activity; they weren’t interested in what Hsee and his colleagues call ‘futile busyness’. But the results showed that even futile busyness is better than idleness.

    “In my organization’s own recent research with a global firm, we discovered that a common characteristic among the company’s great leaders was their recognition of the importance of busyness. They knew idle employees would suffer and so pushed to create a stimulating environment. For example, a leader responded to a downturn in work by encouraging team members to look for new projects that interested them and that might generate opportunities. Not only did this keep the group engaged, but some of the projects also eventually bore fruit. This wasn’t futile busyness, of course. ‘Creative busyness’ might be more appropriate.

    “Indeed, busyness seems to be most productive when the tasks we busy ourselves with are also meaningful. In a 2008 MIT study, researchers investigated meaning by asking participants to build Lego models. Finished models were either kept, or they were disassembled in front of the participant and handed back for rebuilding. (This was called the ‘Sisyphus condition,’ after the mythical figure condemned to repeatedly push a boulder up a mountain only to watch it roll back down again). Even though the two conditions involved exactly the same type of work, participants in the ‘meaningful’ condition were willing to produce more models (and built them more efficiently, for a lower median wage) then those who mimicked Sisyphus. Surely Michael, who attends one meeting only to have another scheduled, and completes one spreadsheet only to be presented with new figures, is starting to feel like he’s pushing that boulder.

    “Perhaps we are not so much caught in a ‘busy trap’ but a ‘meaning trap’. A meaningful life involves pursuing what we truly value, a sense of contribution in our work, as well as time outside of work to relax, enjoy hobbies and spend time with loved ones. It’s perhaps no surprise that the great leaders in our study were also expert at modeling work-life integration; they value busyness but also meaning. How did their emphasis on both impact the bottom line? Positively. Their teams were more engaged, their revenues were higher, and their turnover was lower than other groups.

    “If you are responsible for keeping others ‘busy,’ consider the following:

    1. People have a fundamental need to feel competent. It’s your job to give them stimulating, meaningful work.
    2. Rather than waiting out a lull, encourage employees to be creative and proactive.
    3. Give them the time they need to complete key assignments. Don’t let meetings or inefficient work practices hijack their workdays.
    4. Help employees stay connected to the meaning in the work they do. Tie tasks to how they benefit the person, the team, the client, the organization.
    5. Consider what makes life, and not just work, meaningful. Make sure your team members have time for it.”

    The above suggestions are part of your challenge this week if you manage others. If you don’t manage others, take a look at your own level of busyness. Are you feeling like Sisyphus, constantly pushing a rock uphill just to have it roll back down? Does your work have little meaning? Or are you having trouble connecting what you do to meaningful results for the company? Do you end up doing things over and over again without any change in the results? Or worse, with no real results at all? Start asking your boss to help you connect what you’re doing to the goals of the company. Change the way you do something if it’s become so mechanical that you could do it in your sleep. If you’re just going from one thing to the next without feeling inspired, ask your boss if you can work on another project or find a way to do something differently to rekindle that fire within you.

    Sometimes we mistake busyness for being important. If you think you have to stay busy all the time to make others think you’re important, think again. Some of the best leaders build time into their day to be not busy, so they can digest what’s happened and make better decisions. If you’re too busy, you may not be giving enough attention to others, which sends the wrong message to your co-workers, customers and partners.

    See if your busyness is adding value to your time or wasting it. If you feel “crazy busy”, ask yourself if things are truly crazy and that’s why you are so busy. If not, is being too busy making you crazy? Either way, find out if your busyness is worthwhile.

    Have a good week!

    Kathleen

    Kathleen Doyle-White

    Pathfinders Coaching

    (503) 296-9249

    © Copyright 2012 Pathfinders Coaching, Scout Search Inc., all rights reserved.

    7/29/12 “Learning How To Learn”

    Good morning, team.

    This week’s challenge is about learning how to learn. That may sound redundant, but honestly, now that I’m trying to learn something new, I’m realizing some things about how I learn.

    I’m learning about horsemanship. That is, I’m learning how to ride a horse, how to care for horses, how to speak horse language, how to relate to these amazing four-legged animals. Call me crazy. A friend of mine recently commented, “Wasn’t falling down a flight of stairs last October scary enough? Now you want to ride a horse? Isn’t that dangerous, particularly for someone your age?” I know this doesn’t sound like something a friend would say, but her comments did come from a deep concern for my well-being. I tried to make the case that since I haven’t done so well on two legs, perhaps being on something with four will actually be safer. I’m not sure I’ve convinced either of us yet.

    Truth be told, part of why I’m learning to ride a horse is to get over my fear of falling from high places. Getting on a horse for the first time last weekend was scary — shaking in your boots kind of scary. As I sat there in the saddle, feeling my whole body quiver, I realized that the only way to get beyond this was to be patient enough to just sit there until it stopped. If I could wait and the horse would just stand there, I knew the shaking would stop eventually. Of course, it did, and I embarked on my first horse ride in 40 years.

    It’s been a long time since I last learned how to do something brand new, and I have to say, I’m really not fond of being a novice. I’m one of those people who grows quickly impatient if I can’t do something well right out of the gate. I don’t like how it feels when something is foreign to me — all that new information can be overwhelming. I quickly think, “This just isn’t worth the time or effort. It’s going to take too long to learn how to do this.” Part of why I never learned how to play a musical instrument is because it takes an enormous amount of time, practice and patience to become good at it. I have great respect for musicians because I have no idea how they have the persistence to keep at it year after year.

    When I’m learning something new, it helps if I can find small accomplishments within the larger experience of the learning. For example, when I rode for the second time yesterday, I could already get on the horse better than the week before. I gave myself a little nod of encouragement by saying to myself, “You see, you’ve already learned something new.” Between that and my teacher giving me kudos for a few things, I’ve been able to overcome the negative attitude that I can’t do this.

    When I was in grade school, teachers weren’t aware that different children learn in unique ways. It was all about delivering the information in the curriculum so that we could complete our lesson plans. But the fact is, a lot of us didn’t get it. For one thing, all of the information was delivered either via the teacher talking to us and or through our own reading about it. For many people, these methods are the least effective to learn. They are boring. How many of us remember sitting in school and listening to the teacher begin to talk about something? After about three minutes, the mind would go blank. On the other hand, I clearly remember every moment of my sophomore biology class when the teacher allowed his pet boa constrictor to crawl all over us. I’m an experiential learner. I like to learn as I’m doing rather than reading about it first.

    I’m sure my computer skills have suffered because of my aversion to reading manuals. Short instructions that come from recipes, I can handle. But just looking at the front page of an instruction manual gives me a headache. I can’t keep my attention glued to a written step-by-step process. But throw me into the pool with a vague idea of how to keep my head above water, and I’ll figure it out.

    When I was in college, my physics teacher realized that I wasn’t learning anything in his class. Maybe it was how I always sat in the back row hiding behind the tall guy. Eventually, my professor asked to meet with me after class. I dreaded the meeting. I knew I was in over my head, but I needed the science credit to continue majoring in anthropology.

    “Not getting much out of this, are you?” he asked.

    I could feel my face redden. With down cast eyes I replied, “Nope.”

    “Do you know how you like to learn?”

    “I’m not sure I know what you mean,” I said.

    “Well, he went on, everyone learns a little differently, and the trick to learning isn’t so much about the subject you’re trying to learn but rather about how you like to learn things. Once you figure out how you like to learn, you can learn just about anything.”

    This was a new idea for me.

    “Let’s try an experiment,” he said. “Let me explain centripetal and centrifugal forces to you, and you can tell me what you’ve understood once I’ve finished.”

    He proceeded to explain the two forces and how they work. As much as I tried to listen, he lost me at, “a mass underdoing curved motion, such as circular motion, constantly accelerates toward the axis of rotation.” What?? He might as well have been speaking Greek to me. When he went to the blackboard and wrote out an equation illustrating his point, I was truly lost. He could clearly see that I wasn’t getting it.

    “Okay,” he said patiently, “let’s do it your way. Come with me.”

    I followed him down the hallway to his classroom. He asked me to get on the stool that he generaly sat on during class. It had a rotating seat, which made it easy for him to turn toward his students and then back to the blackboard when illustrating a point. He asked me to get on the stool and hold my arms in close to my body. Once I did this, he came over and gave me a spin. “This is fun,” I thought as I spun around in circles on the stool.

    “Now, hold your arms out,” he instructed. I did this and immediately began to slow down. He came over and spun me around again, this time asking me to bring my arms in and to extend them out as I spun around. Each time I held my arms out, I slowed down. When I brought them back in again, I would speed up. He explained, “When I spun you around, the energy I was using created centripetal force upon you. When you extended your arms out, the opposing centrifugal force created by your extended arms in space slowed you down.”

    He went on to explain that there were other laws of physics at work here in regard to Newton’s laws of motion, but this was one small illustration of some of these physics at work.

    “Does it make more sense to you now?” he asked.

    I had to admit that it did. “Why can’t I always learn it this way?”

    “You actually can,” he replied. “You just need to ask for more of a demonstration so you can see how it works. It’s called ‘visual learning,’ and for some of us, seeing how it works is the only way we can learn it.”

    When we made it back to his office, he went to the bookcase and handed me a textbook. “Here,” he said, as he handed it to me. “This is my gift to you. Do the exercises in this book, and I’ll pass you in my class.”

    The book was called “Physics for Poets.” I laughed. How appropriate, I thought. A book about physics written for people like me!

    As I turned to go after thanking my professor for teaching me a lifelong lesson, he remarked, “Promise me that you won’t take physics again. I don’t think it will be your area of expertise.” With a great sigh of relief, I assured him that I wouldn’t take physics again but that I would never forget what he really taught me: how I like to learn.

    This week, take a look at how you like to learn things. If you haven’t learned anything new in a while, choose something. Do you like to read about it first, assimilate the information and then try it out? Or maybe you’re like me — you’d rather learn about it as you’re doing it. Perhaps you enjoy the interaction that comes from learning from someone else. Do you prefer doing this in a larger group or one on one? Maybe you’re someone who enjoys going online, watching a video of how someone does something while you take notes and then try it yourself. Some people learn best by telling someone else about what they are learning. My horsemanship instructor suggested I tell my husband what I’m learning. She understood that if I have to explain it, I’ll learn it more quickly.

    However it is that you like to learn, this is the week to experiment with it. As Benjamin Franklin wrote, “Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn.”

    Have a good week!

    Kathleen

    © Copyright 2012 Pathfinders Coaching, Scout Search Inc., all rights reserved.

    7/22/12 “Simple Pleasures”

    Good day, team.

    I must admit, I am a nester. I enjoy creating a snug home, a retreat. I’m lucky that I have two nests — one in the country and one in the city — and I enjoy both of them for very different reasons. They each provide me with simple pleasures, which is the theme of this week’s challenge.

    This morning, as I was hanging laundry out in the back yard, I realized how much pleasure I find in this activity. I enjoy hanging the clothes just right, so they get maximum sun and breeze. Once dry, I like taking the clothes down, folding them and putting them away. And I love the fresh smell and feel of the sheets as I make the bed. There is nothing more pleasurable than getting into a bed with freshly cleaned sheets that have dried on a clothes line. It is one of my favorite simple pleasures.

    I also enjoy cooking. The process of planning a meal, shopping for the ingredients, and creating something healthy, nourishing and good-tasting is another one of my favorite simple pleasures. It’s a daily ritual that makes me happy — and my husband appreciates it, too! This morning, I’m making zucchini bread, a wonderful bi-product of our abundant zucchini crop this year.

    Each evening, when we get home from work, my husband and I sit for a while with a glass of wine or other drink and review the day’s events. It’s a simple thing, just a daily check in to talk about work, our family and friends. In the winter, we sit in the living room by the fireplace. In the spring and summer, we sit out on the porch or patio. It’s a tradition that gives us a chance to connect and share simple moments of partnership and support.

    I used to have a cat. I enjoyed how he would jump up onto my lap when I was reading and make a few circles to the right and then to the left to find the best spot for a nap. Once he’d found it, he would nestle in, knead me a few times with his paws and settle into a deep sleep. It was a simple pleasure that I miss — that warm, soft feline purring softly on my lap.

    Yesterday, in a coaching session, my client and I spoke about the pleasure that comes from staring into space. We each acknowledged what a privilege it is to have the time to just sit and stare in silence. No texting, no talking, no thinking — just sitting and looking at whatever is in front of us. It’s a simple pleasure that soothes me in a way nothing else does.

    As I write this, a fresh summer breeze wafts through the screen door and passes over my forehead. The chime outside makes a small tinkling sound. The delicious smell of zucchini bread cooking fills the room. I’m grateful to be here right now, experiencing these simple pleasures.

    There is a direct connection between simple pleasures and being grateful. Each time I experience these simple things, I realize that I have more than I need to be happy. My grandfather used to say, “I have a good day when I remember to take pleasure in simple things.”

    This week, take time to enjoy life’s simple pleasures. Perhaps it’s that first sip of refreshing, cold white wine or lemonade on a hot summer evening. Maybe you’re watching your children run through the sprinkler on your front lawn. You may find yourself sitting with a colleague having a simple exchange about the weekend’s activities. I often see my neighbor out walking her collie and love witnessing the enjoyment she experiences each time she reaches down to give him an affectionate pat on the head. Whatever it is, revel in these moments that give you pleasure in their simplicity.

    As the writer Jerome K. Jerome expressed, “Let your boat of life be light, packed with only what you need — a homely home and simple pleasures, one or two friends, worth the name, someone to love and someone to love you, a cat, a dog, and a pipe or two, enough to eat and enough to wear, and a little more than enough to drink; for thirst is a dangerous thing.”

    Have a good week!

    Kathleen

    Kathleen Doyle-White

    (503) 296-9249

    © Copyright 2012 Pathfinders Coaching, Scout Search Inc., all rights reserved.

    7/15/12 “The Science of Happiness”

    Good day, team.

    This week’s challenge is a rerun from 2009 about happiness and being positive. I was recently reminded of the important work being done on the science of happiness and thought I’d share this piece again.

    Last week I re-read a great article in The Sun magazine, “The Science of Happiness” by Barbara Fredrickson. Fredrickson is the Kenan Distinguished Professor of Psychology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She has spent more than 20 years investigating the relatively uncharted terrain of positive emotions, which she says can make us healthier and happier if we take time to cultivate them. She has recently published a book called “Positivity” about many of her findings.

    I have long been interested in understanding group dynamics in business teams. I’ve spent many years observing the behavior that occurs when teams work together and often wondered why some teams are successful while others are not. What factors create high-performing teams? What factors create teams that spiral down to a dead end?

    In her work, Fredrickson was introduced to Marcial Losada, a well-known business consultant who has developed mathematical models of people’s ability to broaden and build their capacities, resources and resilience. In many years of studying 60 business teams during their annual strategic planning sessions, Losada ranked their success based on the number of positive and negative statements made during the meetings.

    People on high-performing teams had a 6:1 ratio of positive to negative statements, whereas the low-performing teams had ratios of less than 1:1, meaning that more than half of what was said was negative. The high-performing teams had an even balance between asking questions and advocating for their own points of view, and also an equal measure of focusing outward (for example, on customers) and focusing within the group. The low-performing groups asked almost no questions and almost never focused outside the group. They exhibited a self-absorbed advocacy: Nobody was listening to anyone else; they were all just waiting to talk.

    Ultimately, Losada took his behavioral data and wrote algebraic equations that reflected how each stream — asking questions, being positive and having an outward vs. inward focus — related to each other. He learned that his equations matched a set of existing equations called the Lorenz System, which is famous in nonlinear dynamics because it, in turn, led to the discovery of chaos theory, sometimes called “the butterfly effect” — the idea that the flap of a butterfly’s wings in one location can set in motion a series of events that causes a hurricane on the other side of the globe.

    Underneath the dynamics of high-performing teams is what physicists call a “complex chaotic attractor,” which produces unpredictable or novel outcomes. So high-performing teams produce novel creative results. Underneath the structure of low-performing teams is a “fixed-point attractor” that causes the teams to nosedive. What’s interesting is that negativity always arose within the realm of self-absorbed advocacy and not asking any questions. That’s where the fixed-point attractor lies.

    Ultimately, using the Lorenz equations, Fredrickson was able to predict that a ratio of three positive events to one negative event is the tipping point where things become chaotic, which is a good thing, since it’s only in this environment that people can be truly interactive and creative. In her study, as a team interacted more and experienced more creativity, positivity spiraled upward.

    Fredrickson tested this 3:1 ratio over the next few years to see if it was actually true. In each case, the theory held. She also applied it to her own life in raising her second child and found it to be a much better method of child-rearing. If she could balance the number of times she said, “No” to her son with three times as much positivity, his ability to express himself and pursue his creative interests was much higher, and he was happier. She found this to be true in marriages as well. Research suggests that married couples who express about a 5:1 ratio of positive to negative emotions have much more solid marriages than couples who exchange greater amounts of negativity.

    So what’s the challenge here? This week, try seeing how much negativity grabs your attention and how often you express it. Then take a look at how often you express positivity and what tends to draw you in more. Fredrickson’s research shows that negative experiences tend to demand our attention more, and it takes self-discipline, will power and practice not to focus solely on them and to choose a positive outlook instead. So negativity tends to happen to us, whereas we need to intentionally choose positivity.

    Observe what’s happening in your team meetings. Do the negative comments far outweigh the positive? Do people seem disengaged? Do they ask questions and share new ideas, or do they just sit there and choose not to participate? When they do speak, is it to protect their territory or is it because they want to share an insight or encourage creativity within the group?

    If you see a lot of negativity in your life, here are some simple suggestions from the article for experiencing more positivity:

    • Be aware of the present moment, because most moments are positive. We miss many opportunities to be positive because we’re thinking about the past and worrying about the future rather than being open to what is happening now.
    • Pay attention to human kindness — not just what others do for you but what you can do for other people.
    • Go outside in good weather.
    • Practice mindfulness or loving kindness meditation.
    • Arrange your life around your strengths. Ask yourself: Am I really doing what I do best? Being employed in a job that suits your strengths is a great source of enduring positive emotions.

    Check out the amount of positivity you experience in your life, both personally and at work. Try injecting more of it into your life this week, and see if it makes you happier. As Robert Ingersoll wrote, “My creed is this: Happiness is the only good. The place to be happy is here. The time to be happy is now. The way to be happy is to make others so.”

    Have a good week!

    Kathleen

    Kathleen Doyle-White
    Pathfinders Coaching
    (503) 296-9249

    © Copyright 2012 Pathfinders Coaching, Scout Search Inc., all rights reserved.

    7/8/12 “Second Company”

    Good day, team.

    This week’s challenge comes from the Harvard Business Review blog. It is written by Grant McKracken, a research affiliate at MIT and author of “Chief Culture Officer” and “Culturematic.”

    In his blog post “Every Company Should Build a Second Corporation,” from Friday July 6, McKracken suggests that while companies need to keep doing what they’re doing to win business and be successful, they also need to create a second company that is always looking at worlds that may be in the future and designing ways to best survive different scenarios.  It’s like having a scout who’s out in front of you always looking for the best path ahead.

    Here’s the post in its entirety:

    “All winners lose. The market leader is a dead man walking. The incumbent is cursed with inevitable failure. That seems to be the prevailing sentiment among many in the investment and journalism worlds: The smart money, they argue, bets against the incumbent. Their surmise: The world will change. The reigning corporation will fail to adjust. The right thing to do? Short them (assume that their share price will fall). Short the winners. Bet against those who flourish. Because all winners must lose, and sooner than we think.

    “I have heard this argument before, but for the first time I am hearing it argued as something unobjectionably and manifestly true. At some point in the past 10 years, ‘short the incumbent’ had gone from being a daring proposition to received wisdom. There is evidence, to be sure. Of the top 25 corporations listed in Fortune in 2000, only 12 were still there in 2010. Let’s put this another way: In the decade between 2000 to 2010, half the winners lost.

    “And the structural factors are clear enough. The world is changing more quickly. Black swans are multiplying. Disruption is everywhere. The incumbent can end up failing dazed and confused.

    “Success makes the corporation believe it has got things right. So change feels like self-betrayal. The competition forces a new business model. So change feels like a tumult. The new market often forces a move from a premium price position to a commodity one. So change feels like a giveaway. Adapting to change feels just plain wrong.

    “But the market has spoken. It’s telling us we have a systematic problem. It’s time for a systematic solution. We cannot nickel and dime our way out of this one. We need a big, bold answer. Assuming, that is, that we want to escape the curse of the incumbent.

    “My version of this answer — and I am sure there are others — is to build a second corporation and wrap it around the first. So now we have two. The first corporation is defined pretty much as it is now. And the second corporation is another creature altogether, with a different set of principles and processes.

    “The first corporation exists to win. It exists to find, extract and capture available value. Leave this just as it is. But let’s acknowledge that this first corporation exposes us to risk. After all, it is designed to work with the world as it is. So it must be out of alignment with the worlds that may be. It makes us a prisoner of the moment. The second corporation is looking for those worlds that may be. Its task is not to win but survive.

    “It’s counter-intuitive and I can hear you arguing: ‘Winning, surviving, this is a distinction without a difference!’ But look at it this way. If winning (and the first corporation) were enough, we wouldn’t see half the winners on the top of Fortune 500 fall like Icarus. If winning were enough, surviving would take care of itself. But it turns out, winning and surviving are different things. They take different mindsets. They take a different set of systems and instincts.

    “Just to be crystal clear, I’m not saying that the corporation should stop struggling to win. It should keep hiring the best people, finding the best partners, devising the best strategies, squeezing out costs, innovating faster and smarter, clobbering the competition, etc. Winning is the deepest part of its DNA.

    “I am merely saying that now that the incumbency comes with a curse, now that the smart money is betting against us, now that our death is nigh, we need something more. We need an exterior that is vigilant, experimental, assumption hunting. We need a bridge from which to spot those black swans. We need a way to prepare for worlds that are implausible.

    “Everyone knows that we live in a world of tremendous change. But our response has been what Andy Grove calls ‘building a better firehouse.’ We are committing to getting faster and more agile. But there’s an absolute limit to how fast we can get. Many corporations run pretty good firehouses as it is. They can’t get a lot faster. The world doesn’t care. It’s going to get much, much faster. Time to rebuild the firehouse. Time to rethink firefighting.

    “Indulge me a different metaphor. As the world gets more turbulent, the organization gets harder to ‘fly.’ What used to be simple acts of navigation now have a lot of guesswork. Simple acts of decision-making are no longer straightforward. Once as easy to fly as a 747 in light chop, the corporation can now feel like a Piper Cub in high winds. There are moments when the instruments go out and decision-making takes on a ‘hope and prayer’ quality. We are pretty sure those lights on the port side are Baltimore. Because, well, they could be Cuba.

    “Now that the smart money assumes our demise, we need a system to ensure our survival. We need something that looks less like improv and more like engineering. We need a second corporation.”

    Your challenge this week is to explore ways to be nimble and quick in the face of an ever-changing world. Maybe your processes are currently working, but if one part of your customer base suddenly changed, would you be able to stay on top of servicing them? How about creating a team of people within your organization who’s sole focus is on scenario planning — that is, creating strategic plans for a variety of possible outcomes? If you’re currently working on a team, what would it look like if your team got caught in firefight mode? Would it survive? And what can you do to help the team create the kind of skills that expert firefighters need to have?

    As McKracken says, “We need a way to prepare for worlds that are implausible.” This week, try thinking outside the box and look at your job, your company and your team from a completely different perspective. What would it look like if the world changed?

    Have a good week!

    Kathleen

    Kathleen Doyle-White

    Pathfinder’s Coaching

    (503) 296-9249

    Note: Many thanks to my coaching associate Kate Dwyer for sending me this article. It’s just one more way that she’s helping me take a more expanded view of my business.

    © Copyright 2012 Pathfinders Coaching, Scout Search Inc., all rights reserved.

    7/1/12 “Honoring our soldiers”

    Good day team,

    “All wars are civil wars, because all men are brothers.” Francois Fenelon

    This week, we’ll enjoy a day off on the 4th of July, the day we celebrate our country’s freedom through patriotic displays. Dramatic fireworks are the centerpiece of many July 4th celebrations – awe-inspiring displays symbolic of perhaps the greatest expression of patriotism, fighting in one’s country’s wars. This challenge is about honoring the soldiers who make that sacrifice.

    This past week, an unusual experience reminded me of the wars we fight and the people who fight them for us. On Thursday evening, my husband and I headed off to have dinner with some friends. As we neared the restaurant, a railroad crossing brought us to a stop. The crossbars came down and the red railway lights blinked to let us know a train was coming. My husband commented, “Geez, now we’ll be late, this could take a while.” I agreed, with a long sigh.

    As the train passed in front of us, we saw flatbed after flatbed carrying beat up armored personnel carriers, artillery, and ambulances with fading paint and camouflage. An armored personnel carrier (APC) is a fighting vehicle designed to transport infantry to, and hopefully from, the battlefield. Most are armed with a combination of artillery, machine guns, and mortars and are propelled by wheels or tracks.

    I have seen army vehicles transported by train before. But this time was different – the APC’s were covered in dust, light colored desert dust, the kind of dust that comes from the sands of Afghanistan and Iraq. These foreign places seem very far away from my life in Portland – almost unreal. But they are very real to American soldiers fighting an often invisible enemy under very dangerous circumstances, in extreme weather conditions, with little relief.

    A sinking feeling came over me as I imagined being a young soldier stuffed into a cramped metal box, dirty and sweaty, trying to breathe in suffocating heat, clueless about what might happen next – combat or boredom.

    As the train continued to roll down the track, we sat in silence. Some of the APC’s had painted dragon heads with necks bent in the shape of a question mark. Others had long gun barrels with names stenciled on them such as “Athena”, “Duke” and “Delilah”. It seems odd that we humanize our weapons of war by naming them. Whatever the reason, I couldn’t ignore the ache in the pit of my stomach as I read them. There was something about seeing that dust and reading those names that made these wars in the Middle East so much more real.

    I understood in that moment how easy it is to forget about these wars and the soldiers that fight them. It doesn’t really affect my daily life here in Portland. Occasionally, I hear of someone I know who lost a loved one or said goodbye to one that has just shipped out. But, by and large, I don’t think about it much.

    This week, in honor of July 4th, I plan to spend some time honoring those who go to war. I could start by raising my awareness of the huge human consequences of war – a very personal matter of life, death or terrible injury. I know there are many veterans and their families who need help. Perhaps I’ll donate money or time to help them find work. Maybe I’ll say a prayer for the soldiers who are currently fighting in Afghanistan or write a letter to one of my Dad’s old Navy buddies just to brighten his day. When I watch a fireworks display, I’ll think of those who have to watch the real thing.

    That’s my challenge for the week, perhaps it’s one that you can embrace as well.

    Have a good week,

    Kathleen

    Kathleen Doyle-White

    Pathfinder’s Coaching

    (503) 296-9239

    © Copyright 2012 Pathfinders Coaching, Scout Search Inc., all rights reserved.

    Coach’s Challenge 6/24/12 “What Not To Do”

    Good day, team.

    I tend to focus on the strengths and positive aspects of any person or situation. This is often reflected in my weekly challenge since I believe that encouraging and inspiring others to take positive action is part of my job as a coach. Consequently, many of the weekly challenges revolve around what to do to improve a situation. However, this week’s challenge is about what not to do.

    The following article comes from Steve Tobak, a consultant and former high-tech executive. Tobak offers “10 Things Managers Should Never Do” — meaning anyone in a management position, from first time managers to CEOs.

    “We’ve all had bosses do things we didn’t like, appreciate or respect. And every manager has done things they later regret. The business world is, by necessity, one of real-time decisions and judgment calls that sometimes turn out to be bad choices, in retrospect.

    After all, nobody’s perfect. We all make mistakes. And that’s a good thing, since that’s how we learn lessons, including how to do our jobs better. That goes for every employee, manager, executive, business owner, CEO, everyone.

    But sometimes a mistake can become a slippery slope. An exception can all-too-easily become the rule. Simply put, there are lines that managers should not cross, behavior they should not exhibit, and not to be overly dramatic, pathways that lead more or less to the dark side.

    In 10 Things Great Managers Do, I went back in time to the best characteristics of the best CEOs I’ve worked for and with over the past 30 years. I decided to do the same thing here for the simple reason that I learned as much from the negative experiences as I did from the positive ones.

    Keep in mind, this isn’t meant to be a whine-fest to get employees riled up and pissed off at their bosses. Think of it instead as a standard that employees and managers alike can agree upon and, perhaps, a wakeup call for those who need one.

    10 Things Managers Should Never Do

    Order people around like dictators. Contrary to popular belief, managers are not dictators. Every manager has at least one boss. Even CEOs serve the board or directors and shareholders. Any manager who thinks he can order people around or abuse his authority because he’s the boss is a terrible leader. Employees are not soldiers or children. You can tell them what their job is and even fire them, if you want, but if you order them around, the good ones will up and quit, as they should.

    Forget about customers. It never ceases to amaze me how many managers forget that organizations and companies exist for just one reason — to win, maintain and support customers. Business is about business, and when you make it about you — your issues, your fears, your empire, your thin skin, whatever — you cease to be an effective manager.

    Behave like arrogant jerks that are better than others. Just to be clear, I’m not saying managers or bosses can’t be jerks. A lot of people are jerks, including plenty of employees, and almost everybody’s a jerk under certain circumstances. I’m specifically talking about the arrogant “I’m better than the little people’ thing. It makes you look like a little brat and completely neuters your authority and credibility.

    Let their egos write checks that reality can’t cash. Oftentimes, leaders attain their position because they believe they’re special — a fascinating misconception that’s nevertheless often self-fulfilling. The problem with that is the slippery slope of drinking your own Kool-Aid. Either you grow up or, sooner or later, things end up unraveling. I’ve seen it time and again, and it isn’t pretty.

    Publicly eviscerate employees. Of all the things I’ve experienced over the decades, this is not only the most dehumanizing but also the most demoralizing to employees. I had a couple of CEOs that practiced this on a regular basis, and both were universally despised, as a result. Moreover, both self-destructed in the end.

    Wall off their feelings. This may sound touchy-feely, but it’s far from it. Researchers are fond of classifying executives and leaders as psychopathic, but the mechanism by which that happens is compartmentalizing of emotions. If you’ve ever wondered how people who seem to lack any semblance of humor or humility can behave the way they do, the answer is, if you’re not connected to your emotions, you’re far less human.

    Surround themselves with bureaucrats, BSers and yes-men. When you encourage the status quo and discourage dissent, you doom the organization to stagnation and eventual decline.

    Threaten. Threats don’t work. They’re just as likely to motivate the opposite behavior of what you’re trying to achieve. They diminish your authority and make you appear weak and small. You should communicate what you want and why, then act on the results. That works. Threats don’t. And for God’s sake, never threaten an employee with his job or a vendor with your business. That’s just out of control.

    Act out like little children. Everyone goes through the same stages of human development on the road to adulthood and maturity. Unfortunately, some of us get stuck in one stage or another, stunting our growth and rendering us dysfunctional. We look just like ordinary adults, but we actually behave a lot more like children, acting out, throwing tantrums and generally making life miserable for everyone around us.

    Break the law. America is a nation of laws, and civil or criminal, they’re black and white for a reason. For some reason, executives will sometimes risk everything — power, wealth, careers, families, everything — for motives most of us will never understand. We’re talking accounting, securities, bank, wire and mail fraud; insider trading; bribery; obstruction of justice; conspiracy; discrimination; harassment; it’s a long, long list.”

    This week, be honest with yourself. Could your behavior be defined by one of these 10 categories? If so, you may have moved away from a management style that helps your people be successful into territory that is counterproductive, dysfunctional or destructive. If you find yourself doing any of these things, stop. Ask for help to stop. Get some feedback and suggestions from one of your peers or friends to help you find ways to avoid these dysfunctional behaviors. Hire a coach to help you draw out your more supportive behaviors. Talk with your human resource manager to find professional development courses that can teach you effective ways to manage others.

    As Albert Schweitzer said, “Example is leadership.”

    Have a good week,

    Kathleen

    Kathleen Doyle-White

    Pathfinders Coaching

    (503) 296-9249

    © Copyright 2012 Pathfinders Coaching, Scout Search Inc., all rights reserved.