Learning from my Children

My partner and I have the pleasure this week of two of my adult children returning from university for the Easter break (the eldest had a better offer: three weeks in Shanghai). So the house is a hive of essay and play writing, requests for food they can't usually afford and conversation topics that I am not usually exposed to. So it's a place of learning for all of us.

We get insights into a parallel world, where different knowledge is assumed and traded. I didn't know about the Bechdel test until I was party to a debate about which blockbusters passed (apparently "Die Hard" passes but the whole of the first Star Wars trilogy fails). We hear from our daughters about the cutting edge of feminism and learn that, despite the best efforts of our younger selves, there is still work to do. And a great take on teamwork from my son, born in the experience of a successful show at the last Edinburgh fringe: "if everyone does more than their job, then you get more than the job done."

And I am taken to task when I disparage recent graduates whose consultancy style involves fitting their client's problem to the latest faddish solution. That is, of course, poor practice but it's not about the consultants being young. Some of my children's peers have had experiences I'll never share. They have freshness, energy and curiosity. They will have their own blind-spots and frailties but you won't hear them discard an idea because "we tried that in 1985 and it didn't work". But it does seem that many organisations are poor at harnessing this resource.

We also seem to have a problem at other end of the career path. I meet many people with track-records of successful leadership who have reached the stage where they want to do less but still share and apply their hard-won wisdom. But few jobs or organisations are geared up for that: keep on putting in the hours or (if you don't have 3 children in higher education) plan for your retirement.

And in the middle, there are the thirty and forty-somethings: often the powerhouse of the organisation, young enough to have some energy, openness and creative ideas, experienced enough to know which ideas to back. But often my clients in this age group struggle to get the balance right. They have growing families, with children soon to hit the mumbling, grunting, door-slamming years. They risk burn-out out just when they are starting to ask existential questions that seemed irrelevant when they were younger. They shoulder a burden at work and at home.

But of course, we mostly deal with all this. And do our best to get a decent balance and ensure that our enthusiasm and our wisdom get heard.

I do wonder though whether we could do better and make our organisations more productive places where the changing needs of individuals are recognized.

Perhaps we need something simple, like the Bechdel test, to assess how well organisations take account of the shifting priorities, gifts and perspectives of their employees. I think I'll ask my children to devise one.

Top Teams are Different

If you work with teams on their effectiveness and
performance then there are some standard tools in
your tool box. MBTI gets you into decision-making
preferences. Belbin's great on roles and contribution.
Simple models - like Bolton and Bolton's - help with
communication style and influencing. But top teams
are different. They need something more.

Top teams have to lead the organisation, not just
deliver a project or fulfill a function. They're full of
strong, successful, often competitive characters who
have personal responsibility for the delivery and
quality of a major chunk of the business. Teamwork
may not come naturally to them nor seem that high a
priority. But unless there is unified leadership,
turn-arounds, cultural change, or strategic shifts don't happen.

When the pressure  is on, teams can fragment. A top team that I am working with is
reeling from delivery pressure and a sharp staff engagement survey, looking to make
a strategic shift and instill new behaviours to support that shift. What do they need?
Four things have emerged as vital: trust, courage, skill and belief.

Trust in the integrity, competence, value and intentions of their fellow team members.
This means that, even if others' priorities and preferences are different to yours, and
their actions perverse (to you), you can look beyond the behaviour and find common
cause.

Courage, because this stuff can be personally challenging. Conflict is inevitable
(desirable even). It will get emotional (even if some like to pretend it isn't). And it
might feel easier to let things go and hope they'll improve. They won't, so stepping
up is necessary.

Skill, because becoming a top top team depends on the quality of the conversations
you have: harnessing your trust and courage to listen and speak well. These are the
top skills for top teams: insightful listening, fueled by a spirit of inquiry; and powerful
advocacy, driven by the desire to be properly understood.

And belief, because this stuff is hard and the outcome has to justify and inspire the
investment. So you have to believe in the prize, in what you can achieve and create
together. It takes full commitment to take on corporate leadership, grounding your
vision and values by modelling the behaviours they imply.

A heady cocktail: trust, courage, skill and belief.
And trust is the spirit that gives it its power.

The Wandering Coach

There's something about walking alongside a tumbling winter river, listening to Stairway to Heaven, that brings a smile to my face.

On Monday I found the old Cockermouth to Penrith railway line that skirts the Greta river out of Keswick. Unlike most lakeland walks, it's hard to make a worthwhile circular route. So I set off with the simple intention to walk along it until I felt like turning around and heading back. I knew that it was five miles to Threlkeld and there is a cafe there - so a possible goal, an incentive and a way to replenish my energy.

I passed various people with the telescopic walking poles that mark the serious hiker. The performance hiker. And I saw groups of people with dogs that mostly ran in circles around their owners and sniffed out long forgotten items from the undergrowth. The amblers and the anarchic explorers.


I like the performance focus. Success is clear. You can mark off your progress. All involved know how they're doing. But I did enjoy the liberation of just walking the path I'd chosen. Of stopping to enjoy an unexpected vantage point. Of resting when I wanted. Of sitting in  silence in an old railway workers' hut (until the dogs arrived). And it made me aware that when I focus unduly on where I am going or how much progress I've made, it's easy to stop noticing what's happening around me. There's so much to see when I do.

As I went, I focussed on what was appearing around bends, from within tunnels, across arch-spanned iron bridges, and decided whether it drew my interest enough to continue. And a little bit of my performance focus crept in: I wanted to be able to say I got to Threlkeld (after all, five miles is not far). So I continued
until I hit a major roadway and found a sign saying: Threlkeld 1/4 mile. Easy. But I couldn't immediately find the cafe so I adapted, waited 10 minutes by the unexpected bus stop, got the bus back and had tea by the fire at home.

And my future approach to walking? Sometimes from A to B, with B a stretch goal, stopping at key way stations, ideally with a pub at the end. Sometimes, wandering with intent, noticing what I notice, stopping when I stop, with the goal to savour where the path takes me. Just like my coaching really, walking alongside my client, with them setting the direction and me as the guide.

Blog like an artist

I went to see the Late Turner exhibition at the Tate Britain last week.
Remarkable work. It covers the period from when Turner was 60. A
highly productive, startling phase characterised by his use of light, simple
lines and looking beyond form to the essence of things. He seemed to be
seeing through his accumulated wisdom. And, in his time, many critics
dismissed this work as a descent into senility.

In the Tate shop I bought Austin Kleon's second book called "Show your
work". It complements his first, "Steal like an artist". Kleon's credo is:
build sharing into your routine.


I spent the next evening with a group of close colleagues and two of them
(Vik and Jo) gently challenged me: "So Stephen, what happened to
November's blog post?" I muttered the odd excuse that added up to not
quite getting around to it. Austin Kleon's book helped me recognise that
I had made the mistake of making 'blog' just another item on my to do list.
It became a task rather than part of my process. And sharing your process
is what it is all about.

So what? Well, blogging is an essential part of how I do reflective learning.
Writing stuff down means that I have to focus and achieve some clarity. It
also plays to some strongly held beliefs about the value of what
experienced coaches, teachers and leaders do.  We have insights and
through working at a high level of expertise, we create new ones as we
work. It's important to share what we learn. If we don't, the only voices
will be those of academics, with their clear, clean and tidy models rather
than the messy, contingent and emergent sound of real work. Practitioners
have a unique contribution to make. If they do, it can change the nature
of theory from observation to dialogue. Theorising becomes pragmatic
sense-making.

That prompts a challenge - one that I reflected back to Vik and Jo: what stops
you blogging? Here's what I have found helps:

1. be like Turner, always carry a notebook. (It will save you getting out of
bed as I had to when I had some ideas for this piece.)
2. be an observer. Collect fragments - your own and others' - and make
connections.
3. share your first attempts with trusted friends and colleagues. Ask: "what
was the impact?  Did it interest you?" But don't let them edit - speak with
your voice not theirs.
4. post when it's fresh. By all means take a day to read it back and check
it says what you want. But if an idea or theme goes off the boil, save it and
wait for something to refresh it.
5. embrace the ephemeral nature of the form. What you say does not have
to be right. It just has to be true for you now (and, ideally, interesting).
6. write for provocation not agreement. The point is to share, to be read
and stimulate others' thought and action.
7. let go of needing to be expert.

Blogging is, of course, about visibility, about speaking out and being heard.
But it can also be an act of generosity. So be like Turner and trust your
wisdom. Share your learning, your insights, your wisdom - you never know,
you might find a new collaborator, or save someone a decade.

So coach, how do you feed yourself?

At my first session with my new coach - Aboodi Shabi - he asked:
"So Stephen, how do you feed yourself?" He meant: how do I relax?
How do I replenish what I need for my work and for all other
aspects of my life?

A good question and I stuggled a bit to answer it. I said that I played
tennis - but I am pretty competitive and always looking to do better.
I added that I play music - but that can be hard work and performing
can be highly demanding.

Aboodi said that he used to go to have a Turkish spa and massage. 
I was about to go on holiday to Turkey so that seemed like a great
opportunity to feed myself and notice what worked.

And my short list? Sit by a river with a beer on a sunny day. Read
good detective stories in a hammock. Leave the Blackberry
somewhere else. Listen to mellow music. Spend time on water.
Laugh with someone you love. And the Turkish massage? Quite an
experience but only relaxing once it stopped.


A great holiday but why does this matter? It matters for perspective:
if you're inside the vortex it's hard to notice that you're going round
and round. It matters for presence - being able to just be where you
are and do what what you're doing. It's about not feeling responsible -
not feeling you have to do anything. This is something that many of
my clients need to do more and so I had better engage with it for
myself if I am to work with them.

Aboodi's question helped me realise that things like tennis and music
do feed me. Also, I get a deep satisfaction from my work that is in
itself energising. But that's not enough and reading 'The Musician's
Way" by Gerald Klickstein while I was away showed me why. He
distinguishes three types of break during musical practice: the active
break (which I am good at), the diverting break (which I am ok at) and
the restorative break (which I - like most people - need to do more). I
was struck by the parallel with being a coach.


This helped me see that the perspective, presence and relaxed
attention that I bring to my coaching takes a special type of energy that
has to be fed. So if you see me in a hammock, or having a beer by the
river, I am working, honestly.

Can leaders play the blues?

"The most important thing I look for in a musician is the quality of his
listening." Duke Ellington

Each time I start to coach a new client I am fascinated to find out who they
are. I know that the 'self' they show will be part, but by no means all, of who
they are.

As we work together I'll ask about what they like to do when they are not
working. So often, this is their hidden hinterland. It's a window on the
person and a resource. It is, afterall, what they choose to do and there is
energy in it for them.

My clients have been secret jazz singers, inspired gardeners and avid
golfers. The jazz singers know about performance and improvisation. The
gardeners know about nurturing growth and the importance of situation.
The golfers know about how to deliver under pressure. One of my clients
told me that he was a straight-down-the-line, play-it-by-the-numbers sort
of guy with no creativity. And then he divulged that he customised big
motor-bikes and rode them with pride through his sleepy village. So, when
he got stuck I could ask  what he would do if the issue were a bike
project. He quickly found his creativity and shifted. He also discovered
that his repertoire was much wider than he imagined and that was
significant learning.

I try to apply these insights to myself as a coach. From playing the blues, I
have learnt that to play well you need to play with freedom; silence is
musical, it's part of the rhythm and gives others space to play; when my
attention is on myself I don't make good music; when I am dissonant I need
to be totally committed to it; practising alone is not rehearsing together,
rehearsing together is not performing, but each supports the other; very
occasionally the music plays the musicians and then magic happens; to
attain mastery you much learn, practise and commit; and mastery brings
relaxation, confidence and resourcefulness and they allow you to play with
freedom.

And if I apply all this learning then I am doing well as a coach - so
long as I remember the words of one of my favourite coaching gurus:

"When I've played from my mind, I get in trouble" Stevie Ray Vaughn

Space: the Final Frontier

On Tuesday evening I went to a preview of Martin Firrell's new
installation in The Vaults underneath Waterloo Station. It's called
"It ends here" and it's inspired by the Planet of the Apes and
explores human nature and the possibility of peaceful co-existance
with those who are different to us. I went with an open mind but
ready to find an 'installation' could tell me nothing about things I
care about. I was wrong.

The installation is just four rooms. Atmospheric, drenched in soft
sound, with smells and vapours, and sparsely lit. Each has just a
few words on a wall. It was the power of the spaces that hit me
first and has stayed with me. It was the use of space that allowed
the economy of expression to work.

Interesting. But what's it got to to do with leadership and coaching?

We know that the nature of a working space sends a message to
those who work there. If a leader has an important message to
give then choice of venue matters. Creative team work needs a
creative space with light, air and colour. Coaching literally and
metaphorically needs a safe space. But do we fully know or use
what different spaces can generate?

Think about what is happening when a leader gets others to enage
fully with a compelling vision, or when coaching provokes change.
It's not only the words, the insights, the actions that people take
away, it's also the felt sense of possibility -  generated in the
moment, in that space.

Martin's third room was the Brutality Room. Unlit apart from pencil
lights that some of us carried. A towering arched roof, dank brick-
work, squelching underfoot along a tunnel. It felt brutal. And it gave
onto the fourth room - small and gently lit with three words in gold
lettering on the facing wall: "Resistance is Grace". Tight, sofly
provocative and cathartic. Wonderful.


So what space might evoke your leadership message? How few
words would you need if you got the space right?

And if you see me coaching in an igloo, an art gallery or a tree-
house, you'll know why.