Preparing for a Conversation

Difficult conversations are an inevitable part of life. The blog of Harvard Business Publishing recently offered a simple three step checklist to keep tough conversations productive, not combative:

1. Decide on a realistic outcome. Remember, you and your counterpart may want different things. Think about your desired outcome rather than accomplishing everything on your personal agenda.
2. Focus on the future. What is your ultimate goal? Describe it and the benefits of your vision. If this is a review conversation, explain how you'd like to work with your employee going forward.
3. Identify what's in the way. With the future as your backdrop, articulate what is interfering with reaching the goal. This helps to keep the conversation away from personal barbs and focused on making positive changes.

This checklist keeps us looking in the right direction - the future. How often are our own conversations mired down with recounts of past hurts, problems, failures? It is easy to forget that we can't change the past, but we can most definitely effect our future. Central to effecting this change is, of course, our own mind/body state. The more we choose to breathe and to center ourselves, the easier it will be for us to do the above steps, to move to a place of greater perspective.

Judy Warner

Just a Thought

In church this morning, we sang a hymn by Peter Scholtes that contained these words:

"We will work with each other, we will work side by side/
And we'll guard each one's dignity and save each one's pride."

And I thought, what would the world be like if we really did this -- if we guarded each other's dignity and saved each other's pride?

I offer it up today as a thought to ponder.

Good ki!
Judy Ringer

Are you a "Glue Guy?"

Tim Wakefield of the Boston Red Sox is a glue guy. So is Ryan Howard of the Philadelphia Phillies. According to the Wall Street Journal, the term refers to baseball players who hold teams together. They're not always the guys who have the best batting or earned run averages, though they could be. But they are the people who show confidence under pressure, offer support where needed, and generally demonstrate leadership. I quote from the 7/15/09 WSJ:

Psychologists say there is indeed a spill-over effect with glue guys that helps their teams win, one which goes beyond quantifiable contributions. John F. Murray, a sports psychologist in Palm Beach, Fla., says that teams are much like fraternities or high schools in that players spend a massive amount of time in close proximity to each other. Because of this, "they're constantly influencing one another," he says. "One of the keys to confidence is social support and modeling. If you have some outstanding role models who deal with pressure effectively, that glue is going to spill out of the bottle and help everyone."

Influence is happening -- glue is "spilling out of the bottle" -- where we live, where we work, and where we play. Can we can take a more active role in how we influence our families, our workplaces, and our teams? Who are the glue guys on your team? Are you one?

Good ki!
Judy Ringer

Walking Down Another Street

I first read this poem in The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying by Sogyal Rinpoche. When I Googled it, I found fourteen pages of links. It's clearly a favorite with many, including myself.

Autobiography in Five Chapters

I walk down the street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk
I fall in.
I am lost . . . I am hopeless.
It isn't my fault.
It takes forever to find a way out.

I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I pretend I don't see it.
I fall in again.
I can't believe I'm in the same place.
But it isn't my fault.
It still takes a long time to get out.

I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I see it is there.
I still fall in . . . it's a habit
My eyes are open
I know where I am
It is my fault.
I get out immediately.

I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk
I walk around it

I walk down another street.

Good ki!

Judy Ringer

A View From the Other Side

Here is a piece that I couldn't resist sharing from our fellow aikidoka blogger, Mark Walsh, over in the United Kingdom. It is called 7 Reasons Why I Like the Recession. This is not meant to diminish acknowledgement of the pain that recession brings. But, as always, conflict bring opportunity and Mark does a great job of opening our eyes to that viewpoint. Thank you Mark for these great points!

• The recession separates the wheat from chaff in business. Out of date training competitors with large overheads aren't doing so well
• The recession encourages creativity and the return of lost skills...like making and fixing stuff. People are opening up to new ideas out of necessity
• People are now questioning "old business" and the notion of chasing short-term profits
• People are demanding increased transparency in business
• Customers are demanding training that works.
• Some great people are being made unemployed and starting all sorts of conscious business multiple bottom-line projects on their own.
• It's a challenge to rampant IkeaChangingRoomstastic consumerism and fixing the internal with the external. Values are being questioned.

Judy Warner