What I have learned so far - Making Choices and Being at Choice
We make choices every hour of every day, and most of them we do without even thinking about them. Do we want toast for breakfast, or is today an oatmeal day? Is the red tie appropriate for the meeting or does the blue one look better? Should we take the freeway or should we drive through the city?
We all understand how making choices works: we are presented with multiple options about something, we weigh out each possibility and choose what we would like best of all — pretty simple.
We tend to put making choices into two categories: easy and “makes my head hurt” difficult.
The simple choices we barely think about. However, choices get tricky when we have to really think about the consequences — of choosing a fork in the road or deciding something that will affect other people.
Making choices is something we either have to think about or they just happen. But what about how we choose to react to situations we have little control over?
When I first heard of the concept of “being at choice,” my then black-and-white mind couldn’t wrap itself around it. I could understand how I make choices when presented with options, but when I didn’t have options how could I possibly have any control over choices?
What I have come to understand is that I am always in control of almost everything. I am not just a passenger on a journey but an active participant in my life.
While I may not actually be in control of all things that can impact my life, I am 100% at choice with how I can react to everything that happens in my life.
I was reminded of how much we can impact our lives by choosing to remain in a place of possibility by a remarkable person in my family, who recently broke his leg while on a skiing holiday.
My nephew is a stonemason, and so being physical isn’t just important to him, it is how he makes a living. While he could have chosen to wallow in self-pity about how this had happened TO him, he instead chose to look at what choices he participated in that brought him to this newest fork in the road. His conclusion was that although he isn’t exactly happy with the outcome of his choices, if he had to make them all over again he would make the same choices, which would bring him to the same outcome.
The thing that impresses me the most is the way he is choosing to accept his situation and make the most of it. He is actively participating in creating the possibilities for himself. He is catching up on a lot of reading that he would most likely not have done had he not been in this situation, and he is planning his future for when he regains his mobility.
What I know to be true is that when presented with tough situations it is a very easy thing to get stuck in the downward spiral of “why me” and “if only”; it takes real courage to step up and make an active choice to stay positive and look for the possibilities.
Taking an active role in understanding and being at choice about how we react and create the possibility for ourselves at any given time is just as important as the life-altering choices we often agonize over.
And that’s what I have learned so far…
What I have learned so far – Purpose Driven Leadership
First I have to ask the question “what is purpose driven leadership? What I believe is that a purpose driven leader is a forward thinking leader, who creates meaning and value for themselves and for others. A purpose driven leader creates clarity of their commitment and direction, blending the spirit and the soul with results. It is leadership that is founded upon a clearly articulated vision which meets opportunity and creates something new.
Purpose connects leaders with their passions, provides them with an inner compass or North Star to follow and serves as an anchor during challenging times. Most importantly, a leader’s purpose keeps them moving when obstacles arise.
Purpose can sometimes enable a leader to do things they normally would not do. It can connect a leader with who they are and the work they do in the world, and provides meaning for both the leader and the follower. Purpose links what we are doing with how we are doing it and who we are being whilst doing it. Purpose reminds us to create rather than destroy.
The value of purpose is that as leaders it solidifies their direction, attracts and motivates their followers and infuses their accomplishments with real meaning. Purpose can create real ownership and engagement of team members, and connects the organization with the world around it. It provides a strong, strategic narrative about the organization, where it’s come from and where it is going. It is the root of organizational and personal integrity and will also bring humanity into the often cold world of work.
Leaders can discover their purpose through the exploration of values and ideal-self. Leaders can uncover their purpose by asking themselves “what do I want to create”. Regardless of how they reach their purpose, leaders who are in tune with their purpose know the difference and contribution they want to make in the world and understand what gives them passion.
When talking about Purpose, it is hard not to talk about vision – but there is a distinction. Vision is how you want the world to be, whereas purpose is how you will make a difference in the world. Purpose is from the soul whereas vision is from the imagination. Purpose is the song inside; vision is the music others hear us play. Purpose is about life direction and creates the foundation for strategic thinking. Vision can drive our purpose and purpose can be expressed through our vision. Vision is core to purpose, and purpose is further enriched with values and ideal self.
There is also a relationship between purpose and values. Values can guide our purpose. We are bound to our values, however our purpose can change and purpose is often the possibility created by our values. Where our purpose can inspire others, our values inspire our own motivation and in most cases we achieve our purpose by being guided by our values. Most importantly, values give integrity to our purpose.
Purpose and leadership go hand in hand and purpose is important for a leader because it enables the followers to see what the leader sees. When challenges arise, purpose can reignite a leader’s energy and creates a touchstone for them to point to. Leaders who are fully in tune with their purpose will show clear direction, which will inspire and engage people. For the leader themselves, purpose can lift them out of egocentric behaviour.
One of the most effective ways a leader can communicate their purpose is to model it. By walking their talk a leader will align team members to achieve shared purpose. Leaders who are actively modeling their purpose will relish feedback and stay curious always seeking to learn and improve from their mistakes.
Along with modeling their own purpose, a leader can support others to connect to their purpose. Through coaching, leaders enable others to discover, share and align their purpose. Leaders acting in integrity with their own purpose attract others to do the same and leaders will listen and reflect back the purpose they hear in others igniting possibilities. When a purpose driven leader supports the “shining eyes” of team members they create an atmosphere where purpose, values and vision are spoken and shared.
For me, purpose driven leadership creates the possibility for forward movement within any organization and the more we create the space for leaders to get in touch with their purpose the more we will all benefit.
And that’s what I have learned so far…
What I have learned so far - Collaboration
When I think of the word collaboration, I am instantly transported back in time to when I was a child sitting in front of the TV with Sesame Street flashing before my eyes. I remember how, as always, there was a clever lesson to be learned. This particular lesson, I remember, included two creatures, one with long arms and one with short arms, and a rather tall fruit tree. The long armed creature could pick the fruit with ease, but couldn’t get it to its mouth, whereas the short armed creature couldn’t reach the fruit on the tree no matter how hard it tried, but could not only reach it’s own mouth but also that of its long armed friend. Of course they figured out rather quickly that if they worked together; the tall armed creature could pick the fruit and drop it down to the short armed creature who would in turn feed the both of them.
Now I do know that what they were demonstrating was cooperation and not collaboration, but for me those two words seem to be intertwined almost to the point of meaning the same thing: "people working together to achieve a common goal." The thing that I appreciate the most about my early learning years is that it was learning without instruction. The method used to convey the concepts was through modeling the behaviour. The phrase “monkey see, monkey do” springs to mind – another one of my childhood remembrances. Learning by observing is something we never forget how to do. What fascinates me about collaboration and cooperation is that they are simple concepts and ones that businesses today should be able to implement easily. It is true that successful leaders and their managers are taking full advantage of all the benefits that come along with collaborating and cooperating in the workplace, however for the businesses that could benefit from it the most, it is talked about but rarely acted upon. In a world where leaders are continuously asking their managers to do more with less, you would expect managers, across all organizations, to bring groups of their remaining people together to create high performing teams. Instead, what I have observed is that in some organizations this has led to the creation of more silos and managers refusing to share resources without pressure being placed upon them to do so. So where and what is the disconnect? Like almost anything in business, it comes down to leadership. Leaders must be able to communicate not only how budget constraints must be adhered to, but ensure that they also communicate their purpose and vision for the organization. The more a leader can connect the dots for their managers the more successful those managers will become. It is true that leaders must walk a very fine tightrope of balancing both fiscal responsibility and supporting their managers to get the job done. That’s not an easy task at the best of times, but in this economic climate it is even more essential that leaders create the space for managers to excel. That space can be created through communicating and funnily enough, collaborating and cooperating across groups of leaders. Leaders must remember, that at all times, those that they lead are always looking to them to understand how to behave. Modeling the behaviour they want to see in their managers is one of the easiest ways leaders have to communicate their purpose and vision, and it is easily passed along for the managers to imitate and emulate. So we have come full circle. Perhaps, as leaders, we all need to take the time to reflect back to simpler times when pride and greed didn’t enter into our environments and "simpler" was something we had to learn, it just was. And that’s what I have learned so far…
