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The brief was simple. Respond ‘Yes and’ do whatever your partner says and then add to it. Katie went first and said: “Let’s pretend we’re dogs and go to the park”. Last week was my first experience at an Improv class. I went for fun although it seems I can’t escape work. Andrew, the instructor said: At work (and he said corporates specifically), “we’re so busy defending our position that we say: ‘yes but’”. The safe. The tried and true. The negative Nancy ‘no’. Yet a world of possibility opens up with ‘yes and’. It’s playful and surprisingly fun. Your job is to accept whatever is put to you as reality and then add to it (and keep taking turns). To Katie I replied: “Yes and I’ll be a whippet”. [Delightful childhood memories of my dog Ben, the dachshund, chasing the whippet next door around in circles sprung to mind. (They reversed direction when the whippet lapped Ben.)] Places like Google, PepsiCo and McKinsey have discovered Improv can work wonders at work. If you want to get better at: being present with others improve your listening skills boost your creativity your focus create a more positive environment   …then ‘Yes and’ is

I knew it was the day and I could barely do it. But I had to. It seemed so ridiculous, even at the time. Bravely I opened up my computer and typed in the url. There it was in bigger lights than I ever imagined. The article I wrote. All I was going to do was check out: whether it was published; and how much it had been edited.   There it was, the FEATURE article, me as the author. I wasn’t expecting that. It was way more. Way better. Almost too much!   A heady, delicious mix of shock, denial and delight. I couldn’t read it.   Here’s why I’m telling you this. This feeling is one way to know when you’re doing what you need to do. The numb, disconnected feeling that let’s you know that you are growing and developing (in a good way)… by leaning into your discomfort zone. It goes with feeling not quite ready to take the leap (and it feels like a leap), and knowing that if you don’t, nothing will change. That’s because the growth happens when you start before you feel ready. Before you know everything you need to know.   The trick is

What do you do when you realize you’re getting in your own way? Get out of your own way! You’re setting yourself up for long-term discomfort if you stay in your comfort zone. There’s no silver bullet. It isn’t easy to get out of your own way. That’s because we’re wired for the status quo. Our brain likes efficiency and mindless habits are efficient. Change is hard work and requires conscious and continuous effort. Willpower is a finite resource and gets depleted. You get tired. You make the mistake of using progress as an excuse for self-indulgence. “One donut won’t hurt, will it? I’ve been eating well all week!” Or you fall for the trap of telling yourself it’s better not to start. It’s way less painful to fail because you didn’t try, than it is to fail when you give it your all. The good news…you can train your brain. The legendary football coach Vince Lombardi said: “Practice doesn’t make perfect. Perfect practice does”. Here are 10 tips: Decide what you will do. Be specific. That way you’ll know when you get there. You’ll have more success if you focus on what you will do, not on what you

Any of these sound familiar? You’ve got that presentation to deliver. The deadline is looming and you still haven’t started. You sat silently and watched Chris manoeuvre his way into getting the job you wanted. You know you’re capable of more, but you’re not doing more.   If yes, then you’re probably a master at something you don’t want to be a master of: Getting in your own way.   Stephen Pressfield calls it resistance. “Most of us have two lives. The life we live, and the unlived life within us. Between the two stands Resistance.” Others call it self-defeating behaviour. Self-sabotage. A lack of confidence. Not believing in yourself. Avoidance. Procrastination. Delay tactics. It doesn’t matter what you call it. But it does matter that you call it. Because when you can name it, know what it is and acknowledge it to yourself, then you can start to do something about it. Getting in your own way takes many forms. Yours may be obvious to you, or so sneaky that you’re not quite sure. Here are ten ways you can get in our own way, of course there are more: Fear. Fear = False Evidence Appearing Real. This makes

The first Grand Prix of the year was on in Melbourne last weekend. I don’t follow F1, but living in Melbourne… you’d have to be sleeping under a rock not to know.  Especially where I live. I can hear the cars racing around the track. Best of all… I can see the F/A-18 fly-overs from my kitchen window. Top Gun doing the dishes! Daniel Ricciardo, the Aussie racing for Red Bull, was a serious contender. In the end he didn’t have a podium finish. On the Australian Grand Prix website they posted an article “Should Dan be desperate?” It said: “Our own Dan Ricciardo was sixth – and lapped. That’s unbearable for a front-line driver, a man who won three races in 2014 and was promised better weapons in his fight for more success in 2015”. Dan’s weapons are his car – they argued. And “you can only drive the car you’ve got”. But who’s responsible for that? There’s a whole team behind Dan. The pit stops themselves are extraordinary. The mechanics are more like highly-trained athletes who are clear about their role, are experts at what they do and have the resources they need at their disposal. At least

It was my first year in school. For a few days I was coveting these balls of wool in the cupboard. Don’t ask! I’m not sure why. I do have some vague memory of liking the colours. Then one day I did it. I stole a ball and put it in my school bag! That night my Mum came to me, holding the ball of wool, and asked: “What’s this for?” I think I just burst into tears. I knew I’d done the wrong thing. I’d been “sprung bad” as we used to say. Pretty much caught red handed! The instructions were to give it to Mrs Frizzell tomorrow, tell her I’d taken it and say sorry. Oh my! The humiliation couldn’t have been greater! Boy did that teach me a lesson. Not only is stealing wrong and I felt terribly guilty. But having to fess up and take responsibility for my actions? That felt way worse! Here’s what I learnt: About values Just because you want it doesn’t mean you can have it. You have to take responsibility for your actions. Saying sorry matters. About leadership My Mum – held me accountable. My teacher, Mrs Frizzell – accepted my

Last week I was lucky enough to get freebies to the Eagles concert. I figured, who doesn’t want to hear Hotel California live? Those lyrics, “you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave” always haunted me. Even if you don’t like their music, you can’t ignore the Eagles. They had the highest selling album of all time last century. 26 million copies of Their Greatest Hits 1971-1975. The album was bigger than Michael Jackson’s Thriller! These guys – averaging 67 years of age – are still rockin’ on. They still sound great. They haven’t burnt out and they haven’t faded away. The concert was called History of the Eagles. They took us on a journey from their beginnings in 1971. What stayed with me was when they talked about writing yet another of their #1 hits way back then. Took them 2 days. They laughed and said it would take them 2½ months now. That’s what got me thinking… would you want grey power on your team? They’re going to be slower than your younger team members. They might need more breaks or need to work fewer hours, generally a more flexible work environment. The

This week Jacqui (not her real name) said to me, sadly and with resignation in her voice: “There’s such a thing as integrity in leadership”. Jacqui contacted me after losing out in a political stoush at work. She’s in the C-suite. She’s powerful. But she’s not the CEO. Now she has no choice but to rethink her career. If she’s to maintain her own integrity, she has to find a new role. Jacqui is brilliant. I have no doubt she will. I’ll bet that she will do even better for herself. But at senior levels it takes time. As they say, there’s less oxygen at the peak. It’s tough in the short term. One reason she lost the stoush is because she refused to play the game. It started not long after the CEO joined the organisation a couple of years ago. She watched her peer make a grab for power and then watched her own slow-motion train wreck happen. Some think that’s admirable and others think that’s stupid. It’s a dilemma. If you don’t play the game you will likely suffer like Jacqui is now and find yourself effectively out of a job. If you do play the game

“Oh dear! Oh dear! I shall be too late!” muttered the White Rabbit. If we aren’t careful, being a leader can push us to the overly anxious, always in a hurry, White Rabbit brink: Too much to do. Not enough time. Balls in the air. Uncertainty. Ambiguity. Complexity. Decisions. Deadlines. And the worst?   Staff. Yes, the people problems! Here are some signs that you may not be leading patiently enough: (I didn’t make these up, clients have said these things to me and I’ve thought my fair share of them too). You say to yourself: I don’t have time for this. It’s easier to do it myself. I’ll do it better anyway.   Or you’re thinking: They just don’t get it. Why don’t they just do what I tell them? Another mess I have to clean up. I don’t know if I can stand this. Didn’t we go over that yesterday? I don’t want to hear another excuse. Did I make a hiring mistake? They’re getting paid too much. How could they not know that? Do I have to spell out every little detail? Do I really have to explain that again?   And then you might wonder: Why don’t people like me?

I can’t imagine that you’re horrid to work for, but I don’t work for you. You don’t work for you either. So how do you know? Are you sure? If you want to be a boss of choice, at the very least you want to know if you’re unwittingly rubbing people up the wrong way. In a recent article, journalist Minda Zetlin interviewed Dr Laura Crawshaw for Inc. Laura founded the Boss Whispering Institute (I’m a member). Laura came up with nine questions to ask yourself. They’re a great place to start so I’m sharing them with you here: “1. How long do your employees stay with you?” If it’s less than average, then it’s time to start asking yourself why that might be. “2. What’s your relationship afterward?” If you’ve had a good working relationship, then you are likely to stay in touch. It’s a bad sign if you never hear from any of your ex employees again. “3. Do you help employees develop?” The best bosses want their employees to be successful. Do you do what you can to help them grow and develop? “4. Do you feel like you’re the smartest person in the office and no one else