gone fishin'

I recently completed a course on leadership skills for non-supervisors. One module in the course was change. The course manual explained:

An effective leader embraces change and exploits the opportunities that it presents. By seeking to lead change, rather than react to it, you will help you and your organization be competitive and grow. Change creates opportunities for individuals to enrich their careers and personal lives. While change can be uncomfortable, it can also be invigorating.

The last page of the manual provided a list of encouraging affirmations: “Affirmations are extremely powerful when spoken or thought with emotional authenticity.” I’m trying to do this better. Some important affirmations:

  • You are unique and special
  • If at first you don’t succeed, try another approach
  • For every obstacle, there is a solution

I hope that you find this blog to be an example and inspiration for leadership.

2 thoughts on “gone fishin'”

  1. Excellent post.

    One thing I stress with my team — and my students, when I teach — is that there is no growth without failure. And growth is a type of change.

    We have a very binary view of “failure” in this country. You pass or fail a test. You are a success or failure at a job, project or sport. If you fail, it is bad.

    We forget that practice is a form of contrived failure, and that in almost every situation — even victories — there are specific things we wish we’d done better.

    It’s not that we should aim for failure alone, but that success is impossible without it. A Buddhist teacher once said, “The river of success is only crossed on stones of failure.”

    The Beginner’s Mind allows us to see failure for what it is; part of the path of growth and change. If we hide or failures, are ashamed of them, or don’t respect what they teach us, we will not succeed.

    A good leader models “constructive failure” behaviors for others, and helps those he leads see both the strengths in their failure, and the ways in which success is dependent on a realistic view of how we get there.

  2. Recently read “Snoop: What Your Stuff Says About You” by Sam Gosling; one chapter discusses the structural brain differences (as per scans) of conservatives (resistant to change) and those with more open personalities.
    Maybe openness to change isn’t something you can change.
    Moo!

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