about changes in the market and drives innovation. Comes up with a lot of new and unique ideas; easily makes connections among previously unrelated notions; Is good at bringing creative ideas of others to market; has good judgment about which creative ideas and suggestions will work;
Roadblock – Shuts down discussions before they begin, focuses only on what has been done before, Closed judging language versus focusing on questions and learning
It is a convenient coincidence that the “empower” words come in the order they are in. Yes, it is easier to make the acronym work, but these “middle” words tie together particularly well. That became clear a year or so back when I was talking with a partner who observed that I had lost my Joy. At first, I was a little taken aback, but as we talked through the assessment, she was right
As we discussed with Happiness a few weeks back, Joy can be a fleeting commodity. It often arrives when you may or not be even looking for it, but appears with a smile, a laugh, a look. You may not know what has caused it, but the endorphin rush in your brain confirms it is real..and wants to recreate it again. For the last few years, all I knew was that something that I used to have, and had misplaced along the way, not in a dramatic way, more like how you lose your keys. You know there – somewhere – and you slowly retrace your steps to where you can remember last having them…
Mistakes are the Joy of management, You read that right, and by the end of this, I hope to help you see that is true. We like to think that we are there to ensure things are done “right” and “perfectly” but if you read these enough, you know that mistakes are what has made both my life more interesting, and also the music I love the most. Today’s track is a perfect example of this, going through multiple mistakes to come one of the most important and iconic U2 songs.
I have spent more than a year avoiding writing about one of the most expressed emotions I have seen escalate daily… and I am not going to engage now. I have always been more of an optimistic person, and people who know me get tired of me saying 2 phrases. Both are aspirational, and convey a real sense that I really do want to bring to every conversation. They are a direct antidote to that other thing that has been circulating and now has taken on a fever pitch in all areas of life… but there I go again. Let’s spend the week on better things – let’s talk about Joy!
The wonder of Good Friday is back upon us. The Faithful focus on 3 major events in the year, and you can get a good argument going on which is the “most” important. It would mirror the conversation in the Upper Room last night – who is the most important Disciple? Who is the favorite, who has the most important role in the team? The bickering and fighting, jockeying for position…it is really a wonder that like many leaders, he would have thought twice about going through with the plan. After all, were they really worth the price that was to be paid?
One of the arguments I enjoyed using in Debate was “Causality”. It is something that is often muddy – did this particular thing CAUSE this other thing. We see it all the time now in our reporting, and often is something that is simply correlated. A famous one is the Number of People who Drown in Swimming Pools and the Number of films Nicholas Cage stars in – have the same shaped graph. You could imply that one caused the other, but I doubt that would stick. But do you believe that Happiness causes renewal, or vice versa, or are they even causal?
Being a “human doing” is easy for me, and probably the closest common denominator to what integrates Happiness into my day. If you remember fractions, and frankly who doesn’t, denominator means the quality/number that reduces those crazy-looking numbers into something you can combine together. Without stretching the math metaphor too far, it means that it is present in all of the things you are working with. All my best stories include, “I was … “ followed by something I was doing… A “human being” …and being Happy at that… a complicated conversation to execute…
As I crested the hill west of Tyler as a 17-year-old freshman, Happiness was palpable and real. My favorite radio station would only get stronger, a good stereo to set up in my dorm room was in my trunk, and an easy drive ahead to take me into the…. Future. I was as prepared as I could be, and now it was only to wonder how the story would unfold. Looking back 45 years later, wonder is what I can see in each of the various phases and steps that have landed me here… but Happiness… what actually is that?
In the Will Smith movie 15 years ago, we see a man working to pull himself through a difficult period of his life. Starting as a Stockbroker, he quickly falls into a series of bad outcomes, until he is clearly not “Happy”. As we watch this true story brought to life, there is a particular phase he observes again and again. “Thomas Jefferson… how did he know to put the pursuit part in there? That maybe happiness is something that we can only pursue and maybe we can actually never have it. No matter what?”
Who is around you when Happiness shows up? Seems like an easy question - and yet, as we discussed...
Like many things I start, they go well… until some odd unintended consequence pops up, usually...
As we round the bend on a year of many things, I was looking at my ring finger. Being old, it takes a LONG time to heal, and about this time last year, I was rebuilding one of my flower beds. We have a large surplus of rocks, otherwise known as living on a mountain, and they make easy garden borders. As I was placing one, the point crushed my finger – right on the nail. About 10 minutes of pain… followed by a year of the nail turning black, and being like that for most of the last year. Now, it is almost back to normal, with only a few changes… an interesting metaphor. What reminds you of what has engaged you for the last 364 days?
After listening, the hardest thing I work with leaders on is unlearning what they know. That may seem counterintuitive, but honestly, they don’t know it. Their brains have made it up… based on facts that it has chosen to observe, and ignoring those that it really doesn’t want to notice. The fancy name for it is the Ladder of Inference, but Paul Simon says it clearer “Still, a man hears what he wants to hear.. and disregards the rest”. When you really understand the depth and breadth of this deception, it is really any wonder we know anything…
Success had been tasted, but also had left some residue for Van to wonder about and resolve. Now in New York, he was influenced by Bert who helped Here Comes the Night and Gloria become hits to sign a contract that he didn’t read. He had a few songs collected and was persuaded to go into the A&R studio to record “4 singles” – which is typically 4 ‘good’ songs, and 4 that are the B sides. Now admittedly his B sides were great, but these were all recorded in only 2 days in March of 1967, and he really didn’t think much more about it…
… until he was called to let him know his first solo album was being released, including cover art that was highly psychedelic, and titled Blowin’ Your Mind. Van had never been a drug user, and was adamantly opposed to the release of the album, but the contract was clear that all control had been given completely to Bert, and as such the album came out. Even after Bert’s death later that year, the contract was in dispute which included a ban on performing without Bang Records approval… and Van was forced to move to Boston.
He struggled, but eventually was able to work out of the contract and land at Warner Brothers after, I kid you not, a $20,000 drop of cash in a warehouse on Ninth Avenue…and the commitment for 36 more songs. Van recorded them – on an out-of-tune guitar, with lyrics about Ringworms and sandwiches. They are known now as the “revenge recordings” and only saw the light of day in a 2017 release by Bang 😉 And… the wonder is that the time in Boston allowed him to work on one of the greatest albums ever… but I am again ahead of the story…
Like Van and his contract, your brain literally sees what it wants to see… even if that is not real. It constructs facts that match what it has seen before… unless you can slow it down and wonder what you are missing… what is not seen, or heard, or inferred. And it is particularly perilous as you ascend into leadership – where the common idea is you are paid for what you … know. And often that can work… until it doesn’t. And then you need to have either the ability to wonder yourself what you are missing, or have people around you that see it… Differently.
Those people blow your mind, saving you from decisions that the “facts’ in your head may support, but are actually wonders of your imagination. Differences in perspective that you need to either develop in yourself, or in those around you, so that your decisions are based on an integrated view. Differences that will challenge you, will even raise your anger, but can… in fact… slow down that supercomputer on your shoulders … to actually make better decisions. They are around you, and, like the hit that started a career that we still celebrate in spite of the contract, may come from a Brown Eyed Girl.
Like most weeks, Friday’s wonder post is the easiest to figure out with both what I am going to say, and the musician that embodies that quality for the band. It is a rare treat that the story also aligns with the song title. And if you read these enough, you might guess the player I focus on the most is the Bass player – and this week you would be right. But I am already ahead of myself – one of my Values that is less helpful is being “Restless” – racing ahead and never being happy with where I am. It is what made me a great Youth worker at church, and an even better recruiter…