Category: K.E.E.N. skills

Why We Should Welcome Uncertainty in Our Lives

“It’s funny that when people look back at their careers, the moments that stand out the most – the things they’re most proud of – are often the times that were the most uncertain” says Hugh MacLeod of Gapingvoid.

big chasm illusion
How do you feel in times of uncertainty? And if that was an illusion?

He continues about an example of great success (Netflix when it moved in video streaming instead of sending DVD through the post): “When they were stressed and afraid and not really all that sure anything was going to work out for the best…in fact, they were quite sure it wasn’t. But they kept pushing, until something gave way. That’s the thing about success. It doesn’t appear until it’s over and the results are in.”

It is obvious that it is when we push beyond our comfort zone that things feel uncertain for us. It is when we  persist in our idea even if it looks weird that we are able to cross the chasm and reach a new state that seems more stable.

Don’t be afraid of uncertainty. Welcome it even if that is not comfortable and even if it exposes you to the critics of those who remain on the safe side.

Just go for it.

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How to Listen to the Language Of Our Physical Reactions

“Physical reactions are often the language through which we express painful feelings, especially when it isn’t safe to say them to the people we’re upset with. We often say with our bodies what we can’t or won’t say with our mouths.” – writes the psychologist Susan Forward in Toxic Parents.

back acheAnd these repressed feelings translate into various conditions of chronic pain, tension, insomnia and other symptoms. Just because we can’t say it with our mouth, it endures in our body.

In the particular case of toxic or even abusive parents, Susan Forward’s approach is to enable to talk to the person. Granted it cannot always be a dialogue but the therapeutic impact of just being able to express one’s feelings on a difficult subject, in a calm manner, makes a lot of physical symptoms disappear (it might take quite a lot of time though to reach the stage when this single expression is possible).

If you suffer from some chronic pain that can’t be directly linked to a physical condition, consider whether you would not have some deep feelings repressed somewhere. Then consider how you could express these feelings, calmly, to the person concerned.

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How to Manage Your Daily Reserve of Self-Control

“Self-control is a finite resource. You can only ask so much of yourself each day” – says Nick Crocker. He continues: “You’ll snap or warp or splinter if you ask too much. You have a limited capacity to direct yourself a certain way. It’s worth considering where that directive capacity goes every day“.

self-control - don't explodeSeen from that perspective, we need to be careful in our utilization of self control and be wary not to exceed our capacity in a given day.

This probably means that if you realize you have used a fair bit early, you need to make sure you don’t put yourself in situations where significant self-control is required.

However I do believe that certain exercises of self-reflection and physical exercise can increase one’s self-control reserve when that is really needed.

In any case, if you feel you are exhausting your self-control reserves don’t explode yet! Maybe wait until the next day to tackle the new situation?

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Why You Need to Accept Yourself First to be Able to Change

“The Curious Paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can Change” – Carl Rogers in the book ‘On Becoming a Person‘. Carl Rogers is a famous psychologist that is one of the founders of the coaching approach to change. His book is highly recommended if you are interested in personal change and growth.

The Curious Paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can ChangeThis is a very deep statement. Because of often we think that we should force ourselves to change, with the result that we create resistance and frustration… with poor results.

Carl Rogers’s opinion, forged after decades of giving therapy and counselling, is that deep-seated change is actually possible only when one accepts himself fully, including his emotions and feelings that often tend to be repressed. This deep preparatory work might take months and years before we might be ready for change.

It is interesting that in some respect the same might hold for change in organizations: self-awareness is a necessary pre-requisite.

It might be a good idea to focus first on a deep acceptance of yourself, of your feelings and other psychological and physiological reactions, before venturing down the path of change. A worthwhile investment indeed that will repay multiple times as after, change will become easy and self-sustaining.

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How to Look Beyond Aggressiveness and Hate

“The enemy is fear. We think it is hate; but, it is fear” – said Gandhi. When we express hate (or even just mundane aggressiveness) we in fact somehow express our underlying fear, our intrinsic insecurity.

hate as a distillate created by fearIt is amazing to consider when someone screams at you, how fragile and fearful that person must be. I find it is an excellent way to overcome the natural rush of adrenaline and the emotional reaction to the situation (which typically hovers around our primitive fight or flight reaction) . Plus it provides some empathy that might come useful in that situation (Of course if it becomes too obvious that you pity the person that is aggressive that might not resolve the problem at this instant so remain just calm and composed!)

Fear creates ravages throughout the world and in our daily environment. Nip the fear out, find out precisely what is feared and you’ll overcome aggressiveness.

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Would Happiness Be Our Greatest Fear?

In this post, Om Swami makes the point that Happiness could be our greatest fear. Even beyond fear of unknown, of death, loss, of failure and rejection! “When good things do happen, we think it’s luck, or plain fluke, that we couldn’t possibly deserve this goodness. This is the fear of happiness. And, it stops most people from chasing their dreams, it’s the obstacle to realizing their full potential“.

Seneca quote - fear of happinessAccording to him, it is a fear that we would learn progressively from being in situations where we would not be adequate. “With the passage of time, this feeling — I’m not good enough — prepares a perennial battleground of two opposing forces, fear and self-affirmation“.

I feel it is true sometimes that the fear of happiness prevents us from taking fully advantage of the situation we are in. I would maybe not fully agree that it is caused by comparing ourselves with other people, maybe it is also a question around whether we really deserve to be happy. Maybe it is not our greatest fear.

Anyway, this question resonates with me – is that fear that prevents me to feel happy? I might be sometimes, somehow. Luckily, Om Swami also provides the antidote: “To think about it, that’s what it boils down to: ‘Let’s go.’ Action is the most potent antidote to fear”

Let’s go!

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Why You Should Always Focus On Your Introduction

In trainings, meetings, presentations, speeches and encounters it is always very important to get the introduction right. There are three reasons for that:

  • people generally remember the beginning the most (together with the end);
  • people will judge whether it is worth listening to you within the first 1 to 2 minutes
  • and because depending on the interest you raise, you will recruit more or less brain capability in our interlocutor.

introduction-speech“If you are trying to get information across to someone, your ability to create a compelling introduction may be the most important single factor in the later success of your mission. Why this emphasis on the initial moments? Because the memory of an event is stored in the same places that were initially recruited to perceive the learning event. The more brain structures recruited— the more door handles created— at the moment the learning, the easier it is to gain access to the information” – John Medina in ‘Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School‘.

If you don’t have time to rehearse and optimize your entire presentation, at least do it for the first 1 to 2 minutes of your performance. Just these few seconds can make a dramatic difference in your overall impact!

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How to Deal With Rumors

Why are we so often spreading rumors when not outright gossiping? “Sociologists explain rumors as collective sense-making. In each case, there is a gap in the authoritative explanation for some period of time, and rumors filled in that gap” – says Dan Zarrella in ‘Zarrella’s Hierarchy of Contagiousness: The Science, Design, and Engineering of Contagious Ideas‘.

rumors spreadingHence creating and spreading rumors would be a mechanism for us to make sense of events or situations for which we would not have a satisfactory explanation. Sometimes this exercise degenerates into conspiracy theories, however it generally remains at a more innocuous level.

Rumors disappear instantly when a clear and unambiguous explanation is given, which is the right way to kill them.

With the Fourth Revolution our capability to spread rumors has increased dramatically on the social networks, which is sometimes destructive. Giving as soon as possible an authoritative explanation is the best way to destroy them.

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Why You Should Be Scared Sometimes – It Shows You Are Thinking Big Enough

“If you’re not a little afraid, and the other vendor in the room is telling you you shouldn’t be, then either ‘one of us is in the wrong room’ or you’re not thinking big enough” – says Matt Ridings in this post, written in the context of a small company’s sales efforts. Growth will necessarily happen at the expense of fear.

dreams_scare_not big enoughMatt Ridings continues – “Fear is a good thing, it’s almost universally true that ‘the larger the opportunity the larger the challenge’”. That says it all. If you’re not a little bit afraid, then maybe you are not going after the right size of opportunities.

Not long ago I grasped a great opportunity to grow significantly my company. It came with some risk associated. The risk was quite high, just not so high as to bankrupt the company after some risk engineering. I decided to go for it. Time will tell whether the opportunity will materialize.

Funny, I was about to write ‘time will tell if it was the right decision’ but that is absolutely wrong. Whether the opportunity materializes will be the result of my effort (a little bit) and of luck and other external factors I can’t control (a lot). So, the decision was the right one. Whether the opportunity materializes is something else.

It’s tough to ‘think big’ and when I re-read my post on thinking big posted in June 2012 a few months after I started my company, I see how much a way remains for me to be comfortable with the fear it entails. It is getting better though – and growth ambitions for myself and my company combine into an exciting mix!

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How to Calm Down To Find the Right Response to Your Issue

When you are panicked and stressed there is no way you can find the right way to resolve your problem. If you are calm right now, it might look a straightforward common-sense comment, but how often have you tried to find a way to resolve an issue while remaining panicky excited?

stressed executive
Stressed? Right now, calm down before reacting the wrong way!

That will only result in one phenomenon: you will REACT instead of RESPOND. There is a definite nuance between the two. Reaction is like a knee-jerk; it is unconscious and aims for selfish short-term protection. Response on the other hand is thoughtful, and can also take into into account wider interests as well as a long term view.

So the issue is how to calm down before doing something that you might regret later, in addition to probably be ineffective or even counter-productive. Time-off is the only solution, and then depending on the time available, different techniques can apply. When I have time I like to go walking for a while, or even exercising more actively. Ideally I like to spend a night on a difficult situation. When I don’t have time, I apply mindful breathing which in a few deep breaths do effectively lower my stress and allows me to respond instead of reacting.

These are quite easy; what is difficult is to recognize that you need some time off to cool down when you are in the midst of the difficult and stressful situation, so that you regain clarity of thought. It is worth taking the habit of regularly touching-base with yourself to consciously assess whether you are in that situation.

In any case, stop reacting in panic and stressed mode! Calm down and respond instead!

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The Exponential Deception, or Why We Always Underestimate Incremental Change

I am always impressed how much we tend to underestimate the power of incremental change, i.e. the power of regular, small changes that do aggregate finally in an exponential improvement.

Micro-SD cards capacity transformation
Micro-SD card capacity multiplied by 1,000 in 10 years… that’s only an improvement by a factor of 2 every year!

There are many such examples in the world around us, such as the Moore law for computer processors, or similar laws for the evolution of the memory capability of hard disks or solid-state memory. The capacity of these products do not evolve suddenly through the sudden invention of new technologies, they evolve slowly by successive small improvements, resulting finally in exponential change in capability over time. As shown in the illustration, the transformation of micro-SD cards storage capacity (a factor of 1,000 in 10 years) only means that this capacity has doubled every year. That looks much more feasible!

It is difficult for us psychologically to apprehend what an exponential change means. Its power lies in progressively compounding successive changes.

What does it mean for us personally, or for the organization we try to change? You can reach the goal of a much greater transformation, on the long term, by accruing successive, small changes on a very regular basis. On a personal basis, by small daily or weekly improvement goals. At the organizational level, by setting weekly or monthly improvement goals. These goals do not need to be substantially challenging nor appear to be unfeasible – it is the accumulation of these small changes that will create transformation. And suddenly, with an achievable daily, weekly or monthly goal, change looks much less sinister.

So, when do you start compounding small, incremental changes?

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Why the Ultimate Weapon for Cutting Losses is Changing the Manager

Following our series of posts on the issue of the psychological avoidance of cutting losses when prospects are bleak, let us once again quote Daniel Kahneman in the bestseller “Thinking, Fast and Slow“: “[because of the psychological effect leading to desperate gambles in the face of a high probability failure], the escalation of commitment to failing endeavors is a mistake from the perspective of the firm but not necessarily from the perspective of the executive who “owns” a floundering project“. As a result, “Boards of directors are well aware of these conflicts and often replace a CEO who is encumbered by prior decisions and reluctant to cut losses.” That statement can naturally be extended to any situation down in the organization.

Change_CEOThe ultimate response to the situation of the manager or the executive that continues a failing project and cannot exit this situation of desperate gambling is thus, from the organization point of view, the replacement of the manager in charge. Unencumbered by the issue of sunk costs and sunk emotional commitment, the new manager can cut losses (which, at the same time, allows him or her to highlight that the previous manager what incompetent – while that might just have been bad luck).

However there are obviously many drawbacks to that ultimate decision; in particular, the temporary lack of effectiveness which will be created in that part of the organization until the new manager is up to speed with the particulars of the company and the business. Often, it is preferable not to use that ultimate weapon but rather opt for softer solutions such as introducing as deputy someone that will allow a new course to be taken. This last solution also allows continuity and minimizes disruption.

When it comes to cutting losses on an endeavor and if the situation has already worsened significantly, changing the manager in charge can be the only solution to save what can still be saved. The emotional attachment to sunk actions is too strong to be overcome by the people in place, even if they show outstanding capabilities.

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