K.E.E.N. skills | The Fourth Revolution Blog

What is your secure base? Strengthen it to over-achieve!

We all need our secure base.

It’s a place behind us where we know we can go and rest, be protected and supported. A place we can relax and recover.

The stronger our secure base is, the keener we will be to take risks. Because we know that if we fail, our secure base will be here.

illustration of the secure base concept — a strong secure base

Our very first secure base is our mother. And then over time we develop other secure bases – our significant other, our coach, close friends.

What’s important is to always have one strong secure base. People that don’t have one, or that lose their secure base suddenly, can have extreme reactions if they get stuck in the mourning cycle (more about that in the excellent book “hostage at the table” by George Kohlrieser, a hostage negotiator turned business school professor).

So, you want to move forward, do new things, experiment? Make sure your secure base is strong and that it will welcome you in whatever conditions you’ll end up. Strengthen your secure base as often as you can. The stronger the secure base, the bolder you will be, the more successful you will ultimately become. Invest in strengthening your secure base, it is not time lost.

Have you identified your secure base? Start strengthening it NOW!

Enjoy Christmas, reconnect with your secure base and strengthen it to achieve extraordinary things in 2012!!

Merry Christmas to all Christian friends!

How social networks help me change my identity!

Right now, as you know, I’m in for a deep change, that needs to be accompanied – and even preceded – by a deep identity change. I have to change my identity from a nice, process-abiding corporate executive to that of a daring, weird entrepreneur.

superman with two identities — changing identity

It is funny and interesting to observe how social networks accompany the change. Whenever I push “publish” on a change of my profile on LinkedIn, or on an update on my personal website, that’s where I realize that I am deeply changing my identity. To the public I am now someone else! As I am publishing this new title, this new life, this new identity, I also need to consistently change it myself in my day-to-day behavior and how I view my surroundings. Having changed online, I must change in the real world.

In my case, the usage of social networks accelerates my identity change rather than slows it down. Maybe it is because my online identity was already much closer to the daring entrepreneur than to the nice discrete corporate executive.

For some people it might be more difficult to change their identity suddenly. Facebook will forever remember what you said a few years ago. What if it is contradicting? Worst come to worst, change identity online. Create a new self. And publish you new YOU.

By publishing easily to the world, by taking the entire world as a witness of what we are doing, social networks have the power to accelerate our identity changes. When will you use that power to change your life?

We can’t change against our identity. Change your identity first!

We can change. We should change. But we can’t change against our identity.

We can’t change against this identity which we have developed, voluntarily or involuntarily, over the years.

This identity, which currently defines ourselves in society. This identity, which we like or not, which sticks to us.

It is extremely hard to try to change against our identity. The effort is tremendous, because we not only fight against ourselves, we fight against our environment, which does not understand why suddenly we take actions that do not fit with our identity.

For successful, profound changes; for easier deep change, there is only one solution. Change your identity first. Change that reflection of yourself. Step out of the conventional identity associated with your career, evolve and create your new identity.

Then, only, change.

How can you do that? There is an extreme solution: travel 10,000km away in the middle of people who don’t know you, or engage yourself in the Foreign Legion, and create a new identity. That’s a bit extreme and time consuming. A softer solution is to start progressively shaping a new identity by engaging in some less conventional practices, and evolving the type of people you mingle with.

We all crave for change but not a lot of us succeed. Start by modifying your identity to prepare for your fundamental change. When do you start?

The ever shorter lifespan of ever more immortal information

Evidence is there that the lifespan of information on internet is always shorter. A nice article on the bitly blog, “You just shared a link. How long will people pay attention?”, provides a nice synthesis. The following graph is extracted from this post:

Basically, a twitter or facebook post lifespan (in terms of viewing, clicking, re-tweeting etc) is a mere matter of minutes. Only Youtube videos have a lifespan of a few hours.

Is that really true? All this information is staying somewhere. The information is still there, more or less accessible, but searchable. Even where we thought his information was not accessible, it can come back: Facebook is right now digging the information out for its timeline; tweets can be searched. Beyond the flurry of the initial re-tweets and sharing, a long tail of search results and clicks still keeps the information alive.

This is the paradox of modern data on the internet. The flow of information is so immense that our attention span becomes ever shorter. Yet, the information remains there, accessible, searchable, available for us to build upon it. More and more information from more and more contributors, worldwide.

And those will be successful in the Collaborative Age who, beyond the instantaneous, will know how to dig the heap of historical information for the nuggets they are looking for. That’s certainly a K.E.E.N. skill. How often do you dig deeper for more information instead of letting yourself be overwhelmed by the present notifications? Just do it more often!

Beyond fear

I am deeply scared.

Now that I have resigned from my conventional job to start my own venture, I am really, really, very scared.

It is a fear that comes from far. A fear not to be able to support my family. Of having taken the wrong decision.

Logically, I know I should not be so scared. I have savings to allow for some idle time. I am finalizing a significant contract for my new company that should allow to secure sufficient income in 2012.

Still, I can’t avoid to be scared. I have to learn to face my fear. And I am going through a tremendous learning curve now.

Of course I toyed with the idea of creating a company for some time. I spent hours on numerous simulation spreadsheets, studied the market, involved friends and sought advice. Still, now that I am in it, having cut the bridge to the company that employed me, WOW, fear hits big time! And it is not reality that hits, because reality seems to be OK – it is an irrational fear of the unknown with the thought that my life is at stake.

Now I do face my fear. And it is huge, scary, smelly. It is incredible. As I stand up to face it I feel exhilarated to look at my fear in the eye and with the internal belief that I am going to overcome it.

Because facing my fear makes me realize how committed I am and how deeply resilient I can be. Much more than I thought, actually.

Beyond fear I discover myself.

Maybe that’s an experience everybody should go through to discover oneself?

The under-rated power of Appreciative Inquiry

Have you heard about Appreciative Inquiry?

It is certainly one of the most powerful coaching tools I know. It works extremely well in change situations – personal or organizational.

What is it about? Often people and organizations know they have to change. They know what they need to change. And they often go in negative spirals like “we have never been able to do that”, “that’s not possible”.

Appreciative inquiry challenges this by pushing people or organizations to find situations in the past that were different and had a little bit of what we intend to change. To the heavy smoker: What were situations where you managed to smoke less? To the organization that never seems to be able to innovate: what were situations in the past where you managed to be a bit innovative?

There were always such occasions, because of the intrinsic variance in the way we behave, in the way things happen. Appreciative inquiry then digs appreciatively into these past events to find what were the factors that elicited those changes, and how it did feel.

It shows that the individual or the organization is able to do the change, and identify what needs to be done more or less to achieve the change that is needed today.

Appreciative inquiry requires external help, and is deeply powerful. It allows to figure out the highly emotionally engaged simple actions that make successful large changes.

Next time you think you are faced with a dead end, something you think is impossible, turn to appreciative inquiry. Dig into your past and recognize how you can change.

More so, appreciate your past and build your future upon the lessons you learnt. They may be hidden but they are there. Go and find them.

Fourth Revolution Video of the month: John Hagel on modern organization and work

John Hagel in his video on modern organization and workforce explains

how management – and the organization – and our life – will change with the Fourth Revolution. Watch and understand how your life will change!

Find more videos and resources about the Fourth Revolution on the Fourth Revolution’s resource center on the Fourth Revolution website!

Life begins at the end of your comfort zone

“Life begins at the end of your comfort zone.” – Neale Donald Walsch

WOW. That’s really an inspirational quote, and a pretty strong statement at that.

So, how often are you living? How often do you let yourself bring beyond the end of your comfort zone? How often do you progress?

No often enough? Get help to make sure you’re safe, and just do it! Jump!

[I just jumped outside my comfort zone… more on this in the next post!!]

Are you afraid of the light?

“We can easily forgive a child to be afraid of the dark, but the real tragedy of life is when adults are afraid of the light” – Plato

We encounter this situation everyday. And I do encounter it often when it comes to the Fourth Revolution.

The natural reaction is always one of resistance, of hiding, of avoiding the glaring light.

Only those that come out in the light will learn how the world changes.

Think about your life now. Are you afraid of the light? Come on, put your sunglasses on if you need, but come out in the open, with us. It’s worth it.

10 personal practices to thrive through the Fourth Revolution

I have been asked to summarize the main practices of the successful K.E.E.N.

So, here are 10 basic practices to be successful through the Fourth Revolution, into the Collaborative Age:

Practice regular, holistic exercise (not just the body, but also the emotions/ mind exercises)
Lean into the Collaborative Age. Become literate in social networks: use them – even only at a basic level. You’ll progress soon enough;
Be open to new ideas by following some leading blogs and publications;
At the same time, make sure spare sufficient quality time every day to focus on activities that are important for you;
Practice overcoming Resistance more often by practicing dedicated Creative Work time
Establish your clear purpose – what can you do better than everybody else, and how can you contribute to the world through this talent? (on that one in particular you might need external help)
Write your purpose and 1 year goal on a paper and post it on your bathroom mirror to watch them morning and evenings
Practice and enhance your connection and giving skills
Practice being fully present, controlling your inner chatter, filters and impulses;
Be flexible – master your ego – remember the law of requisite variety: the most flexible prevails at the end.

More of it and more details in the Fourth Revolution book!

Practice feedforward

Do you know what feedforward is?

It has been invented by Marshall Goldsmith, a well-known coach we’ve encountered already in this blog (if you haven’t already, read “avoiding no, but, however – and change your life”).

It is very powerful. And simple. Feedforward is the contrary to feedback. Instead of looking backwards in the past to uncover what could have been done better, feedforward is used to look into the future and give advice and opinion about how to make something work well.

Feedforward works very well at the beginning of a project, or with someone you don’t know. Explain the project, the intent. Ask the person to give a feedforward, an advice of what to do / how to make it successful / how to improve. Listen intently. And don’t debate. Just note and say thank you.

You would not believe how powerful feedforward can be. Try it this week at the first occasion!

Open leadership – giving up control is inevitable

As the Fourth Revolution grows and spreads, giving up control is inevitable.

Leaders cannot any more control everything that is being done in the organization. Organizations cannot control any more their market as they used to do (for example, spending millions on advertising and measuring a constant return on investment)…

Charlene Li mentions the 3 levers of change – the 3 levers of the Fourth Revolution, pushing unavoidable change:

there are more and more people online
social networking sites usage is becoming extremely widespread
sharing is a rising habit

To that we need to add that with mobile technologies, employees stay connected to their own virtual world even when they are in office.

Do you want your organization to create more value? So, give up control! Stop barring access to social networks in the office! Real valuable work is anyway today not any more just dumb repetitive production, it is Creative, Emotional Work. Just allow it.

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