Posts Tagged ‘LinkedIn’

Say Yes! to 2009

Friday, January 2nd, 2009

Happy New Year!

I saw the Jim Carey movie “Yes Man” the other day, and while the film was just ok, I LOVE the philosophy behind the premise: looking at places where we say No in life, and converting that into Yes!

Keith Johnstone, an improvisation guru says: When we say No, we are rewarded with safety and security; when we say Yes, we are rewarded by growth and adventure. Clearly, there are times when No is appropriate, and times where Yes is a no-brainer. The opportunity is in the great mushy middle…

To what would you like to say Yes! in 2009?

In what areas of life would you like More of something that’s already working?

Sure, envision what it would be like to Have More of this, AND…. envision yourself Doing and Living More in a way that makes that possible, with joy and enthusiasm for whatever happens.

As an improviser & clown, I’ve learned that “commitment” means saying Yes without knowing the outcome. Its necessary to commit fully, to jump in 100% — not recklessly, but Yes in the face of uncertainty and perhaps fear.

Silly? Perhaps. But financial investments require a commitment without knowing the outcome. And advertising and coaching. And love. And all of life, really. Events always turn out different than we envision or plan. With full commitment, we have a shot at things being even better than we had imagined. Or we can play the game to mitigate risk, and also perhaps never “arrive”.

No-saying is often (but not always) motivated by fear.

If you want to go a bit deeper, try just noticing the emotions that come with your decisions to say No. What do you notice? Patterns or preferences? When your mind starts to try to understand Why, just go back to the noticing your emotional state as decisions get made, and during conversations, including talking to yourself.

What’s there? Can you feel it in your body? Yikes! Now what?

This is the trail-head of a meditative practice, if you choose to walk it, of saying Yes to one’s own emotional discomforts, self-judgements, and critical voices. “Everyone carries a shadow,” Jung wrote, “and the less it is embodied in the individual’s conscious life, the blacker and denser it is.” Saying Yes to discomfort (without trying to fix or change it) is a deep practice of “being with” — accepting what’s here & now, which can include feeling bad.

Keep breathing. Try to release any body tensions that seem to be triggered by difficult emotions or memories or thoughts. Just notice, without fixing. “Be with” what’s here & now. It can be helpful to have the support of a therapist or coach or yoga teacher with this kind of inquiry.

On the brighter side, Jung also believed that “in spite of its function as a reservoir for human darkness—or perhaps because of this—the shadow is the seat of creativity”. So cultivating more access to and acceptance of our shadow materials can be useful and dynamic work.

I offer these thoughts in the spirit of generating new choices in the new year, alternatives to established patterns. Some patterns are worth keeping, others may be ripe for revolution. Only you can say.

More than changing our decision-making, I think the opportunity is in how we focus our attention. Every No, means a Yes to its opposite. So we’re actually saying both No and Yes, all the time, at the same time. The two are twins. Sure, say No… and spend more energy asking: with that No….

To what am I saying Yes?

As for me, I’m saying Yes! in 2009 to living more open and vulnerable. Yes to taking more risks. And Yes to advertising, coaching, and performing. And Yes to Love, always. And Yes to cleaning out my refrigerator.

If I can help in any of these areas, drop a line and let’s discuss.

Wishing you courage, warmth, and joy, in your journey…

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flirts & the collective unconscious

Friday, May 16th, 2008

My coaches training included an exercise called Cosmic Flirts — being open to the notion that the universe may be sending you messages. How do we explain coincidence? You’re thinking about a friend, and suddenly she calls. Is there a connection? Our mind certainly wants to believe there is, and yet, there’s no scientific proof…

Carl Jung said that his idea of synchronicity really came together while dining with Albert Einstein, whose theory of relativity includes the notion that the whole universe exists simultaneously, that seeming separations of events & things are only due to our perspective, our relative location in the field.

For Jung, this was support for his idea of the collective unconscious, a connection that does not have to travel like an email or phone message or envelope does. Events can be connected, without conforming to temporal-dependent cause/effect. And we can be connected without our minds acknowledging or understanding the connection.

In coaching, a client and I might keep a peripheral eye/ear open for flirts — small shouts out from the universe of coincidence — and we ask: What is that trying to tell you? What wisdom is here for you?

Its been said that real change happens in small ways, on ordinary days, at seemingly insignificant moments that perhaps only later we might label as a Turning Point. Jung believed that flirts (or winks, as he called them) are most potent at boundary events — moments of great life transition, where turning seemingly randomly left rather than right may make all the difference in the world.

The most important question of our over-mediated age is — To what are we paying attention? The thinking mind is one channel of information, like channel 7 on your TV. And there are others: the emotional channel, the flirt/wink channel, the body channel, the intuition channel, the ‘What your partner is really trying to say’ channel. Yoga and meditation are ways to switch the channel of attention, away from the mind to breath, to sensation. Just focusing on the Now seems to be useful.

So everyday, give your thinking mind some time off, and practice paying attention to something else — the sounds of silence, your breath, ask your body what it wants for lunch today. Really listen to your intuition for 5 minutes straight, without judgement or disagreement about what’s practical. What choices become available when we give attention to the parts of us that we don’t believe we control?

Why even ask these questions? Basic research and exploration, on the road to growth and innovation…

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The Designed Alliance

Tuesday, August 15th, 2006

Pop Quiz: How much time & money does your team/company budget for “client relationship development”? On a 1-5 scale, how would you rate your company’s relationship strategy?

The most common answers to both these questions is: zero. And a blank stare. Can you remember the last time you lost a client or colleague or friendship, and you didn’t know why?

How about budgeting one day a year for the team/group to ask itself & discuss:

• How do we want to be together? (values)
• How do we want to define “success”? (goals, processes, feedback)
• How do we want to handle difficult topics & conversations? (accountability)

The Designed Alliance is our workshop for the team to co-design a conscious & intentional relationship for themselves. Its a radical idea: to suggest that we might ask ourselves and each other — How do We want this relationship to feel and work? Rather than only: What do I want here?

Pre-workshop, we also conduct an online quantitative team self-assessment, which measures 7 Productivity and 7 Positivity skills or factors for the combined client/agency team.

Productivity factors are things like knowing what our goals are, clear decision-making, adequate resources. Positivity factors include trust, respect, and optimism; essentially Emotional Intelligence for teams.

Revisited annually, your team can track change in its own productivity and satisfaction. Ad agencies can track a client team over time, and benchmark across agency, team to team.

The Designed Alliance also works for new parents, business startups, rock bands & stage hands, even amongst siblings. We’d replace the quant survey with a self-assessment wheel, and start with the few simple questions noted above.

If you have a small in-house team or performing group that would like to test drive The Designed Alliance, we offer an intro mini-workshop for free, plus travel. Write or call for more info.

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20 years in the business

Wednesday, April 12th, 2006

Sometime this month, April 2006, will be 20 years for me in advertising. I’m happy to say I still enjoy this business, the people, the ideas, and yes I even still enjoy moderating focus groups & training moderators.

When people ask, Where Do You Want to Be in Five Years?, I’ve never had any idea or answer. Mostly, I’ve been confused enough with where I was. My 2006 answer: “Somewhere I can’t possibly imagine today”.

My first 6 years in the business I was a sponge at DMB&B NY as a P&G media planner & then Chiat/Day NY as a young account planner. The pay was crap, and the work was fascinating. I liked the strategy of media, and literacy in MRI books proved an asset at C/D. The people I worked for at both shops are still rock stars in their world. There’s no way I could have planned this kind of education & opportunity.

When I moved to FCB San Francisco, then started my own business a year later in ‘92, I wasn’t sure what would happen next. Pitching IBM with Ogilvy in 1994 was a good break, and started a 12+ year relationship. And clients in SF, NY, Seattle, and elsewhere have kept me busy & learning & paying my mortgage. Thank you.

One day, I sat down & asked myself about widgetwonder‘s value proposition: How do I best serve my clients? Why should someone hire me?

Perhaps contrary to my British-infused education, I was tired of the planner’s role as “most clever person in the room”. So I said Yes to Collaboration — work to bring the group together, into alignment around language and ideas. The power of brands are expressed as shared values, not proprietary. Help the team move forward, and experience themselves in new ways. My job is to help create an environment where the group can do its best work. Building & holding a group is a skill, and I’ve been focusing here for the past 10 years.

Mostly, I just follow what I’m most curious about. And I like to solve problems, tell stories, and make a connection. That’s my idea of a plan. Oh, and its ok to freak out all along the way because you don’t know where you’re going. Doesn’t everyone do that anyway?

The best thing about entrepreneurship is that I’ve had the opportunity to invest in my business & myself. With each 5 year period of the past 20 years, my growth & learning have accelerated & have become more interesting.

This diversity of experience drives innovation for my business, and adds value to my clients. Personally, I couldn’t ask for anything better. Check back for an update again in 2026…

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When In Doubt, Accelerate

Wednesday, August 17th, 2005

There’s a great book called "Twist of the Wrist 2: The Basics of High-Performance Motorcycle Racing", in which racer Keith Code very simply explains the physics of a gyro in motion combined with braking forces and traction dynamics, and suggests that all our gut reactions are wrong — fear based — when we think we’re going to die in a firery speeding crash. Keith says doing the opposite of the fear reaction is the best policy, all physics concerned. His suggestions? See if they seem useful improvisational tools for life..

1. When in doubt, accelerate. The bike is most stable when the throttle is cracked open a bit, accelerating, especially useful in scary turns and unstable conditions. Bike is least stable while braking.Brake + turn = disaster.

2. When the road gets rough, let go. Bumpy road means bumpy bike means use your body as a shock absorber – squat rather than sit, and loosen on the bars. Relax your hands arms and shoulders.

3. Pick a line in a turn and hold it. Correcting course mid-intitaitive curve creates a moment of extreme instability in a gyro. Momentum is lost as accelaration drops.

4. Look where you want the bike to go. If there’s a haybale or truck in the way suddenly, look at the space between obstacles while hurtling forwards, not at the truck. The bike will follow your balance & focus.

5. Counter-steering: push where you want to go, don’t pull. To turn a bicycle or motorcycle to the right at speed, you push right and pull left. Its just true. The gyro again, somehow. But push seems building, while pull to get what you want feels limiting.

Doing this stuff makes it possible to go really fast on a motorcycle, and to find the edge where your speed exceeds your skills. Keith suggests racing at 85% to your edge. Try applying his skills to your life & decision-making. Experiment, and send me post cards….

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