Manage To Change

Bend Don't Break

When I was in chorus in elementary school I had this great teacher (that NO ONE appreciated).  She didn't just babysit - she taught.

Being an alto, I was pretty bad at the high notes. Aside from surely sounding horrible, she realized that I was trying hard, stretching as far as possible, but I couldn't get my low voice to go any higher. After class one day she asked me to try something. She said, "Don't stretch to reach the high notes.  Approach them from above. Reach down and grab them."

As abstract and non-specific as that advice sounds, it really helped me.  Suddenly I could see how to could get to my destination.  Visualizing it caused a funny thing happend, my body did what it needed to do and it worked!  She had changed my mindset from thinking something was just out of reach to thinking that it was possible if approached the right way.

As you may have guessed, this isn't just about singing.

2011 was my busiest year ever.  There were many times when my "to do" list felt just as out of reach as those high notes, but I got through them all and she's the person to thank for that.

When my list got too overwhelming, instead of thinking of all the things I needed to do all at once and stretching to get it all done, I thought of my "to do's" as though they were in a bucket with the most pressing things on top. As I finished one thing I would reach down and pull out the next thing.  

What happened was that my stress level went way down. It became easier to prioritize what really needed to be done and by when (as opposed to layering on manufactured levels of urgency). It also became easier to see what I needed to do myself versus what could be done by other people.

This even worked with interuptions.  When something tried to slam its way in, it would have to earn its way first into the bucket and then to the top.  It wasn't allowed to stay just because it cut in.

So looking forward to 2012, I'm going to try and keep this up.  

What's your plan for 2012?

 

RIP Steve Jobs

My two favorite Jobs quotes:

“Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.”

Stanford commencement speech, June 2005

 

“That’s been one of my mantras — focus and simplicity. Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.”

BusinessWeek, May 25, 1998

 

Turn It Off

We're all busy.  

For me, a small and rapidly expanding business takes up most of my time. It's both exciting and exhausting. For you it might be the same or it might be a demanding position with a more traditional employment agreement. It doesn't matter.  

My epiphany this weekend was that it is NOT only the hours I work that exhaust me.  It's the hours I think I'm not working that wear me out!

The busier I get the more I seem to mentally process all the things I need to do at times when I should be disconnecting, relaxing, and giving my poor brain a rest.

Sure we could start talking about multi-tasking, over stimulation with news and information, fractured attention, and tons of things that erode our productivity and inhibit our ability to rejuvenate.

But for me...I'm going to start by taking one day completely off every week. 

What do you do to recharge your brain? Any suggestions? 

Motivation: Do You Have Drive?

"There's a mismatch between what science knows and what business does." Daniel Pink at TED Talks 2009

According to Dan, what science knows is that when people are offered rewards for simple, structured tasks results improve.  But, when rewards are offered for tasks that are conceptual they have a negative impact on performance.

What business does, especially American business, is almost uniformly attempt to motivate staff through monetary incentives.

The alternative?  Intrinsic rewards: Autonomy, Mastery, and Purpose.

This video was an introduction to Dan's new book, Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us. I just ordered my copy.

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SSP: Are you IN?

Why haven't I been blogging regularly?

One big reason is the Society for Scholarly Publishing (SSP) IN Meeting.

Richard Newman, from the American Medical Society, and I are the co-chairs of the SSP IN meeting.

SSP IN will take over the entire Hotel Providence from September 23rd - 25th. I could tell you all about IN here, but everything you need to know is on the SSP website:

IN is a different kind of conference. It is part symposium, part seminar, and part un-conference. Most of all, it's an opportunity to learn from your colleagues by participating in small groups lead by industry innovators like Kent Anderson (Massachusetts Medical Society, New England Journal of Medicine), Chris Beckett (Atypon Systems), Alex Frost, Thane Kerner (SilverChair), Howard Ratner (Nature Publishing Group), and John Sack (HighWire Press). During IN you'll be the student, the collaborator, and the instructor!

IN was created to address the unprecedented change taking place in today's scholarly publishing industry. Disruptive technologies and business models are changing the market at the same time the global economy presents the most challenging fiscal climate in nearly a century. IN is designed to help you formulate strategies and tactics to take advantage of the opportunities and successfully negotiate the challenges of today's publishing landscape.

If your interested in a highly interactive program and you care about the future of publishing and media, think about coming to IN!!!

reBlog from Kent Anderson under: The Scholarly Kitchen

Image via CrunchBase

I found this fascinating quote today:

Earlier this week, I wrote about the management trap that occurs in industries undergoing disruptive innovation. David Smith from CABI forwarded this presentation from Netflix to me. It’s excellent, and deserves to be shared widely.Kent Anderson under, The Scholarly Kitchen, Aug 2009

Culture

View more presentations from Reed Hastings.

Anderson, Gladwell, and Godin - Oh My!

Image via CrunchBase

As many of you know, there has been an interesting and spirited debate going on around Chris Anderson's (pictured) new book Free: The Future of a Radical Price, Malcolm Gladwell's review of that book, and Seth Godin's rebuttal to Gladwell's review.

Those arguments speak for themselves and you can see them on this Squidoo lens started by Seth Godin.

What I find interesting are that the tactics being used and the roles being assumed look very much like those employed during a change management effort within an organization.

There are people advocating, recognizing, and interpreting change (Anderson and Godin) and there are those seemingly resisting change or debating its impact (Gladwell).

Those that bring up alternatives or poke holes at the new direction are regarded by the "change visionaries" as resistant, threatened, or sometimes, simply ignorant.  Often, while some are truly resistant to change, many are simply raising issues and perspectives that haven't been fully considered by the change management effort.

On the other side, change visionaries are often resistant to considering anything contrary to their position. Adaptation or adjustment of the change being implemented is viewed as selling out or lacking faith.

It's the healthy debate between these groups, and the shades of gray between them, that allows the organization to find its way and avoid some costly mistakes in the process.

As General George S. Patton said, "If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn't thinking."

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Communication is Key

We hear it all the time.

Without effective communication every interpersonal relationship, every goal, every strategy, every organization, is at risk.

Misunderstandings, poor morale, and ineffective relationships rooted in poor communication are commonplace.

Effective communication is hard.  It can be uncomfortable.  It can make people angry with you.

But, it's the only way to solve problems.

When times are difficult and emotions are running high, how can we be sure we're communicating effectively (and respectfully)?

It's time to get back to basics. 

Listen to what others are saying.  Adjust your style to try and connect with them effectively where they are. 

Don't think it's the other person's job to communicate with you no matter where you are on the organizational chart.

Remove yourself emotionally from difficult conversations, at first.  Listen. Ask questions. Stick to the cold, hard facts when assessing a situation. 

However, when it comes time to implement a decision it's time to let emotions back into the picture.  

If you find that a conversation or a topic is annoying you in some way, get another person's perspective.

Effective communication is like exercise.  We all know how to do it.  We all know that we should do it. Yet it's often neglected.

Communication: Know What You Know

Image by maveric2003 via Flickr

Not everyone in a company hears the same thing at the same time.

Everyone hasn’t gone to the same meetings, had the same hallway conversations, seen the same PowerPoint decks, read the same emails, or had the same amount of time to digest the information.

This impacts change initiatives, including “restructuring efforts”, in several ways.

We can’t expect people to understand actions for which they have no context.

We can’t get frustrated when someone asks us questions about something we feel pressured to accomplish quickly.  We certainly can't get defensive.

We can’t keep information about changes from the people they impact and then expect them to jump off a cliff with us with confidence in the depth of the waters below - especially when, if we're honest, we don't know how deep they are either.

Times are tough and there are difficult decisions to be made, but people can support decisions they understand, and to which they've had some input, even when they don't like them.

When you've been included early in the communication chain, and understand the context of the message, it’s hard to be patient with those just hearing about it.

What can we do?

Include people at different stages of the thought process to properly assess the impact of the change, worry about accuracy more than secrecy.

When it comes time to spread the word more broadly, take a deep breath and remember the thought that went into defining the action. 

Remember what you know and the process your team went through to come the decision, and try to give your colleagues, audience, staff, the context they need to understand the change in front of them.

Virtual Brainstorming: Expect the Unexpected

Image via Wikipedia

Most of us have brainstormed with a group. 

Someone puts an idea out there, someone adds to it or adjusts it, and the group iterates through possibilities. 

Many ideas come to surface.  Some are “good” (meaning that for our particular purpose they have potential application). Some aren’t.

Until recently what we’ve called brainstorming has usually occurred with a limited number of participants, often people we know, over a fixed time period.

But social networking has changed all of that.  If you allow them to be, social networks can be giant brainstorming sessions. 

Throwing around ideas with a changing group of people we know, don’t know, and know of, but never actually met is a tremendous source of both innovation and energy. 

We can churn through concepts, tools, business models, or whatever interests us over an indeterminate amount of time with whom ever happens to be available.  At any time we can jump off with an idea and play with it in another context. 

It's experimentation and idea sharing that's completely organic, unstructured, and "open source."

Everyone has access.

All we need to do is stay connected to the group and see what happens - because I'm willing to bet that we’re no where near done yet!

Now, isn't that exciting!?

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