Shift to the Future

As I've taken on leadership roles in different organizations I've learned a lot about people.  When I was younger and much less wiser, I used to get frustrated when people wouldn't respond positively to the direction or support I was so cleverly providing.  Some of my team members would respond very istockphoto# 11806154 well, others so-so, and then another group that didn't get it or passively resisted.  Little did I understand at the time that 'people are different'.  Fast forward to my wiser self (from many schools of hard knocks along the way), and I believe I get it now.  I appreciate the differences I see in my team members.  People complement each other's performance with their differences when they understand each other better. This year I am focusing on helping my team do some self-discovery.  I started with a simple activity at our last all team meeting in September.  The activity was drawn from Bruce Wellman's book Groups at Work on pa

I believe in teaching people to 'fish' rather than 'fishing' for them.  In practice I have found this philosophy when working with my staff and 'clients' to be a powerful way to grow people and their capacity.  It takes time and patience and you have to hold yourself back from just doing 'it' your self. Some years ago, my wife Shelley decided to create an online business where she needed to learn a ton about a variety of technologies, in a hurry.  She would call me with lots of questions and although I think it frustrated her at the time, I would respond with questions, not answers.  I would ask her what she thinks she should do and in a round about way, help her get to the answer or possible answers.  It didn't take long for her to stop calling... :-)  I often do the same with my staff and the clients I support.  It would be so much easier just to answer the specific question or do it for them but then they would be dependent on me which does no

Something has been on my mind as of late and I feel compelled to write about it.  I am grappling with why technology is so often pushed to the background into a supporting role.  I know, I’m biased right, I’m a technology advocate.  It’s true but that is not why I believe technology should always be first when considering an activity, a way of working, a way of learning, and a way of teaching others. Way back in 1985, my wife and I got married.  We planned a honey moon trip to California.  We bought some paper maps and had access to, yes, an atlas!  We figured out our general plan then as proud BCAA members, asked for driving maps to be produced.  We studied and followed those maps carefully all the way down and back over the next couple of weeks.  Now fast forward to 2015, we are planning a trip to Spain.  Should we use the same approach with the same tools (technology) to plan a trip?  No of course not.  We are using Google Maps and other Internet resources to plan things out, much

When I was a young student we had to do our school work mostly independently.  It kind-of matched to the workplace where people mostly contributed individually.  I remember in university one of my computer science professors would say “I don’t care how you get the assignments done but I will get you on the test”.  His point was that if you don’t do or understand the work that you turn in you will not be able to pass the final which was worth 50% of the grade.  I think things have changed where we value collaboration, reuse, and innovation more than just following the rules, doing it yourself, or doing it ‘my way’.  I certainly value a balance of this from those that are part of my team.  But, what do students in our schools today experience?  I was speaking with some teachers the other day and the English department head asked about using a tool Turnitin .  This tool ensures that “[s]tudent work is instantly checked for potential plagiarism using pattern recognition algorithms.  An O

It is so easy to be busy in our jobs.  You know, doing email, returning phone calls, and having meetings.  Some days on my commute home I wonder what happened during the day.  Busy does not equate to progress and most definitely isn’t strategic.  What does it mean to ‘be strategic’?  Why is this important to making positive progress?  Is strategic planning still a relevant business function in this ever fast changing world? My wife and I visited Greece this past year and saw amazing examples of architecture and focused energy in creating complex structures and infrastructure.  When you think of the resources they had at their disposal, it seems impossible that they could have done the things they did 1000’s of years ago.  Take the Isthmian Canal for example. It was created to replace the more difficult method of rolling ships across land on logs.  But, it took incredible focus and resources to complete.  It was a very strategic goal designed to make far faster and easier passage fro