I am the Chief Energizing Officer for the Matchbox Group. We ignite. involve. inspire.
I am a keynote speaker, author and positive change agent.
I energize people to improve their cultures.
matchboxgroup.com
Ignite Passion and Performance with User Friendly Brain Tools
I am the Chief Energizing Officer for the Matchbox Group. We ignite. involve. inspire.
I am a keynote speaker, author and positive change agent.
I energize people to improve their cultures.
matchboxgroup.com
Yes and…
The art of accepting reality and building upon and adapting to it… rather than fighting, denying or complaining about it.
What changes are happening in your life that are out of your control? What would be better for you to accept and adapt to quickly? What areas would you be more successful in if you were even better at accepting and improvising a positive response.
When we disagree with someone’s idea, approach, beliefs we often respond negatively. Sometimes that’s helpful, usually it’s not. If we can affirm (yes) to what we DO like and then build (and) in a mutually beneficial direction we build motivation and openness.
Yesterday I had the pleasure of presenting “Improvisational Leadership” one of my favorite trainings. “yes and” is the capstone of the training. Every time I talk about it I feel my own skills improve as well. It’s one of the joys of teaching what you love.
Soon I plan to start posting video clips of these concepts in action or being taught. I hope that helps make much more sense of it all.
I’d be delighted to receive examples from readers about where you use “yes and” to influence your world more positively.
We can’t actually be anything we want. I’ll never be an astronaut because I get dizzy and claustrophobic. Instead I’ll put my energy into being the best of who I am. It feels completely natural and exciting for me to stand in front crowds of people helping them learn, making them laugh, helping them connecting to each other in positive ways. I love who I am in that moment — I love being me. So I “amp up” these qualities of mine and be the best of who I am whenever I can. It makes life so much richer.
Each of us have native strengths and passions that when we use them fully make us feel wonderfully alive. When we find the strengths and passions that also help us make a living we are on a path of fulfillment, achievement and increasing power.
1) What are your strengths and passions?
2) What do you do that makes you feel fully alive?
3) How can you “amp up” those strengths in your life to be even more fulfilled, successful and vibrant?
4) What are people willing to reward you for doing?
Find out what lies at the intersection of all three of these areas. That’s your Best DNA for work, or for volunteer work, or whatever area you want the rewards in.
How would you answer these questions for your employees … spouse … children?
If you want help answering the strengths questions, the book “Go Put Your Strengths to Work” and other works by Marcus Buckingham can be very helpful. (note: The author has absolutely no connection to Buckingham, only respect for his work.)
Later in 2012 Matchbox Group (matchboxgroup.com) will be putting out a self-assessment process for discovering your own Best DNA, along with tips on what to do to enhance that and make your life more successful and fulfilling.
What helps YOU create “R Responses” in yourself?
Our brains are highly influenced by what we see. The images effect what biochemicals are put into our system. Even our mental images have this effect.
When stressed out, distracted, confused, anxious or angry we can CHOOSE to focus on something that creates an “R Response”. An image like this sunset can induce dopamine and endorphins to flow in us. Equally important, it can soothe our brain so that the “stress hormone” cortisol is no longer produced.
Then we’re able to relax… our bodies can now recharge… and our minds are able to refocus…
Refocus on what we WANT, rather than what we fear. Refocus on influencing positive results, rather than reacting and worsening the situation.
What do you do to create R Responses in yourself? I’d love to hear from you!
(FYI: If you liked this photo click here to see my “Soothing Photos” album)
This blog post of Dan’s shows great research to answer this question.
This is why we say, “Influence your world”.
Make your world better and it will also make you more productive.
Improving yourself, relationships, or your organization is like a journey. We’ve all heard this many times I’m sure.
What if we look at improvement as a ROAD TRIP?
Fun…
Adventurous…
Exploratory…
Half planned and half improvised…
Where the journey is as exciting as the destination…
I’ve gone on many road trips
The best road trips are the ones where I knew it was an adventure while I was on it.
This recession is a detour, an unsought for part of all of our road trips. How can we adventure as much of it as possible?
Make your life an adventure. Go on improvement road trips.
Positive Change Questions
These three questions create positive direction, momentum and creativity–fast. I’d guess that in most situations 95% of the problems that might have been brought up in tension-causing ways are dealt with simply by answering these questions. That saves a lot of potential waste of time and emotional energy from blaming, defensiveness, avoidance, obfuscation of the goals, etc. If there are still problems to be dealt with after answering these questions, I find that people address them more positively and optimistically having already created significant momentum towards their goal(s).
Our Positive Change Questions tend to increase momentum, goal-focus and unity in a team. Each question has specific effects on the people answering them:
Goals? It is part of being human to be regularly distracted from our goals by the demands of the day, the stressors of the moment, and the frustrations caused by problems. It can be easy to become focused on fixing problems that may have little impact on our actual goals, particularly in interpersonal dynamics. Answering this question helps to refocus ourselves on the point of why we’re doing what we’re doing.
What works? This helps us build upon momentum that already exists by first asking about our past successes. This question has many powerful benefits. This builds confidence by focusing upon the capabilities, attitudes, tools and resources we already have. It helps us to remember to do what has been successful when we might otherwise have left it behind unnoticed and unappreciated. A third benefit is that we learn during these dialogues about many best practices that others have used and how they were used successfully. Then we focus on what is currently working for others. This broadens our focus by learning from others’ best practices as well. These conversations also help motivate people to strive to create best practices that will be mentioned in such discussions in the future. There is a very healthy pride that is cultivated in these discussions as well.
I’ve noticed with many clients that “What works?” is rarely used during most teams’ problem solving. This habit often lowers morale, creates meetings most people loathe, and the too common Blame Game.
What else? I find it very helpful to do this after the “What’s working” discussion so that we are building upon the momentum and thus it is far easier to keep focused on solutions and away from blame.
It is helpful to “think out of the box” regularly, too. Allowing a free flow of ideas on other alternatives is the fundamental step in innovation. I’ve found it also builds a sense of vitality and creativity in teams. Done well, it cultivates a culture in which ideation is rewarded and innovation is fostered. It is very helpful to have commonly agreed upon brainstorming guidelines during this stage.
An Old Sea Dog Can Learn New Tricks
I want to tell you why my approach has changed so radically over twenty years as an Organizational Development practitioner. I want to tell you why I love my work now more than ever and why my clients do as well. I’ve grown into using the OD approach known in Europe and Japan as Solutions Focus1. We’ll start with a true story.
It’s December, 2008. I’m in a conference room in The Mariner’s House in downtown Boston. It’s an Inn where sailors have been visiting for 160 years. You can practically smell the salt in the air and feel the roll of the ship underneath your feet. I’m facilitating an inter-sector collaboration event with forty-five members of the US Coast Guard. Bill Schenkelberg, my internal partner, approaches me. Bill is the Special Agent in Charge of the Coast Guard Investigative Services. He’s one of those rare clients that really understands both the nitty gritty challenges his agents face and the concepts of organizational development. He and his eight liaison agents are the hosts for this event, to which they’ve invited several other Coast Guard sectors. He has a worried look on his face. “Some of these guys look tense. Most of them only see my men when we’re investigating somebody within the Coast Guard. Are you still confident that we can pull this thing off?”
I survey the room looking at the inflow of sturdy sailors of all ages. These people look like they could face down the perfect storm. I doubt they would tolerate anything that is not eminently practical. Looking back at Bill, I put as much confidence into my voice as I can and say, “It worked with the Transit Authority, and they had a much tougher situation. These are good people here who are passionate about their jobs. We’re using language designed to work with their physiology. It’s very powerful. Plus, we’re giving them a chance to achieve collaboration, which is in everybody’s best interest.”
As Bill begins his introduction, I notice a burly weather-bitten man with his arms crossed and a look of real skepticism on his face. Let’s call him “Mike.” Seeing Mike’s dubious expression, I now need to reassure myself. To do that, I think about the training and preparation we’d already done and begin to relax. Bill and his crew of eight agents had proven to be as tough and resilient mentally as they were physically and emotionally. They had learned the brain science I’d taught them. They’d really grasped the concepts on how to craft language that motivates others rather than scaring them into fight, flight or freeze. Most importantly, they had created very moving “Solution-Focus Power Reframes” about the value of each sector and the importance of collaborating with each other.
As the Power Reframe presentations are happening, I can see most people relaxing, with smiles appearing more frequently and more and more nods of agreement. During our first discussion there is an almost tangible spirit of openness and sharing. Bill and I tell each other, “Things are going well.”
Later in the training, I lead the group in a feedforward2 exercise. Mike approaches me still looking skeptical. In a deep growl he asks, “What’s the point of this positive stuff anyway? Does this activity really make any difference?” Taking a breath to keep myself calm I reply, “In ten minutes (gesturing to the group), they will tell you the answer to your question. Yet I can tell you now if you’d like.” At his nod, I continue, “My experience and many scientific studies have shown that people are much more open to new ideas when you build on the strengths they have and focus them on positive outcomes. There’s a clear place to address problems, but a vast majority of the time focusing on solutions is faster, easier and a whole lot more fun.” Mike’s expression softens a bit, but he still looks a bit dubious.
As the activity continues I muse on Mike’s question. I think back to how I became so convinced of the power of more positive approaches. Twenty years ago when I first began consulting with organizations I used the classic root cause analysis approach.
I still remember the one event fifteen years ago that was my catalyst for using Solution-Focus with my clients.
We were in a beautiful conference center in central Massachusetts. I was facilitating thirty members of a small medical clinic – helping them to improve their teamwork. We brainstormed a list of problems with their teamwork and began a Gap Analysis to see what needed to be done to fix the problems. I watched the group closely and noticed that their motivation continuously waned as we talked about the problems. This distressed me as they had started out enthusiastic and optimistic when we did our team simulations. I asked myself, “How I would feel if I were in their group right now?” I realized with a start that I would also be depressed by the conversations we’d been having. I then realized that I didn’t use this approach with my own life because I didn’t like the way it felt and found it so negative that I’d often abandon problem-focused efforts mid-stream. So why was I using it with them? … Because that’s how I’d been trained.
Over the next few weeks I thought about what actually works best for me personally, and what works with my own employees. Over time, I realized that focusing on three topics energized and directed us very well. I sat down and wrote down what I came up with:
(Note: Years later these topics evolved into my Solution-Focus Change Questions – see full article)
I began to get very excited about trying this with my consulting clients. I also began to feel very nervous. I worried, “This just wasn’t the way it was done. What if clients don’t like it? What if they find it too ‘touchy feely’? But I decided it was worth the risk.
To my great relief and excitement the approach of focusing on solutions not only worked, it worked far better! It also was faster, which surprised me at first. Then I realized that often focusing on problems takes the group down rat holes of blame and defensiveness, and then it takes a long time to get people focused on the goals again. This new approach was also more fun. This didn’t surprise me as talking about strengths and energizing visions is generally motivating.
Over the years I experimented with many ways of guiding my clients to focus on solutions. I kept honing the concepts, tools and my approaches. I took courses in Appreciative Inquiry3, learned about building on strengths4, and studied emotional intelligence5. I began using Marshal Goldsmith’s feedforward model2. I loved them all and adapted my favorite ideas and concepts into an approach that I began to call Solution-Focus. I discovered more and more research that supported my experience6. I was delighted to discover a burgeoning movement in Europe called, delightfully enough, Solutions Focus1!
This led me to using the Solution-Focus Change Questions with the Coast Guard. Responding to these questions was clearly building energy and focus, whereas in the past focusing on the problems between the sectors had often led to more conflict.
The Coast Guard members are done with the feedforward activity and I bring myself back to the present. I ask them each to share one word about what the Feedforward activity was like for them. The energy builds in the room as they excitedly throw out words like “enlightening”, “engaging”, “fun”, “educational”, “helpful”, “insightful” and “energizing”. I look at Mike to see if he is satisfied with their responses. He nods at me thoughtfully. The smiles and creative ideas people have shared understandably build far more credibility than my reassurances had.
The feedback at the end of the event includes phrases such as “built bridges”, “I now see how much we need each other”, “I have great ideas for better cooperation”, etc. Bill and I feel great and talked excitedly about next steps to keep the momentum going. The icing on the cake, however, is when Mike approaches me and asks, “Can I have your business card? This would be really helpful in my sector too.”
The views expressed in this publication belong solely to the author. They do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Coast Guard.
You’ve heard that “You are what you eat?”. It’s the same thing for what you think.
This can be frightening, and yet exciting when you think of the potential to influence yourself for the better…
What we think about…
… creates or reinforces neural networks that make up our personality, our sense of the world, even effect how we respond to our loved ones.
You always influence who you are when you…
Ask yourself…
I’d love to hear your answers and your results!
Bob