Communication is an area that we can forever improve on and its an important area for anyone interested in personal development.  With my recent discovery about Appreciative Inquiry and looking more carefully at how to employ a new method of communication, I’ve realized there is much we do in communication that is based on habits.  These habits are often harmful and promote bad communication styles.  Most of us are trained to be advocates in our communication, that is one who argues there case, pushes what they want and seeks to find approval of that communicated message and to find followers doing so (Oh ohhh…, that might include a few bloggers then as well!).

The One Communication Mistake We All Make

There is one mistake everyone makes from time to time in the way they communicate.  This is when we send our message instead of communicating in a way that ensures our message is in fact received.  This happens when we are impatient or not considering the other person’s perspective and we simply think that making our voice heard and our message sent is in fact communicating.  Well, it is not.  Communication is all about how you actually deliver your message and so you cannot simply send your message without knowing it is actually received.

Don’t make the mistake of sending your message simply to get your ideas out without regard for others.  Keep your ego at bay when you want to be heard and consider whether it is an appropriate time for the receiver as well as you to communicate.  Remember, if they are not going to hear it, then it isn’t worth saying.

Getting Past Being Right

The next mistake often made in communication is that of having to be right.  Many of us just love to be right and it is a conversation and healthy communication killer.  If you do not stop to listen to other perspectives and accept new ideas in the way you communicate, this having to be right habit will surface often and it a tough problem to break.  Trust me, I know from experience.  I can’t say I’ve broken this habit myself but its something I’m much more aware of and I do notice it and stop myself often.  If you simply state that you disagree AFTER listening to another person’s angle and actually ensuring you understand it, you can still debate things in conversation but if you have a habit of telling someone else how they are wrong, you can immediate kill the conversation.

Criticism

Criticism for some people is very easy and its often the first thing on your mind when you hear other people’s ideas.  I think this is closely related to the bad habit of having to be right and this one comes more subtle but even more dangerous because often it isn’t even founded in anything.  Being critical and voicing it often comes very easy to most.  Its a way to express creative ideas but unfortunately, when it is delivered as critism, it is often a power trip for a creative mind to show their creative powers over another’s idea.

All three of these bad communication habits lead to adversarial communications and they can harm your relationships with other people.  Be aware of these in your conversations and look to eliminate these bad habits by replacing them with good communication habits.  Listen more than you speak, try to actually understand what others are telling you before debating it and don’t tell them they are wrong or make generalizations about people with words like always and never.  Keep your criticism at bay and do your best to keep conversations going by showing interest in others, inquiring more about what they want to talk about and by staying open minded of other’s ideas.  These steps will help you practise good communication techniques and can lead you away from the bad habits that bring upon adversarial communication.

Posted by Mike King under Relationships | 21 Comments »

Author: J. Barry Griswell and Bob Jennings

An Unconventional Guide to Achieving Uncommon Business Success

The Adversity Paradox is a fantastic business book.  It looks at how obstacles and setbacks in life (adversity) can create the experience a person needs to overcome such challenges and development themselves to improve their circumstances and prepare themselves to be better equipped in the future.  It’s a book with stories and a close examination of what are the main contributors to people overcoming tough circumstances in life to be successful.  It specific looks at this paradox of how great challenge and some times suffering can lead to so many later great things.  There are a number of factors in those challenges that if handled well allow a person to overcome it and turn things around.  This of course is not something that happens to everyone, but those that do overcome the paradox seem to have a lot of similarities and understanding them and learning from them allow each of us to better prepare for adversity and to achieve more.

Business Savvy

The book first looks at the term business savvy and explains it as those who understand how to do well in business, consistently achieve their business goals and to be proficient in the realm of business.  This is something you develop through practice and experience and there are a number of core competencies of a business savvy profile:

• Systems and linear thinking: Big picture perspective with ability to execute smaller consecutive tasks
• Continuous thinking: Having forward or visionary skills to steer and react quickly to future events
• Synthesizing: Able to turn data into meaningful and useful information
• Knowing what you don’t know: Seeing gaps, working to fill them through learning and through the help of others
• Communication: Solid skills to communicate at all levels
• Empathy: To recognize and understand the thoughts and feelings of others

“And Then Some”

Throughout the book the stories are shown to have each of the characters practicing an over arching theme where no matter what is expected, no matter what the circumstances and no matter how difficult something is, you should always work to go above and beyond which is described and doing the task or job “and them some”.  Always that little bit more.  Each of the characters practiced the idea of “and them some” and it continually payed off, not immediately, but eventually, it always payed off.  This is big contributor to overcoming these challenges.

This concept is put forth as a universal one where you can practice “and them some” in anything you do, which I personally think is a great message on its own in the book with or without the paradox of adversity.  If you gain anything from the book at all then I hope it is this concept since it is so simple yet so effective. I can’t stress enough how powerfully this is portrayed in the book and the chapter on “and them some” is easily worth the price of the book alone and I’ve already gone back several times to re-read pieces as it truly is brilliant!

Next, this chapter expands to look at the concept of “and them some” in a general sense of self improvement and outlines in text and pictures two main steps.

The first step, that any adversity has two options:

1. Wallowing and pessimism
2. Acceptance and analysis

It takes a step to progress from 1 to 2 and this is the key to overcoming adversity.  Move from 1 to 2 quickly and then get into the next main step of the self improvement process.

The second step requires using introspection (more on that below) to look specifically at the other human capital components to identify what can be done to better oneself.

Human Capital

1. Introspection

This is the practice of observing and evaluating oneself to assess your personality, goals, performance, ideas, capabilities, strengths and weaknesses.  This skills collides with our egos and so an honest assessment is very difficult and this skill takes time to hone.  One cannot truly assess the other human capital components until this skill develops.  However, it must be conducted with the help of what the authors call, “mirrors” or other people who can honestly provide feedback about our character and human capital components.  This understanding helps us grow and realize what we need to change to direct our efforts to improve ourselves.

2. Values

This component outlines the values and beliefs a person has.  What is it that they are founded in and can rely on for extended periods through their life. Matching your behaviors then with these lasting values is what allows you to stay consistent and stay on purpose through your career.  Doing what is right and good is outlined as an important factor to success and moral leadership is hinted at as something that defines true success.  I love that and I definitely agree with the authors that this component ought to have a spiritual foundation where the values steer a person towards a purpose in life and that only living that purpose can deliver true lasting happiness.  Ahh…

3. Work Character

It just keeps getting better and I particularly loved this component as its one that I have changed a lot with (my own introspection) and so now I value this component a lot to how it has impacted me personally and in my career.  Anyway, work character is outlined here as how committed and hard working you are.  Of course it goes deeper than that and to me its a lot about the attitude you have when it comes to work as well and its an easy place to practice the “and then some” concept from above.

4. Purpose and Passion

This one connects with work character because to have a good attitude about work while consistently working hard and always putting in a little more than expected, you really need to love what you do.  You need to find a way to enjoy your work and be passionate about it.  One line from the book that I think deserved far more attention is this piece of great advice:

The trick is to view work as a means to far greater benefits or enjoyment.

This is just brilliant and I hope that you take a minute to really think about that and your own work.  I personally can find joy in my work easily and be passionate about it because of that statement above, not always the work itself.  I find it troubling that people always say they work 1/3 of their lives so you need to love your work as its the majority of your life.  I hate that message and its really not true anyway.  People only work 17% of there entire lives so there is clearly much more to life than work.  Let your work feed your passions and bring your passions and purpose into your work, not the other way around!  Anyway, back to the book, purpose and passions are obviously important to have included in your work and they are definitely an important component in this human capital outline from the book.

5. Thirst For Knowledge

And the fifth component wraps this up well with a look at learning.  How appropriate as the enitre book is about changing from adversity and improving oneself to have business success.  This thirst for knowledge and the power of applying knowledge is transformational and can keep you on an upward success trajectory for life.  Life long learning is obviously something I write about often, I completely feel the same way about it as the authors and I too, have had that shift in my life where I realize life long learning is now a given for me, not some kind of band wagon I am on.  This type of realizating and the transformation it brings can be sparked by overcoming adversity through knowledge but its more than it, it feeds life long change, powers you to be excited about doing what you are asked “and then some” and it keeps you looking for more and more areas of introspection and building your work character.  Knowledge brings on curiosity and these thigns are absolutely essential to great business success.

Summary

So, I don’t have much criticisms about the book.  Personally, I thought that 80% of the content was packed into the first few chapters and the second half had lesser value but overall, the stories and expansions in the second half of the book certainly added more understanding and were still well worthwhile reading.  The first half is simply brilliant and I know I will be recommending this to more people and re-reading sections of it again.  The concepts and messages are realistic and can be applied whether the adversity is experienced first hand or not.  The book states, there are no secret insights, quick success steps or other tricks or promises, its straight forward and offers accounts from those tested with adversity to put those misfortunes to good use and gain business savvy from them.

I certainly learned a lot from the book and as you tell from this review, I loved the content and the message of the book so yes, I definitely recommend it to anyone interested in business success or really, any level of self improvement since the patterns can be studied and learned from in any area of life.

Posted by Mike King under Book Reviews | 11 Comments »

After Armen’s list of 100, my own 100 Ways to be a better leader and now several readers creating their own lists of 100 topics, I thought I would continue this trend and build one more on 100 ways simplify your life and mind. I’ve written a couple articles before on this topic and I’ve kept a few items from those articles on my list here, but most of this is new and it is really a useful way to find things to start doing. As with any of these 100 lists, obviously you can’t do all of these things (I certainly don’t) but you can pick some items on the list and start with them to simplify things in your life. I’d love for you to comment and add your own items or why not create your own list of 100 items, link back to these if they have inspired you and challenge your own readers to do the same and keep these lists going!

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Simplify Your Actions

1. Start everyday with your most important task, leaving other ones undone
2. Do what you said you will do first
3. Say no when you are already committed and asked to take on more
4. Ask others for help whenever you need it
5. Finish things completely, don’t leave it only to have to come back again and again
6. Pick one thing at a time to do and focus on it
7. Make the most time for your passions and purposeful work
8. Leave spare time for yourself unscheduled and uncommitted
9. Prioritize your todo list
10. Keep one todo list and keep it short (only the most important things should be on it at any time)
11. Take time to be in solitude
12. Take time to pray and meditate
13. Make wasteful actions (like TVwatching or pointless internet surfing) more difficult to do to help avoid them.
14. Find and eliminate other wasteful actions in your life
15. Develop habits and daily routines to practise important actions
16. Read every single day
17. Plan your week and all major tasks for that week
18. Review your accomplishments each week
19. Be grateful for what you have, what you can do, and for everything in your life
20. Turn off your cell phone
21. Turn off all notifications on your computer from IM, email or other popups
22. Eat simple meals and don’t cook things that don’t need to be cooked
23. Eat less, which lets you also prepare less and cleanup less and store less
24. Automate any bills, payments, and money transactions that you can
25. Ignore distractions from media
26. Commute by bicycle or public transit instead of the busy freeway
27. Use commuting time wisely by reading or listening to books
28. Consider a career or job change to reduce stress
29. Find and maintain routines for day to day things

Simplify Your Stuff

30. Get rid of clothes you no longer wear or have worn in 6 months
31. Sell or give away household items you rarely / never use
32. Eliminate 2 things for every one new thing you acquire
33. Lend things out to friends often and don’t ask for it back if you don’t need it
34. Buy less stuff by only buying basic needs
35. Move to a smaller house or living space and get rid of all extra stuff
36. Give away books when you are done with them and let someone else enjoy them
37. Give up some electronic gadgets and do without them
38. Engage in simple hobbies that don’t require a lot of stuff (music, art, perhaps writing?)
39. De-clutter your living space and don’t keep any trinkets or excessive decorations
40. Consider going more green since this requires reducing things that consume power / energy
41. Get rid of your televisions or at least reduce the time you spend watching
42. Get rid of other media distractions in your life
43. Put a sign on your door/mailbox asking not to receive any flyers or unsolicited mail
44. Don’t carry all your credit or debit cards, just a small amount of cash for emergency
45. Downsize your vehicles or sell one
46. Clear out all clutter and extra stuff from your vehicle
47. Spend a weekend and pretend you are going to move, then clean out and get rid of everything you don’t need
48. Have a place for everything and keep it organized in place
49. Label, simplify and organize your file systems (both physical and electronic)
50. Consolidate your email accounts, bank accounts, RSS feeds and others
51. Recycle and reuse as much as possible
52. Give to those who have less than you
53. Volunteer your time for service to others
54. Keep a vegetable garden
55. Grow some plants and flowers
56. Enjoy nature’s company

Simplify Your Relationships

57. Be honest with others (it will help avoid complex issues and conflict)
58. Treat everyone with respect, not just your close friends or relationship
59. Treat everyone fairly, don’t complicate things with favoritism
60. Trust others without them having to earn it first
61. Accept people for who they are and don’t expect them to change
62. Compare yourself only to yourself from the past, no one else
63. Learn to say, “No”
64. Ask your friends and family for things they are looking for, and give them any items you can do without that you have
65. Keep all your contacts and address book items in one place
66. Involve your whole family with simplifying your life
67. Tell your friends about what you want to achieve by simplifying
68. Pick some of the actions above and do them with a friend
69. Focus on activities for doing things instead of buying
70. Spend less time with the “negatrons” around you and more time with positive people
71. Apologize quickly for any hurtful actions
72. Spend time in private with a significant other each week
73. Go for walks and have time to just talk with your friends and family (you don’t always need to be doing anything)
74. Make a gift for someone else instead of buying one
75. Write a personal thank you note or letter to a friend
76. Call someone you care for with no reason other than to tell them you were thinking of them and wish them a wonderful day
77. Walk away from all gosip and don’t participate in those conversations
78. Put family meals at home first and don’t let work get in the way
79. Stay completely disconnected from work on weekends and vacations
80. Listen to others and stop talking so much yourself

Simplify your Thoughts

81. Be content with life for health, love and happiness instead of with belongings
82. Keep less goals and plans (focus on just 2 or 3 at a time)
83. Exercise often as this clears the mind and keeps you healthy longer through life
84. Make time to do what you love and to provide relief from stress
85.Make a list of all your simple pleasures in life and pick an item from it to do every day.
86. Evaluate new things by asking “Will this help to simplify my life?”
87. Let go of perfectionism
88. Find what calms you and visualize it to reduce stress
89. Be positive and look for the best in things
90. Be anxious for nothing and live more in the moment
91. Let go of things from the past
92. Face and get over your fears
93. Always look for ways to improve oneself
94. Note and express gratitude
95. Know and stick to your limits for commitments
96. Seek knowledge only to apply it as wisdom
97. Look for and express love to yourself and others
98. Choose to be happy and at peace with yourself
99. All that you express, comes back to you, so think and express what you want for yourself
100. Seek and love God and He will provide, you need not worry about anything else

Posted by Mike King under Life | 46 Comments »

Leadership on its own is a heavily debated topic as to what clearly defines a leader.  I’ve outlined many points of what leadership means to be in my leadership series and I provided 100 example actions to be a better leader.  While there is generally a consensus of what leadership is, one factor in leadership I find still often debated is that of moral leadership.

What is Moral Leadership?

First, I need to explore what moral leadership is. It’s more than leading others and having influence, it introduces how one does that into the equation.  It needs a leader to act, follow and call others to a higher standard, a standard that is directed by what is thought to be good or right by a common standard.  That standard is generated by a group of people, recognized by some authority and may even be based on spiritual foundations.  It’s these types of standards that are expected in decisions and actions of moral leadership.

More and more is our world experiencing global crisis and needing leaders to join forces to battle for the greater good.  There seems to be continual uncovering of unethical behavior in business, politics, religion and all areas of society around the world.  There are no shortage of leaders making this happen as behind each one of these stories lies a leader who brought about the action and behavior in question.  They chase money and let greed bring them into a position often seen as heroic leadership where ruthless actions, self centered decisions and environmentally disconnected standards allow them to feel what they are doing is acceptable and unfortunately, their followers, many of society’s success criteria and the media encourage this kind of destructive leadership.  This is exactly why moral leadership is easy to debate because there is no easy to agree on good or right way to lead.  I hope to make a difference on that in my own leadership and I know that there are just as many morally grounded leaders out there as there are ones in question here.

Demonstrating Moral Leadership?

As you know, leadership is about leading others and influencing them to behave a particular way.  Moral leadership requires you to always look at what is right and lead others towards that.  Moral choices come from a person’s character as well, they do not always come about by rational thinking.  This makes moral leadership more difficult as there is a personal characteristic that must be evident to onlookers to believe choices are in fact moral ones.  Directions that a moral leader takes do not always please the most people and so it is often counter to what people think a leader ought to do.  Leading by popularity and influence alone will not typically create a moral path and the sacrifices that must be made around moral dilemas are often costly ones in terms of popularity, fame or wealth.

With morality formed by different sets of values and principles it is often difficult to truly have agreed upon standards and so moral dilemas do not always have an clear right and a clear wrong.  They also often face a decision where there are two competing goods. One must choose based on the greater good in this case defined by their own principles and standards.

However challenging moral leadership may seem, it also brings about an opportunity to be a leader of morality.  Can you look at your decisions and actions and say that you do so by a moral standard?  Do you demonstrate decisions based on what you know to be right regardless of the circumstances or influence it might bring about? Let me suggest that you start with considering your own moral ground. What principles do you want to demonstrate when leading?  Are those principles known to your followers?  Would your decisions be based on what is right for others?  Do your decisions promote respect to others and do you practice servant leadership?  It’s these types of actions that most would agree are for the greater good and for what is right.

Teaching and Promoting Moral Leadership

Seeing as moral leadership is greatly needed in this world of struggles I want to also encourage people to look at teaching and promoting it.  Teaching morals is something done by those with influence, parents, teachers, business leaders and anyone in a leadership position.  Morals are something that must be rooted in your character, your decisions and your actions so that teaching it is a matter of demonstration, intention and deliberate choices.  Our children and youth could clearly benefit from it but also those around us in our lives and businesses.

Take note of the morals you teach and look at what you stand up for as a leader.  Are you willing to stand out in a group, do what you know is right even if that is not the consensus or immediate reaction or preferred response.  If you don’t promote what is right, who will?

This whole subject started when I was reading an article called, “Valueless Leadership” at All Things Workplace and that article includes several examples of leading with values and the comments got into moral leadership which I wanted to expand on.  An example there was one of a a student returning a purse with $1000 in it and that the fellow students all concluded she should have kept the purse.  The teacher didn’t say anything and didn’t want to impose their own views of whether this was the right or wrong thing to do.  My reaction, “Unbelievable!”  Of course I would expect a teacher to impose some teachings of right and wrong and I would hope that teachers of young students would in fact do so.  There was a perfect opportunity to teach the class what was good in this and she was afraid to take it.  So my friends, please make your stand for what is good in this world and take every chance you get to teach and promote treating others how they want to be treated, demonstration respect and good judgement of right and wrong in your own moral leadership!

My own experience and development deepen everyday my conviction that our moral progress may be measured by the degree in which we sympathize with individual suffering and individual joy.  ~George Eliot

Posted by Mike King under Success | 18 Comments »

Favorite Picks Recently

Here are a few of my favorite items I’m either been sent or have come across in my browsing and reading online in the last little while.  Not as big of list as usual, I’ll admit.  Its due to much less reading lately online and work with other things, either way, here are some gems I’ve come across, I hope you enjoy em!

• How Giving Changes Everything at ZenHabits
• I made another list of top 50 productivity blogs over at EvenCarmichael
• An interesting series of 5 articles over at BunnyGotBlog called, Advertising Towards Dummies
• A 2 part article that is most interesting on Thinking Traps
• An excellent 3 part series on Comparing Ourselves to Others
• 33 Things You Should Stop Doing to Double Your Productivity
• Five Essential Pre-Interview Strategies for Job Seekers
• 100 Inspirational Blog Posts for Personal Change
• First Comes the Fear Then the Blessing – I love this examination as it lets us look at what creates the fear and also what benefits we could have if that fear is eliminated
• Top productivity and personal development blogs
• If you don’t already know about David Zinger and the employment engagement network, check out some of his top reading list blogs and join the network!
• An excellent article on valueless leadership with a discussion well worth reading.

Carnivals

And as usual, I continue to publish some content to blog carnivals for promotion and to expose to and read from other bloggers.  Here are a few of the ones I’ve used recently:

• Carnival of Inspiration and Motivation at Positive and Successful Lifestyle Tips
• The June 7th Leadership Development Carnival
• Blog Carnival of Personal Power for 31 May 2009

Posted by Mike King under Life | 11 Comments »