Christmas - and a New Present

A sleigh-bell away from the end of the year, you may be looking ahead to new strategies.

I'd like you to have the strongest possible platform on which to build a template for success.

Let's first dig the foundations. Part of this Present is a new toolkit...! To make magic happen, you have first to believe that you can - and have others believe that you will.

Here's one for starters. Conditioning. We all have it - whether it's from our parenting, or our workplace experiences, or what happened as we went through school; all our experiences combine to shape our world view and set our world line on a particular track we might well want to change. A strong sign that something is looping is when it appears repetitively - the same kind of outcome when you've been in a job for a while, regular arguments with family members, showdowns with colleagues, anything in fact that we're likely to label as "Always". Something 'always' seems to happen when it's got itself ingrained in our circuitry.

When a group or team are first faced with the prospect of self-creating, they are surprised that so many others present in the room share their experience of being stuck in loops. Infinite ribbons of probability always seem to collapse into the same kind of shape, and inevitably (with the brain being what it is) outcomes are typically foreseen to be negative. "Nothing's going to change around here," is a classic example of undesirable mentality.

The first ribbon to come off the wrapping sighs that a positive approach is waiting with bated breath to be invited in...

Now we come to Communication - everyone's first choice of "what needs to change around here." We are not gifted, as Robert Burns well knew, with the ability to see ourselves as others see us. In fact it's impossible, for we only have the capacity for incoming information as far as our five senses are concerned. We don't get to see what goes out at the same time as we are measuring what comes in - this is a law etched in the Uncertainty Principle.

Having unwrapped it, you can take a look at a new kind of communication and build fresh components into your strategy. Make sure they fit the needs of the human beings in your employ - Maslow had some good things to say about self-actualisation.

Here's the real clincher - wait for the mistletoe :} * {: Confidence. When people have confidence in a purposeful process, they enjoy being part of it. When first starting a job, we take it on with some degree of confidence that we can succeed. This zest can quickly be eroded by behaviours that point to failings, shortfalls and unmet targets as first ports of call. In a dysfunctional culture, the emphasis is on what hasn't been achieved.

Turning this around takes a little time, for there's a trust factor to consider and this is why trying to change things from in-house is a shot to disaster. Employees at the grass roots already have a strong impression of the management and vice versa - shaking off confirmation bias can't be done as an inside job. Fresh perspectives come from new introductions of new ideas from new faces; this free-thinking approach is essential to raise an organisation from despondency and inertia to enthusiasm and mission alignment.

Here are some stocking fillers:

Warrington Worldwide's concise appraisal of why engagement initiatives commonly fail:

 (but trust me, you can't sort this out with AI..!)

Manpower reported in June on what's stalling the engineering sector right now:

(with 10 useful steps to consider in your strategy)

LumApps published a hefty guide to engagement essentials in May:

 (you won't solve these issues with an App, though :)

Now, you know about the ROI of £4 for every £1 invested in people, it's rumbling all over the search engines. But what do we know about what's stopping strategies from getting off the ground? 85% of CEOs believe there is a direct link between engagement and profitability, but only 22% can identify root causes of the problems.

On January 29th, the Engagement Brainstormers will again discuss long-term strategy in changing negative cultures into positive ones - a chance to share experiences with other leaders facing similar things in a comfy, confidential environment away from the office. If you'd like to be there, email me here:

kathy@worldlinetraining.com

(And now you know why I called it WorldLine!)

Happy holidays, my friend x