Studying what people actually do…
January 22, 2012
Well I thought that it might motivate me to actually get on with my doctoral studies if I thought about it from a practitioner not an academic point of view again. I started my Executive Doctorate at Cranfield in October 2008 with a desire to shed light on what it takes to change the way people work – to move beyond prescriptive answers to delve into what’s happening when people embrace change. I’ve done some serious digging into literature and even more serious learning about research from a social science rather than natural science perspective. I’m very heartened that there is a ‘practice turn’ happening in management science, with credence now given in the best journals to ‘what people do’. I’m hopeful that some of my work will be accepted for the Europeanan Organisational Studies conference this year, and I’m even more hopeful that I’ll get my act together, write up what I need to write up and get through this process before I’m 51. If anyone is interested to talk about my work and thinking – from a practical, or academic point of view then I’d be happy to hear from you. But if nothing else this blog post will nudge me to keep going everytime I look at it.
At the start of my 50th year
January 1, 2012
…just wanted to marvel at life and the opportunities we have to come close to others and share what this world offers us. I don’t do my own parties, but I love other people’s, so it was wonderful to share the 50th birthday party of the friend I’ve loved for the longest yesterday – Jo. At 50 we’ve only just started – let’s hope we’re only half way and make a better job of the second half than the first.
What fantastic advertising
December 13, 2011
I was delighted to read in the paper this morning that there is support for the fantastic Christmas ad developed by www.churchads.net
The pdf of the ad is too big to upload here – but I’d encourage you to take a look. The message…
However you dress it up – Christmas starts with Christ.
Hope you have a great one.
Life is not a problem to solve, but a gift to be enjoyed
December 4, 2011
On a recent trip to Kuala Lumpur – 2 x 12 hours on a plane with just my thoughts for company – I was reading a great little book called “Do nothing to change your life” by an Anglican bishop – Steven Cotterill. Whether you have faith in a God, or no faith, this little book is very thought provoking and it made me reflect on the busyness of our lives, and our striving for….. what? My good friend Rachael always tells me that I’m too busy looking forward to my desert and so don’t enjoy my starter – and I’m always going on at my kids to ‘plan ahead’ and ‘think about what’s coming up next’ and they tell me that perhaps I should try just enjoying now. Now as a good projects person, I do believe that it’s important to plan, to anticipate, to look ahead at things that may or may not occur and what we can do to make sure we meet our objectives. I still firmly believe that. But stopping for a while to reflect that actually the point of life is not to solve a problem, but just a gift to enjoy has made a different to my life this weekend, and I’ll be trying to remember it every day.
What destroys confidence?
November 12, 2011
For some time I’ve been going on to anyone who would listen that one of the big benefits of making your perception of risks explicit (rather than keeping them to yourself) is to make sure that others with a vested interest have confidence in you. People think I’m mad, believing that talking about worries makes other people worried. I think that in business, as in life, a problem shared is a problem that you’ve got at least double the effort to solve. I was SO pleased therefore this week to be sitting in a Programme Board meeting for a large government programme and hearing the Minister in charge express that “if people are not knocking on my door telling me about risks, it makes me worried that people aren’t thinking enough – it destroys my confidence that we can deliver”.
It’s not negative, or pointless to share what you think is risky and why. It’s a really positive thing to do to engage others who can help you in meeting objectives.
Vengeance is mine?
July 1, 2011
Romans 12:19
Never take your own revenge, beloved, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, “VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY,” says the Lord.
This is a true story, told by a guy called Tom who works for an international oil company in Nigeria. I was teaching Tom and 23 of his colleagues in Nigeria in June this year.
On 30th April 2011, Tom was kidnapped by an organised and armed gang on his way home from a Church meeting at 9pm. To cut a long story short, he was taken far away to the bush, and verbally intimidated for 4 days until a ransom was paid for his release. He was telling his story to our group as part of a ’safety moment’ at the start of the day. He told us how his faith enabled him to be released unharmed, and with total understanding and forgiveness of his captors, with no desire to have them arrested or otherwise punished. He told his colleagues that if the same happens to them (there is little people can do to avoid the situation other than never leaving their house) then the key things to do are:
- Be in control of your own emotions, so you don’t show anger, or desperation, but instead show total respect to the captors. His faith in God, and his belief that his kidnappers were loved by Jesus just as much as he was enabled him to do this;
- Never lie about anything, e.g. where your family live, our bank card PIN number, or any other things asked for where they could discover you had told them an untruth and therefore seek retribution. To do this requires a great deal of faith that God will protect you;
- Speak to your kidnapper with respect – he called them Sir throughout – even though he was frightened and angry about what was happening. My making the situation respectful and personal, it gives far less ammunition for the situation to escalate into violence or physical abuse.
What was most powerful for me was that Tom, blind-folded throughout, talked to his captors about his belief in the Lord, and what we were told by St. Paul in his letter to the Romans (chapter 12, verse 19), i.e. that when God says “vengeance is mine”, it is not to make God more powerful, but is to release us from the internal pain and suffering of holding a grudge.
Tom’s particular story may not happen to us – but similar things do happen in Huddersfield every week – what can we learn from Tom’s testimony?
Things happen that might make us want to seek revenge all the time. Do we hold that pain in our hearts, or do we give the power to God to avenge? How much more resilient would we be, and how much would our mental and physical well-being be improved by our increased faith in our Lord?
How much risk is too much risk – shedding light on risk appetite
June 2, 2011
You may know that, with David Hillson, I’ve had lots to say in the past about understanding and managing risk attitude – for individuals and groups. Since publishing our books on the subject (put my name into a search engine to find them), I’ve been surprised at the confusion between risk attitude and risk appetite amongst the people who you might expect to know the difference. So David Hillson and I have been writing again – this time trying to make the differences between Risk Appetite (RA) and Risk Attitude (RA) clear ! Our RARA model is nothing to do with a short skirt – you could say it’s more boring than that! – but is lots to do with helping organisations of all sizes (I start with my company and my family) to decide “how much risk is too much risk”.
Our white paper can be found on our websites (www.lucidusconsulting.com or www.risk-doctor.com).
Hope it sheds some light for you.
It’s about time to start blogging again and see if I communicate, or just type!
May 23, 2011
All these thoughts I have – then never write them down – so thought I’d start again today with something I was thinking about driving down the motorway earlier. It’s about communication in a business context again. Although I try my very very best to be clear and concise in what I say and what I write – how come when you’ve done your best, others still don’t get it? I wonder how much of what we hear and what we read is coloured by our own filters and prejudices and pre-occupations, and how much we actually take on board. A worrying thought really – perhaps we don’t communicate at all – we just exchange points of view and if we’re lucky points of view overlap enough to gain some sort of agreement and action.
What do you think?
Personal projects for another new year
December 31, 2010
I shared some of my personal projects for 2010 with you as part of this blog. Daring to care, achieving my goals using a project-based approach and remembering that trust pays back are all things that I re-learned in 2010 and will remember into 2011. But what’s new for 2011? I’m not one for New Year Resolutions as such, but I do like to reflect and to plan and my reflections tell me that it’s all too easy for those of us who are good at organising to try to organise everyone else, thus depriving them of the chance to either – learn how to do if for themselves, or feel what life is like if they don’t. So – here I declare in the the most public way possible that in 2011 I will organise myself and I will help others who ask me at home, or pay me at work, to organise themselves – but that’s all. Everyone else can choose for themselves.
May I wish anyone who reads this my best wishes for 2011 – I hope you can rejoice in the fact that you have many things in your life to be thankful of.
Appetite and Attitude – not the same!
December 17, 2010
If you’ve read any of my work you’ll know that I’ve had a lot to say about understanding and managing risk attitude. (do a Google search for books by Hillson and Murray-Webster, 2005, 2007 and Murray-Webster and Hillson, 2008). More recently I have had lots of conversations with my clients, and had cause to write about risk appetite (e.g. in the latest edition of Management of Risk, OGC, 2010 ). I hear, and read, great confusion between the two concepts. I’m clear that my Appetite and my Attitude to things are related, – but not the same thing.
David Hillson and I have started some work together this week to try to really nail these, and related concepts in a usable way for practitioners. Until that work appears, you may want to read Lucid Thought 76 that you’ll find on www.lucidusconsulting.com
It starts to unpick the differences between risk appetite and risk attitude and might wet your appetite to join in a conversation about it?