by John Brooker | Mar 31, 2015 | Free Articles, Solution Focus, Tools
Eight Steps to Achieve Your Targets Faster Do you have tough targets to achieve? How can you plan to achieve them faster in a less conventional way? This article provides you with an eight-step approach to use as an individual and it will take you about 90 minutes. Whilst developing an individual plan is a good thinking tool and starting point, I urge you to involve your peers or your team to develop the final plan. Involving others will broaden your perspective and enrich your planning. To illustrate the article, I use an adapted case study of a leader responsible for software testing in four countries, with teams brought together through mergers and takeovers. There were different tools and methods at each site and the leader had a target to integrate the country teams. The leader arranged for a set of workshops to follow these steps. Step 1: Identify Stakeholders First, identify who has an interest in your success, both internal and external. This may be customers, end users, regulators etc. In our case study the stakeholders were internal product managers and the end users of products. Let’s call them customers. Create a short profile for an example customer,e.g their job role, what they do and the key issues they have. Step 2: Sense the Future Detail a preferred future by asking, “What will we be doing in future that will most benefit customers?” Instead of writing your description draw a picture. Drawing taps into different parts of the brain and broadens your perspective. In our case study, the leader described a view of what the customers would see when testing...
by John Brooker | Mar 13, 2015 | Free Articles, Overcome Challenges, Solution Focus
How a Japanese art form can enhance your business The picture alongside [Source: www.kintsugi.jp through Pinterest] is of a broken vase that has been repaired with gold. Developed in Japan, making such a repair is known as Kintsukuroi or kintsugi, which is the art of healing broken pottery with lacquer and silver or gold. The philosophy behind this type of repair is that something should not be discarded just because it is broken. In fact, it is more beautiful for having been broken and repaired. I saw this on Pinterest and pinned it to my Think Innovatively board with this thought: How might you apply the principle of Kintsukuroi as a metaphor for repairing something that is broken in your business? You might consider this metaphor anytime something breaks; a process, a business (or personal) relationship, a bad media story. I feel it is a very solution focused metaphor to have your client focus on the damaged pieces as a resource (what they can build on), not on the damage (the problem), have them visualise how they might make it better and progress towards that better future. Is Kintsukuroi not a better metaphor than “fighting fires”? It is certainly more elegant. Have an elegant week. John Brooker I Yes! And. Think Innovatively. To receive regular articles, register at our website: www.yesand.eu and receive Section 1 of John’s book, “Innovate to Learn, Don’t Learn to Innovate”, with our compliments. We guarantee not to share your details. Or you might buy John’s book at Amazon now: “Innovate to Learn, Don’t Learn to Innovate.” Read: www.yesand.eu and Facebook Talk: +44 20 8869 9990...
by John Brooker | Jan 3, 2015 | Collaborate, Develop Opportunities, Facilitate meetings, Free Articles, Innovate, Overcome Challenges, Solution Focus
““When people talk listen completely. Don’t be thinking what you’re going to say. Most people never listen.” Ernest Hemingway in Across the River and Into the Trees Do you listen well? Really listen? Or do you spend the time whilst others are talking, thinking of what you will say next? How much more creative might you be if you listened well and built on the ideas of others? I was in a café in a garden centre on a recent Monday, waiting at the counter for my coffee. Two ladies walked up beside me, chattering away to each other very animatedly. As I waited, my ears attuned to their conversation and I realised they were not talking to each other but at each other. One was talking about her garden and the other was talking about her mother. It was surreal and a bit sad, like a Woody Allen movie. By chance I had just attended an Improvisation Comedy course that weekend. Improvisation puts great emphasis on listening to the other performers. That’s “listening” not “hearing”. Taking the time to consider what is said and so perhaps finding a deeper meaning to the words. If we listen in Improvisation, we can build more on the creative ideas of others and we can prevent our own preconceived ideas ruining a scene with an insensible response. It also provides the other players with the confidence to develop the scene further, as Menninger says, “it makes us unfold and expand”. In short, by listening we can make the work more creative and humorous. When you speak in innovation workshops, you only hear one idea. When...
by John Brooker | Jan 2, 2015 | Collaborate, Facilitate meetings, Free Articles, Innovate, Overcome Challenges, Solution Focus
You need to be logged in to view this content. Please Log In. Not a Member? Join Us
by John Brooker | Jan 1, 2015 | Collaborate, Develop Opportunities, Facilitate meetings, Free Articles, Innovate, Overcome Challenges
You need to be logged in to view this content. Please Log In. Not a Member? Join Us
by John Brooker | Aug 29, 2014 | Collaborate, Facilitate meetings, Free Articles, Overcome Challenges, Solution Focus
How might you resolve interpersonal tension between leaders? “Conflict can and should be handled constructively; when it is, relationships benefit.” In, “Who’s Pulling Your Strings?” by Harriet B. Braiker Recently, a company asked me to run a workshop for them. During a fact-finding call to establish the client’s situation and required meeting outcomes, I learned that two senior people involved in the workshop were not working well together. People had noticed tension between them in other meetings. As the client’s outcome for the pending meeting was to build an effective working relationship between three teams, it was vital that the two leaders work effectively together during the meeting. I suggested that I hold a pre meeting with the two leaders and the client arranged this. The following is an outline of the intervention that you can follow. Intervention Outline To establish a relationship with them, and to save time during the pre-meeting, I telephoned each leader to establish their view of the situation in terms of what they wanted. I asked them three questions: Imagine the pre-meeting works really well, what would your outcomes be? What would you like to be different about the situation? What would you and others notice is better if the situation improves? You can adapt these, but note that I did not ask, “What are the issues?” or “Why is there conflict?” These would focus them on the problem and achieve little. Before the meeting I wrote notes of their individual responses, and asked them to verify their own answers. I also wrote each answer on Post – it Notes (use a different colour...
