What am I scribbling?

[3 minute read]

I’ve learned a new word. Iatrogenic. 

It’s when a condition is caused by medical intervention. Without coming across the term, we know what it means. The tiredness, nausea and hair loss that can accompany chemotherapy is an example, one in which a patient knowingly opts for the treatment’s iatrogenic consequences in hope of its effectiveness. Survival. The trade-off is considered worth it.

We’re probably less familiar with inadvertent iatrogenic conditions. Ones that we don’t expect. Ones that don’t get talked about. Topical Steroid Withdrawal is an example. Sometimes called ‘red skin syndrome’ or ‘topical steroid addiction’, it describes a group of side effects that are commonly misunderstood but for which, in the UK, a warning has been included with all topical steroid products since 2021.

The British Association of Dermatologists, British Dermatological Nursing Group and the National Eczema Society recently updated their joint statement on Topical Steroid Withdrawal. Their statement offers a description of these side effects, including inflammation, redness, swelling, thickened ‘elephant’ skin. It acknowledges the lack of a clear medical definition, which makes it difficult for sufferers and health professionals to talk about it. It references, however, the widespread discussion on social media, which is where many go to understand what they’re experiencing and to find the support they need.

A scan of social media and survivor advocacy campaigns, like the super helpful Scratch That , reveals how people live – or more accurately exist – with TSW. Trigger alert. TSW makes for shocking viewing.

Topical steroid withdrawal is overwhelming. 

Its early stages involve severe inflammation. Intense pain. Skin that breaks, oozes, peels, flakes and sheds. Increased sensitivity to environmental irritants. Symptoms spreading to areas of the body where steroids haven’t been used. Hair loss. Insomnia. Fatigue.

As time passes, some of these symptoms slowly ease. For many, burning ‘flares’ continue while the affected skin slowly strengthens. Slowly. The process can take months. Or years. Meanwhile, survivors’ lives are turned upside down. They may not be able to work or study. They may need help with everyday self-care. Antibiotic or antifungal medication to mitigate infection risk. Extra nutrition to promote healing. Extra rest. Extra support at a moment’s notice because the healing process is nonlinear and cyclical. TSW’s slow, painful and unpredictable course, the absence of a cure, and the DIY approach to healing that survivors need to adopt, together present a huge mental health challenge. Grief. Anger. Loss of hope.

So what’s the good news?

People recover. That’s been our mantra, over the last year, as we’ve watched our daughter go through this horrific experience. She’s not yet recovered. She will. We don’t know when.

What else? It’s rare. Though perhaps not as rare as many imagine. One study estimates that 12% of people with poorly controlled atopic dermatitis may be experiencing TSW ( Fukaya et al, 2014 ).

And what else? It is preventable. In the late 1970s, a few dermatologists began to notice TSW’s grouping of symptoms ( Kligman and Frosch, 1979 ). Nearly five decades later, some are now attempting to define it. And some are raising the call for high-quality research (British Journal of Dermatology 2023, 188:288-289). You’ll find a review of the evidence so far on www.gov.uk. You’ll find very little on www.nhs.uk.

TSW is difficult to write about. 

I haven’t done justice to the breadth and depth of the pain and distress it causes people. If you think that you – or anyone you know – could be affected by TSW, Claire Oxenham’s brilliant book ‘This Isn’t Eczema’ will give you the overview you need. This is my limited attempt to contribute to raising awareness of this cruel condition and its devastating impact.

[6 minute read]

Fall. Melt. Evaporate. Reform. And melt again.

Some of us are flaky. A rare few have rock-solid resourcefulness. Most of us are shifting between these extremes and all the phases in between. Good days. Bad weeks. Aha moments. Getting stuck. Leaping ahead. Two steps backwards.

Like water, we’re all changing state. It’s not an age thing. It’s not a generation thing. It’s the reality of being human. It’s our response to the opportunities and challenges that pop up within our ever-changing lives.

I’ve never got why we pin ‘snowflake’ on our young people. And I’ve learned that the term has complex origins beyond my understanding. So I’ve kept quiet. But recent experiences are nagging at me to challenge the laziness with which my generation dishes out this term.

We’re all snowflakes now and again

In May, in the heat of lockdown, I read my grandfather’s wartime letters. His early notes home, in 1940, are short and moody. They list his complaints at the utter boredom and brutality of army life. He asks for money – in almost every letter – and he sends his washing home. He offers occasional thanks, for cigs or a cake, and odd words of encouragement to his mother struggling with life in London.

His tone changes in 1941 as army life gears up. Now he’s on guard, digging, preparing for an exam and learning about guns. He empathises with his mother and asks about home. He falls in love with my grandmother. I read about his adventures, along with his trials, and hear his warm expressions of affection.

By 1944, aged 27, he’s in India. His letters include beautiful sketches and descriptions of the camp he commissions his men to construct. A hill flattened. A bungalow built. Flowerbeds dug. He moves on, fretting about leaving his men for a new posting. His letters come to an end as he shares his fascination with Sri Lankan life – the climate, the wildlife, the people – with his wife and son. Responsibility was placed in front of him and he accepted it.

While I’m learning about my grandfather, I learn more about my daughter. We watch as she dares to acknowledge, out loud, that the degree course she’s started is not right for her. We all hold our breath as she turns to face the feelings that follow – the tsunami of remorse, regret, uncertainty, fear. We stand in awe while she finds the courage to dig, explore and listen for her vocation. The opportunity called her and she took it.

We take shape in the right conditions

Behaviour is a function of the person and the situation. This principle is the cornerstone of everything I’ve learned about people’s abilities, values and potential. We don’t go through life telling each other what to do. If we want the best, from ourselves and each other, we give our attention and effort to creating the right conditions. You know this. Many of you reading this have placed this principle at the centre of your work. Comforting the afflicted. Afflicting the comfortable. Creating inclusive cultures. Challenging bias. Boosting competence. Connecting people with opportunities and resources. Revealing leadership potential. Generating learning experiences. Reminding us that we’re all learning – throughout our lives. And reassuring us that the shifts we feel in our capabilities, our outlooks – even our identities – are part of this process. These words are my expression of gratitude and respect for the work you do and the positive impact you have, especially on those at the beginning of their working lives.

You – coaches, youth workers, teachers, counsellors, trainers, leaders, mentors – are busy countering systemic changes that have been eroding the living and learning conditions for our young people for many years now. An education system that overtly values assessment above learning, that tells young people “learn this” instead of asking “how are you learning?” A housing situation that requires an average salary of £37K and a deposit of nearly £30K from first-time buyers ( The Guardian, 24 Oct 2020 ). Unregulated, addiction-forming platforms that reward one-way broadcasting above mutual communication and connection. A climate crisis that we’ve effectively handed over to young people to solve.

And now this…

The situation we’re in right now is life-changing for all of us. My heart breaks as my father postpones plans to travel across Europe, quietly acknowledging that the pandemic has probably stolen ten percent of his remaining agile years. I hardly dare talk – let alone write – about how people are being affected, in case I misrepresent complex experiences of fear, loss, pain and anger. But I want us to think about how different this situation is for those whose adult lives are just getting started. And here’s why.

I can lay all my bits of learning out in front of me and take a good look at them. The time my greengrocer boss encouraged me out on the pavement to flog sprouts – and then thanked me. The kind, generous male colleagues who showed me how an engineering solution can emerge from a conversation as well as a calculation. And, right now, the young people I’m working with who are showing how they navigate the situations we’ve created for them. I own nuggets of learning gathered over 50 years – I can decide what I want to do with them. Young people are still collecting and creating theirs. And we can help.

What can you share? Time or money?

If you’re snowed under responding to changing Covid-19 measures, but business is doing OK, think about donating to the Prince’s Trust’s Young People Relief Fund. With youth unemployment set to reach one million this year ( Class of 2020, Resolution Foundation ) – and courses, training and jobs on hold – your donation could be the turning point for someone.

If cash is tight but you’ve got time to give, share it with someone who needs your encouragement. Don’t wait until you retire. Don’t wait until you feel you’ve got all the answers. Answers are thin on the ground for all of us, but experience has equipped us midlifers to ask great questions. And questions open up ideas and possibilities for people. Hope is extremely thin on the ground for young people ( The Aspiration Gap, The Prince’s Trust ). And we can show, from our ups and downs, how opportunity can emerge in unlikely ways.

You could sign up as a mentor. Or you could just ask a young person you know about their dreams and plans. What’s getting in their way and what other options can they explore? Who do they know who might give them a head start? Who do you know? How do they feel about their CV? Has anyone taken a look at it with them? And what about their interview skills? Do they need a bit of practice? What other skills and interests do they have up their sleeve that they haven’t thought about?

Whatever you can offer, it’s well worth the investment. I’m working with a group as they write, which means I get to see how they think, and it’s giving me huge hope for the years ahead. Despite the challenges they’re dealing with, here are the leadership qualities I see young people demonstrate readily and willingly:

Compassion – listening to, learning about and understanding others’ experiences.

Sensitivity – tuning in to areas of individual difference that the rest of us are still trying to define.

Resilience – flexing their learning and work to handle everyday chores, events and setbacks.

Integrity – the determination to interrogate information and give credit to others’ work.

Impact – meeting their potential audiences halfway by imagining themselves in others’ shoes.

Insight – digging under the surface of issues and facing life’s complexities and paradoxes.

Generosity – sharing what works for them to make others’ lives easier.

Am I preaching to the converted and asking you to do even more? Or has this call to action sparked a possibility for anyone who, like me, needed a bit of encouragement to do this kind of thing?

I’d love to hear your thoughts and reactions. Share a comment or drop me a line on sam@yourstorymywords.co.uk   

Thank you for listening!

Stop. Look. Listen. Ask. Think.

What do you get if you look for images that convey ‘listening’? A screenful of individuals, wrapped in their headphones, in perfect isolation. And if you search for ‘thinking’? More shots of recluses, headphones off, looking skywards.

We’re all learning to be solitary right now (and some of us secretly love it). But were we already halfway there? For some time, our ages, geographies, politics, platforms, jobs, resources and headphones have been driving a wedge between us. Just before our current crisis, let’s not forget, we were acknowledging the sinking feeling that we haven’t been listening to each other.

So what does it take to listen? What good comes of it? And how can we learn to listen better?

In the peace and quiet of lockdown I’ve opened the books I’ve been itching to read. Four of them, together, tell a story of what we can accomplish when we tap into our most human capabilities: listening, curiosity, attention, encouragement and appreciation.

“Are you listening or just waiting to speak?”

What do we expect of our leaders? What do we need them to do? Jane Adshead-Grant believes that listening is the game changer. She listens to leaders, teaching them to listen to bring out the best in themselves and others. For Jane, leadership is an immense privilege and responsibility – a job to be done with thought and care. But she understands the huge and conflicting pressures that many leaders are under.

‘ Are You Listening Or Just Waiting To Speak? ’ is the perfect primer for leaders who are ready to talk less and listen more. Jane whittles listening back to its heartwood, giving busy leaders exactly what they need to do it better. She confronts the myths and challenges – honestly and directly – of being a good listener. She sells the benefits – business and personal – convincingly. And she sets out clear dos, don’ts and tips.

What makes Jane’s book stand out is that it guides us through the behaviours and into the intentions of good listening. Within her 70 pages she invites us to put ourselves in others’ shoes, acknowledge our biases, and leave our ego at the door. And she reminds us to listen out for potential, placing good listening at the heart of leadership.

Read Jane’s book if you want to encourage the thinking and contributions of the people you lead by really listening to them. Or if you’re supporting leaders to become great listeners. Everything you need – from skills to mindsets to benefits – in an afternoon’s reading.

“You’re not listening”

Earlier this year, journalist Kate Murphy gave us the bible on listening. Struck by the astonishing lack of attention that listening receives within communications research, she dived in with the rigour, scrutiny and celebration that it deserves.

Pitch, volume, tone and pace. Words, thoughts, feelings and intent. Kate explains how the physiology and neuroscience of listening, alongside what makes us tick, equip us to generate understanding and meaning. 

She reveals our internal barriers to listening. Our assumptions with those we know. Our biases towards those we don’t. Our social anxieties. Our tendency to let our thoughts race ahead of others’ words. The pain of reorganising our beliefs in response to what we hear. And she exposes the external factors. The distractions pushed at us by our phones. The noise levels in our homes, public spaces and open offices. The pressures to multitask, eroding our ability to share our attention between the people we care about, our work and ourselves.

Many organisations are recognising that listening boosts teamwork, honesty and innovation. Kate showcases those using improvisational comedy to teach employees to tune in to each other’s cues. And, at a time when data informs more of our decision making, she warns that algorithms can miss the mark. Turn a question into an invitation, followed by full-focus listening, and we can elicit deeper truths. Kate takes us back to toddlerhood, when our genuine curiosity had us asking, finding out, building rapport, and asking again.

Read ‘You’re Not Listening’ to build a deep, comprehensive understanding of listening and why it matters. If you’re studying listening, or revisiting its importance in our lives, make sure this is part of your reading list.

“A more beautiful question”

Journalists are all about the question. For Warren Berger , questioning was a well-used, taken for granted tool. Then he turned his spotlight on how engineers, designers and inventors generate ideas and solve problems. He studied organisations that go out of their way to encourage questioning. Businesses that make it part of their culture. Educators who teach their students to question. Innovators and entrepreneurs who challenge themselves to ask the right questions to identify what really needs fixing.

In ‘A More Beautiful Question’ , every subheading is a question. But Warren warns us that not every question is a useful one. So what is a beautiful question?

Action is at its heart. For Warren, questioning without action is philosophy. Potentially stimulating, but unlikely to trigger change. People solve problems when they tie questioning and action tightly together. And his dissection of the questions they use reveals a powerful sequence:

Why? The kick-off when we find ourselves in a situation that is far from ideal.

What if? The question that elicits possibilities for improvement and generates a whole bunch of ideas.

How? The question that makes your best ideas real and workable.

Warren takes us behind the scenes, showing how our most innovative household names asked ‘why?’ when no one else did. And then kept asking ‘what if?’ and ‘how?’ until they found the solution. He poses questions that can help businesses get to the core of their purpose, culture, leadership approach and processes. And he returns to us, offering questions that help us step back for perspective and forward towards change.

Read ‘A more beautiful question’ to appreciate how questioning can be so much more powerful than knowing – or pretending to know – the answers. Use Warren’s anecdotes and case studies to challenge a culture or leadership that stops your business asking questions. Celebrate those in your organisation who are already asking big questions to generate ideas and change. And for more questions to support decision making, creativity, leadership and connecting with others, follow up with, ‘ The Book Of Beautiful Questions’.

“More time to think”

Nancy Kline asks the most fundamental questions. Questions about what makes us unique. About purpose – and how we abandon our purpose and stifle our thinking through our readiness to obey, collude and give up. Questions about how our thinking frees and enslaves us.

For Nancy, “the quality of everything we do depends on the quality of the thinking we do first”. Thinking for ourselves is not just the highest expression of our humanity, it’s what we do to ensure our relationships, organisations and societies are healthy and effective. Helping people think for themselves, “with rigour, imagination, courage and grace”, is the focus of her work as a teacher, consultant, author and speaker.

In ‘More Time to Think’ she makes the case that the quality of our thinking is determined by the way we behave with each other. And she sets out ten factors that create an environment for thinking. To help each other think at our best, she invites us to share our attention , with genuine interest, equality and ease . To show appreciation and give encouragement . To acknowledge and release feelings , and to share information that dismantles denial. To seek out the realistic diversity of groups and of divergent thinking, and to create respectful places that affirm each other and our thinking. Crucially, Nancy teaches us how to remove untrue limiting assumptions and ask incisive questions to liberate thinking.

‘More Time to Think’ helps us put what we need – and what we can give – into practice. Nancy shows how a thinker and their thinking partner can create a thinking environment together. And she offers a process that frees the thinker to work at their own pace, commit to their thinking, capture their goals and unearth their assumptions.

Nancy’s careful honing of the thinking environment process, over 20 years, reveals her forensic precision. For her, language matters because it’s what we think with. Read about how she chose the word ‘assumption’ over ‘belief’ to appreciate her determination to keep the thinker in the driving seat, thinking for themself, taking responsibility, making the choices that are theirs to make. Observe the skill with which she constructs questions that flip limiting assumptions into liberating alternatives. And reflect on her work with ‘what if?’ and ‘how?’ to give us incisive questions that ignite a firecracker of free, positive, practical and doable thinking.

Read ‘More Time to Think’ to challenge the very fundamentals of how you listen and ask questions. And to remind yourself – whatever your role – that people own their own thinking. If you want to commit to doing what you can to ignite the very best thinking in others, consider learning more.

Learning to listen – all over again

We do our best to listen to each other with the scraps of time and patience we can muster. Isn’t our positive intent – along with the odd time we manage to pull it off – good enough? What’s more important, the effort we make – despite the odds against us – or the quality of our listening?

Who’d have thought that self-isolation would offer such a great chance to learn how to communicate better? The call to listen with full attention is making me more honest about when I can’t. It’s giving me permission to put aside proper time to listen. The power of asking questions to ignite other people’s thinking is making me stop and think. At best my questions guide. Often they direct. Rarely do they invite…

So here’s a question for you. Have you found this useful? Has it made you want to read more?

I’d love to hear your thoughts and reactions. Share a comment or drop me a line on sam@yourstorymywords.co.uk

Thank you for listening!

[4 minute read]

Unprecedented

We’re facing a situation so beyond our experience, and shifting so rapidly, that it defies description. But we’re trying. And people are making sense of it as best they can. As the scale and span of this crisis sinks in, organisations are starting to communicate their early messages.

But this is just the beginning. Things are changing by the day. And there are many months of uncertainty ahead. More than anything, your employees and customers need regular updates, with all the clarity, honesty and reassurance you can muster.

Understanding your different audiences – and tuning in to their needs and feelings – has never been so important. Keep talking. Keep listening. Keep sharing what you can.

Here are a few questions and ideas, to trigger more of your own.

Putting your team first

Right now, no one cares about your workforce like you do. Whatever support measures our governments put in place, you are the one who really understands your people’s needs, fears and circumstances.

• What are we feeling in common? We’re all blindsided by the waves of uncertainty. Let’s keep acknowledging the common fears.
• How do our different circumstances amplify our fears? Identify the different issues that groups of employees are dealing with: care responsibilities, health and age concerns, access to technology. How can you tailor your support to help each group deal with their own practical problems? How can you do and say the right things with the right people?
• What info does everyone need? Situations are changing every day. Right now, your employees may well have more trust in you than in any other organisation. Can you share easy-access updates, as well as point them to other trusted sources?
• What are they hearing on the grapevine? Is fear taking a hold of their conversations? Without skating over the seriousness of our situation, can you share what your business is doing to fix problems, help out or raise hope?
• What are they still part of? With your team members at home, your words are maintaining and bolstering your culture. What do you want your people to remember when they look back at this time?

Keeping your customers close

What do people care about most? You may be sharing your beautifully formulated Covid-19 measures. But your customers are too busy dealing with their fears, shortages and uncertainties to read the detail.

• How can you respect and ease their fears first? Let them know that you’re on the case and doing your best to respond as things change. Spell out, honestly, what they can expect from you. And say how they can help you to help them.
• What are their priorities? Can you share info in an order that matches their concerns? Can you structure each communication so they can quickly find what they need to know?
• When this is all over, how do you want them to remember you? How can you show and share the loyalty that you hope to receive from your customers in return?
• How are you standing out from the crowd? Differences in customer support, website capability and generosity are becoming huge differentiators. Customers will appreciate – and remember – your timely honesty about what you can and can’t do.
• Are you doing business differently? Stories of collaboration and resourcefulness lift our spirits. Capture and share the courage and initiative your business is showing right now. If you’re partnering up, agree who will take the lead in communicating the difference that you’re making to your customers.

What next?

Who knows? But we’re seeing businesses respond with phenomenal initiative, flexibility and cooperation. Sharing trucks and drivers. 3D-printing ventilator parts. Brewing hand sanitiser. Alongside the sacrifice and commitment of health workers, carers, teachers and refuse collectors, ordinary individuals and businesses are stepping up with inspiring contributions.

Keep capturing and sharing your stories. You’ll generate hope and reassurance now. And you’ll build your recovery on a foundation of strong, shared, culture-boosting memories.

[3 minute read]

Who needs a defined job these days?

As we embrace agility and abandon ourselves to ever-changing job demands in our volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous organisations, do we still need job descriptions? Aren’t they too static, limiting, time-bound and boring for today’s adventures in employment?

Hands up if you’ve even got a job description! I bet many of us have managed perfectly well without one for years. We’ve found other ways to nail the clarity we need to stay on track.

Good for us. But what about others? What about new recruits, super-keen to know what’s expected of them? What about working carers, trying to fulfil all their commitments without taking on two full-time jobs at once? What about workers in today’s complex, global organisations, who need to know who they’re working with, where the boundaries are, and how they can contribute quickly and effectively?

Do job descriptions have a soul?

If a job description is the physical manifestation of what we sign up for, the psychological contract is its soul. We probably all have one, deep down. We certainly do if we care about our work.

It enshrines our understanding of our relationship with our employer. It captures what we’re ready to give and the expectations we have of ourselves. We bury within it our beliefs about what our organisation stands for.

And it’s precious. If you’ve ever experienced the ripping up of your psychological contract, you’ll know what it feels like.

For organisations that are set up to operate with low employee retention, the psychological contract is probably an old-fashioned notion. But for those that want to keep their employees motivated and engaged, as they ride the latest wave of change, insight into what’s unwritten can help get the important stuff on paper.

Whose job is it anyway?

The employee inhabits the job and breathes life into it. The organisation owns it and pays for it. In practice, it’s often the manager who writes it down.

And that’s great if you find yourself working for one who has a broad vision for your job, its purpose and how it can be fulfilled. An open-minded boss will shape a role around future possibilities as well as current requirements.

But what if your manager can’t surface and address their biases? If they describe a job around the most recent incumbent, or the type of person they can easily imagine, they can unwittingly set expectations and limits that keep great candidates out.

It’s all about clarity

Imagine you’re starting a new job. To give your best, you need quick answers to a heap of questions:

• What’s this job all about? What’s its purpose?
• What will I be doing? And what will I need to do it?
• What’s the organisation like? And what does it stand for?
• How will it be day-to-day? What will it feel like to be part of the team?

The writing is the easy bit. The challenge is about perspective. Asking the searching questions – from the viewpoint of the jobholder – that tackle assumptions about skill, will, approach, background, time and place.

For organisations keen to address barriers, pay gaps and discriminations, a second pair of eyes on a job description – and few tricky questions – can make all the difference.

[2.5 minute read]

Really?

No. Of course not. Exams are demanding and stressful. But they can instil a reassuring sense that learning has clear boundaries. Revise X, Y and Z. Complete four years of past papers. Learn the ‘right’ answers. Get a good night’s sleep. Eat breakfast. The work might not be easy, but at least it’s defined and predictable.

As I write this, my daughter is preparing for her last A level exam. For many months she’s organised her time, put in the effort and kept herself – and us – calm. Now, at the end of the ordeal, I’m looking back and wondering what she’s gained from the experience. What has she learned about learning? What habits has she formed? And how useful will they be for her in the long term?

The benefits of ‘book’ learning

Along with foreshortened hamstrings and a stiff neck, here’s what my daughter has gained during her years of study:

• An ability to grapple with defined chunks of knowledge, commit them to memory, and reposition them in response to direct questions.
• A toolkit of stress-relieving techniques to get her through weeks of being tested.
• A sense of responsibility for her own success.

But what comes next?

Lifelong learning looks and feels very different. Firstly, because we don’t always know what we’re about to learn. And secondly because, whatever it is, we’ll probably learn it with other people. Along with the habits ingrained in us at school, we need to get good at:

• knowing what we DON’T know – sensing the exciting state that kicks off a wave of learning
• coming up with a question. And then another question. And another. And then agreeing, with other people, on the best question. And THEN working together to answer it
• believing that a failure isn’t the end of the road – there’s ALWAYS another way around things
• asking for ideas and help, trusting that most people love to be asked, AND…
• having the confidence to question experts, authorities, assumptions and experience
• sharing what we learn with other people.

What kind of learner do we want as a workmate?

What we think, feel, say and do – over time – reinforces our habits. And the habits that lead to exam success are very different to those that make us effective at work. Perhaps more different in recent years, as a result of the GCSE and A level reforms that were introduced to “provide students with the skills and knowledge needed for progression to undergraduate study” (Michael Gove, 2014).

Moving on to higher education is a goal that around a quarter of 18-year olds pursue. It’s important – to them and to our economy. But it’s only part of the journey towards a lifetime of work, in one form or another.

Young people who have survived our education system are made of strong stuff – they’ve developed enviable stamina and focus. But they’ll go on to learn in very different ways. As colleagues, we can show them how much fun learning at work can be. We get to help them develop the learning habits of a lifetime.

[2 minute read]

We all know there’s more to life than work

Writing for a living, for me, means thinking about work and describing the bits that can be observed, measured and valued. Jobs. Competencies. Leadership behaviours. Performance. How to attract, engage and reward people. How to get more from them. Some clients want words for bigger themes like values, culture and agility. Harder to measure, but suggesting something deeper about what really goes on within us – as people, not just workers – and within our organisations.

So why the urge to write from an end-of-life viewpoint? Why meditate on death when there’s so much scope to deliberate over working life?

How much more?

Death is one of the few occasions when we stop and think about someone in their entirety. It’s a rare chance to widen our outlook and add many other partial perspectives to our own. We can choose to look beyond the role that the deceased fulfilled for us. We can appreciate what they meant to others. We can hear how their life took shape over time. We can reflect on their full complexity.

Interests explored through years of fun, fear and fascination.

Talents honed through trial and error.

Qualities forged through hardship and tempered by experience.

Prized opportunities traded for a more urgent goal.

Effort beyond reason and concern beyond necessity.

Secret, unheeded sacrifices. Promises and compromises. Break outs and breaches.

Side steps that cleared new paths. Chance meetings that started lifelong conversations.

Crazy decisions that paid off and cautious investments that didn’t.

The juggling, dropping and picking up of different roles.

The call of others’ needs and wishes, and the constant carving of time and energy in response.

Losses weighed in sleepless nights. Achievements that took years to blossom. Labours that never did.

Hobbies that became bill-payers. Jobs that became cages. Burdens that unleashed hidden resources.

Are we missing the things that matter?

This isn’t a plea for organisations to do more to recognise the ‘whole person’. They do – or don’t – to the extent that it meets their purpose and bottom line. Many of our organisations are well-equipped with tools that can spotlight the bits that fit and blur anything that’s not relevant to the job in hand. And, when supply is tight, employers recognise and value more.

There has to be a filter. Otherwise none of us would ever get any work done. We’d be too busy talking about the phenomenal, beautiful intricacy of being human.

This reflection simply offers a quiet celebration. A realisation that, wherever the spotlight falls, there’s always so much more to see.

[1 minute read]

Rhyme is a crime

Great in rap. Slightly odd everywhere else. Writing rhyming couplets has never grabbed me. Why constrain meaning, logic and flow within an auditory axis of symmetry?

Remember the little etiquette poems on the underground? Not the ‘proper’ poems by real poets. I’m thinking about the quaint requests to give up your seat, take your litter home and stop holding the doors open. They felt like a tap on the shoulder from a well-meaning aunt. And they revealed how rhyme often comes with a generous helping of cheese. If you’ve ever had a colleague who’s spontaneously written a poem about a legendary workplace event you’ll know what I mean. Everyday rhyme should be uttered by a tongue trapped firmly in its own cheek.

Rhythm is a dancer

The wave that carries your voice. The pulse that animates your words. Write to your rhythm and your reader will hear you . And scribbling the odd poem – no rhyme, just the beat – can help you craft an idea, with concise clarity, in your own breath and tone.

I think that’s why Neil Taylor gets people to write haiku in his workshops. This deceptively simple three-line Japanese form compels you to find your voice and whittle your message. Surrender to the process and you’re hooked.

Here’s one that popped into my head after chatting with my retired neighbour the other day.

  “I’m on Link é-Din.”

“What does he mean?” I wondered,

“Must be all that noise.”