Christina Lattimer - People Discovery

About Christina Lattimer

Christina has managed people for twenty seven years and led hugely successful teams. She has worked with people at all levels in various organisations to help them achieve their potential, and she has been actively involved in the learning and development field in a number of different roles. In latter years she worked as an HR Strategist. She has a range of management qualifications, is a learning professional with a BA Hons in Education, and is a Chartered Fellow of Chartered Institute of Personnel Development. She is passionate about people and believes everyone counts to make a great team.

No comments

Five Ways To Get Rid Of Stress and Honour Yourself

By Christina Lattimer • April 21, 2014 - 9:58 pm Leadership Development

To alleviate stress, you have to strike an equal balance between work, rest and play.

I write a lot about inspiration and what leaders should be doing well. I am always keen to describe how we should have vision and be using reaching strategies and behaviours to make things happen. Big action is often my cry. I’m a big advocate of emotional intelligence, intellectual dexterity; resilience, unity consciousness and how we relate to each other for example.

I read and share a plethora of intellectual, insightful and inspirational articles and blogs about what makes a great leader, manager, boss, HR Director or whoever may be paving the way for others. is a passion.

There are many people out there who tell us how to live our lives and what to strive for, how to do things well, improve, be better, be best, and yes I do that too.

For the majority of the time, I love it. I love finding new ways to motivate interest, excel and go the extra mile.

But there are times, when thinking about how efficient we should be, or how much we should challenge and push ourselves that sometimes; just sometimes it’s great to be just ok, in the here and now, right now, without any wish to be, do or think anything else.

The world is mostly in a queue, a whirlwind, aspiring to something, wanting to improve, getting better results, being more honest, moving forward, changing at the speed of light, a hive of activity which can be true in our personal lives as well as at work.

Stress is one of the biggest reasons for absence and one of the biggest costs of presenteeism at work. There are a number of causes of stress, and most of them caused as we live out the challenges of moving quickly, changing lives, work, roles, partners, houses, jobs, and the way we do things and there are many more.

And we don’t really have much choice. Unless everyone stood still at once, we need to keep up with it all, or risk being left behind, and that is our fear and why we tolerate stress often.

Sometimes though we need to stop and do something different. Oh the sweet relief of taking time out. Taking time out is important for anyone, whether you are a leader, a team member, stay at home or business owner. The world would be a better place, if everyone gave themselves a real break. So if you are endlessly busy and the adrenaline is wearing thin. Or you are too busy, too worried, stressed or in the throes of any kind of change: The following are some of my suggestions about how you can give yourself a respite from the madness of your daily life:

Accept everything completely as it is and make a decision just for even half day or so, not to wish for anything different. Just accept and surrender to where you are right now. Stop wanting people, situations or ourselves to be different. You don’t have to be happy about “what is” just make a decision not to be unhappy about it. That’s called being at Peace. And it’s refreshing.
Be with yourself: Watch yourself, feel your feelings, if you feel happy indulge yourself and let yourself really feel the happiness. If you feel sad, then give yourself permission to. Know it isn’t going to destroy you. Feel negative emotions instead of repressing them, just don’t act on them. Your emotions are simply a guidance system. If they are happy you are on the right track, if sad they are telling you that there is something you believe which is not true about yourself. Feeling and releasing negative emotions can feel brilliant, as long as you don’t wallow in them and don’t identify them as being who you really are.
Breathe; get away from the hustle and bustle if you can. Breathe in some healthy fresh air and enjoy the feeling of taking the air into your lungs and right into your body. When you are breathing you are relaxing your body, and giving it a rest. Conscious breathing is like having an inward shower, all your cells and your being benefits.
Meditate: For years I struggled with being able to meditate. I read all of the guidance and yes of course when I tried to stop thinking, the thoughts crowded in. Once I realised the true purpose of meditating is to focus on the gap between the thoughts I cracked it. The beauty of concentrating on the gap is twofold. Firstly you are in touch with your higher self who is all powerful and wise; and secondly, by being in the gap between your thoughts you are actually giving yourself a well-earned break. Thoughts are energy and too much thinking depletes us, yes even if most of our thoughts are happy ones.
Appreciate: Gratitude is a brilliant state to be in. Appreciation is even better because you tend to be grateful for something you have or have earned, or have been given. You can appreciate situations, people and stories which have nothing to do with you and as a result you are simply being appreciative of the world around you. Appreciation is akin to real love because real love is unconditional, all-encompassing and not limited to the personal self. Therefore feeling appreciation is restful, energising and soothing.

So go on, give yourself some much needed time off and practice some of the relaxing ways of “being” described. If you have your own ways of de-stressing or relaxing please do let me know, I’d love to hear from you.

This great article is from the People Discovery blog, associated with The e.MILE People Development Magazine: the Magazine is currently running a series for the 6 months April to September 2014 based on the challenges identified by The Centre For Creative Leaderships report 2013 Don't Miss Out! Sign up here to be notified of our subsequent issues and posts

If you are a leader, you are continually developing and "Sharpening the Saw". If you lead and manage teams, then you must read about our Inspirational New Leadership Programme. Sign up now to find out more details when we launch in July 2014. There is no obligation to undertake the programme, if you sign up today, you will simply be sent more information about the programme. You can unsubscribe at any time! Click below to register for further information.

No comments

A New Paradigm – A Leadership Development Model

By Christina Lattimer • April 21, 2014 - 1:41 pm Leadership Development

To give clarity to my paradigm on leadership and management, I set out below my leadership development model which gives on overview of my own philosophy.

I fell into the leadership and management field really. When I left school at 16, with no expectations other than eventually to get married and start a family I had no clue what I wanted to do. Taking the first job I could, in an office, I eventually became a manager at the tender age of 22. Being the youngest in the office and the manager meant I had to learn quickly, and I did. After decades now of leading and managing teams I made every mistake in the book. Much of my career whilst successful in many respects was born of trying one thing, and when it didn’t work, trying something else. I think I probably need to apologise to my many team members and colleagues over the years, because life with me as a leader wasn’t always easy!

The years of leading and managing though always felt right, even when everything was going wrong, and it quite often did. What I did over that long path of time, was to learn. I realised early on that life was about learning. First of all I had to learn about other people, then myself, and ultimately that real learning which only occurs around relationships.

In the early days, I wanted to learn to become a better person, and often failed miserably. Although I needed to take in information and learn the tools of my trade, I realised these were mere props. Eventually I realised that learning is actually about bringing out of one self. The word “Education” actually derives from the verb educe, which meant “to draw forth from within”.

Having dedicated myself to a path of self-learning over the years, I would contend that the most satisfying purpose in life is to learn and uncover one’s own real self. In this respect, I now know that learning about one’s self is not to make a better person. But rather to uncover the person which was always there. That is true for all of us.

What I also discovered on my learning journey was that as my self-awareness grew and where my leadership development model came into being, so did my understanding and ability as a leader and manager. For someone who hasn’t undertaken a path of self-learning it might sound self-centred and egocentric. But it isn’t. What I have learned is that as self-awareness grows, so does your regard, concern and respect and understanding of and for others. I also believe a true leader does not lead per sae, but brings out the best in others, consciously or unconsciously helping them to unwrap their own true selves.

Sometime last year I spent some time with MBA Students and we were talking about modern leadership. We looked at the many problems with the world, with politics, and with business. We examined the many crises leaders must be tasked with. They are enormous tasks which need great leadership and vision. When I asked them what skills leaders needed across the board to cope with what was to come. This is what they said.

Our leaders need “Integrity: Credibility: Wisdom: Courage: Consistency: Social Intelligence: Charisma: Vision: Communication: Appreciation: Decision making: Fairness: Justice: Rational: Creativity: Honesty: Open-mindedness”

There are many leadership models, hundreds of thousands of leadership books, underlying the many perspectives out there. But at the core of all us there is a commonality. “A knowing” when things are right, and what is needed. I believe many of the attributes most people want their leaders to have are contained in that list articulated by the students.

Below is my leadership model based on this commonality and knowing. This is, I believe, the new paradigm, so sorely needed right now. Many are already there, many on the journey, and many still to undertake it. But it is open for anyone to choose to do so at any time.

THE PEOPLE DISCOVERY LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT MODEL

The Model is based on a number of characteristics which are available to anyone. The characteristics of the Model are:

Connected to Higher Self

1. An ability to connect to ones higher self. Some people call this Right mind or Right brain, or Spirit, Love, Intuition, a Guardian Angel, or some other Inner Guide. And so they are Inner Directed, Discerning and Confident.

Unity Consciousness

2. An understanding that the higher self is who we really are; the main characteristics of which are unity consciousness and love. And so they are Positively Value Based and Value Others Equally.

Self- Awareness

3. Well-honed visionary, thinking and emotional intelligence skills which are used with the purpose of making a real difference and so they are Creative, Self-Aware and Purposeful

Inspiring Others

4. Understand others and therefore know how to communicate, engage, create an environment which encourages enthusiasm, commitment and motivation, and as a result get the best out of their team. And so they are Accepting, Non-judgmental and Inspirational

Motivate Inspire Lead Engage

Leaders who develop the characteristics of the model are able to create the conditions to self-motivate, inspire, lead and engage their people.

No comments

Challenging Limiting Beliefs Is A Leadership Skill

By Christina Lattimer • April 17, 2014 - 10:13 am Employee Development

Understanding how people tick is essential for a leader, especially at the level of our beliefs.

Beliefs create our individual and collective worlds. Millions of pieces of information are available to us at any one time. Our beliefs and the parameters which are then laid down by our beliefs determine which pieces of information we receive. Our beliefs determine which pieces of information we accept or reject. If we don’t believe it, then we simply don’t perceive it, or won’t allow ourselves to perceive it. In the words of the song

“No matter what they tell us No matter what they do No matter what they teach us What we believe is true” Beliefs come in all sorts of packages and create all kinds of effects in our lives.

When conflicting beliefs come into our awareness it can create confusion
Holding opposing beliefs at the same time can cause internal conflict
Limiting beliefs can prevent you receiving what you want
Subconscious beliefs appear to control your behaviour and make you feel helpless
You can bring subconscious beliefs into your awareness
You can choose your beliefs. No belief is ever fixed
The key to changing your world and experience is to change your beliefs
How you interpret reality around you can inform and shape your beliefs.
Beliefs are simply an interpretation that you choose to determine as true
Beliefs can be changed.

When a leader or manager understands the process to go through to challenge limited beliefs, then they have the key to secure positive change for the greater good. I’m not suggesting that it is a leader or manager’s job to change people’s beliefs. And certainly we need to make sure we respect people’s beliefs, particularly in the arena of equality. However a good leader or manager will understand the effects of limiting beliefs and understand the process of undoing them.

People act and react in accordance with their beliefs and uncovering those beliefs to enable positive growth is extremely powerful. Brainwashing people or trying to force people down a different route is not ethical, and it is not what I am suggesting. Everyone has a free will, and this must be respected. But it is useful to know, how and what you need to do to understand when your employees are holding unhelpful beliefs about themselves or others. Being aware that these beliefs can be changed can help you to influence and persuade employees to adopt more positive beliefs.

I’ll give you an example. I worked hard for a couple of years engaging with a particular team and helping them to think and feel like a successful highly motivated team. In those days I was pretty idealistic and hoped that I would win everyone over, and that everyone would enjoy working in the team. But there was a core of people, who no matter what, were still unhappy. They habitually criticised and caused negative waves. Simply put, they had fixed beliefs about their working lives and maintaining their belief was more important to them then changing beliefs.

I was talking to one of the employees who could be particularly negative. I asked her why she seemed so resentful and was there something I was doing which was causing this particular resentment? Her reply was a real eye-opener. She told me that it was nothing to do with me at all. I had come in and she observed that I was trying to get the team on board. However, she didn’t like management, never had and never would. She went as far as to say that nothing I would ever do would persuade her otherwise!

We did come to a somewhat uncomfortable compromise in the end, which limited her impact in terms of negativity within the team and how our relationship would work in the workplace given her fixed and unrelenting views. Not ideal, but then, not my job to change her beliefs.

The real power of understanding beliefs and belief systems is when managers are instigating change. Work on drawing out existing individual and team beliefs and then understanding how to help people see things through a different lens for the better within the workplace is the key to fundamental and lasting success.

Encouraging employees to reach positive beliefs about themselves, their contribution and the meaningfulness of your vision and task are the building blocks to brilliant success.

Incidentally for the sake of clarification: in the Equality Act; belief is defined as “including philosophical beliefs, such as humanism, which are considered to be similar to a religion. Other categories of beliefs, such as support for a political party, are not protected by the Equality Act.” This is not what this blog is about.

This blog underpins the work being developed for my leadership programme which will be released later this year. If you’d like to be updated when this is available,

2 Comments

21 Ways To Use MBTI To Help You and Your Team

By Christina Lattimer • March 12, 2014 - 10:01 pm Employee Development

MBTI is an essential tool for you and your team.

As a leader, manager or HR Professional, one of your foundational strengths is the depth of your own self-awareness and awareness of how other’s tick. You know the key to motivating people is being completely open and transparent and being able to be yourself, which in turn allows your team to follow suit.

One of the easiest and globally credible tools to develop self-awareness and understanding is Myers Briggs Personality Type Indicator (MBTI). Carl Jung, the great psychologist developed a model of personality type which was later refined by the mother and daughter team, Isobel Myers and Katherine Briggs.

One of the principles of Jung’s model, “Psychological Types” developed in 1921, was each person has an innate urge to grow. Part of our growing process is to learn how we individually operate, develop the parts of us that we need to learn more about, and learn about the people around us.

Understanding difference is a real people skill. Differences occur through cultural, physical and psychological factors. Mix this up with differing beliefs and temperaments, and no wonder managing and understanding people can be challenging.

In the UK, we have travelled some distance in identifying equality and cultural issues; the Equality Act 2010 takes that thinking even further. Some organisations are still learning how to get to grips with difference, and some excel. But I’m sure you will agree it is fair to say we always have room to improve.

When it comes to understanding psychological differences, we still have some way to go, but understanding such difference is important from a leadership or management perspective. Not only is it important; it is relatively simple to grasp.

If you’ve experienced MBTI, you may have found learning about your own psychological type a key starting point for self-development. Once you have an understanding of what makes you really tick, then your whole world will look different. Not only will it lead to greater self-acceptance, but it will also help you accept and value the differences of others.

Many leaders,managers and HR professionals are familiar with and use Myers Briggs extensively so I will skip going into more detail. If you haven’t come across the tool before, you can find out more about Myers Briggs on the link.

If you haven’t used Myers Briggs or you don’t feel you’ve fully realised the benefits from using the tool, here are 21 compelling reasons why you might want to look again.

Learning and understanding how each other tick can help to:

Avoid and resolve conflicts
Play to an individual’s strengths
Identify gaps in the team
Discover how your team style works best with customers
Enable self-understanding and so reduce stress
Help you learn to relax
Aid career development
Assist communication strategies
Provide managers with the understanding to give effective feedback
Inform personal development plan
Work together more effectively
Relate to each other with greater understanding
Encourage true psychological diversity
Support people through life transitions
Inform your own and others decision making
Develop thinking skills
Develop emotional intelligence
Identify and develop strengths and weaknesses
Develop leaders, managers, teams and HR expertise
Encourage team members to understand and appreciate different strengths
Improve and change culture.

There are some circumstances where it can be dangerous to use Myers Briggs such as recruitment selection, judging performance or by making assumptions because of type indicators. The 8 elements of Myers Briggs can be used interchangeably, and people can be just as accomplished using their non-preferred type

If you have used personality type as part of your leadership, management, team development, or HR strategy; I’d love to know how you got on and what you got out of your experience……or not!

3 Comments

3 Steps to Harness the Power of the Mind for Organisational Transformation

By Christina Lattimer • February 20, 2014 - 2:31 pm Organisational Change

In my article about the Hidden Power for Leadership and Life, I wrote about how beliefs, attitudes and expectations drive the outcomes within teams. In today’s blog I am expanding on those ideas and identifying how the power of the mind can be harnessed to lead your team.

The conscious mind is selective. If we don’t like something about ourselves or others, or we just don’t want to think about it, we can bury beliefs, ideas, thoughts and paradigms into our unconscious minds.

This could sound very efficient on a level, but in fact it isn’t really because we can still be unknowingly driven by the information stored in our unconscious which can if left undiscovered, cause all kinds of mischief.

As individuals, developing self-awareness can identify those unhelpful buried beliefs, ideas and attitudes which can help us to become more conscious of why we might do things, and help us to better understand ourselves.

Organisational culture can equally be created by unconscious or long-forgotten beliefs and ideas about the organisation, and the most common approach, i.e. training or developing behavioural competencies are fine, but it’s like trying to get an addict to stop their addictive behaviour by giving them a set a standards to adhere to. It’s often unsuccessful, or takes years.

Using the creativity of our mind through vision or imagination is the most powerful way to overcome those unconscious beliefs, although visionary thinking is often down to individual personality. If you are a visionary, or an intuitive, you are more likely to tap into the power of the imagination to create your story, or future, than someone who may be logical and deal in facts and evidence.

It is the same in an organisation. Organisations which might need lots of attention to detail and factual information to get the work done for example, are likely to attract people who are good at, and enjoy using their minds in that way.

The good news is, you don’t need to be a psychologist to take some simple actions to harness the power of the mind in a positive and affirming way to get better results. The next three steps describe a process which can help to transform the mindset of an organisation, if everyone is involved.

1. Discover the current organisational story

What is the history? What does the team believe about the organisation? Does the organisation have any defining stories which have helped shape the culture of today? Use focus groups, staff surveys and inquiry to piece together the collective view of the organisation by employees, customer’s, stakeholders, and anyone important in the making of that story. Ask people to describe the organisation to you, what critical events, changes or decisions have made them draw those conclusions. Ask them to describe successful characteristics and not so successful characteristics or decisions. Once you have this information, you can determine how far away the perception of employees, or customers is from where you would like it to be.

2. Raise self-awareness by shining a light on any part of the story which might be holding the team back

A particular HR team I worked with, had their role in the organisation changed from a regulatory, decision making entity, to giving advice and options to help managers to make decisions. A couple of years after this change, the team simply weren’t working well. In a reflective focus group, it became apparent that even though the team were paying lip service to the new role, deep down the new role was resented and resisted. Once this was unearthed, and people were allowed to talk about the difference in status in a way they couldn’t at the time, changes for the better came about quickly. Determine what decisions or stories are holding your organisation back from embracing a brighter future.

3. Change the Story

Harnessing the power of imagination, develop a vision for the future. Tell the story of the vision. What will it look like, feel like, and sound like. What will people be saying about the organisation in this imagined future and how will employees feel about working for the organisation? These are just some of the questions you can use to describe the future you want to create. Use feedback mechanisms to bring out doubts, limiting beliefs and different ideas, about the vision, to the surface, then find ways to strengthen belief, faith and patience about achieving the outcome.

What I have described is a simple methodology, using consciousness, self-awareness and imagination to change the culture of your team or organisation. Can you think of any other ways the power of the mind can be used to get better results?

5 Comments

Putting Your Results In Perspective For Effective Leadership

By Christina Lattimer • February 12, 2014 - 2:46 pm Leadership and Management

Of course, most leadership positions in the business world are focussed on achievement and results.

Meeting targets, getting results, setting goals are usually the main focus of any board or CEO. After all, isn’t it the job of the leader about taking and leading others to a pre-determined destination?

Usually when that destination is reached it is deemed to be successful, if it isn’t reached it can be viewed as a failure. Any good leadership course will tell you that of course there is no failure, after all most of us know the famous Edison quote:

“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”
― Thomas A. Edison

But what if we do fail? What if even after 10,000 attempts it seems nothing in this world will make an outcome different? If you haven’t wished for an outcome which hasn’t materialised, or come across a disappointing result, then you probably don’t live on this planet.

There are going to be times, no matter how focussed you are, or how much effort you put in; when things don’t turn out the way you want them to. If you have only been focussed on the outcome, then life can become very difficult and painful, and even though you may mentally tell yourself “there are no failures”, emotionally you suffer the pain of living up to your own or others expectations. Even when the goal wasn’t achieved because of forces out of your own control, the disappointment and fear experienced can be overwhelming.

Don’t get me wrong, I am a firm believer in setting goals, and outcomes and getting results. Because with the right focus making things happen, shaping your life and creating your idea of success can be fun, and stimulating. It just shouldn’t be the overriding focus of your life. While you are focussing on the future, achieving and getting results, the journey (life) is happening, and you may well not be aware of it!

Letting go of your expectations and desire to win not only helps you to deal with the ebbs and flows of life, conversely it also helps you to meet those targets, reach those goals and create those successes, because by letting go you take away the fear and the defence mechanisms which result from fear of failure. Letting go also allows you to enjoy the journey.

Of course, letting go intellectually is easy, letting go emotionally can sometimes take more work. Here are some tips about changing your perspective, which can help you to feel empowered, at peace and alright with your world, even when it has all gone wrong. Treat life as if it were a school. Life is a learning experience. Your experiences, whether you judge them good or bad, teach you something. Learning from your experiences opens you up to the possibility that everything might not turn out the way you expect it, and that is ok.

Learn to deal with uncertainty. If the team is disbanding, or the work has dried up, or money is tight, or whatever circumstance comes along to throw your imagined future into disarray, learn to believe that even though you might not know where you will be in 6 months, develop the faith that it will be in a better place. (Even if you’re not in a better place in 6 months, worrying it for all that time, is not going to help!).
Pay attention to your values and your relationships. Take time away from your tasks, and your schedule and concentrate on what is happening with your team. What values are you demonstrating, how much attention are you paying? Do you know what makes them tick?

By focussing on the journey, instead of the destination, slowly but surely your definition of success changes.

What about you? Are you leading your people through the journey? Or are you leading them to the destination?

No comments

50 Ways you can make a difference as a leader for 2014 – Join the leadership challenge!

By Christina Lattimer • January 23, 2014 - 2:05 pm Miscellaneous

I would like to invite you to a leadership challenge.

Don’t worry there is no work required from you during this leadership challenge. You can simply read, observe, catch up if that is what you would like to do. Alternatively, if something inspires you, then please join in, submit relevant articles, news, insights, contributions or even experiences. Whatever you choose, its up to you, the only commitment is to sign up and receive the weekly updates directly to your mailbox.

You are a leader. I know I am like a parrot repeating this to you again and again, but you are a leader to someone, from being prominent on the world stage to simply being your own inner leader, you are a leader to your employees, your kids, your family your friends and yourself. You can lead on the world stage or simply in your own day to day routine. Join our leadereship challenge and improve your leadership mindset!

At this stage in 2014, you are either feeling great because your New Year promises to yourself are being kept, or you once more have lapsed into the same old habits. If the latter is the case, my only advice to you is to forgive yourself and wherever you are, I’d ask maybe to consider a slightly different approach to 2014.

Why not make 2014 a year when you concentrate on how you are leading yourself and others and your life. It’s about quality, not quantity – content, not form. It’s about how and not what; give and not take. Join our leadership challenge. It costs nothing!

What these following practices in the leadership challenge actually help you do is change mind-set – your own and others. How do I know this? Because over a 30 year span of managing and leading others, these are some of the things I learned along the way and which I know if applied can change the way you lead and manage for good.

The truth is, what you give out, you get back. Newton’s 3^rd Law, “To every action there is always an equal and opposite reaction: or the forces of two bodies on each other are always equal and are directed in opposite directions”, while centred on physical actions and reactions, it is the same with mental and attitudinal energy too.

So come with me on a journey. Each week of the leadership challenge, I will expand on the suggestions below, one by one, week by week. Updates might include a new article, related articles, research, videos or a relevant quote. You need do nothing, but simply consider the suggestion and read the material. If you are hoping to change the way you lead yourself, simply substitute “others or them” for “you or yourself”. If you are inspired, then I invite you to submit your articles, experiences, quotes or other relevant material for each weekly topic. You can do this by commenting, submitting material to me in advance or providing links on the commentry. If you aren’t inspired to do so, simply sit back and enjoy.

You will know some of this, maybe a lot, and some of it might simply be a refresher or even could be new. My hope is that the journey on the leadership challenge will be an interactive one, where we can share perceptions, views and ideas as we progress through the year.

So if you’d like to join me on the leadership challenge journey,

50 Ways to Make a Difference As A leader

Leadership Challenge Part One

Developing Self Awareness to Benefit Yourself and Others

Remembering It’s a Journey not a Destination
Accepting the power of your mind
Tapping into your right-mindedness
Dealing with your inner critic
Understand your own personality type
How to forgive yourself and give up guilt for good
Developing self-trust and trust in others
Practice “honest” thinking, not just positive thinking
How to change limiting beliefs
Understanding, you don’t know what you don’t know

Leadership Challenge Part Two

Creating A Compelling Future

Developing a clear vision
Communicating and engaging with others about your vision
Bridging the gap between the here and now and the future
Understanding the power and limitations of planning
Practice Letting Go
Developing resilience
Developing patience and trust
Keeping an open mind to opportunities
Living in the present while creating your future
Dealing with doubt positively

Leadership Challenge Part Three

Engaging and Motivating Others

Help others feel connected to something bigger than themselves
Help others feel they are part of making a significant difference
Help others feel good about their positives
Help others feel good about the challenging parts of themselves
Demonstrate the power of giving
Practice acceptance of themselves and others
Practice non-judgement
Practice discernment
Develop new thinking skills
Develop new ways to raise awareness of the impact of emotions

Leadership Challenge Part Four

Interaction and Communication

Demonstrate congruent communication
Make decisions with integrity
Use “toward and away” motivation in your interactions with integrity
Raise your awareness of how people tick
Be inclusive
Be visible
Understand how to ask the right questions
Use logical levels to increase understanding
Use Carl Jung’s personality types to aid understanding
True listening

Leadership Challenge Part Five

Relationship is everything

Another way of looking at relationships
Giving up specialness to gain everything
Dealing with difficult people
Preventing conflict
Responding not reacting
It’s either love or fear
The boomerang effect
The role of gratitude
Myths about others
The central relationship lesson

No comments

A Creative Look At Routine – 5 Steps To Transform Your Routine Processes or Tasks

By Christina Lattimer • January 9, 2014 - 1:15 pm Leadership and Management

Are you creative in your routine?

A human myth is that there are creative people and people who simply aren’t. The truth is that we are all creating. Some of us simply create more routine in our lives than others. Some create a more adventurous lifestyle, hone artistic qualities or even can create much drama in their lives. One of the determinants of how you will use your creative skills will be based on your personality preferences.

MBTI (Myers Briggs Type Indicator), is based on the psychology of Carl Jung, where he identified eight distinct personality functions which can strongly influence the way we create our world, our creative approach will differ depending on our type preference.

Until I understood my personality type preferences I used to judge myself for “not having more attention to detail” and for preferring to spend time on my own than with friends (not always, but often!), or for having millions of ideas and not being able to finish implementing many of them. Realising that I had unconscious preferences to be a certain way, but I could choose to do things differently, even if that felt uncomfortable; was extremely liberating.

The relevance of all that is that while some people love routine and feel lost without it, for me I get bored very easily with routine tasks, I love starting new projects, a varied workload and trying new things. At this time in my life I have learned enough about myself and created sufficient discipline to get the routine stuff out of the way, but I simply don’t enjoy it, procrastinate too often and look forward to the utopian day when I can afford to pay others to carry out the routine tasks to free me up to vision, imagine and create new adventures.

Setting up my new business has been a steep learning curve. I have been self-employed in the past but simply worked as an associate and worked with many different companies. This time, I’m actually setting up a business, which means it has to have outcomes, structure, financial plans and on and on. Up until a few months ago I actually sang my way into the office every day. Using my imagination to decide what I wanted to create, with real meaning and purpose has been exciting, new and adventurous.

A few months ago the social media side of the business took a remarkable positive turn which meant lots of services being delivered to new clients. Enviable isn’t it? Well yes it certainly is and we are counting our blessings every day. The problem of course for me is it meant routine work increased because we simply had to deliver. Not my strong preference!

No comments

Why Happiness At Work Is Vital and What Employers Can Do

By Christina Lattimer • December 5, 2013 - 1:42 pm Miscellaneous

It seems one of the vital components for success is happiness

One of the most frustrating problems I found when I led and managed teams was my inability to make all of my team members happy, despite my best efforts. Of course the frustration was misguided because in those early days I didn’t actually realise happiness was an internal choice and that no matter what I did, if someone chose to be unhappy then I was quite frankly stymied in my futile attempts.

In my first management role at age 22, I didn’t realise why having a happy team was important, except that it felt much better to work in a happy environment, the understanding came much later on. It was a no brainer really from an experiential point of view. Members of my team, who were happy, were engaged, motivated, purposeful and optimistic. They were prepared to go the extra mile, were more authentic and open, and simply recognised the importance of team cohesion.

2 Comments

14 Ways to Be a Great Team Player At Work

By Christina Lattimer • November 21, 2013 - 1:08 pm Employee Development

In the new social world we now live in, the importance of teamwork in any organisation is key. Being a collaborative team player, aligning purpose, values and effort will be the hallmarks of a great employee.

Andrew Armour sets out the need for collaborative working in Why Superteams Win In The Social Era Of Business, and asserts that 86% of senior executives surveyed in the 2011 Innovation Barometer, viewed collaboration as vital to innovate, but only 21% had the culture and people to do so. I believe that things have probably moved on since then, but we still have some way to go.

Being a team player at whatever level in the organisation is a skill which increasingly, organisations will view as essential., according to Mckinsey because of global talent shortages. Because the dynamics of our world are changing so rapidly and significantly, team members no longer need to sit back with frustration or without a voice. As has been demonstrated in many incidents over the last few years, employees have used social platforms to “out” many illicit, unfair or just plain silly practices. Conversely, team players can be the biggest advocates and champions for their employers, as they tell glowing stories across their social media communities.

In an increasing global economy, as Mckinsey’s article points out, there might well be heavy demands on highly skilled interactive professionals: A collaborative aligned team is going to be essential to help bridge any gaps. Change is in the air, and switched on employers are already realising that culture change is essential to meet the challenges of the social era, and the talent marketplace. Good HR Expertise is essential.

As an employee, you will gain a distinct advantage if you understand what is going to be needed to be a valued team player. You are going to find that respected employers are increasingly going to be looking at how well you collaborate with others, how positively you interact in the social world, and how much you buy into their values and purpose.

How can you become the team player that good employers will be lining up to have in their team?

Having led and managed literally hundreds of employees, there are some timeless qualities I have encountered which for me make up the ideal team player. Of course in an ideal world, you rarely get the whole set of team player ideal qualities. We are perfect in our imperfections. The following attitudes, traits and qualities are so good to work with, and one’s I would certainly be looking for in any assessment, certainly for key players in my team.

As a great team player you will:

Take responsibility for yourself. This means not automatically blaming your tools, your colleagues or management, but being self aware enough to say “perhaps I could have done something differently”.
Get the big picture and understand exactly what we are trying to do together – You don’t naturally have to be a big picture thinker. In fact some organisations may employ you because of your attention to detail, but being able to pull yourself out of the detail sometimes is a huge advantage.
Have an affinity with and believe in what we are trying to achieve – You will love our products, love what we are trying to do, and it makes you happy because you think by virtue of working with us you have been part of it all.
Give a positive account of the organisation and concentrate on what is good about it – This does not mean pretending that everything is ok and smiling when it isn’t, but realising that even though things might go wrong, there is positive intent behind the decision making. It really is about giving others in the team whatever their role “the benefit of the doubt”.
At times when it is crucial for the business, go the extra mile – Being committed to pulling out the stops when necessary. There is a fine line between occasionally having to put in more effort and it being expected as a matter of course, so if it’s too much, have the confidence to say so.
Care about others on your team – This can be tough because team work can be a hot bed of relationship problems. But with some determination and commitment to creating a caring environment, then concerted effort is never lost.
Commit to resolving differences in an adult and win/win way – Workplaces can be the worst place to play out the parent/adult/child relationship. A paternally based organisation is definitely becoming an old paradigm. Becoming aware of the paradigm, is the lamp needed to dispel it.
When you’re not able to fulfil your contract for any period of time for family or medical reasons, you commit to doing your best to get back to work as soon as you can because you know how crucial you are to the excellence of the business.
Commit to getting the work done, on time and to the best of your ability – This is not just for the team, this helps to raise your own personal standards and improve your own energy. It always pays dividends, and will be noticed.
Trust us to make the best decisions we can with the information we have, even if you don’t like it. With millions of decisions to make, some with consultation, some not so democratic, its a minefield, and we’re not always going to get it right. Sometimes you aren’t going to like it, but you trust the intention is good behind it.
Understand we have a mutual contract and we will respect your rights, and you respect ours. – if it’s not working, then, communicate, communicate, communicate until it’s right.
Forgive us our mistakes, we all make them – Help to create a no-blame culture, where we know none of us are perfect, but we will learn from our mistakes, not use them to beat each other up.
If you’re not happy come and tell us about it constructively, trust us to listen and do something about it – Be open to different ways of seeing things, and commit to finding a solution. Don’t be that person who is happy being unhappy.
If you can’t commit to any of the above, consider how you are contributing to the success of the organisation, and if you can’t or won’t commit then consider your position. If we are doing everything we can to collaborate and it’s still not working then you might be simply in the wrong job.

So there you have it, my somewhat idealistic list of a great team player. It might sound impossible, but I have encountered such positive traits collectively along the way. I would hope many of them are traits I displayed as a team player myself, although, I’m not sure if my past teams would agree. I’m sure there are also many to add, what would be your ideal wish list for a great team player?

Author Archives: Christina Lattimer

About Christina Lattimer

Five Ways To Get Rid Of Stress and Honour Yourself

To alleviate stress, you have to strike an equal balance between work, rest and play.

A New Paradigm – A Leadership Development Model

To give clarity to my paradigm on leadership and management, I set out below my leadership development model which gives on overview of my own philosophy.

Challenging Limiting Beliefs Is A Leadership Skill

Understanding how people tick is essential for a leader, especially at the level of our beliefs.

21 Ways To Use MBTI To Help You and Your Team

MBTI is an essential tool for you and your team.

3 Steps to Harness the Power of the Mind for Organisational Transformation

In my article about the Hidden Power for Leadership and Life, I wrote about how beliefs, attitudes and expectations drive the outcomes within teams. In today’s blog I am expanding on those ideas and identifying how the power of the mind can be harnessed to lead your team.

Putting Your Results In Perspective For Effective Leadership

Of course, most leadership positions in the business world are focussed on achievement and results.

50 Ways you can make a difference as a leader for 2014 – Join the leadership challenge!

I would like to invite you to a leadership challenge.

A Creative Look At Routine – 5 Steps To Transform Your Routine Processes or Tasks

Are you creative in your routine?

Why Happiness At Work Is Vital and What Employers Can Do

It seems one of the vital components for success is happiness

Inspirational New Leadership

Join Us On Our Amazing Journey!

AS FEATURED ON

Follow me on Twitter

Find Specific Articles