Leadership and Management

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Need to Find Inspiration? – 5 ways to get in the Zone

By Christina Lattimer • May 30, 2013 - 12:12 pm Leadership Development

Need Inspiration ?

I work best when I’m inspired. What do I mean by inspired? For me, it is a feeling of “all’s well” with the world: A certainty that nothing is going to go wrong and what I am doing is meant to be. When I am inspired, time ceases to matter and I can be working with focus and complete attention for what seems like minutes and a few hours have passed. Idea’s flow and they are easy to implement. I don’t actually think about much, I am just being, and moving forward. Some people call it being in “flow”. I call it being in the Zone.

Some years ago, I found myself struggling to define “quality” beyond the routine service level agreements, when making improvements to our customer service offer. It was easy to set standards in terms of timing and behaviours for example, it was less easy to define when they were met; but the quality wasn’t good.

The easiest way I found I could communicate quality in this context was to describe what it wasn’t. So for example. If a product was returned, or customers had to ring up for information we could have given them beforehand. If we got feedback which indicated we weren’t meeting on unwritten expectations, for example, an attitude by an employee, or not giving the right information at the right time.

Inspiration is like that, difficult to define or put into words and often easier to describe when inspiration is lacking. So for example: I am definitely not in the Zone when:

I feel de-motivated
I am resistant to moving forward
Time is dragging or worse I feel bored
What I am doing seems like a chore
I feel tired and stressed
I am overwhelmed or discouraged.
I’m easily distracted

Like being happy, being inspired takes some practice. Mostly, you can’t simply choose to be and feel inspired at will, you have to create the conditions which lead to an inspired state. Everyone will have a different way of doing this, but if you don’t know how to create those conditions then it might be worth your while to find out what works for you.

Over the years, I have developed a way of getting into my Inspiration “Zone” and here are some activities which I hope can help you reach an inspired state.

Writing early in the morning immediately after waking is a powerful practice. It is a great way to capture those early morning inspirational ideas and thoughts which often hit, like no other time in the day. Do this before you do anything else, yes even before that morning cuppa, otherwise the “spell” is broken, and you will begin to worry about your day to day schedule, or whatever is on your mind at the time.
If you are feeling fairly negative and need to get into the Zone, then find a comfortable place and stop thinking. No;I didn’t say stop breathing! Although when I suggest this to some, you would think I had indicated such a drastic step. This is a great technique if you have to go into a meeting or an event and you want to be in an inspired state. Instead of thinking about it, just stop thinking. This might involve just observing any thoughts you might have, but not actively engaging with them. It’s a mini meditation which should only last for about 5 minutes or so. Practicing “not thinking” is like giving your tired bombarded mind a mini holiday. It also allows the inspired part of you to shine through. Like sun rays streaming through a cloudy sky.
Take some time out and spend it doing something you love. That might be spending time with family, reading, exercising, or just watching a good old movie. It’s always good to do this, but be warned, if you take your de-motivated or distracted self with you, then you will negate the benefits. You must completely and utterly allow yourself to give your full attention to the activity, and the good feelings which you connect with.
Listen to music. Whether it’s up-beat rousing music, slow, ballads, or indeed anything which appeals to you at the time. Listening to music clears away negativity and if given attention and focus, helps change your state positively.
A state which completely minimises inspiration is when you are cluttered or overwhelmed, whether with things to do, or physical disorder around you. To keep clear and allow the inspiration to flow, take a good inventory of your things to do list, and delete anything less than essential. You must be ruthless. Ruthlessness is also a must when you are getting rid of physical clutter either at home or at work. If you haven’t touched it in 6 months, then you need to ask yourself whether you are going to use it. All clutter and unnecessary tasks are doing to you is keeping you weighted down.

What are your top tips to become inspired?

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Take Another Look : How Your Perception Is Changing Your World

By Christina Lattimer • May 9, 2013 - 10:26 am Leadership Development

I’ve wanted to write an article on perception for a long time, and for a while, until today, the words haven’t come.

Today I had a big personal breakthrough when I was able to see something I had long viewed in a certain way, differently. I feel differently and I know that my experience, has, and will change. The reason we need to understand the way our perception shapes our world is because if we want to experience something different, the change must come from within.

Some time ago a friend of mine, in mid-life, lost her job. She didn’t even see it coming. One day she walked into her workplace and was told, along with the rest of the workforce, that she no longer had a job. After a few weeks she decided to set up a business on her own. After only 18 months she gave up and went to work for a local business in a role which didn’t really reflect her expertise or indeed her valuable experience. A year into the job she came to me for some help.

Describing how she felt, she said she had “lost her mojo”. After some unravelling we got back to the day she lost her job. On the day of the “bombshell”, she took herself off for a walk, numb and stunned, her thoughts went along the lines of “Why me?” “What has gone wrong?” “How am I going to manage?”

Knowing how her family relied on her salary she felt like a failure and even up to the day we discussed the situation, she wondered why this catastrophic change in her life had happened.

She had attempted to pick herself up, starting the new business and then latterly with the new job, but she had lost something valuable inside and her and faith had been severely shattered.

During the conversation, I suggested that some people after the initial shock may have thought “Yippee” I can now explore something else, I can use my unique talents I have to do something great with my life”. She looked at me as if I had gone mad, and I could see she thought I was probably out of touch with reality.

But that is the real problem. We think the reality we see and how we interpret it, must be right. But in any given situation, we can look again and interpret it in a different way.

I realised many years ago that the world I was seeing was a reflection of my perceptions. When I was a young single mother I felt unsupported and alone. I had lots of friends and family, but I always perceived them to have busy lives and asking them for help was a big deal for me, so I rarely did it.

Unwittingly, I was fulfilling my perception of: “I am pretty much on my own, and if I need anything, I had better do it myself, because others are too busy to help”. After many months of feeling frustrated, overwhelmed and alone; a back problem forced me to ask for help.

At first it was difficult and uncomfortable; I felt I was imposing my own problems on others. But after a while, something magic happened. I began to see that people around me, cared about me, and wanted to help.

When I asked people for support they overdid the support they gave me. I saw that when people were helping me, they felt connected and were happier helping me than watching me struggle alone.

I finally realised with a great big light bulb moment, that my outworn perception had unwittingly kept others at a distance and not only was my perception wrong, but my need to be right kept my perception in place even when I desperately needed to see things in another way.

When my friend and I started talking about the choices we have and how we can see things in a different way, she realised losing the job was not a personal indictment on her. She eventually also saw she had been holding on to a faulty perception of the job loss and this faulty perception was affecting her life every day.

She decided to look at the situation differently and came to the conclusion it had nothing to do with her, it was simply a change in her life, albeit an unexpected one. I recently received an email from her. She told me that she was becoming quite an expert at switching her perceptions and most importantly, she had her mojo back!

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The 5 Step Blueprint Of Successful Organisational Change

By Christina Lattimer • May 2, 2013 - 10:59 am Organisational Change

A Blueprint for Change

In my capacity as a Leadership and HR Consultant, I am mostly called in when a problem has been encountered or a change is needed. Consultancy is of course about understanding the problem, so a solution can be found. Because I understand that organisations have a personality just like people, the problem is always unique to that particular organisation. And so of course it follows, the solution is unique.

Over the years, I have developed a paradoxically, simple approach, to what can be perceived as complex organisational change. Using my expertise in Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) and Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) coupled with systems thinking I help leaders get to the crux of the problem, and help them find organisational solutions quickly.

The 5 step process allows leaders to look at the change from a number of different perspectives; zoom in and zoom out; satisfy both intuitive/visionary and auditory/sensor preferences for taking in, assimilating and communicating information. It also encourages a holistic decision-making process which embraces heart and mind, or logic and feeling preferences.

The process in itself is a simple one, which helps maintain focus, although the dynamics within the process helps clarify complexities. The 5 step process can be used in any organisation to solve problems or to instigate change.

The 5 Step Blueprint

1. Where are you going?

There are usually three basic directions, and it’s important to find out exactly where the organisation wants to go and how it wants to travel. It is vital to determine at the very outset the clear drivers for change.

A moving towards or progression
A change of direction – a moving away from
An alignment to perform better

You may find that there is a combination of ways to move forward, but asking the question in this frame helps uncover what is motivating the change and develops the basis for the next step:

2. At What level does the change need to be made?

There are 6 basic levels these are linked to 6 logical levels of change used in NLP:

The purpose or the “Why” of the organisation
The Identity or the organisational brand
The level of values, beliefs or concepts of the organisation
Knowledge, skills and competencies
Behaviours and culture
Environment

While this can take some time to establish it is essential appropriate time is taken to identify the starting level. If your starting point is level one, then it is likely all remaining levels will be affected. If you start at level 4, depending on what that change involves, will determine whether any other levels are affected. The next step is:

3. How does the change affect each part of the organisation?

In addition to the logical levels above, change impacts each part of the whole. A successful change process will anticipate those impacts, consult on the detail, and make necessary adjustments ensuring the change is integrated across each identified impact. The level at which the change occurs will determine the scope and depth of the impact. Some impacts might be:

Relationships
Interdependencies such as linked projects or schemes of work
Policies
Processes
External partnerships and stakeholders
Resources
Customers

4. How will you know that the change is successful?

What exactly does success look like? Ways to frame this question can be:

Will the organisation be more profitable/deliver better products and or services?
How often, and with what method will this improvement be measured?
How will the customers/stakeholders/partners respond to change?
How will employees respond, what will they be doing differently?
What will the organisation look and feel like?
How will existing targets and results change?

5. How will the changes happen?

If the change is a one-off intervention, a programme or project approach may be beneficial. If it is more significant, then you may want to build the change into the strategic plan and build in outcomes and ownership accordingly. For a systematic approach, you need to consider the following elements to ensure success:

Who will own the change?
What is the governance around the change? (Where do accountabilities lie?)
How will the change be communicated?
Who will be consulted and when?
When will success be realised?

As you can see, change is only as complicated as you want it to be. Keeping it simple may not satisfy the more theoretical and analytical minds around, but cutting out complexity is the surest way to get results more quickly and in a way in which everyone understands.

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Are You Awake To Change?

By Christina Lattimer • April 25, 2013 - 11:28 am Organisational Change

Change has been quite a topic for me this week, both from a personal point of view and from some of my clients.

Change models are helpful and I have found with clients that any approach to change and therefore the preferred model, depends pretty much on the situation and the preference of the person wanting to instigate the change.

Standard models, like Kotter’s “8-Step Process for Leading Change” are effective and helpful, and for some are enough. I always find it helpful to illustrate Lewins “Force Field Theory of Change” when looking at resistance to change, although even setting out how behaviours and resistance will manifest, doesn’t usually prepare people for the actual experience of these phenomena when the process is underway.

Levels of change are best described in Bandler and Grinder’s which is for me one of the most helpful models, because it clearly describes the hierarchy of change.

There are many more models out there, so why is it then when change is happening, even when teams are aware of the Kubler-Ross change curve, does it often become so distasteful, stressful frightening and difficult? Is it simply because the experience of actually going through change is much messier than the models lead us to believe it will be?

Through years of experience of leading change and helping to lead change I have found some common factors which help to make the process of change much easier, less painful and less problematical. These factors I call AWAKE. I am not a big fan of acronyms but without any effort the five factors fit, so without apology I present them in this way, because you never know, thinking of AWAKE might help you to remember these factors the next time you are involved in a change, whether personal or work based.

The five factors are all about the energy which is brought to the change. It doesn’t matter which model is used, if the underlying energy isn’t right then the change will be more difficult; take longer and be riskier. I have broken the factors down as follows.

Attention

Attitude

Kindness

Energy

Attention

Any change needs to have attention. This is about the concentrated focus of the mind and the mind-set either in your personal life or your organisation. To achieve real successful change, the change must become the most important thing in the universe during the time it takes to initiate, implement and achieve the outcomes. It is akin to Kotter’s first step about creating urgency, but it is more than that. If you have several programmes, projects or changes going on at once, then the order of attention, priority and importance must be determined. If too much is going on, attention is diluted, the change is slower, and the impetus is lost.

It doesn’t matter if your change affects a team, an organisation, your family, or it is an individual change, like giving up smoking or moving house. As an individual you have different aspects to your personality just as much as there are different personalities in a collective change. For example if you want to give something up, then there are parts of your personality which don’t want to. If you want to change something in the organisation then there will be people who don’t want to. There will also be aspects of you, which do want the change, and people in the team who embrace change readily. The difficulties arise when opposing parts of yourself or people in the team become pitted against each other, even if this is in the short term, and this is when conflict arises.

If you recognise that when change occurs, all parts of the organisation (or all parts of you), need to be understood and listened to: Then conflict is understood and dealt with, and any potential for hidden or unconscious sabotage or resistance is lessened. Coming from the power of “We” takes a certain level of maturity because it needs the understanding that “we are all in it together”, “the sum parts make a whole”, and “everyone counts”. The stock phrase for this dynamic is that “we are changing, and we all count”.

Attitude

I would like to bet that instigators of change believe they have the right attitude because they fervently believe that they want the change, they know the change is for the better, it can benefit all. They have a vision and they understand deeply the benefits. Sometimes though, during the change, conscious or unconscious doubt becomes apparent. The doubt is not about whether the change is needed, it is about whether the change can actually be made. For individuals they may fear their own levels of resilience, or for leaders they may doubt the ability of some of their team to make it. The attitude to change must be one of “Can do”. It sounds simple I know, but that resistance if not uncovered right from the outset can slow down and sabotage change unwittingly.

Kindness

If any of you have gone through difficult or long-winded change which has proved stressful, combatant, or fraught with problems, then along the way you may have experienced the tensions and conflicts brought out the worst in everyone involved. If at the outset, you make one of the conditions of change to be kind to one another (or kind to yourself); the energy of the conflict, resistance or problem simply has to change. It might sound corny, but if you are talking about a particular problematic aspect or dealing with fears or resistance, to start off the interchange with “How can we remain kind in this situation?” just changes the dynamic.

Energy

The AWAKE model is all about the often unspoken energy which is brought to the process of change. To acknowledge the process of change as energy can be empowering, as it raises awareness. There are two further aspects of energy to consider:

Firstly, 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” and

Secondly, Ghandi’s often misquoted declaration; “If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him”

If you are awake to change you will have a head start

What these mean in practice is: If you voice your frustration, or have low expectations about yourself or the people involved in the change then that becomes your experience. If you complain about others, then you are slowing down the change, because the energy you are emitting becomes part of the change process. Even though you might think others don’t notice, on the level of energy they know something isn’t quite right, and they will react accordingly.

So there you have it: Are you AWAKE when making change?

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The Single Daily Choice which will Change Your Life for Good

By Christina Lattimer • April 10, 2013 - 9:48 am Miscellaneous

Yesterday, I had some news which made me want to cry with frustration. This problem had come up a couple of times before, and I had, with much annoyance, sorted it out, and here it was again. I won’t bore you with the problem because problems are two a penny, and the real issue is what I did about it.I had always thought of myself as “A cup half full” person until about 15 years ago. I had an ability to identify and solve problems, and therefore make (what I thought) was a positive contribution to whichever world or organisation I was impacting upon at the time.It was in a session with a coach I had hired to help me make a particular transition in my life who brought that self-concept sharply into question. We had been talking about a situation in my life where I was explaining what was wrong and how I thought I had done all I could to make changes, when she looked me straight in the eye and said “You have a slightly negative outlook on the world don’t you think?”

The silence must have only lasted about 30 seconds but it felt like about an hour while I contemplated with horror what she had just said. In one fell swoop she uncovered one of the biggest blind spots in my life.

In the moments that followed, I didn’t even try to deny it, the only words I could muster were “Do you really think so?” And she nodded. I felt like I had been punched. The horror I think was more acute, because I actually woke up in that moment and realised it was true.

The pattern of my thinking and my self-concept had been mismatched for the majority of my working life up until that point and I’d had no idea until that moment. It was a defining moment for me because it made me look within, and thus the journey to uncover the largely unconscious and negative thoughts and beliefs in my mind began.

For the next few years I worked at becoming conscious of my beliefs and thought patterns and it was amazing how judgmental I had been, not only of myself but others. During the journey, I uncovered many patterns I had acquired.

For me ingrained beliefs and patterns of thinking are like well learned habits, which like tying shoelaces or riding a bike, you have learned so well they’ve become unconscious. When you try to go back to identify the sequence of the beliefs and thoughts it takes some effort to uncover them, and then some real practice to change the way you’ve habitually become used to believing and thinking.

The journey has been painful and liberating and in the end totally empowering. I would love to say that I no longer participate in negative thinking but it’s a lifetime’s work I think for me. I now have strategies in place which can almost instantaneously change my thinking for the better, and some of my limiting beliefs at the same time.

The barometer which measures my progress is my feelings. When I am feeling positive and peaceful emotions, I know my thinking is aligned with who I really am at my core. puts forward the idea that your emotions are a result of your intentions, unconscious or not.

So when I started feeling anxious and fearful as a result of the problem. I realised that my intention in that moment was flawed. I was about to let my beliefs ideas and thoughts turn towards a victim mentality. “Why did this happen to me again?, it must be karma” Helplessness, “What if I can’t solve it?” When you see this pattern in black and white, it seems quite silly. But much of our suffering in life is because of the habitual default to our mostly unconscious negative fears, beliefs and thoughts about us.

You may well have heard the quote “Pain is inevitable, Suffering is optional,” By the Japanese writer Haruki Murakami. If you put this with the quote by the Greek playwright, Aeschylus, “Happiness is a choice that requires effort at times.” In those two quotes you have the single choice, which can, if practised habitually, transform your life.

It is making the choice to be happy, no matter what.

So this is what I did about the problem yesterday.

When I began to feel anxious and worried, I stopped thinking about the problem and let my feelings come up. It took a few moments for the feelings to pass through.
I contemplated for a few minutes, and then decided to look at the problem through a different lens. I realised I had solved the problem twice before and I could very well do it again. The fact I had this problem again, didn’t make me a bad person. In fact, the problem was a real gift because it allowed me to release some of the unconscious worry and further reinforce liberating beliefs, ideas and thoughts which I knew to be true.
Despite the problem, I decided to be happy, and I began to think about and feel grateful for the good things and people in my life. I thought about how blessed I was because I could actually choose to think empowering, and peaceful thoughts, which then translated into positive feelings.

I have this now down to a fine art. The whole process took about 5 minutes in all. All those years ago, it could have taken me 3 days to feel positive again after encountering such a problem. Progress indeed.

If you’d like to read more about some of my methods I have learned over the years, sign up for my weekly blog and download your free e-book: The 6 Secrets of Great Emotional Intelligence”

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What If Everything Was OK?

By Christina Lattimer • February 8, 2013 - 6:05 pm Leadership and Management

What if things were really ok?

Two nights ago, I went swimming. It was an activity I had been looking forward to all day. I usually go quite late because it tends to be more peaceful and as I swim I can ruminate and contemplate.

Tired and tense for the first 10 lengths or so, instead or relaxing, I found my mind worrying about a number of pieces of work I had still to complete. The anticipated peaceful relaxing swim was eluding me

As I carried on, I remembered a technique I use quite frequently with clients. It is the “What if” frame. It’s a well-known Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) technique used to help people tap into their imagination and explore situations they otherwise might consider being impossible. It is usually used to break down limiting beliefs.

For example, a friend of mine loves his sales job, but confessed once he sometimes felt frustrated because never seemed to earn more than £50k annually. He had never exceeded this figure and was convinced it wouldn’t get any better. When I asked why he thought that was, he explained he didn’t think the number of customers were available to exceed that limit.

I recognised his frustration because he had simply hit a limiting belief. I asked “What If you wereable to find ways to exceed earnings of 50k?” What would you have done differently, and what else could you do? He furrowed his brow and started thinking. What this technique does, is lift a person over the “I can’t” barrier, and helps open up possibilities, to incorporate ideas and suggestions, to achieve a different outcome.

Asking “what if” can be a powerful way to get your creative juices flowing. So when my daughter’s friend was planning her wedding, she floundered about the kind of venue she wanted and the colour of the bridesmaid’s dresses etc. So I asked her “what if, you had the wedding of your dreams, what would the surroundings look like?” This and questions like it helped her to begin to describe her highest desires. From there, she was able to begin to imagine and thus describe what would work for her.

When swimming, two nights ago, I didn’t need to use my imagination, or break down my limiting beliefs. On the contrary, my imagination was working overtime, and it was my lack of limiting beliefs, (I know only too well the possibilities open to me!), that were actually overwhelming me and making me feel stressed. So when the “ What if ” came to my mind it was in a different context again.

As I swam, I recalled the final way I use “What if” exercises with clients, which helps them to get in touch with feelings. Used in this way asking “what if ” is used to switch feelings. If you are feeling low because you are scared something isn’t going to happen, or things haven’t worked out in the first place, the state you are creating can become like a self-fulfilling prophecy.

For example, you’ve applied for a job, but you didn’t get through the last job interview, and your confidence took a dent. Your anxiety about failing and the pressure you feel to be successful this time round simply intensifies. You worry about it for days beforehand, and by the time you get in front of the interview panel, you are so nervous, they can’t help but wonder if actually you are up to the job because you have been wringing your hands, and stammered your way all through the interview, simply because your anxiety took over.

If, before the interview, you had asked yourself the question, “What if I were successful at getting this job?” You imagine what it would feel like and get in touch with the joy, excitement, gratitude and enthusiasm you would experience. If you took that experience/state into the interview room, believe me, your interviewers would also have a completely different experience of interviewing you.

Ten minutes into my swimming session, I simply asked myself. “What if everything was OK?” I immediately stopped worrying, the knots in my back started to relax, and suddenly my state felt peaceful. As I swam on, I realised the worst thing I can do is not take my own advice. What was almost certainly going to turn out a most stressful hour of battling against feeling overwhelmed and anxious, completely switched. I realised if everything was OK, I could enjoy this hour, and simply unwind and relax. So I transformed the next fifty minutes.

Why not transform your next hour and imagine “What if, everything was OK?”

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7 Principles To Get An Immediate Return On Your Learning Investment

By Christina Lattimer • February 1, 2013 - 7:28 am Miscellaneous

There are many evaluation models and cost/benefit frameworks which attempt to determine the “worth” of learning and development in the workplace. Depending on the type of learning required, some models and frameworks are easier to apply than others. Sometimes even when applied, the expected outcomes and improvements have either not materialised or they have taken far longer than expected.

Even when the learning programme is excellent, it doesn’t always deliver results

A number of years ago, I worked with an organisation who had invested a great deal of employee time and financial resource into a learning and development programme, with frustratingly little result. A professional business consultancy had evaluated before and after, calculated a ROI which was a persuasive driver to buy in the proposed programme, but 18 months later, the expected benefits had simply not accrued.

The MD was totally frustrated; as the learning programme was polished, expert and inspirational. Employees were enthused, and bought into the concepts and the benefits of working in a different way. The formalised feedback on the training event was excellent. The business consultancy had done an amazing job. So what had gone wrong?

Improving knowledge, skills and behaviours doesn’t always mean better results

In another example, lack of effective leadership skills and behaviours had been identified as a big problem for this national organisation. It was decided to re-design the leadership skills framework and to develop a programme for all senior leaders. A set of behavioural standards were developed, and a methodology to measure changes was put in place. A coaching and mentoring framework was agreed along with monthly action learning meetings.

There was a new spring in the step of leaders across the organisation. They gave positive and enthusiastic feedback for the coaching and development programme.

When the 2^nd annual employee feedback survey showed less than a 1% improvement in perceptions of employees, alongside results with marginal improvements, they were dumbfounded.

Great learning programmes don’t always result in improvements, but they should

Those examples are simply two of hundreds I have seen, when learning and development has been brought into an organisation; the learning has been evaluated and the content and application has been faultless. The organisation is absolutely clear about the improvements they want to see. But yet, still, the expected results did not materialise.

Why is this? As you know there are many factors which impel or motivate people to change the way they do things, and learning new skills, behaviours, knowledge or even raising awareness is just one part of the equation.

When your business is buying in development interventions, you want to be able to see a real return on investment, otherwise why would you use precious financial resources on it? No one can completely guarantee a return on investment, but the chances of a return can be greatly improved, and more importantly you can pinpoint exactly why the return hasn’t been realised by introducing the following principles.

When I was asked to do some work for the organisation in the first example, the MD was frustrated that the learning he had bought in had not realised the outcomes he required, even though the learning providers had delivered the learning they had promised.

Seven simple principles

My first step was to establish the following 7 principles if I were going to take on the task of getting results:

A learning and development provider will facilitate a real return on investment in partnership with the commissioning organisation.
Learning must enable a measurable improvement or change by the learner.
The improvement or change must contribute to the overall outcomes for the organisation.
Each learner must develop a “call to action, or objective” where they are accountable for achieving the measurable improvement or change.
The organisation must enforce accountability, usually through their performance management system.
The achievement collectively of “calls to action, or objectives” will result in a measured outcome for the organisation.
“If it is not possible to set individuals a call to action or objective which aligns with overall business objectives, following learning then the commissioning organisation should consider whether development is actually needed.

I agreed to deliver a short refresher programme, with a pragmatic design. I explained unless the training included an accountable call to action for each employee, it would likely be unsuccessful once more, and so secured his agreement to establish accountability for achievement within the organisation.

We agreed at the end of the event, each employee would identify a work based objective to improve, abandon or shorten a process and to quantify the savings.

Improve customer service or increase customer satisfaction, with a measurable difference
Reduce the number and type of complaints
Create a measurable increase in quality

In a 6 month period, 95% of employees met objectives, outcomes were recorded and collectively it was calculated that almost £1 million had been saved up to that point as a direct result of achievement of the outcomes or objectives.

Not only were amazing results achieved, employees felt an increased sense of ownership of the success of the initiative. They had tangible evidence of their contribution and saw a real difference.

Incidentally, these principles will also work for individuals if you are thinking of buying in your own self-development programme. For the majority of learning, unless it translates into accountable action, then it might be a “nice to have” but not necessarily an activity which will create significant change

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7 Uncommon Ways to be a Positive Influence on You and Your Team

By Christina Lattimer • January 18, 2013 - 8:05 pm Miscellaneous

The psychology of leadership simply fascinates me, and no more so than when leaders have a positive influence on their team. You may not class yourself as a leader, but you are a leader, whether you’re leading a team, a family or even yourself. In your role, as a leader, the energy you emit is vital, and cannot fail to affect yourself and others.

Positive psychology sounds like another fad or for those of us chronic doomsayers, just plain “Pollyanna”. We all know the world we see has positive and negative energy. The question I have been asked on occasions is “By being positive, aren’t we just lying to ourselves?” Another concern centres on being authentic. ”Surely being positive constantly can’t be authentic, because bad things happen”.

Be a positive force

Well actually I do believe you can be a positive force, in all types of situations. If you want to lead people in the right direction, here are 7 uncommon ways you can be a positive influence on yourself and others.

7 ways to be a positive influence

Someone says something negative about you or something you value. Immediately you want to give a stinging reply, rush to your own defence or complain to others. Worse, you actually take the criticism on board. Haven’t we all been in that situation? Pausing to regain your composure and objectivity in such situations is vital before you reply. Pausing to think gives you an opportunity to respond instead. Response instead of reaction means you take the emotional charge out of the situation, incident or problem. It is a great opportunity to turn towards positivity and win/win.
Life is indeed difficult. There are good times and bad. Leading with positive influence means you navigate your way through the peaks and troughs, with hope and optimism. When the facts, which present themselves, seem to daunt, then you will command a positive influence if you remain neutral and objective as opposed to blaming, emotional and subjective.
Being a positive force doesn’t mean you have to deny your own negative emotions, in fact, it means you get in touch with them with a view to healing them. Too often people will blame other people for how they are feeling, but everyone’s emotions are their own. No one can make anyone else feel anything. Owning your emotions means you do not make anyone else responsible for you. It also means the power is in your hands, to take any situation, look on the bright side and change how you feel.
Being glad for others for most of us is quite easy. It’s great to see people doing well. Showing you’re glad means actively helping them to celebrate their successes. When someone gets that qualification or loses that 6lb, find a way to help them celebrate. Buy a bunch of flowers or send that card, or take the time to drop an email, pop your head round the door and tell them “Well done”. Too often in our fast paced lives, even though we may be glad for others, we fall short of showing we are.
When people’s lives are in the troughs rather than the peaks then, it’s time to concentrate on their strengths, and everyone has some strength. The trick here is to feel compassion for how they feel, and to be there for them, but not to join in with blaming others, cultivating a victim mentality or disempowering them from their own inner coping mechanism.
It is through painful situations people have an opportunity to find their strength and a positive influencer knows and gently encourages this.
Happiness is a choice. Every piece of information you process can be interpreted in a million ways. If you choose to interpret the information in a way which makes you sad, then it’s simply a choice you have made. Things happening around you do not determine your state, only you do. You have the choice, why not choose happiness instead.

People who choose to be happy are a joy to be around. They raise energy and raise spirits, which can only positively influence all around them

When you know you have a tricky meeting, or a difficult time coming up; then it’s time to begin intending your day. Intending your day or meeting or event, is extremely powerful. Instead of worrying about the content, think about the outcome. So, for example, you have a difficult meeting with your boss. Imagine it will be positive despite the difficulties, and imagine yourself feeling really pleased that you handled it so well. You will be amazed at the difference intending positive outcomes can make. When you intend great and positive outcomes day to day, then your energy impacts greatly on everyone around you.

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The Golden Triangle Of Open-Mindedness

By Christina Lattimer • January 11, 2013 - 10:59 am Leadership Development

I don’t think any of us can practice total open-mindedness because we continually have to make decisions and in order to make decisions we usually have to come to some sort of conclusion even if that means not making a decision at all.

Practicing open-mindedness, isn’t universal a characteristic we are born with. To be effective leaders and managers we often have to develop the crucial habits of self-reflection, observation, challenging beliefs and perceptions. For many of us, until something in life looms up to challenge us, then we simply don’t make the effort, or we just don’t realise, we should be questioning our daily paradigm.

Some of the pitfalls of not practicing open-mindedness are:

Having a Groundhog day experience
Seeing other people grow away from you
Staying in a miserable situation/state/relationship
Giving up on dreams
Feeling like a victim
Limiting other people
Stereo-typing situations or people
Coming to faulty conclusions

Within my coaching practice, I regularly see clients or people they work with, struggle to overcome fixed beliefs, values, judgments or even wishful thinking that get in the way of changing, or moving forward, in a situation.

The most common reasons they struggle is that it sometimes feels painful to have to a) acknowledge there is another way to look at things, and they might have gotten it wrong, b) they have a need to be right, or c) they have to track back to painful situations in their past which formed their limiting beliefs.

Byron Katie has a brilliant method which demonstrates how we can turn around beliefs and ways of thinking to find relief from uncomfortable or painful emotions. You can find out more about Byron Katie’s work in her series of books which started with.

For me, there is a simple formula which can help the process of practicing open-mindedness, and I call this “The golden triangle”. In essence, this involves looking at tricky situations in 3 ways. From your own perspective, the perspective of the other(s), and then as an observer

The role of the observer is essential in this process because it is in the observer’s role when it is possible to remain neutral, detached and to see the bigger picture.
The possibilities are endless. When you come to make decisions, using the perspective of an observer you come to realise:

For every argument “for”, there is a counterargument
Beliefs, thoughts, perceptions and ideas are fluid and flexible
Values can change depending on different situations
Stories and myths are helpful to unraveling paradigms or thought patterns

We all need to form paradigms, beliefs and ways of thinking and making decisions which work for us, we couldn’t get through our daily lives without such a structure. But if that structure isn’t working for you, then it’s time to visit the Golden Triangle and practice your muscle of open-mindedness.

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No More New Year Resolutions: 4 Steps To Lasting Change

By Christina Lattimer • January 3, 2013 - 4:42 pm Personal Development

Please, No More New Year resolutions – 4 ways to create change at any time

For me, the rot started and ended when I used to make and break New Year ’s resolutions. I always started the diet, or gave up cigarettes or vowed to keep the house, my life, my work in pristine order. I probably averaged about 3 weeks staying with my resolution, over the many years I subscribed to the notion of setting these annual goals, before succumbing to the temptation of the path of least resistance and my old habits.

The year I stopped this maddening merry-go-round, was about 10 years ago, when I managed to give up cigarettes for good one September. Why in September? Why not wait until the wonderful prospect of starting in the New Year ?

Basically, I made the change when I did because of 2 things. Firstly, I had come to hate smoking with fervour. Don’t get me wrong it wasn’t really the cigarettes which I hated, it was the lack of control I had over my urge to smoke the things. Secondly, realising the high risk of returning to the dreaded habit, I spent 2 months preparing to give up before I actually did.

In other words, I spent a long time preparing my mind-set, and my strategy. I actually began to think like a non-smoker before I had stopped smoking. What I realised during this process is that when we are trying to make lasting change, you have to internalise the change before you can make a permanent difference.

Since that time, I have been able to refine and experiment with ways of making significant changes, and this is what I have learned.

You must have a deep desire to make the change. I made overtures about wanting to stop smoking for years, but deep down, I wasn’t motivated enough to do it. It wasn’t until I hated smoking badly that I was prepared to put in the effort of whatever it took to stop the habit.
You need to have a about what it will look, feel like, and be like, when you have made the change. One of the reasons we are unsuccessful when making change is because we are trying to “move away” from something and it is the situation or the habit we don’t want which is what we focus on. Of course, we always get more of what we focus on. It’s important if your motivation for change is to move away from that you do some real work on creating a vision about what you want instead, and switch your intention and attention to that. Visionary people sometimes have an easier time of it, because they tend to “move towards” their goal, and this is what they focus on. One of my great visionary friends said once, “It’s easy, I just picture it in my head and then it happens”. Even with great vision there are some other steps which if not taken can trip you up.
You need to be able to believe you can make the change. Whether it’s making more money, becoming healthier or making some other lifestyle change, if you either consciously or unconsciously don’t really believe you can do it, then it isn’t going to happen. The belief gap is one of the reasons small and incremental steps towards your goal is usually better. Some people just have complete faith that they can make big changes and often they can achieve those leaps because they have created the right mind-set. The majority of us though need to make a gradual shift in our beliefs as we blossom into our vision.
You must act “As if”. We are radio transmitters, and we are always broadcasting our signal out. We often get jammed on the same wavelength, which makes us return to unhelpful habits repeatedly. If you want to become slimmer or healthier, but you constantly feel, talk about and think about being overweight and unhealthy, then you will not shift your signal, and you will keep attracting the same old situation. In order to feel, think and be the person you will be when you reach your goal or achieve your vision, you need to use your imagination. You can do this by asking yourself: How would I feel, what would I think and who would I be if I achieved this goal or my vision? When you get the answer, tune into that state of being as often as you can.

So there are my 4 top tips for creating real change in your life. If you’ve made some New Year Resolutions, don’t despair, just follow those steps and you will greatly increase your chance of success. But remember, you don’t have to wait for New Year; you just have to want the change enough.

Wishing you a very Happy, Prosperous New Year.

Tag Archives: change