Happy Friday all. We’re on the eve of publication - the culmination of almost 18 months’ work. It feels slightly surreal and very exciting.
To mark the occasion, we’ve opened registration for our launch event on 23 June and you can sign up here. You’ll see there are free drinks and nibbles, a fabulous guest panel, and the opportunity to meet and chat with other interesting people (at a safe distance) in the wonderful House of St Barnabas in Soho Square - so as well as celebrating with us, you’ll be helping a good cause too. Tickets are available on a first come, first served basis, so don’t delay.
Don’t forget that there is also the opportunity to join in the fun of trying to beat the Amazon algorithm, so do set aside a few moments between 10am and midday on Monday morning (not yet!) to invest 99p in the Kindle edition - whether you own a Kindle or not. We’ll drop you a line on Monday morning with the details. And if you do both, you’ll get an extra drink on us if you bring your receipt to the launch event. So much fun to be had!
This week, Diana focuses on one of the key themes from the book, and the most in demand topic from our research - how to balance preparation vs planning. As ever, we’d love to hear your views. If you use Twitter, you can see more on this topic over the coming week @OwnYourDay_Book too.
Diana’s thoughts on preparation vs planning
How can you possibly prepare for the unexpected let alone the unknowable? I remember the dot.com crash and 9/11, both of which had a big impact on people’s confidence at the time. As did the financial crisis: who had heard of the sub-prime mortgage market before 2008? And now we are living through another example of the volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous (VUCA) world we live in. All our carefully developed plans were ripped up and thrown out of the window last year.
Image by Miroslava Chrienova from Pixabay
The key to preparation is to focus more on the future, recognising that past experience is rarely a guide to the unforeseen needs of today. And making sure thinking time is fixed in your diary is the basis for preparedness. I can imagine you saying that’s unrealistic when there isn’t enough time in the day to do your job. And if that’s how you feel, then it’s time to reframe your approach.
Time and time again we’ve seen the people who thrive and get recognised for innovative approaches and problem-solving are those who carve out thinking time in their schedules. They feel more confident about the future too. We suggest some ways to make this effective in the book but the biggest step is making the commitment to do it.
Thinking time can take many forms. One of our research respondents went to a conference on AI with no specific agenda other than wanting to know if there was anything happening that might be relevant to his company in the future. As a result, that same manager described how a team member created a virtual reality experience for a client, which also excited people right across the organisation.
Whether it’s going to a conference, reading journals or catching up with thought leaders, managers who are future-focused become enthusiastic about what they discover and the interesting people they meet in the process.
As McKinsey observes in this article about managing beyond the probable, our natural response when faced with uncertainty is to seek clarity. And once you understand that default response, the article describes three different mind habits to help cope with uncertainty. One of these habits is simply to ask different questions and an example of this is described below.
For example, a government agency struggling with ever-shrinking resources and ever-increasing demands had asked two questions for years: “How will we get enough money to meet the demands?” and “Which services can we cut to stay within our budget?” The senior team, tired of running in circles searching for untapped financing streams or arguing over which core services to cut, intentionally explored a new idea: “How can we share our workload with others so that our current financing becomes sufficient without cutting back on services?” This new question significantly widened the available possibilities, and the organization set out to conduct a long series of small-scale experiments with businesses, other government departments, and community members to keep the same level of service for far less money. Asking a different question opened up dynamic possibilities.
Uncertainty is bound to cause anxiety and fear, which is a natural response to the unknown. This can lead to frustration and failure, so resilience is key to dealing with uncertainty.
Resilience is not about getting back up again without having learned anything after a setback, that is simply survival. And I don’t go along with the saying that what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger: setbacks can be brutal experiences causing anger or a loss of confidence. This INSEAD article How resilient leaders think helpfully describes the two natural responses to crises and how to deal with negative thoughts.
From my own experience, I couldn’t have survived the world of work without the support of people in my network. They have helped me to solve problems as well as being a critical friend when I needed one. And in the process of co-authoring Own Your Day, I’ve had some rewarding conversations with people who I haven’t spoken to in years. One resulted in me reading a book about baseball which, although totally bewildering, was recommended because it was about Bill Veeck’s management approach. Which reminds me, I must get around to finishing that!
Your thoughts…
We’re really keen to hear your thoughts on anything in this week’s note that has sparked your interest.
Have you had to switch from certainty to uncertainty? Did you use a method or approach that was helpful?
Do you regularly schedule thinking time and has this had any beneficial effects?
Do you feel able to cope with whatever comes your way? And have you found any particular techniques helpful?
Whatever your reflections and experiences are, we’d love to hear about them in the comments section. Simply click here to share your thoughts.
Until next Friday.
Best wishes
Julie & Diana
PS You can pre-order your copy of the book via these routes: