Make a difference

One of my favourite one-liners is:
“There are only three kinds of people in this world – those who can count and those who can’t.” Drop it on your friends and wait for their response.

Maybe there are only two kinds of people: Those who make their life count and those who don’t.

It is a rare thing to encounter someone who actually leads. Who makes a difference. Why is that?
Our lives are sprinkled with the dead leaves of regret. Don’t get to an old age and look back with sadness, remorse or guilt at what might have been. “If only I had taken the road less travelled. If only I had taken the opportunities. If only I had plucked the ripe fruit and sucked the juice out of it. If only I had planted a seed of hope and nurtured it over the years. What would my life be like now?”
We can all make incremental changes that lead to a richer life. We just have to recognise them and act on it. Make your life count. Make a difference. Be a leader. Take a stand for what you believe.
Its never to late. Don’t make excuses. Take the stairs. Exercise more. Eat healthy food. Read good books. Don’t let life wash over you like the tide coming in. Take a stand. Face your fears. Paint that picture. Climb that mountain. Smile at strangers. Take risks. Relax more. Run and skip and laugh more.

What are your values?

Over the years I have wrestled with understanding the biblical text that "faith without works is dead" (James 2:20). It makes a lot of sense when you put it into the context of your personal growth and development. What is the point of striving to understand what it's all about; gaining all the knowledge, wisdom and riches that you can if you don't share them?
A lifetime of wisdom not shared is not wisdom at all.

To understand the essence of life, of relationships, of dependence on a greater being, of the concept of grace and universal love but to keep it to yourself would deny the evidence of wisdom gained.
For me it is about filling up and pouring it out. then back to the well to fill up again.

The man who asked Jesus what it was all about was told to Love the lord your God with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul and all your strength ... and love your neighbour as you love yourself.
Who is my neighbour? Look around.
It is the person with the presenting need. Wisdom, knowledge and compassion will tell you what to do.
The value for me is about total commitment to gaining knowledge, wisdom, compassion and love, then sharing it out again.

Paradigm Shift

I enjoyed a customer interaction around changing the way projects are managed and delivered.
Six months after approving the adoption of PRINCE2 in one department, the CEO demanded to know from his leadership group why it wasn't fully implemented and working across the company.
That is a common approach from a manager who expects that if something was approved six months ago, it should be working already. Nike's 'Just do it' meets Captain Picard's 'Make it so'.
It takes time.
Changing to a new paradigm is always a challenge where not all the players understand the reason for the change, or if they are uncommitted. It's easier to stay with the status quo. So the transition to something new or better needs time to embed and customize. It needs to become the new way, then the agreed way, then the standard process.
I advised the CEO it would take 2-3 years to embed the change, but he told me he didn't have that much time.
In fact, he does, and the leadership group is committed to go with the change; to baseline current performance and re-baseline every year. We will measure progress and improvement, but it will take time.
In two years time, they will all look back and it will not have taken long at all. We just need perspective ... and a plan.