I do not agree with what you have to say…but I will defend to the death your right to say it For several years I have gone each year to Kilkenomics, my favourite event of the year. One of the most remarkable things about it is that the panel moderators are...
From BelievePerform My question today is not CAN you as a leader take time to learn from athletes, but DO you? As an ex-athlete as well as friend, father and colleague to a number of elite athletes and leaders involved in supporting elite athletes, the crossover in...
As the great Ed Percival always taught me: "never make a point without telling a story". Today, for your Sunday morning delectation and delight, simply sharing the latest from Tim Harford, a great story-teller in written form (who I first discovered through "The...
On the evening of December 26th 2010, Christmas festivities were over. I lay back on the couch to watch a movie but soon fell asleep, only to wake up hours later in some of the most agonising pain I'd ever experienced. I literally could not sleep other than propped up...
The difference between memorization and learningIn order to learn something, you must understand it. You might become so insightful and facile with the ideas that it appears you’ve memorized them, but that’s just a side effect.Rote memorization can be done in some...
noun noun: sabbatical; plural noun: sabbaticalsa period of paid leave granted to a university teacher or other worker for study or travel, traditionally one year for every seven years worked. Recently I was at an event and met someone I hadn't seen for...
Colm O'Regan moderating a Kilkenomics panel Last weekend at Kilkenomics it was, once again, a pleasure to watch Colm O'Regan moderate multiple panels and interview. I've written about "yer man" Colm before and the way he fills his role is exemplary and effortless, yet...
"Although many of us think of ourselves as thinking creatures that feel, biologically we are feeling creatures that think."Jill Bolte Taylor Recently I was at an amazing two-day collaborative event, Basecamp.London. Each participant chose a "challenge" to be part of....
My Purpose is making potential possible. This means I live in this in my work for my clients. Beyond that, similarly minded people are those I connect to most. In "Always be Batman", I wrote: “The two most important days of your life are the day you were born and the...
The new triple bottom line. Scale for Impact This week I was at a stunning event called Basecamp. On the second morning, the facilitator created an open space for a few people to choose to step forward and offer a topic they are passionate about, creating an...
One of the things that I admire the most about the inspiring Chip Conley is his ability to distil what he learns down to elegant simplicity. One such phrase is "Knowledge Speaks. Wisdom Listens". Recently Chip has started daily mini-blogging on what he calls "Wisdom...
I write because my Purpose drives me to share what I learn; because I choose to make that Commitment. This image is of the site traffic for this site over the 18 months to October 2019. In that time period traffic has grown well over five-fold. Overall, the site has...
Over the last two years and more I have now posted over 750 daily posts, as well as collaborated on numerous projects and begun developing a book on leadership. Out of the well over 350,000 words written and many thoughts developed from listening and working with...
"This idea of purity and you're never compromised...you should get over that quickly...the world is messy, there are ambiguities" President Barack Obama These words from President Obama in a recent talk that I tweeted about this week (read on for link to the tweet and...
No one ever made a decision based on a number. They need a story. An unexpected "bucket list" moment Last week I was sat in the centre of the front row at the Royal Festival Hall as Hannah Gadsby came back on after her incredible show Douglas to receive the...
Regular readers will know I love to distil to simplicity, with ideas such as Ockham's Razor, the Da Vinci quote "simplicity is the ultimate sophistication", as well as the idea that "if I'd had more time I would have written something shorter". What I don't tend to...
When we focus on what is best for society, it should also include what is best for the individual. We live in an era where it feels capitalism has run amok and the wide-ranging teachings of Adam Smith have been woefully inaccurately reduced to the level where many...
Today sharing a story I first heard from Chip Conley sitting on the terrace at the Modern Elder Academy in Baja, days after meeting his amazing Dad. How long will you live? What type of life will you live? Society has deeply embedded structures and beliefs in so many...
On average my daily posts take under five minutes to read, yet an average of over an hour to write. I've taken as long as three days at an offsite with a client leadership team to land on a strategy that is simply one word. When I work on Business Strategy Coaching...
"..elites in a society typically maintain their power not simply by controlling the means of production (ie money), but by dominating the cultural discourse too (ie a society’s intellectual map). And what is most important in relation to that cognitive map is not what...
O wad some Power the giftie gie usTo see oursels as ithers see us!It wad frae mony a blunder free us,An' foolish notion Translation from Scots: Oh, would some Power give us the giftTo see ourselves as others see us!It would from many a blunder free us,And foolish...
Rebuilding trust in our professional and business relationships is an important step. Trust is at the heart of all relationships, whether business or personal. We also live in a time where trust has been eroded in so many places. One where I feel strongly connected is...
Alex Davids Today simply curating a powerful post from the amazing Alex Davids, a wonderful coach, and past colleague, now part of the Next Evolution Performance team in New Zealand. Everything Alex said echoes strongly for me. In addition, if you are thinking of...
This week I came across this line that stopped me in my tracks: "The desire for theoretical purity strikes me as a critical failure of both mainstream and alternative economics" Later that same day I met up with a start-up founder and we talked about uncertainty and...
FAIR is a core value for me. I also believe in Business as a force for good, hence the model I developed of the new triple bottom line, putting Purpose, People and Planet as the core drivers, whilst also focussing on making a Profit so as to Scale the Impact for all...
Two years ago today I wrote: "Life is Wild and Precious, Be Present", where I posed the question above, from the last couplet of "The Summer Day" by Mary Oliver. This was when (inspired by Seth Godin doing this for over two decades!) I committed to writing daily....
In life and in leadership, you can edit, hone and distill your message constantly. "The first half of your life is focused more on accumulating: success, responsibilities, family, friends, hobbies, identities. A mid-life crisis is often about feeling weighed-down by...
This week I was complimented by a reader on sharing some incisive and concise ideas in my daily writing. That is wonderful to hear, as a) I can talk a lot when on a roll (!), and b) I love the Da Vinci adage of: "Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication". The thing...
What we see and do not see is a matter of our perspective. How many pillars are there? The answer is seven. Or, how many women can you see? Most see pillars, only some immediately see beyond to the women. This has me thinking about seeing what others don't see. This...
When we make predictions, what do they teach us? Six months ago I wrote: "WeWork and remembering lessons of the past", in which I both predicted the crashing downfall of WeWork, as well as musing on past lessons from market booms and busts, dating back to own my...
What different game can you choose to play that will keep you energised during this transition? In my mid-20s I was on a steep learning curve as a competitive squash player in Cayman. I was at the club every evening after work and, in addition to coaching and formal...
from WhereThereBeDragons Thanks to my friend and past client David Kirkaldy of Massive Group in Cayman. I wrote this post nearly a decade ago and was reminded of the idea of "Go where there be Dragons" by a tweet this week from Carl Richards. Though my old blogs from...
by Carl Richards I seem to have a theme of late flowing through writing and in the people I've been meeting. That theme is ENERGY and is showing up in different ways, as evinced in the blogs of the last week. Nearly two years ago I wrote a short post called: "Cogito...
Today I rode my bike. So what? Well, I hadn't done it in over two weeks. Yup, I'm a sounding board and coach, often my clients ask me to hold them accountable, yet I hadn't got my procrastinating self on my bike for over two weeks. I realise that procrastinating is a...
Coaching and Leadership require many types of listening: for words, tone of voice, body language, and energy. Recently I had the pleasure of spending an evening with a group of experienced coaches to explore and share learnings and experiences. As it was the first...
A few days ago, a tweet went around that I found striking in how it spoke about the importance of trusting someone you select to do a job. https://twitter.com/davetrott/status/1177932437676015619 I'll share the full story below, for now, my thought is simply that the...