Relational training and how to get to 'flow'

Waterfall near Sapa, Vietnam

Does it matter what trainers teach?

Over the years I have run training programmes for a wide range of organisations and institutions. Based on my experiences, I’m not sure if it matters what trainers teach as long as the learners can see the relevance of the content, and the style of the training is ‘relational’. I am borrowing the term ‘relational’ from coaching authority Erik de Haan, who says that the quality of the relationship between the coach and the coachee is key to the success of the coaching relationship. For me, the success of a training programme depends of the level of trust I am able to build within the group of learners, and between the group and myself.

Does it matter which methodology trainers follow?

De Haan believes that lessons from psychotherapy can be applied to coaching. When I was trying to decide which coaching methodology to practice, I was immensely reassured to read in de Haan’s book Relational Coaching that “according to the vast mount of experimental data now at our disposal” there is no difference between one psychotherapeutic approach and another. To be effective, de Haan says, coaches need to commit to one coaching approach, and focus on building a working alliance with the person they are coaching.

It’s not what you do, it’s the way that you do it

The same principles apply when I am co-training. I believe the relationship between the trainers and the learners is key to the success of a programme or workshop. ‘Relational’ training helps learners to travel further towards their learning goals, and makes the learning stick. Years ago I went on a course about how to design and deliver participative training for adults. I still have a handout called ‘How to build a co-training relationship’. It contains a list of key questions that co-trainers need to ask each other before they step out in front of a group of adults. Using these questions has helped me to build a number of open, trusting and creative co-training relationships that are at the very heart of what I do.

Relational training and ‘flow’

Co-training, and being relational, is how I think trainers can help learning groups get into a state of ‘flow’. The main characteristics of ‘flow’ as defined by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi are:

•                Intense and focused concentration on the present moment

•                Merging of action and awareness

•                A loss of reflective self-consciousness

•                A sense of personal control or agency over the situation or activity

•                A distortion of temporal experience, one’s subjective experience of time is altered

•                Experience of the activity as intrinsically rewarding.[1]

These are the key elements of all my most memorable co-training experiences. There comes a moment in a training programme where the group is totally engaged and involved in what is happening in the present time. At this moment I instinctively know what to say, or whether to stay silent. I feel I have the ‘agency’ to help participants to make sense of what they are experiencing, and to translate what they are seeing, hearing, thinking and feeling into something that has meaning and relevance for them.

For me, this is the most powerful and beneficial learning experience one can have because it is long lasting and transformational. People who have experienced ‘flow’ tend stay connected, and continue to learn and grow together long after the programme is over.

Getting to ‘flow’

How can you help a group to reach a state of ‘flow’? I believe you have to be totally committed to co-training and to working collaboratively. You have to do everything you can to build a working alliance with the participants. I also think you get to flow by demonstrating a combination of opposite behaviours:

•                Good planning and being able to depart from the agreed schedule

•                Starting where the group are at and encouraging them to push open some mental doors and windows

•                Sharing your own experience of the training content and holding your knowledge lightly

•                Demonstrating respect for the group, and for your co-trainer, and being able to laugh at yourselves and with the group.

Is relational training a kind of placebo?

Not at all. The point about relational training is that adults will always choose what they want to learn. When you build a working alliance with learners, you encourage and support learners to make meaning for themselves. And for me, this is the most effective way to learn.

[1] From the Handbook of Positive Psychology, C R Snyder, Erik Wright, Oxford University Press, 2001

For more about how I work with groups, please see my main website KellowLearning.com

2013 A year of transitions

High-five on the farm

January Taking myself to the market

This is a blog about how I made the transition from employed to self employed. According to Dan Pink to sell is human.I took myself to market and I sold! I try to sell myself quietly, and I also notice how other people sell themselves to me. One day, after a meeting with another trainer, I asked myself: “What on earth made you think you would be comfortable working with him?” Crossing him off my list of potential collaborators was disappointing, but inevitable. We were poles apart in terms of values and approach.

February Becoming a coach

February was intense. In order to obtain a coaching qualification, I had to write essays, prepare a presentation, and practice my coaching skills ahead of my final assessment. I spent hours coaching, and being coached. What got me through the exam was the support and encouragement that I received from the tutors, and from my group. What I gained was a renewed curiosity and enthusiasm for learning. Best of all, I saw how I could use Gestalt theory to enhance my approach to experiential leadership training and development.

March It’s not what you know

I saw how teaching models and frameworks out of context just doesn’t work. You need to start where your learners are, and work alongside them. Later I read an article on executive education that included this quote from Roger Martin, Dean Rotman School, Toronto: “Knowledge is of minimum use unless it enables the recipient to take action”. He’s so right.

April Collaboration can be hard

Having convinced myself that the trend in leadership is collaboration, I tried to collaborate with people I know. Wanting to work with someone, and making it happen, however, are two very different things. What do I always say when I am teaching project management to other people? “You need to agree what you are trying to do, how and why, and you need clear roles and responsibilities”. The were various reasons why some of my efforts at collaboration failed to get off the ground. They included not being clear about the target audience, underestimating the need for marketing, not having the right business partner, different working styles and times zones. I should listen to myself more…and try again.

May Dialogue not one way conversations

I treated myself to a leadership programme. It was great not to feel responsible for other people’s learning. What worked best for me were conversations with leaders, when there was real dialogue. What I didn’t like was meetings that were more akin to interviews, where we asked all the questions, without thinking to disclose any information about ourselves. For me, unless everyone in the conversation is willing to disclose and be challenged, there can be no real learning. I was most touched listening to the probation officers, and the ex-offenders, talking about themselves, not in the same room. One of the speakers reminded me of the street-wise police that I met in the job that occupies one line of my CV (See September).

June Stressful but successful

Delivering projects for new clients taught me what consultants really do. Consultants are contracted to deliver agreed outcomes. To do that, they need to be able to manage and support their clients in different ways. At the end of a stressful but successful project, I learned (again) that I have a tendency to imagine problems that do not exist. It all ended happily.

July Black Swans can be positive

A friend of mine recommended me for a job that landed on my desk like a positive ‘Black Swan’: 1) It came out of the blue 2) It had a positive impact on my business and 3) afterwards I created a narrative for myself to explain how it was in fact predictable. If this is randomness, please can I have more of it. And I look forward to returning the favour, because I do believe what goes around, comes around.

August Feeling grounded, the importance of.

I learned that when people are struggling with a task, and are losing confidence in their ability to find a way forward, the most useful thing I can do as a coach / facilitator is to ground them firmly in what they already know. All I have to say is: “What do you know?” I believe people have the answers to their challenges and dilemmas within them, and can be helped to discover them.

September Bridging a gap in my CV

I had dinner with a group of people I last met more than 30 years ago when we all worked at the Ministry of Defence (MoD). I was there for nearly ten years, and yet the MoD occupies one line in my CV. I was nervous. My concern was that we’d spend the whole evening talking about accumulated husbands, wives, children, property and pensions. I was wrong. We talked about office misdemeanours, and that person whose name none of us could remember. And, yes, the revelations were delightful.

October Experiencing a different world

My niece Vicky invited me to spend a day with her in the Scottish Borders, on a farm where she has spent time as a veterinary student. At the end of a single-track road, in a valley, by a stream, we picnic-ed with the farmer and his shepherds. They were tagging sheep, before sending them to market. The fleece on the sheep was creamy and rug like. I felt privileged to be invited into Vicky’s world of sheep, cattle, horses, dogs, and farmers, going about their business.

November KellowLearning.com goes live

After months of planning and writing, my website went live, and I was glad. The writing of it sometimes felt like a chore, but because of this, I now know what I do, and why.

December Getting a community complex

I got involved in a bid to have a neighbourhood planning forum recognised by the local council. Despite living in the area for almost five years, I didn’t expect to find so much complexity on my doorstep. Of course, doing what I do, I should have known better. My motives for getting involved were not entirely selfless. I wanted to get to know my neighbours. On that score, I think 2014 is going to be another year of transitions.

PS For more information about leadership and learning, please check out my new website www.kellowlearning.com

How to Survive Twelve Days of Networking: Tips for Reluctant Networkers

Now is the season of goodwill and networking opportunities

If your December diary is stuffed like a Christmas turkey, you have a choice to make. Either you can wrap tinsel round your ear, and get drunk with the crowd, or you can choose to network with purpose. I believe in the value of building, and looking after a strong professional network. Good networks are the gateway to opportunities to learn, grow and be happy. Need advice? Need a facilitator? Need a venue? You need a network.

When I talk about the importance of networking I hear the same objections.

I’m not good at networking

That is a cop-out. Everyone has charm, and everyone can network. To be honest, I am not always in the mood for networking, myself. Like the other night when a lady sat next to me at the theatre, and told me all about her interview with some magazine. “They loved me!” she said. Well, obviously, I was very happy for her, but that’s not networking. That’s broadcasting.

I don’t know what to say

You need to have an opening line. One of my friends swears by ‘I like your shoes’. I just say, ‘Where are you from?’ Then I relax, and listen. Don’t expect to make a good connection at every event. But when you do, make sure you drop them an email the next day. A follow-up email is the equivalent of a friendly wave and it means nothing. Don’t be pushy. At the same time, once you have their email, you can contact them again.

I don’t need to network

Yes, you do. In this hyper connected world everyone needs to be seen to network. For this reason you need an online presence, whether it is a LinkedIn profile, or some other site, so that people can check you exist. No-one exists today without an online profile.

What skills and knowledge are needed to be a good networker?

Good networkers have a genuine interest in other people, and are good listeners. Nelson Mandela knew how to make friends and influence people. One of the stories I read about him recently was how he won over some retired generals who were plotting a guerrilla war by making them all a nice cup of tea. Mandela won respect by giving it to others. Between now and Christmas, you can win over people by making sure they feel heard, and, possibly, making sure their glass is full of mulled wine.

Grey hair is no excuse for wearing a grey suit

Walking into a room full of men in grey suits still makes me uncomfortable, even though I am a grey haired man who sometimes wears a suit. Wear something that makes you stand out from the crowd, and look like you want to be in the room. Be decisive, go up to someone, and introduce yourself.

You have to work to make your network work for you

Here are some tips for how to engage and win people over:

1. Step out of your comfort zone. Talk to strangers, and resist the temptation to talk to the people you know.
2. Notice who is in the room and go and choose someone to interact with. People will not come and speak to you if you are standing hesitantly at the edge of the room.
3. Turn off your phone and put it away. If you need to hold something, get a drink. Even better, grab a bottle of wine and start to circulate.
4. Never make assumptions about the person standing next to you. You don’t know who they are, and you don’t know whom they know.
5. Take a lesson from Stephen Covey and listen empathetically. Give the people you meet a large dose of unconditional positive regard. Encourage them to tell you about themselves.
6. Then, and only then, you can reciprocate with a brief account of who you are, and what you do. Reciprocation, as Robert B Cialdini has taught us, is a weapon of influence.
7. Remember to smile. Flirting is good provided the person to whom you are speaking is not wearing a wedding ring.
8. Talk about what motivates or excites you. Passion and enthusiasm are infectious and engaging.
9. Follow through. 48 hours is the maximum time you can wait to send an email saying how much you enjoyed meeting someone. Even if you didn’t.
10. Keep your connections warm, if necessary using social networks like LinkedIn and Facebook. Tell people what you are doing, share relevant reports, and invite people to events.
11. People who are good at networking are successful because they are curious, and curiosity is the driver of innovation and creativity. The better your network, the easier it becomes to get things done.
12. Now is the season of office parties, talks and events. Put yourself about, go on the razzle. But network with purpose…

For more information about leadership and learning, please check out my new website www.kellowlearning.com

Developing Leaders: What can you teach in one session?

Some people start with theory. I start with the participants

As a trainer or teacher, how do you engage learners in a conversation about leadership? Leadership is complex and context dependent. Some people begin with leadership theory. I start with the participants, and draw out the experience of leadership they bring. This blog is about the best participative leadership exercise I ever invented, and you can download the complete exercise with instructions by going to my new website, kellowlearning.com

‘To see ourselves as others see us’ Robert Burns

Leaders need self-awareness. If you don’t know who you are, why would anyone follow you? Self-awareness helps to build trust and confidence. Self-awareness can’t be taught. We have to learn it as we go through life. It can be an awful pain, learning who we are, and how we impact on other people. But knowing who are, and how other people see us, we can choose to do more of the things that help us to win friends and influence, and less of the things that confuse or irritate people.

Can we teach self-awareness?

Or can we teach self-awareness? Some years ago I developed a set of leadership competencies based on what I have learned from working with leaders in the context of sustainability. Using the competencies as framework for self-assessment, I created a participative group leadership exercise that I have run with all kinds of people in all kinds of places. The whole thing takes just over an hour.

The Leadership Odyssey

I call the exercise ‘The Leadership Odyssey’, because participants go on a short learning journey, with other people, and together they explore their leadership skills and attitudes. 'The Odyssey' is a good example of how I like to work. It's fun going virtual island hopping, and people learn things while they are having fun. In a short space of time people can begin to discover what they do well as leaders, and what they want to develop. 'The Odyssey’ works well at the beginning of a leadership programme as an ice-breaker, and a thought-starter. It can be run as a stand-alone exercise. 'The Odyssey' can also help people to generate ideas for creating their personal development plan. 'The Odyssey' is probably the best participative exercise I ever invented.

Download ‘The Odyssey’

You can download ‘The Odyssey’ complete with instructions by going to my new website, kellowlearning.com I hope you enjoy using 'The Odyssey', and please let me know you get on. 

For more information about leadership and learning, please take a look at my new website

How to give a good graduation speech: a tale of three speakers

Photo Claudia Leisinger

In my time, I’ve taken part in quite a few graduation ceremonies, including the one where the guest of honour told the graduates to stop singing, and listen to what she had to say. I’ve made speeches, handed out certificates, smiled, shaken hands, and mispronounced names. Fortunately, graduations being a time to celebrate achievements with friends and family, audiences are usually very forgiving.

It’s a long time, however, since I graduated myself. Recently I was reunited with my classmates at a graduation ceremony in London. Given my previous experience of graduation ceremonies, I listened to the speeches and observed the ceremonies with a professional pair of ears and eyes. I was looking forward to sharing the stage with my beloved tutors and peers, all of whom had supported and challenged me in different ways. And I was also up for some gentle joshing over champagne and canapes. It was a wet and windy Friday evening, and because of this, perhaps, the promise of a glass of wine was more than usually pleasing.

A tale of three speakers

The first speaker talked about himself. The second speaker talked about somebody else. And the third speaker gave a pitch perfect talk about what she had learned about teamwork and conflict resolution, ending with three powerful messages for us to take away.

Talking about yourself and other people

When giving a speech, it’s OK, and even a good thing, to talk about yourself. I sometimes tell a joke against myself in order to connect with my audience. It’s a well-known technique for putting yourself on the same level as your audience. It’s also good to talk about other people. When I talk about leadership I always speak about leaders I know, and the skills and qualities that make them a leader for me.

Start with your audience

What I really liked about the third speaker was that she kept her talk firmly on intersection of leadership and learning, which was the place where we had all met more than a year ago. The third speaker started with her audience. A transatlantic rower, she talked about what she did, and what she had learned.

Be clear about your messages

Then she shared three simple and elegant messages about to lead a team when the going gets tough:

Have a conflict resolution plan before you start a project
Spend time with different people to avoid factions or cliques, and
Share your vulnerability with your team when you don’t know what to do.

Be modest about your achievements

The other thing the third speaker did was to keep a balanced perspective on what she had done. She didn’t pretend to be a superhero. Yes, she had had to face waves the size of a double-decker bus. And also, she remembered the beauty of seas, gleaming with phosphorescence, and stars so bright she felt she could reach out and touch them.

So what are the lessons for graduation speakers?

Start and finish with your audience

Be modest about your achievements

Whatever you say, have a reason for saying it to your audience

Give your audience something to take away and use

Be authentic

Be brief

For more information about leadership and learning, please take a look at my new website

Making a website: The 'Deep Dive'

This is the second of two blogs about making a website to celebrate the launch of KellowLearning.com. The first blog is called ‘I made a website www.kellowlearning.com'

It took me more than six months to write the copy for my website KellowLearning.com. I don’t regret the time I spent because the act of writing about leadership and learning helped me to find out what I think. I also found out what I remember from the past two decades of working as a trainer, what I have learned, what I have achieved, what I care about most deeply, and what gives me joy. Writing about what I do, day after day, was a ‘deep dive’ into who I am, and what I do. And the benefit of the ‘deep dive’ is that I was able to make a far better website than I could ever have imagined. And, what’s more, I now know what to say when people ask me ‘what do you do?’.

Here is what I discovered, and how it has helped me to communicate what I do.

I wrote to find out what I think. How do I define leadership? What are the game-defining factors affecting sustainability leaders today?

The Benefit: Clients need to know that I know what I am talking about.

I wrote to find out what I do. What is my approach to learning and change, and what is special about what I do?

The Benefit: Clients need to know what I do, and why I am the right person to work with them / their organisation.

I wrote to find out what I remember. What do I still remember from two decades of delivering programme and projects? Why have some people and events stuck in my memory, and not others?

The Benefit: Identifying my most powerful learning experiences has helped me to connect with what I do well as a trainer, and to remind myself how I can re-create transformational learning experiences for others.

I wrote to find out what I have learned. What are my key learnings from designing and delivering training for different groups of people living and working in different contexts?

The Benefit: I can clearly describe my approach to training, facilitation and coaching, the principles I follow, and what informs the choices I make in the interest of helping people to have the best possible learning experience.

I wrote to find out what I have achieved. Recalling the people and the projects that I have worked on since the early 1990s, I became aware that the whole looks greater than the sum of the parts.

The Benefit: I am quietly proud of my achievements, and this gives me the confidence to be comfortable with risk and uncertainty. 

I wrote to find out what I care about most deeply. What are the most precious moments and experiences that I have shared with the people I have met, and why?

The Benefit: Telling stories about what I do, and why I do it, helps me to communicate what it is like to work with me.

I wrote to find out what makes me joyful How do I focus on what makes me healthy, happy, creative, and inspired? How can anyone working in a helping or enabling role if they do not look after themselves?

The Benefit: Paying attention to my physical and mental health helps me to be at my best when working with others.

I made a website www.kellowlearning.com

Thinking about KellowLearning.com

Quick Start or Deep Dive?

This is the first of two blogs about making a website to celebrate the launch of KellowLearning.com. This is the 'Quick Start' blog for people who want to get going now. The second blog, called ‘Making a website: “The Deep Dive”’, is more reflective, and describes how the act of writing helped me to find out what I wanted to say on my website.

It’s possible to build a website in a few weeks if you know what you want to say. It took me more than six months. What I wanted was a creative and engaging site that communicates what I do, how I do it and why I do it. I think KellowLearning.com does that.


Where to start?
Making a website is all about making choices. Begin by answering the questions that people asked me when I told them I was making a website:

What do you do?
Who is your audience?
What are you offering that is special or different?
How can you communicate who you are, what you do, how and why you do it?

Do the thinking

Test your ideas on your friends.
Get a good website builder.
Choose a template off the web. A good web builder can advise you on the best options.
Assuming you can’t afford a copywriter, you will need time to write web copy

Choose a name, logo, and colours for your website

Decide on a name for your business, a log and a strapline. You also need to choose the colour scheme. What kind of online environment do you want to create? Choose welcoming colours that will encourage your visitors to linger and browse

Do the research

Learn from other websites. Consider both content and design
What are your competitors saying, and how do they say it?
What pages and features do they have?
How many clicks does it take to get you to the page you want?

Map out the content

Having decided what you do and what you offer, create pathways with clear signposting that make it easy for your visitors to find what they want

Connect with your audience

Who do you want to work with? Corporates? Government? NGOs? How do you want to sound? What kind of language and examples will engage your target audience?

Make it personal

Tell inspiring stories about what you have done, how you did it, and what it means to you. Use images that reinforce your messages. Ask for recommendations from your clients to show that you really do what you say you do.

Review, review, review
Having put your heart and soul into describing what, how and why you do it, get an editor to help you order your content and put your brilliant copy into some kind of structure. You won’t notice what needs to be changed or improved until you read your copy online. Ask critical friends to review your website, and be prepared to ignore their advice. What matters is what feels right to you.

Let's all do popup training

People's Summit, Rio+20

I want to run pop-up training. Here today, gone tomorrow. You’ve heard of popup shops, popup galleries, and popup restaurants. Why can’t we do popup training?

Caravans and Castles

I want to run popup training in surprising locations. In a caravan or a castle. Imagine hosting a workshop in one of London’s hidden underground stations. Or one of the nicer airport lounges to help high-flyers combat the feelings of hopelessness in transit? Or on the platform of a new Boris bus. “Hop on, what’s your name? Hop off, nice to meet you”.

Environmentally Friendly and Unsustainable

The glorious thing about popup training is that it is totally unsustainable in an environmentally friendly way. Practically any space will do. No expensive technology or structural alterations required. No discernable impact on the environment, and nothing left behind.

Open Space Rules

I wouldn’t feel guilty about doing training with no lasting impact. Popup training is not meant to last. In fact, the rules are very similar to Open Space:

1. Whoever come are the right people.
2. Whatever happens is the only thing that could have.
3. Whenever it starts is the right time.
4. When it’s over, it’s over.

Popup Training at the People’s Summit, Rio+20

This is just silly, you say. Well, I can tell you, I’ve done popup training, very successfully, at the People’s Summit in Rio, with a little help from my friends. The training space was a popup tent with a roof and no walls, like those flimsy efforts that make gardens look summery. We had some tables, and chairs, and we staked out our territory with a circle of chairs. We made friends with the local radio station who were doing live broadcasting in a bigger tent. They even lent us a microphone and loudspeaker, so people could hear what I was saying. People came: some students, a lady with a pink bag, and a very young boy. We played a game of catch with juggling balls. More people came to watch, and then joined in. We started a bit late. Three people in curiously anatomical tiger costumes did an exotic dance in front of our tent. Somehow I held people’s attention with the game, until it felt that we were done. Some people stayed to talk. Others melted away. When it was over, I felt good.

Popup Training Satisfaction Ratio

What does this say about popup training? The feeling of satisfaction after, was greater than the size of the event. And I have run large-scale, resource intensive training events, where the feeling of satisfaction was considerably less than size of the event. That's why I want to run popup training in surprising places. The people who come will be the right people. Whatever we do will be the only thing we could have done. Whenever it starts will be the right time, and when it’s over, it will definitely be over.

How to be Happy in Love, and in Life

“You don’t know what it’s like when someone you thought loved one, goes away and does the same things with somebody else”

Jigsaw, Sybille Bedford, 1989

Pieces from a jigsaw of relationships

Here’s a blog from a volcanic island for anyone who wants to be love again. I’ve just finished reading Sybille Bedford’s autobiographical novel ‘Jigsaw’, and I can’t stop thinking about love. Maybe it’s the Sicilian heat, or possibly my medication, that cost twice as much as last night’s dinner. Whatever. Bedford’s Proustian narrative about inconstant, and unforgiving lovers, has got me thinking about my past relationships: what happened, and what I contributed, often, to make a difficult situation worse.

Patterns of behaviour

I need to make sense of the pieces in Bedford’s ‘Jigsaw’. What messages does she have about love and life? Imagine a real jigsaw depicting a French mediterranean town, north London, and Finchingfield, Essex. If you look at the whole picture, you can see small groups of people, in twos and threes, involved in different types of relationships. Take a closer look, and you will see patterns of behaviour that, for me, are uncomfortable.

The Pursuit of Love

In ‘Jigsaw’, Bedford describes many different relationships. I’ll try to summarise five of the most prominent.

Relationship One

A young woman and a young man have a one night stand. Later, the young man becomes increasingly abusive towards the young woman, because she does not want to sleep with him again.

Relationship Two 

A young man marries a young woman because she is very keen to marry him, and, having been engaged for a year, he feels it is the right thing to do. Once they are married, the young woman makes a habit of sniping at her husband, while cultivating admirers in a very public way.

Relationship Three

An older man has a long term unacknowledged relationship with a young woman. They live separately, and go on holiday together, once. After a number of years, the older man commits suicide over gambling debts.

Relationship Four

A married woman divorces her husband after he tells her that he is having an affair with someone else. The married woman insists on a divorce, saying: “Jamie has done wrong…he must bear the consequences.”

Relationship Five

A young man marries a much older woman. After some years of living happily together, the young man has an affair with a younger woman. His wife starts to drink, and becomes addicted to morphine. The young man still loves his wife, and wants to stay married to her. Eventually, he leaves, because he finds it too difficult to watch her self-destruct.

What can we learn?

What is Bedford’s message? If she had written a book called ‘How to be Happy in Love, and in Life’, perhaps she might have said this:

Have purpose in your life. Discover what you want to do, and stick to it.
The young woman in Relationship Two wanted to be world class tennis player. She didn’t succeed, because she was not physically strong enough. The narrator of ‘Jigsaw’, on the other hand, becomes a writer. Despite her many ups and downs, she is one of the few characters in the book who achieves some kind of lasting personal fulfillment – Maslow’s ‘Self-Actualisation’.

Learn to forgive, avoid jealousy and blame
Taking positions, making demands, and blaming other people, is what leads to the failure of four of the five relationships. In Relationship One, the young man blames the young woman for not wanting to sleep with him again. In Relationship Two, the young woman blames the young man for many things, including not being good at business. In Relationship Four, the young woman blames her husband because according to her principles, he did wrong and must suffer. And in Relationship Five, the older woman blames the young man for having an affair. Only the young woman in Relationship Three does not blame her lover.

Be kind, be empathetic, try to see things from the other person’s perspective
The older woman in Relationship Five has moments of seeing things through her husband’s eyes. However, she needs increasing doses of morphine to manage her rage. What if the older man in Relationship Three had asked himself what it was like for the younger woman to be his lover? He did not even know how she traveled to his apartment every night.
 
In ‘Jigsaw’, Sybille Bedford pieces together what she has learned about love and life. It's good learning, if only I could put it into practice...

Stromboli and London, 25-28 July 2013

PS Listen to Sybille Bedford on Desert Island Discs broadcast on 5 July 1998

Five things I learned about leadership on a Leaders’ Quest

What can you learn from spending five days having conversations with people who are not obviously like you, and who know and do things you may not understand or care about? Quite a lot, as I found out when I went on a leadership journey organized by Leaders’ Quest. I have been home, physically, for two days, but in my mind I am still on the road. I need more time to digest what I saw and heard. Meanwhile, here are five things I learned:

1 How milking with Paul beats sitting with Mary

‘Sitting with Mary’ used to be how one learned to do a job. You sat, you listened, you observed, and you asked questions. And sometimes you got to practice, too. Last week I was given the chance to ‘milk with Paul’. Cows are very large animals, they poo and pee a lot, and they don’t like strangers in their milking parlour. This means you need highly developed skills and awareness to have someone shadow you when you are milking 187 cows in a confined space. Paul, the cowman, who looked after me, demonstrated phenomenal technical, spatial, communication, time and risk management skills. I learned a lot about how to lead from Paul.

2 Collaborative Inquiry not Interrogation

The conversations that worked best for me were the ones where the people we met had questions for us, too. Let me try to explain. If you tell me what you do, and then I tell you what I do, then we both know, what we both know. Whereas, if there is time, and the conditions are right for dialogue, new questions will emerge, and quite possibly we will discover valuable learning points together.  Firing questions at people may result in a diminished learning for all, because the thing you think you need to know, may not be as valuable as the knowledge or experience your interlocutor was going to share with you. If only you had let them.

3 Ditch your titles

We are conditioned to recognize people by their role, and job title. When you meet someone for the first time, hearing a job title may help to understand who you are speaking to: Banker, Consultant, Entrepreneur, Ex-Offender, Husband, Finance Director, Mother, Piano Tuner, Student. Husband, Mother, and Newly Redundant don’t work so well. If you want someone to remember who you are, it is essential to say something about yourself that will help them understand what you do, and, hopefully, arouse their curiousity.

4 Leadership and Learning

‘Leadership and Learning are indispendible to each other’, as John F Kennedy has said. For me, the people we met who were consciously learning from their challenges and opportunities, tended to be the most inspiring leaders. I’m thinking of a manager at a social enterprise who knew everyone by name, a school student in a new Academy, a probation officer who always took the difficult path, a banker who wanted to be a painter, Jimmy Mizen’s family, a piano tuner whose home is London, and who has no home.

5 The Kindness of Strangers

Perfect strangers can be exceptionally kind. Again, and again, we met people doing difficult things, who were patient, open, thoughtful, generous, compassionate, funny, and respectful to us, and to each other. With leaders like these, seizing the opportunity to tell them how great they are at what they do, was a privilege and a pleasure.

Pathways to a sustainability career

Young people doing it for themselves

I’m collaborating on a leadership development workshop for recent graduates who are looking for their first job in sustainability. It took me twenty years to realise I wanted to work sustainability. Now, twenty years later, I’m piloting a workshop to help recent graduates find a quicker route into a sustainability career.

How a little philosophy can help you work in sustainability

I have a hunch that there are a lot of graduates like me, who took degrees in subjects like Fine Art, Philosophy, and French, and want to work in sustainability. And like me, when I was their age, they don’t know what kind of green jobs there are, where to look for them, or how to get through the recruitment process.

Mid-career, multi-lingual and multi-talented: the new global leaders

What if young people on Facebook knew how to create their own professional networks? What would happen if they used their power to help each other to grow and develop, the same way folks who are on Linkedin do? I was having a coffee with one of my students recently. Julia is mid-career, multi-lingual, and multi-talented. She is part of the Linkedin generation: people who can do business in at least three languages, and are accustomed to changing the company they work for, and the country where they live, about every three years. She met a bunch of guys on a sustainability leadership programme, and they stayed in touch. Why? Well, first of all, they like each other. They have become close friends, and they have fun together. The glue that keeps them together is one part shared values, and two parts a common desire to make a difference to world. They understand the need to live and work more sustainably, and they are excited about the opportunities, locally and globally, to change the way we do things.

Networks are good for individuals and organisations

They also help each other with their careers. The Linkedin generation do business together. The fact that they know each, and trust each other, is making it easier for corporations to talk to corporations. Nadia and her network are working together to measure and reduce corporate carbon footprints, locally and globally. None of this would be happening to the same degree, if Nadia and her friends had not met on a leadership programme, and formed a network that works for them at both a personal and professional level. If all networks worked like this, might we all become better connected, more creative, happy and contented?

Can’t young people get jobs through Facebook?

Why can't the pre-Linkedin generation have the same opportunities to motivate and support each other?  That’s what Facebook is for, I hear you say. Yes, and no. Facebook works very well as a means to share photos and stay connected with friends and family all over the world. It’s good for launching projects, promoting causes. I still think there is a need for something that allows you to do more than ‘Like’ what your friend had for breakfast. And I detect a kind of snobbery about Facebook, which means it may not be the best place to look for a job. Quite the opposite in fact. Employers use Facebook to eliminate job applicants.

The power of collaboration

This is why I am collaborating with friends on a leadership workshop for recent graduates. It’s a collaborative event because I believe it is important to walk the talk. I want to show the participants how a highly motivated team working together can create a transformational learning experience.

We want to share what we have learned from working in different areas of sustainability. We want to showcase different pathways to a sustainability career, and demonstrate how to build a self-sustaining network that will benefit participants, personally and professionally. Above all, we want the participants to leave ‘Pathways to a Sustainability Career’ feeling confident about their choice of career, and with an increased awareness of how to network and support each other in the future.