Exploring our belief in a dangerous world and its implication for organizations
(First of a seven part series)

How many great notions are lost in translation? We stand in the shower in the morning or sit in traffic and are bathed and bombarded with idea after idea. What stops us from transforming the idea into reality? How many earth-shattering, life changing ideas, solutions and possibilities just needing a breath of life, have whimpered and dissolved back into the ethers of inspiration. What would be possible if instead of aborting these ideas, we gave birth?

An idea pops! Just as quickly we dismiss it as impossible, unlikely of embrace, or worse yet, crazy. Why are we so quick to deny our insights and inspiration? What is it within us that feels more at home with the known and balks at stepping outside of our cozy envelope? What makes us see lions and tigers and bears, when in reality, there is only potential, possibility and with focus, amplified probability?

Ideas are like precious gold to organizations and yet we each walk past enough nuggets to fill our pockets daily. In the moment we see an idea it is as if the shiny object turns into coal…reverse alchemy! What if instead of walking past the gold mine, we could learn how to pan consciously and discover the weight and purity of each inspiration. Yes, some may be fool’s gold, but what about the others?

What stops us? What is the back story for belief in the impossible? What lies beneath our worry of rejection or fear of being deemed crazy? What universal fear curtails our creative nature? The basic myth, the foundation for fear, is the deeply ingrained idea that this world is not a safe place, that it is indeed, dangerous, so dangerous that we best protect ourselves from harm.

In the business world that myth shows up as protect and defend—be seen as crazy or stupid and you might lose your job, so make certain to minimize risk. Entire departments were formed just for this purpose. We control processes, micro-manage people, who then become defensive, denying and hiding their brilliance. We are so focused on the competition that we often can’t see the opportunities on the sidewalk as we walk by. Scientists are right. We can’t see what we don’t already believe in. Our strategy is limited, focused not on what is possible but what we believe to be possible. We stomp around inside a paper bag thinking it is the big, wide world, our vision intentionally small in response to fear of failure and need for success. And, success when it comes, success that should be satisfying, a celebration of what is good within us, satisfies not. We lost that right as we tinkered with goals and measures to ensure, at the least, our own success.

Can you imagine your world without this basic premise? Stop for a moment, and get a sense of what it would feel like to recycle this belief into one of promise and potential. Feel the world slip from your shoulders and the steel trap loosen around your heart and mind. Relax into this possibility, not as a new-agey exercise, but to grasp the competitive edge you’re looking for. If you could tap into a new level of creativity and innovation, into resources you already pay for, you would be able to pick up the nuggets of gold that line your organization’s halls, nuggets that today, go unnoticed.

FDR was absolutely correct when he said, “The only thing to fear, is fear itself.” Fear prevents us from creating a vision so BIG all it can do is inspire. Consultants, and we were among them, in their rush to find ‘feel-good’ productivity, bottled up possibility and potential in preference for probability, and with that decision, vision as it was intended, died. We decided small was safer, success, even marginalized success, was better than failure. Ask yourself a question…would you prefer success regardless of how small, or would you rather steep yourself and your organization in glorious, outlandish, reach for the stars failure? Wouldn’t it be better to try and fail, than to settle? What inspires? What would make you excited to get to work each day? What would change boredom and disengagement into passionate belonging?

In the world of possibility, personal safety plays out differently. Yes, failure is possible, but so is unqualified success, success that no one has to apologize for, especially to themselves. As people begin to trust in the new possibility rich environment, they pick up the nuggets themselves and share freely. To the organization, each individual’s trust equates to free resources. The first step that’s required is a 180 degree flip of the game board, shifting the focus from danger to safety. Rather than worrying about lions, tigers and bears, dance down the yellow brick road to find the wizard—the wizard within each of us. If we must fear, fear settling for less than what is possible. Failure may be guaranteed regardless of what you attempt, but kudos-for-everyone success, the kind that inspires and delights, is only guaranteed by aiming high!

We would love to hear your comments and thoughts! Click on the comment link to start a conversation.

A Remedy for Timidity

For years consultants, and I was one of them, have spoken of the importance of setting a manageable, attainable vision, matched by an equally, to those charged with executing it, non-inspiring strategy. Stay within your capabilities. Give your organization a chance at success. Stretch, but just far enough to push the current limits. While the inspiration and back-story have foundation to stand upon, as I recently saw in a blinding moment of insight, they miss the opportunity inherent in vision and in being a worthy visionary.

Are you a visionary? Be careful before you answer. A visionary as defined by Webster’s dictionary is, “a person whose plans are idealistic and impracticable”. Most CEO’s wouldn’t lay claim to that definition, choosing instead to walk the more attainable road of realism, pushing the sensible envelope, not recognizing their partnership with timidity. That choice, which by the way is absolutely framed by fear, is the crux of the business world’s malaise and its employee’s critical dissatisfaction.

There is a shift about! Have you felt it? Can you sense the discontent? Old ways of doing business no longer work in quite the same way. Employees are restless, surfing the web in search of greener pastures. Senior staffers, employees too, are just as edgy. What gives?

Our visions and strategies fit like tight pants around an ever-widening waistline. They have become an irritating date with accountability, a sense of pending disaster, a nagging numerical reminder of our insufficiency. Can you feel the overwhelming desire to reach down, loosen the top button and give yourself room to evolve?

In the beginning, vision and strategy were designed to give organizations a focus, to help them drive towards something grander. As execution led to executions our natural tendency for self-protection took over and slowly, subtly cloaked our visioning processes in security, leaving no room for evolution, no space for personal growth, no opening to honor the truth that drives the real human nature. We downsized imagination and vision, making it small enough to allow for success, rather than upsizing our creativity and belief in each other and growing into our potential as humans and organizations.

Humans, contrary to opinion, are amazingly creative creatures. Trap us inside a box and we will try most every way to escape, until that is, we have bashed our hearts so mightily against the walls that we give up, and retire within our small cubicle. Those of us who are surfing the net, who feel the agitation, are the hope of the organization…having not resigned yet! The spark of creativity still glows within.

Vision is meant to inspire that spark. True vision must be so big that all it can do is INSPIRE! If it limits in anyway, it limits our ability to soar, to evolve into the next generation human. If we let go of the possibility of failure, and yes, let go of managing (and therefore limiting) expectations, and realize that there is no end zone, no place to get to, that there is just a constantly evolving bed of possibility, we have the opportunity to reengage the entire organization and rally them to full contribution, into authenticity, and a full YES to being in service to something greater than what minds cloaked in fear of failure can imagine.

Vision calls the heart into action. The heart is the key to each individual’s sense of worth, sense of belonging, their willingness to be of true usefulness. What would be possible if each individual within the organization, from the CEO to the janitor, let go of the distinction of personal success? What could transpire if we all began listening to each person as if they were divine presence? What would happen if we became so adept at listening that inspired doing sprang forth as automatically as a lawn’s greening in the spring?

Can you imagine such a vision that could inspire people to jump out of bed in the morning, excited to get back to work because work is such wonderful play. If you can, your organization will take a revolutionary leap beyond today’s business model that sees itself merely as a business entity. Your organization will realize that it has evolved into a community, a hearth for the heart as well as the mind, and in this evolution, you will have found the secret to unstoppability.

We would love to hear your comments and thoughts! Click on the comment link to start a conversation.

Our differences might just be the missing ingredient!

When you wake up in the morning are you excited to get to work? As you shower are you already thinking about all the good work you are going to do that day? Does your heart open in joy when you think about the camaraderie at work? Do you tell your friends and acquaintances how great your job is and how wonderful it is to work there? Do you bring your ‘all’ with you to work? Or, do you leave parts of yourself behind? How committed and engaged are you—really?

The primary valuation of a company is its people. According to the Human Capital Institute only 25% to 55% of employees are engaged. Committed employees are not only 25% more productive, adding to a company’s valuation, common sense says that they are also less likely to be surfing monster.com. It’s interesting to note that 90% of managers believe that people leave because of money but the top three reasons people actually leave their jobs are a lack of challenging work, little opportunity to grow and develop, and poor management relationships. So it seems, contrary to some opinions, people want to be engaged.

It is a question human resource managers have been struggling with for decades. How do we create job satisfaction? Better, more comprehensive questions would be, how do we help employees find delight, delight that’s foundational for satisfaction, productivity, full-on engagement and commitment? In other words, how does the organization facilitate workplace evolution that feeds each employee’s sense of sheer delight, nurtures their passion, and makes them know they are blessed to be a part of such an amazing collective answer?

An organization’s response to these questions is critical to their unstoppability—their overall long and short-term viability. 70% of organizations say that they have an insufficient pipeline of talent for critical jobs. According to 2007 CEO Briefing, attracting and retaining talented people is one of the top five issues facing organizations today. The cost of working without just one key player is estimated at $7000 a day. By 2010 it is projected that there will be a shortage of 10 Million employees in the United States alone because of several factors, boomer retirement, among them. Even though 70% of organizations are already struggling to fill critical positions, the fight for talent is just heating up! That’s good news for employees and on the surface, not so good for the organization.

Organizations that find the secret ingredient to cultivate full-on engagement and true delight in going to work each day will be able to cure multiple ills. As they race to find the cure, many facets of organizational life have the opportunity to bloom. When employees engage, productivity and delight naturally grow. Engaged employees attract other individuals who desire to be productive and engaged. It’s not surprising that studies show top talent tends to cluster together. Delighted and engaged people are less at risk for stress and stress related illnesses (think medical savings), in fact, they understand that stress is self-inflicted and know better than to dampen their delight.

So what is it that delivers workplace delight besides an upcoming vacation? One possible answer might surprise—our differences! Differences are something we hide, something we work to overcome, and something at which we often inwardly cringe. We find comfort in people just like us. We cluster together naturally. We find safety in ‘us versus them’. But, our differences also supply the ‘juice’ that can energize an organization and life in its many facets.

How do we inspire delight in all employees, from the janitor to the CEO? How do we get each one to take the internal steps toward self motivation, for that is the source of true and lasting delight? It is the missing link, the secret ingredient that keeps people engaged and committed. The company cannot provide this internal spark, except (huge except) to provide the necessary coaching to inspire people to do this internal work. The skeletons of past organizational attempts to create job satisfaction point to this truth. Once this internal work has begun, it provides the internal framework, think of it as the ‘REAL’ infrastructure of the company, a foundation that lives within the people and is shared between them. It is the basic step.

Coaching classes would include everyone within an organization, preferably done as a whole so people see, hear, relate, and find insights together. In this way, they start to bridge and break down differences. First, a basis in unity, an understanding that ‘we are in this boat together’ must be set. Yes, the boat is rocky and the waves steep amid all these differences, but it is from this awareness that an organization can traverse to safe waters. First, we get in the boat together.

Only when we see ourselves as part of something larger than our individual self, as beings together, can we begin to see the power in our differences. Until this point we are separate and different, individual someones requiring protection and defense. Once everyone is on board, diversity is bridged back in naturally, when from this position of non-defense, we recognize, embrace and see the unique value and purpose in each person’s natural style—what was previously seen as irreconcilable differences.

In business, what is needed is a quick means for people to stop acting in-authentically, a system of self checks and balances. When employees identify their primary style and comprehend how to honor it, it is the turning point for organizations and creates a shift from fragmentation to integration. Honoring our primary style means that each person chooses to be authentic, to come from a place of wholeness rather than reverting to the fearful default regardless of situation or stress. We learn to hold our primary style around people of different styles and honor the differences in the process.

How do we create a fluid system where all are honored, allowed to ask questions, voice opinions, where no one is demeaned and the floor is held open? We remove the fear that prevents us from holding the space for each other, in honor, in a system of equal exchange that promotes growth and new ideas. We eliminate praise (an aspect of fear) so there is no room for failure, nothing resting on that one big idea, on proving oneself, so people no longer feel compelled to act in-authentically.

As we learn the true meaning of honor, we create a productive, supportive work environment free of back-biting, gossip and sacrificed integrity. Instead we move toward an environment of authenticity, where people end the stage show, and come to work not to put on a soap opera, a facade or mask, but come to work to work and play, simply by being who they are. We sweep the floor of the stacks of boxes we asked people to fit into to do their jobs. Instead the floor is open, clearing a path to non-judgment of self and non-judgment of others. New ideas, new connection, new commitment, new delight springs forth naturally. We set sail together, each knowing the role to play, each recognizing the value of others, and as one, the organization moves full speed ahead.

We would love to hear from you. Everyone’s comments and thoughts are important to Workplace Evolution. Click on comments and let’s start a revolution!

Seeing our thoughts crystallize into form!

Bring me brilliant, creative, succulent ideas.

Help me rendezvous with kindred spirits who are in integrity, as we enthusiastically co-create together and are deliciously aligned.

Help me be aware of my power.

Guide me to thoughts that are in harmony with my core desires.

Bring me evidence of how this all works in comfortable, humorous and delicious ways.

Magnetizing Your Heart’s Desire by Sharon A. Warren

Some days are amazing gifts from God. Today was one of them! This morning’s call with my two partners from our organizational consulting business, Workplace Evolution, was a remarkable think-tank. It didn’t start out with that intention but that’s what occurred. As we talked about emerging trends—what will soon be the new business paradigms—magic stepped into the conversation.

As a little background, in ten years the business community will find themselves short 10 million employees with the retirement of the Boomers and the birth-dearth of the following generation. Quite a number! It’s staggering when the implications are understood. Businesses that evolve and learn how to engage the ‘whole’ individual will get to pass on the going out of business sale. They will be able to attract and retain talent. It will truly become a seller’s market. Our conversation dealt with how employee’s options will change.

The energy of the conversation was light and open to possibility. We each honored our collective visioning process as well as the unique perspective and experience each one of us brings to our dialogues. Ideas, based on a single observation, quickly expanded into insights none of us alone could have imagined.

The influence of Generation X and Y will be dramatic. This generation of workers will at last demand work-life balance and have it in their power to see it become reality. Many of these internet-reared individuals see the potential for balance in contract work, no fear of, rather an ability to embrace and seek out month(s) long breaks, the possibilities presented by technology for long-distance work situations and with that, the various means for creative workspace and time. These workers walk to a different drummer than the one to which their parents walked. With the sheer power of absent numbers, they will be able to rewrite the rules of business. This trend is already beginning to take shape amongst women executives who have left their jobs, knowing there had to be ‘something better than this’. These women left in hope that meaning and purpose existed out there somewhere and had the personal confidence to go in search of it.

It was synergy at its finest, but not the magic I alluded to in the first paragraph. That was to come later. The conversation was one of those meetings of mind and heart that you don’t want to stop, regardless of time and schedules. You aren’t having it—it is having you! In the business world, it would be called a rare moment. For us, it is normal, not expected, but a natural outcome of our connectivity and unity. Conversations become communion and through communion move into the spaciousness of natural flow. We hold the space for just that to occur on a regular day-to-day basis. That is how we continue to evolve in our work together, how we attract clients capable of hearing this new paradigm and how we each commit to living our lives. We make room each moment for the miraculous to occur, recognizing that what most call miraculous is how all of life can work—effortless, inspired, connected.

As our conversation began to wind down, having completed its natural rhythm, the magic occurred. It was so amazing that I didn’t realize, until afterwards, what had just transpired. When you do this work, Source begins to communicate with you from a different place, with new, uncommon words and symbols. It doesn’t come from a place of mind. It just appears with absolute knowingness that this is so. We had been talking about finding the right clients to share our work with and show how much fun they can have playing and working in the flow. As we talked I felt a wide-energetic field that quickly narrowed into the point of an arrow, an arrow that was swiftly moving into the physical plane. The picture that simultaneously accompanied it was of jumping onto the shaft of the arrow and riding it into its full expression on earth. Our thoughts about the perfect clients had narrowed into physical reality and were about to be born. Nothing more was required.

I had been blessed to see thought crystallize as reality. It was an awe-inspiring experience. I have known for a long time, intellectually and emotionally, how to manifest on this plane. With this experience, it moved from intellect to an energetic cellular knowing. Our thoughts truly do become our reality. The importance of my work, and our work together, of helping people clearly see their thoughts and fears, was driven home with the pulsing energetic breath of God.

We would love to hear your comments and thoughts! Click on the comment link to start a conversation.

Myth or Magical Connection

Reality is not only stranger than we suppose but stranger than we can suppose.
- J. B. S. Haldane

Have you ever dreamt about being a magician, able to expand time, capable of accomplishing everything important to you? Perhaps you have toyed with the idea of cloning yourself so you can get your work done, and have an amazing personal life too. Perhaps, more often than you like to admit, these musings may seem like the only ways you’ll ever find balance, but alas, they are just myth, the stuff of daydreams and conjecture, of futuristic speculation or physical impossibility—merely wild imaginings or the rantings of a crazy person.

All great truths begin as blasphemies.
- George Bernard Shaw

Something within us knows this potential. We have even experienced it more often than we understand. We actually experience it many times in each day, whether conscious of it or not. We call it flow, effortless, magical. We experience it when we are so engaged in what we are doing that we become the doing. The skateboarder becomes skateboard, concrete, body, and environment. Athletics, our hobbies, our passions draw us into that reality. We become the experiencing, with no separation between us and our heartfelt, fully absorbed engagement. This happens at work as well when we are puzzling a solution, in love with the mystery, open to emerging ideas, unconcerned about time’s pressures. These experiences are what make the thought of timelessness possible. The only difference between normal experience of flow and timelessness is that we see it in snippets and it appears to approach us unbidden. Seemingly we can’t summon it at will.

Einstein realized this when he advanced his theory of relativity. Time is relative. It is the reason as we get old, time appears to accelerate. Christmas seems to come faster and faster each year. When we were young, time stood still, especially so when we wanted it to move. When we were 15, turning 18 and graduating from high school felt as it would never come. Yet, once we had children, they magically grew from 2 to 15 to 30 overnight. Some days feel as if they last forever, others vanish quickly.

If we can experience timelessness, or its inverse, accelerated time, we can choose to live outside of time. After all, time is not real. If it were, would it behave in such a relative manner? In order to live outside the constraints of time, we have to understand the common threads that induce the appearance of timelessness. There are three components that nourish this possibility, what A Conscious Collective, calls ‘Love, Grace and Community’.

Love expresses as genuine curiosity and openness, an insatiable willingness to learn, being fully present, bowed in humility. It is the hub of wholeness and ‘love in action’. It is the door into absolute potentiality.

Grace flows from the foundation of Love into that place of discovery, where we use everything as catalyst, and enter into the mystery playfully, holding the space to honor all paths and fellow travelers, excited to be smack dab in the middle of this incredible experiment. Grace is the door into unlimited possibility. It is here that flow and timelessness are naturally available.

Community becomes the expression of Grace. Love and Grace extended beyond the ‘me’ into the ‘we’ of Community, beyond ourselves into service and open the door into amplified probability. This is the space of absolute productivity, unreserved commitment, unconditional inclusivity, revolutionary evolution. Here we passionately belong, our values integrated into everything we are and do. Sustainability, both individually and collectively, is an innate outcome, effortlessly a foregone conclusion.

Possible—is it myth or magical connection?

This last six days I have been working with my partners and close friends in San Diego. We had a full schedule of meetings and a hope that we could find time to finish mapping a new ‘WEllness Business Model’ with which we have been playing. I arrived hopeful and yet, aware the full slate before us. The magic began almost instantly although we didn’t notice it until later. Time expanded to allow more in depth conversations, for traffic concerns, to make all the appointments and connections and some we hadn’t planned. It wasn’t just that we got more done, made amazingly deep connections, and felt no time constraints. We felt like instruments, played by the Divine, led effortlessly, spaciously from moment to moment within the context of motionless time. We would arrive home, with only minutes before the next event, and have time to relax, prepare, synthesize, and plan—to take an unexpected shower, a nap, or a walk in the radiant sunshine. Time expanded to include anything we were called to do. This grace descended from our love and expressed in the community we created. Our willingness to be the listening, authentic listening—tuned and refined us, aligning us with our true purpose and usefulness.

What we believe to be possible is our reality. We are the magician, the creator, the crazy person we have held at a distance. Ask and you shall be given. O, ye of little faith. All is possible. This Grace sits with me now as I write this missive from the plane on my way home. I have no reason to believe it will ever leave and if perchance it appears to, I have but to return to Love, and Grace cannot but follow.

There is only one thing more powerful than all the armies of the world, that is an idea whose time has come. - Victor Hugo

We would love to hear your comments and thoughts! Click on the comment link to start a conversation.