Every morning my husband and I take a walk with the dog. It’s part of what we do to start the day well. It also includes a little coffee ritual where we stop at Coffee Tree, our favourite coffee shop, for the best coffee in Durban. We’re nearly always the first people there, and there’s a group of people who tend to arrive for a coffee to start their day at around 6.15am. It’s a great start to the day – excellent coffee and conversation and laughs with some lovely people who we really like.
One of the people we regularly meet up with is an old Durban surfer who comes for coffee at his son’s coffee shop after having gone for an early morning surf. He’s in his 70s and he lives a very simple life. He is a long-time yoga instructor who learned from one of the gurus who brought yoga to Durban in the 1980s. He’s an excellent instructor – we have a weekly private lesson with him. Like so many self-employed people, he’s apologetic about what he charges – and his charges are WAY TOO LOW!
This is just a simple example of someone who does not appreciate his worth. His free coaching session was about recognising his value and charging what he is worth. We talked about how to attach discounts to commitment – for example, he might charge you R100 per session, but if you pay for a month up front you will only pay R80 per session. We talked about how it is ok to walk away from someone who does not want to pay you what you are worth – even though it does take some courage.
I’ve had to confront this over the last year. All my clients pulled in their horns somewhat because of the impact of Covid-19 on their revenue. What would that mean for my fees? Did it mean I would have to slash them to the bone? I elected not to do this. I elected to rather adjust my fees to accommodate the fact that all my work is now online – no travel time, no plane trips, etc. It was a bit of a lean time, but if I had slashed my fees, how would I ever get back to charging what I am worth?
It’s a bit like accepting a lower salary than what you are worth because it gets you in the door, and you have been promised that your salary will be adjusted after a period of time – once they’ve seen what you can do. How many of you have fallen for that? If you start on a salary that is lower than you deserve, or lower than the going rate for the job, you nearly never catch up. It takes courage to stand firm – what if they choose another candidate instead? Well they might; and they might not. I know it is a tough job market, but I would still recommend that you stand your ground if you have done your homework and you know what you should be paid.
And what about relationships? Whether we are speaking of a love relationship, a friendship or your relationship with your manager, you need to be clear on your value and on what you deserve. Do you deserve to be insulted? Do you deserve to be fobbed off? Do you deserve to be neglected or ignored?
Let’s flip the questions. How do you deserve to be treated? Do you deserve respect? Do you deserve to be heard? Do you deserve time and consideration?
How easy or difficult was it for you to answer these questions in the affirmative and with conviction?
If you really struggled to say “Yes” to these questions, my inclination would be to encourage you to embark on a journey with a therapist – you really cannot stand for what you deserve if you don’t believe that you deserve. There is a healing journey to take first.
However, if you were able to say “Yes” with conviction, your challenge will be to start the process of asking for what you deserve and standing your ground. It might be useful for you to figure out what you will do if you don’t get what you want. In Negotiations, this is called a BATNA – your best alternative to a negotiated agreement. It is enormously empowering to figure our what you will do if you cannot get what you deserve. Will you walk away from the relationship? Will you start looking for another job? Will you impose some other consequence – such as being unavailable in certain ways? It speaks to a quotation that was shared with me today: "Find the courage to leave the table if respect is no longer being served" (Tene Edwards).
“You teach people how to treat you. You either teach people to treat you with dignity and respect, or you don't. This means you are partly responsible for the mistreatment that you get at the hands of someone else. You shape others' behaviour when you teach them what they can get away with and what they cannot.” Dr. Phil McGraw.
How do you need to stand up for yourself? Who needs to be taught to treat you differently? How will you teach them? Who do you see settling for less than they deserve? How will you help them?
Know your worth, expect the best and don’t settle for less.

Life is an echo.
What you send out comes back.
What you sow you reap.
What you give you get.
What you see in others exists in you.

In this video I discuss how you can harness the reciprocity of the universe. It all starts with you.

​It is my very firm belief that we lead one conversation at a time – because leadership is relational.  Everything we do in the working environment is with or through people – so via our relationships - and relationships are built one conversation at a time There are dozens of occasions every day that are an opportunity to exercise leadership – and having a tricky and courageous conversation with a colleague ranks as an excellent example of a leadership conversation.
I believe a conversation is courageous when the content may be hard to hear, must be heard, and the reaction might be strongly negative or emotional. A courageous conversation is one in which something important needs to be communicated to a team member/colleague because it relates to their effectiveness and success – and not communicating it increases the likelihood that this team member/colleague will get themselves into difficulties that could be prevented. In other words, something must be said AND they may react badly. Nevertheless, a conversation must be had.
Most often, people avoid such conversations for one or more of 4 reasons: (i) because they don’t want to hurt their colleague; (ii) because they want to avoid unpleasantness; (iii) because they simply don’t care enough about their colleague to say what must be said; or (iv) because they think it will be a waste of time. All of these reasons are problematic.
When you do not want to hurt or upset a colleague, your empathy is going to harm your colleague because avoidance of the conversation means that they will not hear something that will help them. When you want to avoid unpleasantness for yourself, you are protecting yourself by being insincere. And if you simply don’t care for your colleague enough to have the conversation (or you think it will be a waste of time), this is actually passive-aggressive behaviour – hanging a team member out to dry, when something could have been done.
I’m a big fan of Kim Scott’s book, Radical Candor. She teaches that truly courageous conversations require two things: firstly, that you genuinely care about the best interests and well-being of the other; and secondly, that you challenge them directly in terms that are clear and unequivocal.
Let’s start with the first part. Do you care enough about the best interests and well-being of your team member or colleague (and the team) to have a conversation that makes you feel uncomfortable? If you do not care enough to do this, then you have some personal work to do. Your job as a leader is to set an appropriate example with them team, creating psychological safety, an atmosphere of mutual care and concern, and a climate of candour. You MUST care. You will never be a leader if you don’t care. If you don’t care, you run the risk of either sharing feedback in an obnoxiously aggressive manner – or not sharing it at all.
Once you are comfortable that you do genuinely care about the well-being of the team member/colleague and the team, you can prepare using the following questions:

1. What do you want your team member/colleague to know and understand? How will you say it?
2. What could you say to your team member/colleague before you start that might make them receptive to hearing what you need to say? (It is often useful to set a courageous conversation up with something like “I need to talk to you about something that you may find difficult to hear. I want you to know that I am sharing it with you because I care about you and your success. Could I ask you to hear me out to the end before you respond?)
3. How can you be part of the solution? How can you be supportive?
4. What strong reactions do you expect from your team member/colleague? How will you deal with these if they happen?
5. What are your own possible reactions and feelings? What will you do to keep these in check?
6. When will you have this conversation?

Once you have had the conversation, it would be useful to do a personal review of how it went:

1. Did you achieve what you set out to do?
2. How was your message received?
3. What did you do well?
4. What might you do differently another time?
5. How did you leave things with your colleague?
6. Are you happy with that? If not, what will you do?

Finally, give yourself a pat on the back for caring enough to have a difficult conversation.

In my social media posts this March, I am thinking about the theme of “What Goes Around Comes Around”, and it is not really about karma. It is more about this: “Life will let you get away with something for a while, but sooner or later, you will pay the price. Everything you do in life causes the effects that you experience. When you get the bill, be prepared to pay.” Iyanla Vanzant.

This is as true of the things we do as it is of the things we neglect. There are too many things we take for granted:

• When we’re young we take for granted that our bodies are strong and will always be so;
• We get so comfortable in a relationship with a partner or spouse that we neglect to give it specific attention;
• We take it for granted that our team members will pick up the slack when team members or the team’s leader are laid low by a virus or an accident, or go on leave;
• We neglect to stay sharp in our field of expertise because, after all, we are the experts;
• We eat junk and drink too much despite the fact that we don’t feel too sharp in the mornings;
• We turn the radio up to drown the sound of that strange whine in the engine;
• We allow ourselves to slip (back) into bad work habits, not planning the day or the week, reacting as things happen, taking unscheduled interruptions and hopping between multiple tasks when we know that this just doesn’t work.

Neglecting these things always demands that you pay a price.

Your body will let you down when you most need to be strong. When a serious operation or illness is going to demand great strength from you in order to recover, it is too late.

How many of you have had the experience of coasting along doing what you do best, only to realise one day that what you do best is no longer what your clients actually want or need? Or that the world works differently and needs you to work differently too? I think we all had that experience last year. I had to learn to do a lot of things differently in an online world when I had previously been able to rely on my in-person presence, charm and flair for flying by the seat of my pants!

Too much junk food and booze will affect your mental sharpness! It will also exact a physical toll that you will pay sooner or later.

Slipping into bad work habits has all sorts of consequences:

• You feel as if you never have enough time;
• Your work days are unsatisfying;
• You neglect some team members in favour of others, or neglect them all equally;
• You always have multiple uncompleted tasks on your desks;
• You feel stressed, lose your temper and eat badly;
• You neglect yourself and your personal relationships.

Sooner or later people who feel neglected (and perhaps even abused) will turn away – and they may do so when you need them most.

Team members who are taken for granted, who don’t get a thank you when they have dug you out of a hole AGAIN, will go somewhere else, or just disengage and show up in body but not in soul.

It was Stephen Covey who taught me that relationships are like a bank account – you need to make regular deposits because one day you will need to make a withdrawal. When you do make a withdrawal, will you go into overdraft or will the relationship be able to afford it?

I encourage you to think about what you may have been neglecting:

• Who has not had the time and attention they need and deserve?
• What bad habits have you allowed to develop?
• How have you neglected your physical health?
• How have you neglected your mental health?
• What areas of learning do you keep meaning to get to sometime?
• How have you neglected your network?

If you end up with the proverbial shopping list, then that is a wakeup call in itself. However, I don’t recommend that you try and pick off your shopping list all in one go. Rather review your list and decide which are your priorities because their neglect has had (or will soon have) a negative impact on your values and your quality of life. Then make some specific decisions about what you will do.

• When will you get back to the gym?
• When and how will you relax and unwind for an hour or so?
• How will you get time with those key people into your schedule?
• How will you show your appreciation for the people who are always there to back you in life and in work?
• When will you spend time reading every day?

Of course, all of these require that you exercise some discipline in your work habits and routines – or how on earth will you fit them in? This is an opportunity to get off the treadmill of life and work, take stock and remind yourself of what needs to be nurtured and cared for in your long-term interests.
​
Oh! And get the car serviced!
 
 

The minds is a faithful servant but a tyrannical master!

I believe that we need to have the self-discipline to turn our minds into faithful servants. This relates to both our thoughts and our words. We need to think positive, generous thoughts about life, about ourselves, and about other people. 

Why? What if life really does suck? What if other people really are incompetent idiots? 

The simple answer is because it is good for you. It is good for your sense of humour. It is good for your mental health. It is good for your relationships. It is good for the quality of your work interactions. It predicts better outcomes than negative, uncharitable thinking.

In this video, I offer a few ideas that will improve the quality of your thoughts and words.

Firstly, let's talk about words. Consider that just because it passes through your mind it doesn't mean it should pass through your lips. Just because you think something doesn't mean you should say it. It is worth taking this advice: Before you say something, ask yourself it is true, is it kind, is it necessary, is it helpful?

And now to your thoughts. Often our thoughts are based on untested assumptions. An event happens. We make a judgment about what that event means or what it says about ourselves. We look for evidence that we were right - and what you look for tends to be what you find. This confirms and embeds our assumptions and we treat them as truths.

However, we could do something different. This comes from Nancy Kline.

1. When something sets you off, describe what happened.
2. Ask yourself: What am I assuming about what this event means?
3. Subject this assumption to the test:
            - Is this logical? Does it make sense based on what I know about myself, the world and the other person?
            - Is it factual? Do I have evidence that my assumption is actually a face?
            - Is it based on a positive philosophical choice? This is the choice to believe that most people are good, most                    people are doing their best most of the time, and most often things work out.
4. If you have answered No to any of the questions in 3 above, ask yourself: What would be a more generous (and liberating) assumption?

Now go and live your life - after all if an assumption is just an assumption, isn't it better for it to be a more positive one?