A Musing on Daily Affirmations

I used to think that a daily affirmation was hippy nonsense, but I can see the results.

When I first read about daily affirmations I thought it sounded a bit hippy, something people did in yoga class when drinking green smoothies, in other words not my kind of thing. However, ever the open-minded, and after reading that Stephen Covey thought they had great merit, I thought I would give them a go. I decided rather than using one which I found on the internet I would create my own. Here is my daily affirmation...

Today is Tuesday. Tuesday is a day for impact. Today is the best day. Today is a day for achievement.

I can do what I want to do. I can be who I want to be. The only person standing in my way is me.

Each day I change the day and what it's for:

Monday for opportunity

Tuesday for impact

Wednesday for productivity

Thursday for progressing

Friday for reflecting

Saturday for enjoyment

Sunday for finding peace

I cater my activities around the purpose of the day. I start new projects on Monday, I check I have some enjoyment time on Saturday.

The second part of my affirmation is a promise to myself. That my day is within my own control. That my future goals are being realised with each activity. That any excuses for not achieving are my own illusion and cannot be blamed on external factors. 

Every morning I write out my affirmation. The process of writing for me makes it much more real. Then I repeat the affirmation whenever I need them during the day. If I'm becoming distracted at work or struggling to find motivation, if I'm putting something off or feeling tense or anxious. 

Every day I go for a swim or a walk and repeat the affirmations to myself. I've found I can swim four more lengths when I repeat the affirmations in my head. 

I'd really like you to try affirmations and let me know how you get on.

A Musing on a Hare

The Hare and the Tortoise - have we taken the right lessons?

Someone has asked me why my blog is called the Musing of a Hare.

Just over a year ago I took a new job. The company's logo was a Hare. It was a risky move for me, leaving a secure job as a practicing solicitor for what was basically a start-up. 

I found out pretty quickly that the company was in trouble; their product was poor, their market non-existent and there was a ton of bad publicity and poorly thought-out marketing. I was eventually made redundant after six months. Nevertheless, it was one of the best jobs I ever had, it made me confident to go outside my comfort zone. I tried new things and met great people. It launched my career in a totally different direction, which I am still building on today. 

Since then, I have seen hares everywhere and I feel, in some strange way, that if I see a hare or an image of a hare, then I am on the right path. The Hare is my totem.

This week I read a great article by Steve Blakeman (you can read it here: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/which-business-bullst-phrases-annoy-you-most-steve-blakeman?trk=prof-post) about cliches we use in the office and it brought to mind one which was often said when I was working in law firms; 'Slow and steady wins the Race.' 

When considering this phrase people refer to the fable; the Hare and Tortoise. In this posting, I want to explain why this maxim is the wrong lesson to take, and what else we can learn from the story.

No-one wins by being slow

"Slow and steady wins the race" is false. No-one has ever won a race by being slow.

The Tortoise didn't win because he was slow but in spite of it.

In fact, agreeing to the race was brave, slightly foolish and overambitious. 'Brave, slightly foolish and overambitious wins the race' wouldn't quite fit as comfortably with some of the law firms where I used to work. Yet many of the entrepreneurs and innovators of our time would easily fit this description.

What is a win anyway?

What about the Hare? It may be easy to view the fable as a win/lose situation. Tortoise won, Hare lost. Maybe we should consider this from Hare's perspective.  Hare didn't win because he was complacent. He took it for granted that the race would be easy, enough to lay down and take a nap right in the middle. The maxim should be 'complacent loses the race' and again I wonder how this would be considered by those law firms who rely heavily on only a handful of work source streams.

   Perhaps Hare didn't actually lose. Of course, he lost the race, but perhaps when he was sitting under the tree waking up and listening to the cheers as Tortoise cross the finish line, he had a moment where he realised the major fault in his own character was that he had become complacent, that he had stopped challenging himself. Again my own experience of leaving practicing law rings true to the Hare in the fable. I wasn't challenged, I could have remained complacent and unchallenged. I like to think that Hare stood up, dusted himself down and took a long, slow walk home while he tried to figure out what he really wanted, and once he had done that, he was a winner as well.

Don't react to the one-off case

After winning the race, what happened to Tortoise. Sure we were pleased he won, he was the underdog and he worked really hard to achieve the win. Yet would you bet that tortoise would win the next race? what about the race after that? If your business was sponsoring Hare, would you abandon him and give the sponsorship to Tortoise? Probably not, because it is a one-off result.Yet when I was in practice, I saw this happen time and time again. A mistake was made once and to remedy it an entire complex business process was put it place, justified as risk management when in fact it was a disproportionate response. 

These are all good lessons to be taken from the fable. Can you think of any more? Leave me a comment with your ideas.

A Musing on Improving Communication and the 'Communication Constitution' Method

Do you want to improve communication? 
Yes, good, now what do you mean by that?

Reviewing every letter, email and instant message you send out is a mammoth task and it is often shuffled away for a time 'when we're not as busy!' Well, at least this was my experience when I was working in law firms. Worse still when improving communication was consider an ad hoc task where odd paragraphs were added to existing letters in completely contrary style or using inconsistent terminology. 

If you agree that communication is something which is important to your organisation then you should consider investing time and effort to its improvement, and with anything worth investing time and effort, it must be done in a structured way, with clear goals and a path to achieve them goals.

First, you should identify the problem. This is probably easy enough, look at your communication. Look at your marketing communication and the communication you have with the customer through your business process. Is there an inconsistency? Put yourself in the place of your customer. If you read the press release and then received the communication would you think they came from the same business? Also look at what you promise the customer, do you promise a 'fast and reliable service', does your communication live up to that? 

The temptation is to start re-drafting your letters and emails, but we need to slow down and set up a process, otherwise, this problem is going to come back. You need to pull the root of the weed out, or the problem will only grow again and probably into a Triffid. I devised the following method when looking at my organisation's communication.

I prepared the following on a white board:

The purpose of the model was to establish the vision in the top left quarter, establish what we wanted to avoid in the top and bottom right quarters but preserve what we were doing well.

I did the exercise alone to start with and in the top left quarter wrote things like clear, correct, friendly. I repeated the exercise with some senior members of the operations team and they wanted quick to produce or automated. I repeated it again with customer services, people who were on the telephone to customers every day, and they wanted the communication to be frequent and informative. As you can see the perspectives of communication differ depending on a person's priorities and, as in most business initiatives, a collaborative effort is always more successful. 

From the four sections, we were able to create a benchmark by which all communication and future communication could be judged. We had created a 'Communication Constitution'.

The next stage, setting up a process. Assigning responsibility to people who will be able to come together when necessary to consider changes and regular reviews of the communication and start re-drafting. As with so many business activities, reviewing your communication isn't a one-off job but something which needs to be considered time and time again. As time passes the 'Communication Constitution' isn't used as a benchmark, but as a springboard for improvement. We can start to ask questions such as 'could we make this clearer?' or 'could we automate this communication?'

This method seems to work very well for 'standard' communication but there is always an occurrence which cannot be anticipated and you need your staff to be able to communicate without those helpful templates but still with the 'Communication Constitution' in mind. Engaging with staff is paramount, repeat the Constitution finding exercise with new recruits and in team meetings and check that they share the same values as the original constitution. Encourage self-assessment, getting them to look at their own communication against the constitution.

We focused on Customer communication, but the same exercise could (and should) be repeated for internal communication and communication with third parties.

Reviewing my organisation's communication has been a very enlightening experience, please feel free to try the 'Communication Constitution' method and let me know how you get on.

A Musing on Customer Service in the Digital Age

Consider this example, you are in a restaurant. A waitress shows you to your table and says you can order and pay for your food at the bar. You do as you are asked and return to your table.

Scenario A:  The waitress comes over to you. She explains that there was a mistake when your food was ordered, she undercharged you and needs you to pay another £5.00.

Scenario B: The waitress realises the mistake but does not come back to you.

Scenario C: As in Scenario A, the waitress comes over but explains in this instance she will not ask for any further payment, but she wanted to make you aware so that when you returned to the restaurant you wouldn't be surprised by the change in price, she hopes you have a pleasant meal.

Which Scenario shows the best level of customer service?

Most people would say scenario C, the actual answer is Scenario D (I know, not fair!).

Scenario D is where the customer's order is taken using a tablet or an app from their own device and the information is displayed directly to the chef. The payment is also taken by the technology. As there is no human element in the taking of the order, there is no room for human error. Scenario A, B and C are all ways to deal with errors, but the best customer service is where no error is made in the first place.

Hold on, you say, what about the poor waitress? She's out of a job. No, of course she's not. The technology didn't show you to your table, it didn't explain anything, it didn't imply you would return to the restaurant, it didn't wish you a pleasant meal. Even if it did, it wouldn't feel the same. You would know it's just programmed that way; you wouldn't feel special. Using technology, saving the waitress the time entering your order into the computer, gives her more time to focus on making you feel special. Using technology means she has more time to spend welcoming you, talking to you, making sure you're happy, and giving you any extra advice that might help make your day. It gives her the chance to be more than someone who takes your order and brings your food, which is why scenario D shows the best level of customer service.