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An interesting quote caught my eye whilst browsing an blog post:

“Engage with others.. Connect with something bigger than yourself. Search for those who are working on similar or related things, share ideas with them, ask them for help and work with them where useful. Be willing to offer them help when they need it as well. Engaging with others is about engaging with those who share your visions, but also about engaging with those who think differently from you and are doing something that may seem completely different and unrelated. Engage across diversity, for that is how we learn. That is how we will create and make new discoveries. If you cannot engage directly with those who conflict with you, then seek to understand and to learn from your differences and work based on that learning. Engaging with others is about recognising interdependence. And about practicing humility.”

Technorati Tags: Quote, Relationships, Engage, Networking, Practice

I stumbled across an article written by one of my favorite authors, Warren Bennis titled “The Secrets of Great Groups” like much of his work it was interesting reading. Warren mentions 10 principles common to all great groups, being:

• At the heart of every Great Group is a shared dream.
• They manage conflict by abandoning individual egos to the pursuit of the dream.
• They are protected from the “suits.” All Great Groups seem to have disdain for their corporate overseers and all are protected from them by a leader.
• They have a real or invented enemy. Even the most noble mission can be helped by an onerous opponent.
• They view themselves as winning underdogs.
• Members pay a personal price. Membership in a Great Group isn’t a day job; it is a night and day job.
• Great Groups make strong leaders. On one hand, they’re all nonhierarchical, open, and very egalitarian. Yet they all have strong leaders. That’s the paradox of group leadership. You cannot have a great leader without a Great Group — and vice versa. In an important way, these groups made the leaders great.
• Great Groups are the product of meticulous recruiting.
• Great Groups are usually young.
• Real artists ship.

Warren goes on to describe the leaders of great groups as people who:

• Provide direction and meaning. They remind people of what’s important and why their work makes a difference.
• Generate and sustain trust. The group’s trust in itself — and its leadership — allows members to accept dissent and ride through the turbulence of the group process.
• Display a bias toward action, risk taking, and curiosity. A sense of urgency — and a willingness to risk failure to achieve results — is at the heart of every Great Group.
• Are purveyors of hope. Effective team leaders find both tangible and symbolic ways to demonstrate that the group can overcome the odds.

Successful organisations are built on great groups, however too often we look for the great leader to step up and accomplish something. It seems to me that we have too few great group experiences in organisatoins today. How many great groups have you worked in?

Technorati Tags: Leadership, Teams, Collaboration, Team Leadership, Management, Business, Groups

Well, I have not posted to my blog for a while, I just became too busy. After reading some of the suggestions to simplify your life by Linda Breen Pierce posted on Free from 9 to 5 caused me to reflect on the current business in my life. The suggestions from the article really got me thinking, to take a step back and examine my life:

• Don’t let any material thing come into your home unless you absolutely love it and want to keep it until it is beyond repair. Too much stuff - it’s suffocating us. Purchasing, maintaining, insuring, storing and eventually disposing of our stuff sucks up our precious life energy.

I have too much things and stuff which I need to maintain not only things but also some activities which I do because its expected or a tradition!

• Live in a home with only those rooms that you or someone in your family use every day. Create a cozy home environment that fits your family. You will find this is much more satisfying than living in a museum designed to impress your friends. Spending time and money to maintain a home that is larger than you truly need diverts these resources from more fulfilling endeavors.

This reminds me to be real and authentic, purchasing to impress other is futile! I value people not things…..

• Limit your work (outside of the home) to 30 hours a week, 20 if you are a parent. To live a balanced life, we need “down” time - time to daydream, to relax, to prepare a leisurely meal, to take a walk. If we surround our structured activities with empty spaces, those activities will become more productive and meaningful.

This really hit me between my eyes! I have almost no downtime, not time to stop and think through where I am in my life, what I want from life and to really connect with those who matter to me. One of the reasons I started this blog was to create a place and some space to stop and reflect!

• Select a home and place of employment no more than 30 minutes away from each other. Commuting time is dead time. Preserve your energy and money for more rewarding life experiences.

Another thing to work on, currently I spend at least 90 minutes a day commuting to and from my place of work!

• Spend at least an hour a week in a natural setting, away from crowds of people, traffic, and buildings. Three to four hours of nature time each week is even better. There is nothing more basic, more simple, than the natural world.

For me this is an extension of the “making a time and place to think” principle.

• Do whatever you need to do to connect with a sense of spirit in your life, whether it be prayer, religious services, journal writing, meditation, or spiritually-related reading. Simplicity leads to spirituality; spirituality leads to simplicity. Cultivate a practice of silence and solitude, even for 15 to 30 minutes a day. Your spirituality will evolve naturally.

This is another area of my life that has taken a beating this year!

• Practice saying no. Say no to those things that don’t bring you inner peace and fulfillment, whether it be more material things, greater career responsibility, or added social activities. Be vigilant with your time and energy; they are limited resources. If you say yes to one thing (like a job promotion), recognize that you are saying no to something else (perhaps more time with family). Live consciously and deliberately.

Now this is a challenge, my companies management likes to coin the phase “customer orientated”, which in the organisation’s culture actually means “never say no” and “do as much as you can” and “all projects are a number 1 priority”. However, I need to consciously choose to live differently!

Its clear that to live a life which is fulfilled and has meaning requires us to be intentional. To make time to think and reflect on those things which really matter. How about you guys? How intentional are you being in creating a life full of meaning? How would you rate yourself?

Technorati Tags: Simplicity, GTD, Lifehack, Meaning, Reflection

Do you know how much money they will need to be able to live comfortably in retirement? If not, you’re not alone, according to an article titled “The New Retirement Model” by John Mauldin discussing the results of research by Merrill Lynch. In the article John mentions that:

“There are no secret investing techniques that will make you wealthy. The not-so-secret answer is to save as much as you can and compound it as safely as you can over time, and start when you are young…….Investing is about managing your assets in such a way as to have them grow and compound. That implies you have assets to begin with. This means that saving is more important than investing in the process of accumulating wealth.”

John goes on to mention a book by Michael Masterson called “Automatic Wealth - the Six Steps to Financial Independence, I personally haven’t read the book, but John states that Masterson mentions the following eight habits of wealthy people:

• A. Wealthy people work hard.
• B. Wealthy people are good at what they do.
• C. Wealthy people have multiple streams of income.
• D. Wealthy people live in (relatively) inexpensive homes.
• E. Wealthy people are moderate in spending.
• F. Wealthy people are extraordinary at saving.
• G. Wealthy people pay themselves first.
• H. Wealthy people count their money.

Micheal, in the book, goes on to say that,

“statistics show us that it is more likely you will achieve wealth by owning your own business, investing in small businesses and/or real estate.”

Something to think about!

Technorati Tags: Finance, Wealth, Business, Personal Leadership, GTD, Lifehack, Investing, Book

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