Self-regulation—while integral to our success—is not a part of our educational system. Nobody teaches us how to manage ourselves, how to stay calm under pressure while we are expected to perform with mastery. We learn this skill intuitively, through trial and error.
Read More
photo credit: Unsplash
THE PREPARED MIND: The 7 Step Guide to Training Your Mind, Like A Craftsman
[Article originally published on Medium] The feelings we have about something motivate the involvement that leads to our ability to develop a feel for something. Feelings also contribute to complication and emotional intensity.
The wrinkles of life make us emotional. Nowhere is this most acute than when we are learning something new.
We don’t like to admit it, but we are all emotional beings. The goal is not to overcome emotions. The goal is to manage them and make them work for you. Steadiness occurs when we seek neutrality, avoiding high highs and low lows, no matter what happens, no matter how much external events may fluctuate.
Craftsmen and women at their practice understand what it means to manage feelings as they gain a feel for their work. When they are engaged in their work and in harmony with their medium, they enjoy what many refer to as a meditative state. Time slows down. Choices that were absent before suddenly appear.
It’s the kind of peace that comes with the absence of extreme emotions.
What follows are the 7 steps you can take to achieve this state, so you can focus on learning to learn well, rather than fighting the anxiety, frustration, or boredom that inevitably comes with the repetition when learning something new. The craftsman learns to evolve those emotions into an alert, practiced skill of anticipation as they
STEP 1: FIND CALM
“It is in your power to withdraw yourself whenever you desire. Perfect tranquility within consists in the good ordering of the mind, the realm of your own.” - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
A 1949 fire fundamentally changed the way we approach fighting fires. Everyone ran away from the fire except a more experienced foreman, Dodge, who instead ran into it.
That takes nerve.
Like Dodge, we must prepare ourselves for the realities
of our situation, steadying our nerves so we can apply our abilities creatively when unique problems present themselves.
STEP 2: MANAGE YOUR FEELINGS TO GET THE FEEL OF YOUR WORK
“Of all the important pieces of self-knowledge, understanding how you learn is the easiest to acquire.” ― Peter F. Drucker, Managing Oneself
Even though pilots fly for a living, they can be overcome by anxiety. The same is true for first responders, ER staff, race car drivers and astronauts. In fact, these professions are trained not to panic.
When we make mistakes or something doesn’t go according to plan, we often trade in our well thought out plans for a good old-fashioned meltdown.
When we actively manage our feelings, we acknowledge that they are present but can be challenged and channeled. Only then, can we get back to the business of developing a feel for our work.
STEP 3: GAIN PERSPECTIVE
“The faculty to think objectively is reason; the emotional attitude behind reason is that of humility. To be objective, to use one’s reason, is possible only if one has achieved an attitude of humility, if one has emerged from the dreams of omniscience and omnipotence which one has as a child. Love, being dependent on the relative absence of narcissism, requires the development of humility, objectivity and reason.
I must try to see the difference between my picture of a person and his behavior, as it is narcissistically distorted, and the person’s reality as it exists regardless of my interests, needs and fears.” ― Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving
Our first reactions are never our fault. They are simply, our reactions.
Sometimes in minutes, sometimes longer, changes in perception occur when the situation itself has not changed, but our understanding of the situation changes. The facts haven’t shifted, but our context has.
As our understanding changes it’s time to question our initial reactivity, our reptilian impulses. This takes strength and is a muscle that must be constantly developed.
STEP 4: SEE REALITY CLEARLY, BUT HOLD IT LOOSELY
“Imagination is the only weapon in the war against reality.”― Lewis Carroll, Alice In Wonderland
Craftsmen and women work with “what is” before them and do not “spin the facts.” The clay might be too dry. The wood might be wet. What to do? How to remedy those situations?
To learn, we have to detach from reality a bit. We abstract problems to simplify them and in doing so, engage our imagination.
By imagining what might be against what is, we lose direct experience, or feel, of the particulars. Loss of this proximity to reality can engage our creativity for new solutions.
We can do this for anything that stands in our way, seeing
things as they truly, actually are, but with enough flexibility to engage alternative realities of what might be.
STEP 5: SEEK TENSION BETWEEN FAILURE & FAME
“Let difficulty transform you. And it will. In my experience, we just need help in learning how not to run away.” – Pema Chödrön
It’s important to note that we choose how we’ll look at things. That means that we have to limit and expand our perspective to whatever will help us remain neutral in feeling, in order to get the feel of our work.
Not to be confused with “faking it until we make it” which denies our feelings of anxiety around under-performance, it is a form of selective editing in order to properly orient ourselves to the task at hand.
STEP 6: SHOW UP
“Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” – Pablo Picasso
Day in and day out, find a way to love the grind. Embrace the continuousness of your work by noting that the many small, incremental improvements add up to substantial change over time. This leads to “good change.”
Showing up when it is difficult takes heart, a long-term view, and stamina. It takes hard work to make the vision you have in mind a reality.
STEP 7: SEEK & FIND PROBLEMS
“The quest for certainty blocks the search for meaning. Uncertainty is the very condition to impel man to unfold his powers. – Eric Fromm
Only when you show up for work you choose to labor over deeply can you begin to embrace the discipline of anticipating mistakes and stopping them before they happen.
Working with craft requires distinct attitudes and capabilities of solving the problem at hand, but also the intellectual vision and insight to find new problems. Seeing what is missing involves the application of ingenuity.
Stability has provided the conditions for us to think of organizations of all types as machines. That thinking enables us to move forward with the certainty of predictability, reliability efficiency, and productivity. We update, copy, scale, and own them. We think of organizations as having parts and concentrate efforts on making them operate ever more cheaply.
This model works, until it doesn’t. Natural resources are finite. People burn out. Markets get over-saturated.
Given the amount of change with which we are forced to reckon, the flaw in this approach is that our perception of problems remains predefined. But there is growing momentum in the belief that business is not an independent machine. It is a living, breathing network of people, interacting with supporting networks, and dealing with ongoing, adaptive crises. This requires us to move forward in the face of great uncertainty.
Business as usual, with its dependency on scarce resources, is a dead end. This means that business as unusual will not feel natural at first. We might even need new words to describe it. We will need to reinvent what it means to lead or to work in an organization.
We have to create for ourselves the firm foundation that enables us to question constraints we see today, engage with risk toward opportunities, and take the leap. Like a craftsman, we will need to create new tools to contend with problems as they present themselves.
We must learn to improvise, because there are no manuals or operational excellence department for the crises we encounter today.
###
Everyone suffers setbacks: an injury, untimely surgery, a death in the family, a promotion that didn’t come.
Everyone has dreams: that book you want to write, business you want to start, that job you want to go after.
Our most painful or long-lasting experiences, our unfinished projects are hypotheses. They answered the initial question of “what if” and can be used in your next experiment.
Flipping your perspective—seeing through negativity, pain, perceived failure—toward opportunity and learning enables more opportunities, solutions, and creative thinking.
Returning toward what you know, doubling down on old approaches—rarely provides you more options. Perhaps sometimes. But now? Not anymore.
Go, try something different. Try something special.
If you find yourself blaming your (mental) tools, do something about it. Learn about mental models, learn from how Craftsmen talk about how they learn and get better at what they do and more importantly, take ownership. Moving forward requires change but change by itself does not mean that you are moving forward. As Socrates said, “The un-examined life is not worth living.”
Christine Haskell, Ph.D. is a leadership consultant and adjunct faculty at Washington State University. She helps busy leaders take responsibility for their learning and development. She writes on the topic of “Craftsmanship and The Future of Work.” sharing lessons from master craftsmen and women on personal and professional mastery, is due out late 2019. Sign up for her (semi-regular) newsletter here.
The emotionally healthy childhood
An emotionally healthy childhood can’t be particular. It can’t be dependent on one kind of environment. It can’t, we hope, just come down to good luck. There are distinct themes to identify. With the best possible outcome in mind we can start to form a map of what an emotionally healthy childhood looks like. Using that map, it becomes more obvious where we are taking a left turn. We see where we can express more gratitude. We see what causes us to feel our greatest shame. At a societal level, this is how our definitions of success start to form. We can see what there is to achieve in order to create a more emotionally stable and therefore slightly saner world.
An emotionally healthy childhood could give us the following:
A lifelong advocate. Someone will put themselves profoundly at our service. If as adults we have even a measure of mental health, it is undoubtedly because, when we were small and dependent, there was a person (to whom we essentially owe our lives) who pushed their needs aside for a time to focus wholly on our own. They understood our babble and heard us into speech; they gave us their best guesses on treatment when we were sick; they calmed our fears, consoled us in our insecurities, and protected us from harm. They provided a protective barrier from the chaos of the world, showing us just enough of it—carving up our experiences for us in manageable pieces. Without thanks or sympathy, they didn’t expect us to ask how their day went or how well they slept. They catered to our needs, so that we would later on be able to submit to the rigors and slights of daily life. This lop-sided relationship was temporary, but by modeling with consistency, made certain our ability to form a healthy one.
We generally think of egocentricity a quality resulting from too much love or attention. But it’s actually the opposite. An adult who is ego-centric never got their fill as a child. Self-centeredness has to have a clean run in the early years if it isn’t to haunt and ruin the later ones. Those we regard as narcissists are simply unfortunate people who never got the chance to be exceedingly admired at the start.
In an emotionally healthy childhood, our advocate is there to give us the benefit of the doubt. They offer us a positive spin on our behavior. We are assessed by what we might be one day, not by what we are right now. From this we learn kindness and charity.
If our advocate is a harsh critic, for example, they might say that we were ‘attention-seeking’. They imagine that what we most need is a hug and some encouraging words. We might have acted meanly. Our advocate adds that we must have been feeling threatened. If we dropped something accidentally or were negligent; our advocate remembers that tiredness could have explained it, or they were distracted by a new visitor.
Our advocate constantly searches for the story behind the story. They look under the surface for more compassionate explanations. They help us to be on our own side, to like ourselves. If we actually like ourselves, we learn not to be too defensive about our flaws. We learn there is always something to work on, constructively, and we learn to accept ourselves as we are.
In a healthy childhood, the relationship with our advocate is stable, dependable and long-term. We have faith they will be there tomorrow and the day after. They aren’t explosive or fragile. They are almost boringly predictable—so much so, we might start to take them for granted. As a result, we project this trust on to other relationships we develop throughout our life. We are able to believe that what has gone well once can go well again. This belief influences our choice of friends, adult partners, bosses—everyone. We aren’t fascinated by people who are abrupt with us or unreliable; we don’t relish being punished, judged, or mistreated. We can pick out influences who are kind and nurturing, and don’t view them as weak or deficient for being so.
If trouble strikes with our kindly partners, we don’t go into an instant panic. We don’t immediately try to defend ourselves by turning away, avoiding or cutting them off. We can confidently set about trying to repair a love we know we deserve.
In a healthy childhood, we aren’t always required to be wholly good. We are allowed our emotions. We can get angry and sometimes be disgusting. We can say ‘no more, absolutely not, no way’ when we disagree, or settle a dispute with ‘because I feel like it’. Our advocates are adults and know we all, no matter what our age, have our own flaws. As a result, they do not expect a child to be fundamentally better than they are. We do not have to comply at every turn to be merely tolerated. We can let others see our see our shadow sides.
This kind of freedom within our family systems prepares us one day to submit to the demands of society without having to rebel in unproductive, self-defeating ways (rebels being, at their core, people who have had to obey too much too early). We can tow the line when it’s in our long-term interest to do so. At the same time, we’re not overly cowed or indiscriminately obedient either. We learn to find a sound middle point between being completely submissive and self-destructive defiance.
In a healthy childhood, our advocate isn’t jealous or competitive with us. They can allow themselves to be overtaken and superseded. They have had their moment in the spotlight, or else are having it elsewhere beyond the family. They can be proud rather than resentful of the achievements of the (usually same-sex) child. It doesn’t need to be all about them.
The good advocate doesn’t live through the child’s accomplishments. They want them to do well, but for their own sake, and in their own way. There is no particular script that the child has to follow to be loved. For instance, the child doesn’t need to become a doctor or a famous soccer player because that is the path their parent chose. The child isn’t required to support their advocate’s self-doubt or pump them up to others.
In healthy childhood, the child learns that things that break can be fixed. Things that spill can easily be picked up. Plans can go awry, but new ones can be made. The advocate models for the child how to self-soothe, calm down, keep going, and remain hopeful. A voice of resilience, originally external, becomes the way the child learns to speak to themselves. There are alternatives to panic.
Notably, even emotionally healthy childhoods suffer from thins going awry. No one has hung their reputation on the notion that anyone’s childhood could ever be perfect. The advocate does not see it as their role to remove every frustration, pad every sharp corner, or remove every obstacle. They sense that a lot of good can come from having the right, manageable kind of friction through which the child develops their own resources and individuality. Having contact with bearable disappointment, the child is prompted to create their own internal world, in which they can dream, generate new plans, learn to self-soothe and build up their own resources.
Even emotionally healthy childhoods suffer from things going awry.
The child can see that the advocate is neither entirely good nor wholly bad, and therefore is worthy of neither idealizing on a pedestal nor casting out in disparagement. Just as the adult accepts the child with its faults, the child learns to accept the adult with theirs with a blend of melancholy, maturity and gratitude. They learn that, like their advocate, they need to accept that everyone they come into contact with will be a mixture of positive and negative, and that the presence of negativity or flaw is not cause for banishment. As adults, they won’t fall deeply in love and them (becoming fast friends or quick lovers), nor will they become furious at the first moment of let-down (by ghosting or giving off a vibe of being cast out). They have a realistic sense of what can be expected of life alongside another human who is, like them, good enough.
Unfortunately, despite all our advances in technology, education, and material resources, we are not much more advanced in the art of delivering emotionally healthy childhoods than previous generations. The number of breakdowns, inauthentic lives keeping up with some external image of success shows no marked signs of decline. We are failing to offer one another tolerable childhoods not because we are malicious, apathic or uncaring but because we still have so far to go before we know how to do that most apparently simple yet infinitely complicated of things for ourselves: emotional intelligence.
One tool that might just get us there is coaching.
This blog post is part of a series related to Driving Your Self-Discovery pending publication.
Markers of emotional intelligence (and health)
Coaches with a background in psychology are grounded in theoretical perspectives of family systems and the impact a family template can have on adult development; how our lopsided natures can hold us back from the progress we wish to make; and, how denial can lead to blocking learning and remaining stuck—among many other aspects of human development.
It is a great myth, and one that we have bought into, that we are one person at home and another at work. The fundamentals we just reviewed—how families work, how our lopsided natures are formed, and how we become stuck—give us a very high level, basic understanding for why “conscious leaders” and “emotionally intelligent leaders” are so highly prized in the work environment.
One way to start understanding just how lopsided we have become from our earliest experiences is to identify a range of markers of emotional intelligence and general emotional health, visualizing how we rank in comparison. In therapy we would direct most of our repair work and attention toward healing those early experiences that generated the most hurt, and therefore contributed to the greatest gaps in our emotional health. In coaching, we recognize that these experiences occurred, gain awareness and insights about how they contribute to our present, and determine actions that will increase our effectiveness and performance.
At least five qualities come to mind.
1. Self-love: the ability to like oneself, wholly.
Before we can empathize with other’s experiences, we must learn to empathize with our own internal experience—the emotional reactivity and interior monologue that is generated when we are under stress.
Self-love is the quality that determines how much we can be friends with ourselves, learn to become our own (caring) advocate, and commit to constructive choices that suggest we are on our own side.
When we observe a stranger having things or experiences we don’t, how quickly do we feel less than or resentful? How long is it before we are making assumptions of how they came by those things and experiences or questioning the fairness of things? When another person irritates or demeans us in some way, can we let the slight go? Can we see the action for what it was (senseless spite) or are we left brooding and lose ourselves in overwhelming sadness, indirectly agreeing with the verdict of those judging us? How much can the disapproval or neglect or public opinion be counterbalanced by the memory of the steady attention of a few significant people in the past?
In relationships, do we have enough self-love to leave an abusive partnership? Or are we so down on ourselves that we carry an unspoken belief that mistreatment, disapproval, or outright abandonment is all we deserve? In a different vein, how good are we at apologizing to a lover, a family member, or dear friend for things that actually might be our fault? How rigidly pious do we need to be? Can we dare to admit mistakes, or does an admission of guilt or error bring us too close to a sense of complete insignificance?
How do we regard our desires? Therapy will venture into family histories and the bedroom for those answers. Coaches will seek to understand how we define and self-edit our desires for success. Are our desires clean and natural or alternatively disgusting and sinful? are we a little off, but not bad or dark, since they originate from inside us and we are not wretches?
2. Candor: the ability to be truthful and authentic about oneself.
Candor is about being “real” when you might feel vulnerable to judgment and open in the face of difficult ideas and troubling facts. It determines the extent to which you can consciously open your mind, to thoughtfully explore and accept facts without denial—without lying to yourself (and then others).
One question both therapists and coaches get equally: “Am I normal? You’ve seen this before, right?”
The fact is, there is no normal. And, yes, we’ve seen it before.
The essence of candor is intimacy, with ourselves. How much can we admit to ourselves about who we are—even if, or especially when, the material is unflattering? How much do we need to insist on our own normality and sanity in order to accept ourselves and admit our inner natures? Can we explore our own minds? Can we, as one psychology professor challenged, confront “the dogs in the basement”? Can we shine light in those darker and more troubled corners without flinching too much? Can we admit to foolishness, envy, sadness, confusion, and galactic mistakes?
Around others, how ready are we to learn? This matters for parents and partners as much as it does for newly minted managers and CEOs. Do we need always to take a criticism of one part of us as an attack on everything about us? How ready are we to listen when valuable lessons come, painfully, over and over again through multiple contexts?
3. Social Skills: the ability to communicate, persuade, influence, and listen.
Can we patiently and reasonably put our disappointments into words that, more or less, enable others to see our point? Or do we internalize pain, act it out symbolically or discharge it with counterproductive rage?
When other people upset us, do we feel we have the right to communicate or must we slam doors and retreat into sulks? When the desired response isn’t forthcoming, do we ask others to guess what we have been too angrily panicked to spell out? Or can we have a plausible second go and take seriously the thought that others are not merely being nasty in misunderstanding us? Do we have the inner resources to teach rather than insist?
4. Motivation: having an interest in learning and improving oneself.
Do we have the strength to keep going when there are obstacles in life? Motivation is about setting goals and following through with them.
When something deeply interests us, we take initiative and demonstrate the commitment to complete a task. If we are truly passionate about our goal we will persist through adversity, boredom, frustration and find creative ways through setbacks.
Embracing better health, taking steps to advance our career by attending graduate school, saving for retirement, and paying off loans are examples of goals that motivate us internally and result in self-improvement.
Marrying at the “right time”, getting the best grades, having the latest gadget or car are examples of chasing goals that flaunt wealth or status and can represent a slippery slope. Failure in the face of these kinds of goals is unlikely to result in a constructive learning opportunity. More than likely failure to maintain the perfect house, keep the kids in private schools, avoid divorce and poor performance at work will result in increasing self-doubt, and reducing one’s ability to be their own best advocate (and friend).
5. Self-Management
How do we react in the face of risk? And, how do we manage our impulses in relation to those risks? Do we think before we speak/react? Do we express ourselves appropriately?
How well would we perform a challenge in the form of a public speech, a romantic rejection, period of financial strain, immigrating to another country or lengthy physical illness? Sometimes a small cold can set us back in ways we didn’t expect. How close are we, at any time, to financial, professional, or personal disaster? What mettle are we made of?
Is the stranger dangerous or benevolent? If we lean towards be a little more direct than most, will they accept us or ghost us? Will unfamiliar situations end in a disaster? Around love, how tightly do we need to cling? If a lover, parent, sibling, friend is distant for a while, will they return? If a boss neglects regular touch points, stakeholders go silent, or direct reports fail to check in are they sabotaging us or will they still support our efforts? How controlling do we need to be? Can we approach an interesting stranger or colleague to connect on some interest or other? Or move on from an unsatisfying relationship?
Overall, do we think the world is expansive, safe and rational enough for us to have a genuine shot at fulfillment, or must we settle, resentfully, for inauthenticity and misunderstanding?
Our first answers to these questions are not our fault, or anyone else’s. They are merely the first responses that were wired into us during a galvanizing experience. Many of these questions are so hard to answer sincerely in a positive light. But, by considering them, we are at least starting to know what sort of impact our primal wounds have and, therefore, what we need to do to address it.
This blog post is part of a series related to Driving Your Self-Discovery pending publication.
Driving Results With Others: 5 Principles
In 1995, author and science journalist Daniel Goleman wrote Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ. The book was groundbreaking but remained on the fringe of business literature for several decades. Now, the concept of emotional intelligence is widely accepted as the practical application of an individual's ability to apply their knowledge of emotions to manage their own behavior and to influence others.
Read MoreThe Secret Life of Trees: Awareness & Intelligence
[ from BrainPickings ]
Summary: Trees dominate the world’s the oldest living organisms. Since the dawn of our species, they have been our silent companions, permeating our most enduring tales and never ceasing to inspire fantastical cosmogonies. Hermann Hesse called them “the most penetrating of preachers.” A forgotten seventeenth-century English gardener wrote of how they “speak to the mind, and tell us many things, and teach us many good lessons.”
Illustration by Arthur Rackham for a rare 1917 edition of the Brothers Grimm fairy tales. (Available as a print.)
But trees might be among our lushest metaphors and sensemaking frameworks for knowledge precisely because the richness of what they say is more than metaphorical — they speak a sophisticated silent language, communicating complex information via smell, taste, and electrical impulses. This fascinating secret world of signals is what German forester Peter Wohlleben explores in The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate (public library).
This is a must-read if you love trees! Science reveals what we knew all along...trees have awareness and intelligence.
Christine Haskell, PHD has built her practice on credible, published research and data. In the Research Series, you’ll find highlights, shareable statistics, and links to the full source material.
Peopling 101: Understanding Interpersonal Skills
The skills we use to interact with others are skills that lay the foundation for successful interactions, rich relationships, and meaningful results. They are also integral tools for effective leadership.
Unfortunately, many people graduate school and go through several initial jobs before they learn they lack basic communication, team-building, and conflict resolution skills.
For too long these skills have been referred to as “emotional intelligence” or “soft skills.” Though some K-10 programs now integrate Emotional Intelligence skills into their schools, most business school and graduate programs assume competency of these skills as part of the application process.
People who want to advance their careers eventually come to the conclusion that they need to take time to assess their social skills to foster the climate conducive for learning and leading.
HOW INTERPERSONAL SKILLS ARE RELATED
Interpersonal skills are the tools that enable people to communicate, learn, ask for help, get needs met in appropriate ways, get along with others, make friends, develop healthy relationships, protect themselves, and in general, be able to interact with the society harmoniously. As such they form a foundation for every interaction we have.
Basic interactions include behaviors like making eye contact, using names, and sharing information. Can you think back to a group you worked in that had all these basic qualities, and some that perhaps did not? These behaviors seem small and inconsequential but can have a big impact on the bottom line. When we don’t maintain eye contact, we get left out of impromptu gatherings and conversations where information is shared. When we don’t use direct address and speak only for ourselves, not for others, we learn to take a stand, become trustworthy, and authentic. Following directions and working in groups speaks to our effectiveness. Sharing information is what keeps the wheels turning in groups. When we hoard information and it only benefits our own advancement, it holds the rest of the group back. This can directly impact safety, quality, revenue, and time.
Figure 1: People Skills
Once people feel comfortable operating in and out of groups, it’s time to look at communication skills by practicing or looking for specific behaviors, such as the table below. Sit in any meeting, and you’ll more clearly identify the attributes of the negative behavior. It’s always easier to spot in others, isn’t it?
NON LISTENING BEHAVIORS
Sounds like….
tapping a foot or pencil
Saying “uh huh” a lot
Saying “really”
Sighing
Asking non sequitur questions, “What’s for lunch?” “Are you going to the game?”
Looks like…
Darting eyes
Fidgeting with a gadget
Playing with hair or clothing
Rummaging through paperwork
Looking down
Turning away
Not facing the speaker
Looking at the clock
Once people gain awareness of the things they say and do that may exhibit non listening skills, they are ready to create Chart of Active Listening Characteristics. By writing what the skill looks like and sounds like, the abstract skill of "listening" becomes more concrete and measurable.
ACTIVE LISTENING
Sounds like…
“Say that one more time.”
“I know what you mean.”
“Tell me more.”
“So what you’re saying is…”
“That’s a good idea…”
Looks like…
Nodding
Making eye contact
Positive body language
Smiling
Generally calm, relaxed body language
We can laugh and say we should have learned these behaviors in kindergarten—and the thing is, we did! But when faced with a potential result like test scores or managing the bottom line, we forget that how we get there matters.
If we are going to advance in our careers, we are going to need to better assess our own and others’ social skills. Too often we are stumped for language when asked to give feedback on themselves or our peers. We need to translate the skills to checklists that we can use to self-evaluate our own progress. Sometimes just the awareness of the these skills helps focus our attention. We understand these ideas intellectually, just too often lose them in practice.
It is important to integrate the practice of observing, embodying, and practicing these skills in our day to day. We can justify reflection time to monitor these skills because we need to know the parameters and the expectations of high-performing behavior—whatever level we serve.
For ideas on how to develop a practice for reflection, check out posts on Developing a Practice, Morning Practice, Evening Practice, and what it means to Maintain Tension.