The war for attention: A challenge for future leaders
For decades organisations have been focussed on how to win the “War for talent”. This concept of attracting and retaining the best people for your organisation to beat the competition has been studied and written about extensively. Billions of dollars are invested by the largest organisations in the world every year to ensure they win this so-called “war”. Reason being, it’s hard to find talented people, and even harder to keep them. Before you tune-out and move onto the next story in your newsfeed let me hold your attention for a moment longer. If you want to win, stop focussing on trying to “win” new talent and start focussing on how you harness the attention of the talent you already have. A room full of highly talented people that are constantly distracted is far less productive than a room full of average people who are highly focussed.
Do you know your pattern?
To know your own automatic, unconscious patterns of thinking, feeling and behaving. To know your own pattern is to have what I call True perspective and it’s something you can’t achieve alone. To know your pattern is like having a map to a secret treasure that contains all the riches you’d ever need. Indeed, knowing your pattern is the greatest gift you’ll ever receive, should you be willing to receive it. Sometimes, we may think we are aware of our patterns where in fact, we are just observing the familiar outcomes associated with them. Below are a couple of frequently occurring examples of people focussing on the undesirable outcome, not the pattern that underpins how they got there.
The Fishbowl: Real life, Real people, Real cases | Adam Camerlengo
As part of my regular posts, I’m introducing a new series called ‘The Fishbowl’ that focusses on real people and how they self-reflect, prioritise, make decisions and show up in the world. It takes courage to put yourself out there and share aspects of who you are and what you believe has shaped you and your life. However, I strongly believe (and my experiences and my clients’) suggest that when you demonstrate courage and show a bit of vulnerability, it enables you to grow and expand. For anybody reading this, take the opportunity to self-reflect and potentially see yourself in their stories and learn from their own insights and courage. You never know, you too might feel compelled to share a bit more of who you are with the world….what’s the worst that could happen?
Do you lead with Guilt or Shame?
As many of you right now, my calendar is full of end of year gatherings, parties, kids’ performances, presentations etc. It can be hard to juggle priorities and ensure that you give everyone the attention they deserve. In my case, with four kids, this is always a challenging time of year when it comes to getting to everything and being a supportive, loving parent whilst maintaining my sanity.
The 5 Laws Governing your Leadership Legacy
I’d like you to imagine that you’re in a hospital surrounded by medical professionals, machines beeping, people rushing about, and a heaviness is surrounding everybody. You feel it too as you know that you must make a choice. The doctors have so professionally outlined all the pros and cons associated with either choice you make but the final decision lies with you…and you alone. You’re feeling a little bit angry at the situation, it’s not fair that this decision rests squarely on your shoulders….is it? You feel cornered like you’re being pressured into making the wrong decision…will you? You wish somebody else could just tell you what you need to do…. don’t you?
Emotions trump talent and purpose: Like a kite without a string
It was windy, very windy, the perfect day to fly a kite. I was about 12 years old and the proud owner of a stunt kite…you know the triangular shaped ones that do loops and spins once you’ve learned how to master them. Well, given the wind was blowing I thought I’d take my kite for a spin but not just as it was, I wanted to see how high it could go so I craftily enhanced it by tying an extra 200metres of 30-pound fishing line onto the existing string. This was going to be good! I appealed to a couple of mates to come to join me but to no avail. I didn’t care…the excitement of flying my stunt kite in near gale forced winds with an extra 200 metres of line propelled me to my destination.