I thought about what to blog about. Never give up, my husband said. I thought he meant for me to not give up on coming up with a blog topic, so I thought some more. Maybe that guy throwing his shoes at George Bush, I said. That would be a good leadership blog. Sort of about what not to do. Don’t throw your shoes at the leader of the free world and all that. Try to keep control of yourself. Be emotionally aware and so forth. Be able to disconnect your hot buttons. Maintain your good reputation. Not prove to people that you are an idiot in ten small seconds. Five, maybe. Stay a bit under the radar if you’re having a non-emotionally-intelligent day. Leave your shoes at home.
Churchill Never give up, he said, and I realized that he meant for me to write a blog about that. About not giving up. But Winston Churchill had already said all there is to say about that, really. He had been very clear, when with his jowls trembling, he said it and emphasized it: “Never give up. Never, never, never, never give up.” He actually said it on more than one occasion, sometimes mixing it with another favorite mantra: “Never give in.” I think he meant it.
When you consider the times in which Winston Churchill wrote this, it is clear how powerful it was. People were thinking about giving up on a daily basis. Their social, political, economic, and geographical foundations seemed to be slipping away dramatically right under their very feet. The world as they knew it was unrecognizable. Bombs were dropping. People were dying. Buildings were falling. The fabric of society was peeling apart. I’ll bet for a few of them giving up seemed like a reasonable option. For some of them it may have seemed like they had no other option! And those were the very ones Churchill was talking to. He wanted them to keep that famous British stiff upper lip. He wanted them to keep the faith.
We still have Churchill’s words ringing in our ears. Most of us can remember them even though we weren’t alive to hear them. We’ve really never been a giving-up kind of a country, and that’s very good. It gives us a strong legacy to lean on in these difficult economic times. We need it. All of us do. And it’s our job as leaders to inspire our organizations, both professional and personal, to keep the faith. Never give up. Never, never, never, never give up. It creates a deeply held value for us that mandates a right way to do things.
And what was Churchill talking about not giving up to? Not giving in to? I think it was the evil of entropy. The notion that if you give up or give in for a moment things start slipping away and it’s hard to get them back. Giving up starts that insidious process. I realized that not giving up is the key to everything. Success in anything depends on not giving up. Weight loss. A wonderful marriage. Good parenting. Quitting smoking or drinking. Reaching a creative solution to a business problem. Winning a war. Retrieving a ruined reputation. Regaining health after a heart attack or amputation. Learning to play basketball or skateboard. Completing a dissertation. Anything we try to do, if we give up, it starts slipping back. That’s what Winston Churchill meant. Don’t let it start slipping away. Sometimes you can’t stop it once it starts.
Another famous shoe incident some of us remember: Nikita Khrushchev taking off his shoe and pounding it on the table of a summit of world leaders. All of the most powerful leaders in the world at the table, and in his feelings of anger and impotence he was unable to form words, so he took off his shoe and started pounding. Some of us feel like this right now, with our retirement, our health insurance, our Christmas vacations, and our bonuses slipping away. But we should never give up. It could be worse, no matter how bad it gets. A big part of what helps us conquer anything is just what Churchill said: not giving up. If you want to land on your feet, you can’t give up in the middle of the air.
It is part of the leader’s job to maintain hope, to inspire. Yes, we must be realistic, but realism should include a generous dose of optimism because we really are strong and smart, creative and caring. We are a great nation. We must never give up. Never, never, never, never give up.
Talula Cartwright on Monday, 22 December 2008 (originally posted on LeadingEffectively.org)
Showing posts with label inspiration. Show all posts
Showing posts with label inspiration. Show all posts
Sunday, April 4, 2010
What's Drawing Got To Do With It?
We used to have a course at CCL called "Leading Creatively," for which I was a lead instructor. It was a course that used art as a metaphor for leadership. It wasn’t easy. It was a difficult five-day journey, and its graduates were immensely grateful, tremendously loyal. They learned a huge amount about themselves, about others, and about leadership. We haven’t offered it as an open enrollment program for several years, although is it still sometimes requested as a custom program. I still think nostalgically about it from time to time because it was one of the most powerful programs I have ever had the privilege to lead, even though it was a dragon to market. We just couldn’t talk people into it ahead of time. I can’t tell you about the entire course in one little blog, but I can introduce you into one small part—the art of drawing.
One of my opportunities as a trainer was to lead our participants, over the course of several days, to the place where they finally drew their own beautiful hands. The results were without exception astonishing. Breathtaking. Leaders who accomplished this after thinking for three days that they could not were thunderstruck at the results. We used Dr. Betty Edwards’ technology and gave out copies of her flagship text, Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. The reason we used it was not only for its successful drawing instruction but also because it was connected with Dr. Edwards’ extensive research into how the brain works at Cal State Long Beach.
Dr. Edwards was involved in split-brain research from an early day. She had a vivid understanding about the two different ways in which the brain thinks, and developed a brilliant vision about how to integrate both ways into whole-brain thinking, actually making people smarter by using the “two sides” of their brains together. Most of us use our so-called left brains very effectively. (Linear, rational, verbal, logical, symbolic, and so on.) It’s our right side of the brain that needs a bit of work. (Aesthetic, emotional, musical, imaginative, visual, and so on.) And then some work on integrating the two. The very best in science, art, business and leadership always integrates the two.
Everything we do at CCL has to do with leadership. Always. Even if it also has to do with creativity, or with how the brain works, or with making people smarter. So how does drawing relate to leadership?
Making a drawing is very like solving a difficult problem. The best way to start is to examine the problem very closely, like a serious detective solving a tough cold case. Not looking for short cuts that will only lead one down the path of what’s already been seen, but down the more difficult path of what’s been missed. Draw what you actually see before you, not what you think you see, we said emphatically over and over. Our expectations can so mislead us, not only in drawing, but also in problem-solving and certainly in leadership—especially when they mislead us into missing what is actually there. The results in drawing can be disappointing or amusing. The results in leadership can be disastrous.
The technology of excellent drawing requires us to slow down so we can see. Once we have learned to do this, paradoxically, we can learn to do it quickly. As leaders, being able to slow ourselves down quickly keeps us from going off half-cocked, half-ready, half-aimed. It’s too soon to fire before we can actually see what’s before us. Police officers have to slow themselves down quickly in simulated shooting tests so they don’t shoot the little girl with the puppy. The same on the street, with higher stakes. In drawing, the stakes are low. We practice with a sketchbook instead of a pistol or a nuclear weapon.
When we draw, we learn to look at the boundaries. What part of this is my hand and what part of it is a shadow? Sometimes we can see more effectively if we change the light, or look at the empty spaces. Drawing forces us too look at the edges of the “problem,” because we are drawing with a line. There are no “lines,” in nature, just as nature does not always create actual “boundaries” between countries. They are artificial boundaries, just like pencil lines. Knowing the difference between what’s “real” and what’s contrived can make the difference between strong and weak leadership. As leaders we have to learn not to be deceived by our own press, or any other contrivance of our own leadership. We have to know what part of the problem is real.
As drawing artists, we also have to look at the whole picture, not just the one line we are drawing. We have to check the fit of the line with the other lines that are already there. We have to look at the gestalt. Check the entire picture and rely on our sharpened intuition to tell us if it looks right. In leadership, we must be aware of the whole system. Those reporting to us rely on us to be aware of the things that they cannot see. That’s why we’re the leader, after all. We have that vision. We have that insight.
In drawing, as in leadership, we have to develop our ability to see things accurately and represent them effectively. We have to learn to not be deceived by our own expectations and our hopes and fears. We have to learn to put everything into perspective, including our own leadership.
Talula Cartwright on Wednesday, 07 January 2009 (originally posted on LeadingEffectively.org)
One of my opportunities as a trainer was to lead our participants, over the course of several days, to the place where they finally drew their own beautiful hands. The results were without exception astonishing. Breathtaking. Leaders who accomplished this after thinking for three days that they could not were thunderstruck at the results. We used Dr. Betty Edwards’ technology and gave out copies of her flagship text, Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. The reason we used it was not only for its successful drawing instruction but also because it was connected with Dr. Edwards’ extensive research into how the brain works at Cal State Long Beach.
Dr. Edwards was involved in split-brain research from an early day. She had a vivid understanding about the two different ways in which the brain thinks, and developed a brilliant vision about how to integrate both ways into whole-brain thinking, actually making people smarter by using the “two sides” of their brains together. Most of us use our so-called left brains very effectively. (Linear, rational, verbal, logical, symbolic, and so on.) It’s our right side of the brain that needs a bit of work. (Aesthetic, emotional, musical, imaginative, visual, and so on.) And then some work on integrating the two. The very best in science, art, business and leadership always integrates the two.
Everything we do at CCL has to do with leadership. Always. Even if it also has to do with creativity, or with how the brain works, or with making people smarter. So how does drawing relate to leadership?
Making a drawing is very like solving a difficult problem. The best way to start is to examine the problem very closely, like a serious detective solving a tough cold case. Not looking for short cuts that will only lead one down the path of what’s already been seen, but down the more difficult path of what’s been missed. Draw what you actually see before you, not what you think you see, we said emphatically over and over. Our expectations can so mislead us, not only in drawing, but also in problem-solving and certainly in leadership—especially when they mislead us into missing what is actually there. The results in drawing can be disappointing or amusing. The results in leadership can be disastrous.
The technology of excellent drawing requires us to slow down so we can see. Once we have learned to do this, paradoxically, we can learn to do it quickly. As leaders, being able to slow ourselves down quickly keeps us from going off half-cocked, half-ready, half-aimed. It’s too soon to fire before we can actually see what’s before us. Police officers have to slow themselves down quickly in simulated shooting tests so they don’t shoot the little girl with the puppy. The same on the street, with higher stakes. In drawing, the stakes are low. We practice with a sketchbook instead of a pistol or a nuclear weapon.
When we draw, we learn to look at the boundaries. What part of this is my hand and what part of it is a shadow? Sometimes we can see more effectively if we change the light, or look at the empty spaces. Drawing forces us too look at the edges of the “problem,” because we are drawing with a line. There are no “lines,” in nature, just as nature does not always create actual “boundaries” between countries. They are artificial boundaries, just like pencil lines. Knowing the difference between what’s “real” and what’s contrived can make the difference between strong and weak leadership. As leaders we have to learn not to be deceived by our own press, or any other contrivance of our own leadership. We have to know what part of the problem is real.
As drawing artists, we also have to look at the whole picture, not just the one line we are drawing. We have to check the fit of the line with the other lines that are already there. We have to look at the gestalt. Check the entire picture and rely on our sharpened intuition to tell us if it looks right. In leadership, we must be aware of the whole system. Those reporting to us rely on us to be aware of the things that they cannot see. That’s why we’re the leader, after all. We have that vision. We have that insight.
In drawing, as in leadership, we have to develop our ability to see things accurately and represent them effectively. We have to learn to not be deceived by our own expectations and our hopes and fears. We have to learn to put everything into perspective, including our own leadership.
Talula Cartwright on Wednesday, 07 January 2009 (originally posted on LeadingEffectively.org)
Creative Thinking: Leadership and the Walnut Root
We had a small walnut tree in our back yard. I guess the squirrels loved the nuts, because we never got very many of them. Finally the tree just died. My husband carefully saved all of the pieces and made beautiful handles for things—knives, axes, hammers. They would just show up under the Christmas tree as exquisite gifts for several years. He also made several walking sticks and finally an elegant highly polished sculpture for me this year, I guess from the trunk. It was like “the giving tree.” Never hugely noticeable in its life, the tree had been gracious and generous in its death.
Just when I thought all the gifts from the tree and my creative husband were finished, this week Richard dug up the root of the tree, which was rather remarkably big. He couldn’t get it all, because a piece of it had already made its way under the fence and into the neighbor’s yard. I wondered if they mightn’t have been willing for him to get it, but he said he had already poured concrete over it to make the foundation for the fence he is building. So, no.
So now he has taken several pictures of that big root and he studies it on his computer to see what he might do with it. He looks at it from different angles, perspectives; considers different opportunities for it. What a shame we as leaders don’t get to consider our problems from so many perspectives. He can do anything with that root. All possibilities are open. Base for a table. Another sculpture. Base for a lamp. A bowl, a dish, a clock. He wanders back by the computer screen and investigates it again and again, patiently, like a predator gaining on its prey.
What a blessing it would be if we had time to examine our colleagues and our clients with such consideration. Everyone and everything is in much too much a hurry. No time to come back and look again. Decisions must be made. Projects must be planned. People must be assigned. Budgets must be developed.
Such a hurry and rush approach does limit us, though. It’s hard to do really creative things without giving our “right brains” time to work. Our right brains are very efficient, but they do not operate in a linear fashion like our left brains. We must have some time available so we can come back to something patiently, consider it over time. Put it up on our computer screen and look at it casually as we walk by. Like a stealthy predator: “I don’t see you. You’re safe over there.” And all the time our minds are working. All the time, we’re gaining on it.
The wonderful thing about the way the right brain works is that we do not have to be conscious of what it’s doing for it to be effective. We can be deeply involved in other things. We have all experienced an “aha!” while we were showering, driving the interstate, or drifting off to sleep.
Good creative leadership allows such thought processes, and is ready to take advantage of them. We must acknowledge the efficacy of such workings of our brains and be ready to claim the harvest. We must find ways to inspire such thinking. Sometimes “sleeping on it” really is the best idea.
Talula Cartwright on Monday, 26 January 2009 (Originally posted on LeadingEffectively.org)
Just when I thought all the gifts from the tree and my creative husband were finished, this week Richard dug up the root of the tree, which was rather remarkably big. He couldn’t get it all, because a piece of it had already made its way under the fence and into the neighbor’s yard. I wondered if they mightn’t have been willing for him to get it, but he said he had already poured concrete over it to make the foundation for the fence he is building. So, no.
So now he has taken several pictures of that big root and he studies it on his computer to see what he might do with it. He looks at it from different angles, perspectives; considers different opportunities for it. What a shame we as leaders don’t get to consider our problems from so many perspectives. He can do anything with that root. All possibilities are open. Base for a table. Another sculpture. Base for a lamp. A bowl, a dish, a clock. He wanders back by the computer screen and investigates it again and again, patiently, like a predator gaining on its prey.
What a blessing it would be if we had time to examine our colleagues and our clients with such consideration. Everyone and everything is in much too much a hurry. No time to come back and look again. Decisions must be made. Projects must be planned. People must be assigned. Budgets must be developed.
Such a hurry and rush approach does limit us, though. It’s hard to do really creative things without giving our “right brains” time to work. Our right brains are very efficient, but they do not operate in a linear fashion like our left brains. We must have some time available so we can come back to something patiently, consider it over time. Put it up on our computer screen and look at it casually as we walk by. Like a stealthy predator: “I don’t see you. You’re safe over there.” And all the time our minds are working. All the time, we’re gaining on it.
The wonderful thing about the way the right brain works is that we do not have to be conscious of what it’s doing for it to be effective. We can be deeply involved in other things. We have all experienced an “aha!” while we were showering, driving the interstate, or drifting off to sleep.
Good creative leadership allows such thought processes, and is ready to take advantage of them. We must acknowledge the efficacy of such workings of our brains and be ready to claim the harvest. We must find ways to inspire such thinking. Sometimes “sleeping on it” really is the best idea.
Talula Cartwright on Monday, 26 January 2009 (Originally posted on LeadingEffectively.org)
No "Sullen" in Sullenberger
I had seen several news features on Captain Sullenberger, as we all have. The words I might have used to describe him: noble, humble, gracious, dignified. Perhaps also heroic, serious, sincere, kind, and intense. I wouldn’t have chosen lighthearted. It wouldn’t have even been close to the list. A serious in-control hero like Captain Sullenberger didn’t seem to need the added bonus of humor in his life. He is just all about doing his job tremendously well and making excellent decisions, after all. He is a man of action. Taking care of and saving lives are all just part of his everyday fare. They are his daily expectations of himself.
So imagine my mouth dropping open when I saw the David Letterman show last night. There they all were, as they have been before, the five courageous heroes of Flight 1549, retelling their story as they have done before. The two pilots were first. Pilot Jeffrey Skiles, Captain Sullenberger’s second in command, appropriately deferred to Captain Sully for the telling of the story, but Skiles allowed Letterman to deftly extract a few one-liners from him. Skiles did not steal Sully’s thunder, but he did provide a little needed lightness. Finally, the dignified and reserved Captain Sullenberger broke into a grin that involved most of his face, and I’m sure had all of us in our easy chairs at home grinning right along with him. A real mouth-breaking bona fide face lighter-upper! Later on when the flight attendants came in, he did it again!
Ah, that lovely grin. Wow. When I went on YouTube today, there it was again. When I checked the CBS website, there it was again. I didn’t really need it, because I have it in my mind forever. It was just like my daddy’s grin, just like my son’s. It was the grin I knew of a fine and wonderful man having a good bellylaugh over something genuinely funny.
We like our heroes and leaders to be serious, so they can get the serious work done. But when it is finally done and over, we also like for them to be able to smile: “It was no big deal, really. We do this kind of thing every day. We’ll do it again if we need to. Relax. It’s all over now.” That’s how we know it’s all right again, when our heroes begin to smile.
Talula Cartwright on Wednesday, 11 February 2009 (Originally posted on LeadingEffectively.org)
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