lloydmasters @ the Swan at the Globe

"All the world's a stage; And all the men and women merely players; They have their exits and their entrances..."  As You Like It, Act II, Scene VII, William Shakespeare (1564-1616).

Many of those exits and entrances were made at the Globe theatre by the Chamberlain's Men (later known as the King's Men), the playing company to which William Shakespeare belonged. The theatre was designed and constructed in 1599 on land co-owned by the sons of theatre entrepreneur and manager James Burbage and a group of five actors including Shakespeare himself. The original Globe was destroyed by fire in 1613 but rebuilt the following year remaining the home of the King's Men until all theatres were closed under England's Puritan administration in 1642; it was demolished in 1644.

Happily for lloydmasters, a modern reconstruction called 'Shakespeare's Globe' was completed in 1997 along with a conference centre 'The Swan', which is where on 10 February we are holding our winter networking event – you are all invited! The focus is change management, and we have an excellent speaker – Justin Hughes, from Mission Excellence – who will look at change through the lens of military strategy.

But where did the Globe get it's name from? Well supposedly it alludes to the latin tag Totus Mundus Agit Histrionem – all the world is a playhouse – words that are said to have been the motto of the original Globe and a belief that Shakespeare stuck to throughout his life.

note.

Goal Directed Planning

In last weeks blog I mentioned Goal Directed Planning. GDP sounds like a planning tool –  and indeed that's how it started life, but to lloydmasters it is a dynamic, visual process that enables groups of people, often from different teams or organisations, to agree on a collective way forward.

Working together in one room, over one or two days, drives an output of a high level milestone plan, set around ‘themes’ or ‘result paths’ with each result path having an agreed goal, or end point. Whilst developing this plan issues are identified, hidden agendas surfaced, silos broken down and meaningful dialogue undertaken. It is an exhausting process, but apart from producing the plan, the process also engenders real engagement of all players, with participants clear on what needs to happen, by when and by who – most importantly this real understanding of the issues which will need to be faced, means that they can be added proactively, rather than ignored until they become show stoppers later on in the life of the project.

The plan itself can also act as a very elegant communication document. As on one piece of A3 paper a whole two year plan can be shown, together with dependencies, creating assurance amongst stakeholders and users, enabling a holistic view to be taken. Progress can be measured against each high level milestone, with the detail being illustrated in action plans that sit behind the top 2 milestone in each resource plan.

Goal Directed Planning has been used extensively with lloydmasters clients, helping support mergers, projects and reorganisations. The process translates well across nationalities and cultures and because it’s so visual, helps understanding. If you would like to understand more about this technique please contact lloydmasters for an information document.

Kindle

Strange how technology can sometimes make me feel like it has to be either flight or fight.

I was recently given a Kindle – now the Kindle is something I have steered away from on the basis that the feel of the paper and the weight of the book would be lost to me forever. I have conveniently ignored the upsides such as ease of use when travelling, particularly those endless flights from London to Houston, and of course not having to carry the weight of book that can sometimes be like an SAS Bergen.

So when I was given my Kindle for christmas I had a dilemma – do I say thanks but no thanks and appear rude or do I embrace the technology and give it a go.

You know what, now I have experienced it I cannot imagine why I was so hesitant. The whole episode made me think about the importance of finding ways to give our clients the opportunities to experience different tools, such as a strategic planning tool called Goal Directed Planning, and use technologies such as Podcasts as an integrated part of workshops that we run for clients

How come we can have perfectly good conversations in the dark?

Just before christmas I was running a ‘change management’ workshop for a financial services client, and, helped by a professional role player we discussed interpersonal skills with our participants.

A key facet of these skills is the importance of non-verbal communication, but some recent work does question that in all cases, i.e., if 93% of communication is non-verbal (7% verbal (words); 38% vocal (tone); 55% facial (body language)) then how come we can have perfectly good conversations in the dark?

Research by Albert Mehrabian applies specifically to the communication of feelings and attitudes (like-dislike). For effective and meaningful communication about emotions, these three parts of the message need to support each other – they have to be ‘congruent’. In case of any incongruence, the receiver is likely to quickly spot the mixed message when the ‘words & music’ are different. In fact narrowing the application to the specific restrictions of Albert Mehrabian’s experiments, it only applies when: 

• A speaker is using only one word
• Their tone of voice is inconsistent with the meaning of the word, and
• The judgement being made is about the feelings of the speaker

So here’s the payoff… live with the dilemma. Common sense tells us that words count for more than 7% and experience tells us that we can spot incongruence in a flash! Celebrate it as another triumph of reality over misinterpreted research.