Summer: The Season for Blooming

Summer is the season of light. It’s warm, vivid, and bright. The days are long. Plants blossom all around. We feel more alive than ever. Play comes naturally. We find ourselves outside more.  Summer provokes fun, exploration, and vacation. Walks, bike rides, milkshakes, and ice cream come to mind. 

During this season, the potential that we dug up during winter and planted in spring is now coming into fruition and growing. It's the ideal time to nourish projects and see them blossom.  Some of the seeds you planted are already showing in recognizable form while others are just about to sprout through the soil. Nurture and develop them for the harvest in fall when you will see the supple fruits of your labor ripening.

There are several ways to make the most of summer and thrive off the enjoyment of it’s most beautiful characteristics: 

• Wake up early and go outside to enjoy the sunrise. 
• Bring some flowers in and keep plants around your living spaces. 
• Open your windows and allow the fresh air in. 
• Pause and enjoy the richness of flowers in full bloom.
• Enjoy your playfulness and be spontaneous. 
• Take a trip to the beach... and go in the water.
• Listen to the beautiful sounds of summer while letting the sun warm your face. 

Enjoy your summer!

Dancing with Change

Change is constant, whether we like it or not.  If we don't know how to to deal with change, it can slow us down, feel very difficult, become very expensive, and cause a lot of waste.

Our ability to manage change well directly influences our speed of growth, daily experience, success in achieving goals, and ability to make a valuable impact.

Here are keys to improve your ability to manage change.

Create a Change Map
True clarity on what specifically needs to change is critical.  We can achieve this by:

• Having a high level of awareness of current position
• Creating a clear vision of desired outcome (with a thoughtful, elevated outcome)
• Mapping a path from one point to the other
• Assertively chasing that path every day, being the force to make it happen
• Being flexible and adapting the path, as needed, to reach the outcome

By mapping this journey of growth, we paint a picture of the specific shift that needs to happen.  Priorities become clear and noise is eliminated.


Refresh Habits
Our daily habits are essential to driving important change.  People who consistently bring effort, energy, and attitude excel regardless of factors outside of their control.  Encouraged daily habits:

• Engaging in a mindset routine every morning feels motivating 
• Obsessing with being better than yesterday
• Living each day as if it's the only one
• Seeking to be coached and learning from disappointments
• Speaking words that are rooted in love and honoring them

When we demonstrate our ability to thrive with change, we encourage others to do the same.  This synergy is powerful momentum.


Influence Progress
Collaboration that leverages various perspectives while creating ownership at the same time is a great way to elevate results.  We have an opportunity to not only seize opportunities for change, but to lead others to do the same.

• For changes that are big - a clear, agreed upon action plan with a small, specialized group who is highly motivated is a great way to drive fast progress in a fun way.  Be sure to set a cadence of regular work sessions to speed progress and give the team time in between to elevate their work product.
• For changes that will be repeated - a simple guided process with forms that gather all necessary information,  create clear ownership over each step, and ensure checks and balances is a great way to drive quality and efficiency. 

Passionate Performance

Highlights from the book by Lee J. Colan

Passionate performance is demonstrated by a strong, sustained intellectual and emotional attachment to one’s work.  It is made visible through enthusiasm and seeing results.  People choose to do more because they have fun.  This happens when a person’s intellectual and emotional needs are fulfilled.

Intellectual needs are fulfilled by engaging the mind and result in high performance.   There are 3 intellectual needs that need to be fulfilled.  When a person regularly experiences achievement, autonomy, and mastery, a self-reinforcing cycle of improvement, growth, and high performance is created.

1. Achievement – Outcome: eliminate barriers to achievement and define crystal clear goals
2. Autonomy – Process: improve the process and establish broad, yet clear boundaries
3. Mastery – Specialty: fit person to position for highest, best use and create a learning environment

Emotional needs are fulfilled by engaging the heart and result in passion.  There are 3 emotional needs that need to be fulfilled.  When a person regularly experiences purpose, intimacy, and appreciation, they form strong relationships that result in amazing results.

1. Purpose – Cause: create a compelling purpose and focus on activities that directly support it 
2. Intimacy – Connection: maintain small teams to build strong relations and create team rituals
3. Appreciation – Recognition: find opportunities to express contributions and to be sincerely interested in each person

Implementation Ideas:

• Look for opportunities for your team to master key skills
• Define goals for each person (eliminate the primary barrier to achievement)
• Find a reason every day to recognize someone on your team
• Implement a structured selection process to ensure a good fit between each person and position
• Ask team what changes they can make to be certain we stay focused on our purpose

My Purpose Statement

I was just at the Conscious Capitalism Conference this week and realized I have never quite nailed down a personal purpose statement.  Here's my current draft:

I build systems that bring people together to create opportunities for growth, optimize experience, and drive progress.

My Favorite Trick for Feeling Truly Fulfilled: Planning Outcomes

The habit that helps ensure my personal fulfillment over all others is a 90 day pivot review.  Every quarter, I carve some time out to take a fresh look at what my priorities are and set new goals accordingly.  Sometimes these goals are changing or elevating my approach on a goal I've been actively pursuing.  Sometimes they are completely new ideas.  By reviewing this regularly, I improve my ability not only to plan, but to elevate what I'm planning for.

When I step out of this Outcome Planning Session, I feel reinvigorated and ready to drive forward.  This 30 minute practice renews my motivation by alinging my focus with my planned actions.  It also prioritizes important reflection on my prior goals versus actual accomplishments.  I love to look back see the results of my intentions versus what really happened.  I learn so much when flipping through the pages and seeing my progress.

The template that I use is from my Daily Notebook and is pictured here.  The Notebook helps create daily balance, focus, and enjoyment.  When partnered with quarterly outcome planning and weekly organization sessions, it brings a much higher level of self-growth and fulfillment.

Other Favorites:

• My Favorite Organization Trick
• My Favorite Life Hack
• My Favorite Time Management Trick
• My Favorite Daily Mindset Practice

Roll with Change

Change is the one constant in life.  The feeling of being “short-changed” or on the losing end of change can be overwhelming and incredibly painful.  It can bring the intense emotions of disappointment, sadness, and regret.  The changes that can hurt us the most are those that we never expected.  The more love, hope, and energy we invest into something, the harder it hurts to let it go.  Letting go is the only way to deal with changes we can’t control. 

The greatest growth, accomplishment, and achievement often come from changes that seem impossible to overcome.  These challenges bring opportunity.  They create a new foundation to build something better than before.  Listening to feedback from people that care about you and have different perspectives helps to open the mind to new possibilities that may be blocked by fear or limited thinking.  While the entire path ahead may be hard to see, the next step is usually not too hard to figure out.  It’s up to us to open up, be flexible, and keep putting one foot in front of the other.  

My Mission Statement

I drive optimal outcomes.  I find enjoyment through writing, organizing, and advancing goals. 

I focus on these attributes:

• Leverage talents to benefit many
• Be a great friend
• Put family first

I constantly renew by focusing on:

• Creative weekend sessions
• Mastery in areas of excellence
• Playful execution of strategy 

Timeboxing to Optimize Output

Timeboxing is a time management technique that has been proven to increase productivity.  This method allocates a fixed time period, called a time box, to each planned activity.

Organizing activities this way helps some people more easily enter a state of flow or to be "in the zone".  In positive psychology, flow is the mental state of operation in which a person performing an activity is fully immersed in a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and enjoyment in the process of the activity.

I use time boxes to design my daily activities.  Once per week, I break my current projects into bitesize tasks and allocate them into a framework which consists of windows of time.  This practice enables consistent movement forward and a great sense of clarity.

I've found that these blocks of time facilitate a better output as well.  They allow me to dive into the topic at hand and think creatively on a deeper level about it.  Over time, I've learned how to really elevate the quality of thought I can produce by working on the placement of the boxes in particular sequences.  I've got a few time boxes that are my favorite part of my week every week.

When I use time boxes, it often silences the critical part of my brain, which enables real-time discovery when probing ideas.  I highly recommend using timeboxing in your electronic calendar to design your days.

References:

• Evidence of Maximal Adaptation to Task Constraints
• 4 Scientifically Proven Ways To Boost Your Brain Productivity
• Ultradian Rhythms in Prolonged Human Performance
• For Real Productivity, Less is Truly More
• Wikipedia: Flow (psychology)
• Wikipedia: Timeboxing

Conscious Capitalism Credo

I'm reading through the handbook and want to capture how awesome this is. :)

We believe that business is good because it creates value, it is ethical because it is based on voluntary exchange, it is noble because it can elevate our existence, and it is heroic because it lifts people out of poverty and creates prosperity. Free enterprise capitalism is the most powerful system for social cooperation and human progress ever conceived. It is one of the most compelling ideas we humans have ever had. But we can aspire to even more.  

Conscious Capitalism is a way of thinking about capitalism and business that better reflects where we are in the human journey, the state of our world today, and the innate potential of business to make a positive impact on the world. Conscious businesses are galvanized by higher purposes that serve, align, and integrate the interests of all their major stakeholders. Their higher state of consciousness makes visible to them the interdependencies that exist across all stakeholders, allowing them to discover and harvest synergies from situations that otherwise seem replete with trade-­‐offs. They have conscious leaders who are driven by service to the company’s purpose, all the people the business touches, and the planet we all share together. Conscious businesses have trusting, authentic, innovative and caring cultures that make working there a source of both personal growth and professional fulfillment. They endeavor to create financial, intellectual, social, cultural, emotional, spiritual, physical and ecological wealth for all their stakeholders. 

Conscious businesses will help evolve our world so that billions of people can flourish, leading lives infused with passion, purpose, love and creativity; a world of freedom, harmony, prosperity, and compassion. 

From Conscious Capitalism

The Purpose Economy

Highlights from The Purpose Economy by Aaron Hurst

      “It’s not only what you are doing, but how you do it and thereby relate to the world.” 

·        What is the Purpose Economy?

o   Describes the new context and set of ways in which people and organizations are focused on creating value, and it defines the organizing principle for innovation and growth

·        3 Types of Purpose:

o   Personal Purpose – special talent that they feel fulfilled when expressing (i.e. cake baker)

o   Social Purpose – desire to build a community, product doesn’t really matter (i.e. wine maker)

o   Societal Purpose – affect something greater than themselves (i.e. Kate’s club, nonprofit)

·        New economy doesn’t entirely displace its predecessor, it complements and builds from it

·        Information Economy changed employees relationship with employers – no longer does an employee stay with one company that takes him/her under its wing for their entire career.. organization needs have caused these changes …employees have to fend for themselves so the mindset has changed… “ the instability caused by these major structural changes and magnified by the economic recession brought with it a need to find stability and a future path within ourselves, rather than from an employer”.

o   Purpose, rather than career longevity, provides the stability we need

·        10 Key Drivers to the Purpose Economy

§  Human scale technology – we are using technology that once isolated people/minimized social interactions and using it to regenerate that movement…connecting people with local farmers, local bloggers, borrowing from individuals instead of big banks, renting individuals’ homes rather than hotel chain.

§  The Maslow Millennial Effect – desire to make a difference, grow and share their passion with the world. A shift up in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. People of all ages are feeling the shift but Millennials are the driving force.

§  Generation Disrupt – Generation X (IT Economy) came of age in dot com boom where they saw how powerful technology with the right idea and the right passion. It could change the way things had always been done.

§  Environmental, Economic and Political Turmoil – uncertainty of society is making people look into themselves for stability and to identify the needs and empathize with those affected by the turmoil – 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, the Great Recession especially impacted Millennials who were in their formative years during that time.

§  Longevity – Baby Boomers looking for purpose in their second careers whereas their first career was all about earning. This is creating a talent boom for the social sector.

§  Changing Families and Evolving Roles – shift in intellectual sector as opposed to physical sector allowed for more opportunities for women.

§  New Social Science – use highly researched “positive psychology” tools to measure employees overall well-being because those individuals are most productive at work. Role of work leadership is changing to not just helping employees move up the corporate ladder but to help them find purpose and meaning.

§  Accelerated Globalization – everyone is subject to higher visibility now making a higher level of accountability. More awareness of devastating situations around the world, seeing it first-hand makes others feel a need to make change happen. Technology has also led to faster social change in underdeveloped countries that wouldn’t have been possible without it.

§  A Shifting Social Context – seeing the gap in what the government is able to provide and they are trying to fill it. Trust in the federal government has been on the decline for decades. “Regan Revolution” emphasized putting the power and responsibility of society back into the hands of the people rather than the government.

§  Blending of the Sectors – hybrid business models between nonprofit and for-profit companies, lines blurring more...opportunity for returns but still have a social mission. To move/change the market have to incorporate corporations, nonprofits and government to do so.

o   Purpose is a verb and is something to be chosen…(i.e. not all doctor’s feel a sense of purpose, some just want career success for example)

o   Once American households meet roughly $70,000 in annual income, they are no more or less happy the more money they make

o   “Lean, earn and then return model” is outdated – rather all three aspects should be blended and practiced at every year of your career

o   Myth: don’t have to find one life-calling, one specific cause to help, purpose is about seeking a direction not a destination. PURPOSE IS AN APPROACH TO WORK AND SERVING OTHERS

o   Purpose isn’t a luxury reserved for the well off

o   Create a purpose/mission statement: WHO? HOW? WHY?

o   For two minutes each day, think about what surprised, inspired and moved you – way to PROACTIVE purpose

o   Traditional ideas around an unsatisfactory work environment would suggest changing the job but positive psychology/purpose ideals say change the job you’re in to better fit your needs

o   Why people leave?

§  Bad manager 

§  Organization 

§  If individual’s purpose drivers and company’s are not aligned

o   As companies grow, employees feel farther removed from feeling like they are working toward a clear purpose – why large companies develop volunteer programs…it’s a way to simulate purpose but it doesn’t have the same effect at all (for employees, it’s not fulfilling the same way as having a purpose-oriented job in the company)

o   Need an audacious goal, not a modest one if you really want to be successful… you go to the bank for a modest idea but to aim for the stars, you need rocket fuel

o   Vulnerability – in the new economy, you are not just putting managers in charge or someone’s job but in charge of someone’s entire purpose. This brings a whole new level of responsibility and accountability to leadership teams.

·        Well Being:  five core components to attain:  positive emotion, engagement, relationships, meaning, and accomplishment

·        Stats

o   Volunteerism/Purpose

§  32 million people are seeking purpose-rich second careers.  People find purpose in many places including 30% education, 25% health care, 25% government, and 11% non-profit organizations.

§  The number of volunteers age 65 or older in the US will increase 50% by 2020 from just under 9 million in 2007 to over 13 million.

o   Aging

§  In 1796, the average person only lived to be 24.  Just a hundred years later that person could live to be 48.  Now the expectancy is 76.

§  The average employee stays at a job for 4.5 years.

§  The peer-to-peer or sharing market is now estimated at $26 billion

§  Seniors now account for 12.9% of the population – a number expected to increase to 20% by 2030.  As of 2010 there were approximately 1.9 million home health and personal care aids in the US to care for them.  The employment of home health aids is projected to grow 60% from 2010 to 2020, with the personal care aid profession to grow 70%.

§  10,000 people reach the age of 65 every day in the US.

o   Misc

§  More than 17% of the fourteen million self-employed workers in the US consider themselves independent contractors or freelancers.

§  82% of women in the US now work, a 250% increase since the 1950’s.  Fewer than 7% of households have only a male breadwinner.

§  According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, in 2010 the estimated economic value of household work would have boosted the American GDP by 26%. 

§  The number of preschool teachers is expected to grow by 25% between 2010 and 2025, and the number of childcare workers 20% in that same time.

Goals: Desired Impact

Ponder this:  If you could have any impact on the world what would it be?


I  want to leave my children with a strong set of healthy values that are inclusive and caring.  I want to leave them with the tools to deal with life's challenges and the ability to navigate them in a way that builds strong relationships and creates meaningful moments.  I want to leave them with a foundation that enables them to learn many perspectives and empowers them to achieve their dreams.  I want to leave them with the impression that their mom was someone to be proud of and inspired by, someone that they cherish the essence of, and encourage their kids to be like.  I want to leave them with the feeling that they can make an impact and the understanding that we all need them to do so.


I want to contribute toward making essential changes for the well-being of people, to set up well-organized and optimized systems that encourage high performance, and create unforgettable memories and relationships along the way.

Finding Purpose in Work

Last week I took a training led by Imperative to train a class of professionals to become Certified
Purpose Leaders for their organizations.  The program began with a four day intensive workshop in a beautiful lodge near Seattle, Washington.  In a cohort with 14 other individuals and my co-worker Calen Schultz, I explored purpose, it's relation to work, and what it means to me.

One of the most amazing aspects of this workshop was the group that was in the class.  It was led by the talented Imperative crew.  Aaron Hurst is a co-founder and is the author of the Purpose Economy, a wonderful book which paints a captivating case for an economic evolution led by the practice of bringing purpose into what that we do personally, in organizations, and in society.  Arthur Woods is also a co-founder of Imperative, is ridiculously intelligent, and is the best speaker I've ever listened to.  Maggie Shelton is the Head of Programs and led the class.  She brings a wealth of knowledge from her past awesome and interesting experiences.  She also creates a nurturing environment and well-designed guided experience for learning and reflection.  There were 7 pairs of  professionals in attendance as well who were all inspiring, passionate about people, and brought a wealth of experience that was great for colorful discussions and brainstorming sessions.  Companies that participated in our training included LinkedIn, Tides, Kenneth Cole, Elder Care Alliance, FCB Global, Neal, Gerber & Eisenberg LLP and, of course, Emerios. :)

Over the course of 4 days, we went through several exercises in small groups to explore what purpose means for us individually, for others, and how we can help contribute to the movement of infusing purpose into the work that we all do every day.

Here are some of the key takeaways from the training:

• We invest an incredible amount of time, energy, and ourselves into the work that we do every day.  Finding purpose in what we do allows us to find more fulfillment in our lives.
• When you are aware of what your personal purpose drivers are (what makes you feel fulfilled), you can design your time and the use of your energy to encourage more of those meaningful moments.  
• 3 Purpose Myths
• Purpose is Not a Cause - Purpose is not associated with a cause.  Purpose is an approach to work and serving others in anything that you do. 
• Purpose is Not a Revelation - Purpose is not an external calling that instantly hits us.  We must discover this wisdom for ourselves by being aware and seeking new experiences.
• Purpose is Not a Luxury - Purpose is not only for those that have plenty to spare. The prioritization of purpose is often inversely correlated with wealth.
• Stats.  There were a lot!  Here are some standouts that highlight the performance of purpose-led organizations:
• The Company is More Likely to Grow
• Higher Revenue Growth – 202% more likely to report revenue growth. 
• Positive Growth – 85% show positive growth in the last 3 years. 
• The Employees are Happier
• Higher Fulfillment Rates – 64% more likely to find fulfillment in their jobs.
• Higher Retention Rates – 11% more likely to stay in organizations longer than their peers.
• The Customers are Happier
• Higher Levels of Service – 51% more likely to have stronger relationships between employees and customers.
• Higher Bottom Line Performance– Firms of Endearment companies have outperformed the S&P 500 by 14 times and Good to Great companies by 6 times over a period of 15 years.

• Imperative has created a purpose assessment that individuals can take.  The assessment asks questions to uncover your purpose drivers.  With this awareness, you can infuse these drives into the work that you do by hacking your job.  
• We learned how to:
• Read individual assessments
• Hack job postings to attract purpose-oriented individuals
• Hack job descriptions to infuse specific purpose drives of an individual into the work they do daily to ensure maximum fulfillment
• Create team reports utilized to coach teams to work well together
• The goal of this work is to reach beyond employee satisfaction or engagement - to achieve fulfillment.

One of the best rewards from undergoing this training, was the return home.  I feel like this program helped me to loosen up some of the limitations I had in my mind and it left me feeling deeply motivated and inspired about every aspect of my life.  There was a "buzz" that came home with me and I enjoyed reflecting on my time with the class and integrating my new perspective into everything that's important to me.

We learned a lot in this small window of time.  We'll continue to work together over the upcoming year to roll this out company-wide.  This type of work is fairly new.  It will be a lot of fun to be a pioneer of this change and work with the purpose community to bring it to our organization and build a movement! :)

A Transformational Purpose Moment

A moment that held a lot of purposeful meaning for me was the first time I helped lead a meditation that kicked off a women’s inner development retreat weekend.  Although I had spent some time prior helping to organize the event, during the moment that the retreat kicked off, I felt a great surge of joy and fulfillment.  I was so excited that I got to participate in this work and this was my actual job!

I had recently quit my prior job as a staff accountant.  After desperately searching for an opportunity late at night, I found a job post that seemed crafted just for me.  Shortly thereafter, I took a risk to completely switch roles and become the executive assistant for a transpersonal psychologist that teaches conscious embodiment. 

In that moment when the retreat kicked off, I felt like a caterpillar who had thought the world was ending, but instead had become a butterfly.  Although I have always sought to live each day with purpose, regardless of my environment, this moment stands out as one that reached a new height of fulfillment.  It tapped in perfectly to my dominant purpose drive which is to bring people together and leverage the strength of communities.  I was deeply excited to get to work on a project that was drawing a collective of women together to expand their awareness as well as build their love and compassion for themselves.  In this experience, I felt a sense of fulfillment by contributing to the growth of others, building relationships, and seeing an immediate impact of my efforts. 

That’s the power of purpose and the fulfillment it brings.  When you’re aware of what your individual drivers are, you can consciously design your time and the use of your energy to encourage more of those meaningful moments.