Diversity Input : Innovative Output

Eleven men, three women - all aged 50+ - and from the same industry. That's about all I can tell from their photos and titles.

This is the composition of a leadership team being charged with leading and creating a dynamic and vibrant community project.

What are they thinking?

Where is the diversity that will give them the innovation that the project and region needs?

Where is youth? Where is the diversity of talent, skills, thinking and backgrounds? Where is the lateral thought, from related or totally different fields? Where is the willingness to learn? Where is the leadership?

In an inspiring contrast, yesterday I spent a thrilling day at the Future of Leadership event in Melbourne. 

Several presenters spoke about leading without a title, without a position and simply doing what needs to be done. 

Most of all, our current world, climate and communities need different ways of thinking and working to solve the challenges we face. 

A key lesson is that you must get diversity plugged into the 'input' part of your project, program or event to ensure you get innovative responses in 'output'. And leaders can make this decision, source the diversity and encourage it. 

There are long paths to travel for many communities and organisations, where diversity hasn't been considered or thought of or it's simply been forgotten. Sometimes people get allocated to leadership teams from the positions they hold, rather than the experiences and diversity they will bring.

We need to encourage teams, communities and groups so they think, invite and act with diversity, are not afraid of it and see it as an opportunity to go further and do better than they have before. 

That is what will bring a dynamic and vibrant result to that community or project!

How to have the best job ever

I saw a speaker at a conference a week or two ago; she walked on stage with some Bollywood dancing music pumping out loud … and she danced and danced! She used this as a metaphor for loving the work you do.

It was Diana Larsen, speaking at Agile 2014 in Orlando, Florida. Diana presented on how to have the Best Job Ever. Here are my visual notes to her wonderful and energetic keynote. I hope this gets you thinking about what you're doing and whether it's what you really want to be doing!


Diana's advice is to:
1. Do work you love to do (and you might need to think back to when you were doing work you loved)
2. Work with purpose - work that inspires, focuses and motivates
3. Care for your tribe - this is about collaborating. Working on working better together is the best team building!
 

I'm just back from presenting at and attending some brilliant events in Berlin, the Florida and Sydney and will share some of the great learnings, insights and thinking from these events with you over the next few weeks. 

For now, get thinking about how much of what you're doing is contributing to you having the best job ever. 

How to explain your ideas…

Product design company Zurb was in Melbourne recently at a session on ideation. These creative people spend their every waking hour creating; they're constantly designing products, websites and online services. 

But it's not always a smooth path... uncovering your awesome ideas so you can get your thinking 'out there' to people in the shape of a product or service. 

My visual notes reflect some of the hottest tips on ideation:

• Use stories (more engaging than boring zzzzz features and benefits)
• Set a time limit or 'time box' so brainstorming time is constrained 
• Get user feedback to inspire and generate new thinking
• Use a Sharpie marker to sketch out your thinking
• Keep your sketches 'lo fi' and rough
• Go for quality ideas not quantity

Then once you've got some ideas down, group them together in chunks or clusters so they're easier for people to see, understand and digest. 

Go ahead and encourage some wild ideas with the team this week! It's the actual process of coming up with ideas, the 'ideation', that gives structure to creative thinking.

In the words of Albert Einstein: "If I can't picture it, I can't understand it'. 

Business Design and the Rise of the Toolsmiths

Responding to the complex and challenging environment most businesses are operating in today is about being adaptive, agile and nimble. 

But the trouble is, most of us are using tools that are from a bygone era. That's dated, rigid and stuck!

My sketch video and visual image this week looks at mutations, stories and visualisation. These are the tools of today. 

Join this "Rise of the Toolsmiths" and make sure you're equipped to respond!

Careful of those unconscious 'commands'

"I know you're tired after a long day today..."

"We'll do this activity so it might feel like you're a kid back at school doing a test..."

"I'm sorry if it feels like all of the speakers are droning on about this..."

"You probably don't want to hear what I'm going to say next but ..."

These are four real-life statements, made by team leaders, speakers, executives over the past few weeks ... people who should "know better".

But often we don't know! We're blissfully (or dangerously) unaware of the words that leak out from our mouths from our minds and the power those words have on a team, an environment, a presentation, a project.

I noted these four statements when I heard them and they all have a dangerous power to have the audience agreeing with you, under their breath, in their mind, or muttering to someone else.

Let's run them again:

"I know you're tired after a long day today..."

<Yeah, so get off the stage and let me go and have a beer!>

"We'll do this activity so it might feel like you're a kid back at school doing a test..."

<So stop it! I don't need to do kids stuff. Let's do things that will actually create an outcome for this project!>

"I'm sorry if it feels like all of the speakers are droning on about this..."

<OK, so you're going to waffle too? Yes you've all been droning ALL day!>

"You probably don't want to hear what I'm going to say next but ..."

<You're right mate. I'm not gonna listen. Instead I'll think about ....>

Be super careful about your 'banter' before you deliver important messages. This 'leakage' of uncertainty, apology or low levels of confidence can be turned around. 

Instead, positively frame up what you're saying. 

There's no need to use any of these waffle statements. Just deliver your content, your point, your story, your case study. And move on. 

Set up the environment, the context and the team for a positive interaction, a creative environment with a strong 'why we're doing this', or 'why I'm here presenting this' or 'why this change is happening'. 

They're the 'commands' you want people to buy in to and adopt. 

That's a smoother path to change.