Unlock the Magic in Your Story Now
Get the Free 20 questions to Ask Before Launching Your Idea workbook when you sign up for occasional updates.
Get the Free 20 questions to Ask Before Launching Your Idea workbook when you sign up for occasional updates.
On Certainty
filed in Worldview
Nobody creates from a place of certainty.
You can’t predict the future. You never could. Nobody can.
Despite this fact, you took action in the past.
You made brave decisions without absolute proof.
You loved without knowing if your love would be rejected or returned.
You did things you were not sure would work.
You tried, knowing you might fail.
You trusted things would work out.
And if they didn’t your resilience enabled you to try again.
We are our most creative in times of uncertainty.
Image by Bob Jagendorf
Share this article
Permission To Reset
filed in Worldview
We’re used to using the reset button on our devices to reboot them. We think nothing of shutting down our technology and starting again.
We didn’t know how to do that for ourselves and humanity until this week.
We’d forgotten we could come together as communities and nations and agree to pause for the collective good. We didn’t believe it was possible for humanity to reset.
Now we do.
As each town, city and country around the world responds to halt the spread of the virus, we simultaneously see the spread of our shared understanding.
From Sydney to Stockholm, we find ourselves on a more empathetic footing. For once, we know how it feels to live through the same experience. The contagion is shifting from ubiquitous fear to universal hope.
When we witness the agency of our fellow humans across the globe as they navigate daily life during the crisis, we suddenly discover our agency.
The quarantined community in Italy, gathering on balconies in the evening to sing together, the author broadcasting virtual readings of his books and the outpouring of immense gratitude for the delivery drivers, shelf stackers and checkout operators we had come to take for granted.
All of these happenings give us the permission we thought we needed to reset, reboot and reclaim our agency and our humanity.
We get to choose how to create the future we want to see when this passes.
Image by S Alb
Share this article
Care To Lead
filed in Worldview
You don’t know Hitesh Palta. Not many people do. Mr Palta is not famous. He doesn’t have a fancy title or a massive Instagram following. He doesn’t occupy a powerful position in government, and nobody asked his opinion about how to alleviate our current global health and economic crisis.
Mr Palta is the owner of a small independent supermarket in Altona, a suburb in the south-west of Melbourne. When he saw scenes of panic-buying across Australia on the news, he feared for the elderly in the community. He decided to do something to help.
Last weekend, Mr Palta extended his store’s opening hours, by an hour in the morning, exclusively to serve the elderly. He was the first retailer in Australia to do so. The next day, Australia’s two biggest supermarket chains announced they would follow suit.
As fear changes our behaviour and social contagion takes hold. It’s our quiet leaders, those with the least authority who are making the most difference.
To our grocery store managers, checkout operators, shelf stackers, warehouse supervisors, logistics co-ordinators and delivery drivers, thank you for caring to lead.
Image by Paul Townsend
Share this article
On Safety
filed in Worldview
We know, as Maslow described, that our most basic needs are physiological and safety.
If these needs aren’t met we stumble, we stall and we stop being caring and creative.
Safety is a state, but it’s also a feeling.
We can be perfectly safe yet feel fearful.
Fear is more contagious than any virus.
And once it gets hold it’s hard to eradicate.
Great leaders don’t just ensure our safety, they also to make us feel safe.
That’s the challenge we face today and every day, to lead with empathy for the people who look to us.
Share this article
Build a Reputation
My friend Anna has been going to the same hairdresser for ten years. She’s never trusted anyone else to cut her hair in all that time. Now though, she has no option because her stylist just had a baby, and she’s on maternity leave.
When Anna sat in the new stylist’s chair, she was so anxious her palms were sweating.
Objectively, she had no proof that her regular stylist was more skilled than the new one. But reputation is built on beliefs and opinions, not objective facts.
Trust earned over time is a powerful differentiator.
Who do you want to be most trusted by and what for?
Image by AW Creative
Share this article
What Separates This From That?
When we’re not simply driven by price how do we choose what to buy?
We tell ourselves a story about quality, design, durability, or provenance. But often as we rationalise about the advantages of one product or service over another, the differentiator we perceive is the degree of love and care that’s gone into making or delivering it.
There is no place for love on a spreadsheet, ironically that’s what makes it invaluable. When we care it shows.
Image by Thomas Marban
Share this article
The Captive Vs. The Captivated
filed in Story Skills, Storytelling
When people are given the microphone or stand on a stage, they have our attention, we listen. They have a captive audience for eighteen minutes, an hour or maybe a day—if they’re lucky.
Here’s the thing, you don’t need a captive audience to be heard. You need better true stories, well told. You don’t have to rely on luck to tell better stories, you can do it with intention and practice—by design.
The world is waiting, not to be held captive, but to be captivated by new voices—for the hopeful messages and stories, each of us has to tell.
You don’t need permission to take the stage. You need to find and practice telling stories that matter.
*Today is the last day to register for the current session of The Story Skills Workshop.
Here is a special link for my blog readers to join us.
Image by Tommi Boom
Share this article
Influence Vs. Impact
filed in Meaningful Work, Story Skills, Success
In a world where attention has become both currency and commodity, it’s tempting to believe there’s a direct correlation between influence and impact.
The modern definition of an influencer is someone who can persuade people with their recommendations. But it turns out, the people who have the greatest impact are not necessarily the people with the most influence.
Our impact isn’t only measured in crude metrics like attention.
Think about the people who have had the most impact on your life—a patient teacher, a caring friend or a wise mentor. These people likely made a difference, with something they continually did, not just something they once told you to do.
Change happens when more people seek to be less influential and more impactful.
We get to choose which matters most.
*We’ve opened The Story Skills Workshop again this week.
If you’re ready to increase your impact, I hope you’ll join us.
Image by Monika Kosub
Share this article
Are You Ready To Find Your Voice?
filed in Story Skills, Storytelling
Eleven years ago, as I was pivoting my business, I began reading a new book. I was barely two paragraphs in when the following sentence stopped me in my tracks.
‘Either you’re going to tell stories that spread, or you will become irrelevant.’
Those words, written by my friend and colleague, Seth Godin, over a decade ago still hold true today. They inspired me to find my voice, own my story and invest in becoming a better storyteller.
Eight bestselling books later and ten years after I first read those words, Seth and I built and launched The Story Skills Workshop. We’ve been blown away by the impact it’s had on the thousands of people who have taken it.
We’ve just opened the workshop again today. If you’re looking for a proven, effective, powerful way to find your voice and your stories, I hope you’ll join us.
My blog readers can register using this discount link.
To find out more visit The Story Skills Workshop and hear what others are saying about how the workshop impacted them and their work.
Are you ready to find your voice, own your stories and create the impact you want?
Image by Wonderlane
Share this article
What Does Being Successful Mean To You?
filed in Success
This question about success is one that members of the Right Company have been reflecting on this past week.
It seems like a question that should have a straightforward answer.
After all, if success is something we aspire to, we must know what our ambitions are.
If we don’t know where we want to go, how will we know which path to take?
What does being successful mean to you?
Image by Emma