The e-newsletter from Forrest Workshops
Why bother with the plan? Why have the planning session? The saying is usually pretty bang-on - "the plan won't survive it's first contact with sunlight". The changes happens fast, the theory is punched in the nose by reality, the unknowables we're pontificating on will blindside us in a few hours, the need for agile overwhelms the idea of laying down iron train tracks. And put that aside one moment... you, and your humans, just aren't disciplined enough to follow it through the briar. Short-term gratification (placating the noisy, dealing with spotfires, listening to the ever-moving whims of the one up the mountain) will indubitably trump your good intentions. Implementing consistently through changing weather conditions is nigh on impossible for all but the ninjas
(and there really aren't many of them). So why bother with the planning workshop? Is it ritualised corporate entertainment? Is it delusions of control? Is it "because they do it"? Is it "because we have to do SOMETHING!" Maybe it's to create a collision space, out of the day-to-day, where thoughts and experiences and observations can butt heads, and insights can emerge, and patterns can apparate, and the eyeballing around the room on this crystallised moment creates a common tie. Maybe it's to recalibrate in a temporary demilitarised zone, in a quarantined time slot, at a different altitude, against your highest order decision making filters... your Purpose, your Vision, your Values. To reflect on what
they realllllly mean. To assess where you're nailing it, where you're stinking it up, where the likely trip wires and slipstreams ahead are, and rethink your ways forward. Maybe it is ritual. Part of what we do in this brand. Part of how we maintain a sense of connection, of a sense that we indeed are progressing to a blurry sun through a foggy world. That our culture is one that doesn't meander haphazardly into the chaos of tomorrow, but does its best to make sense of it and works hard to map important, "right" paths that we believe represent our best chance of success. From a planning workshop facilitator, I'm here to tell you that perhaps the least important part of the planning workshop is the form of the plan you come out with. The shared knowledge that you have a plan? That it's freshly and regularly reconsidered? That the right eyes, mouths and fingers were on the job? That it's cohesive, integrated and guides a schedule of work all in the boat can (must) contribute to? And that it points, as best it can, to who you believe you are, what you believe you can achieve, and how you're committed to going about it? That's why. Troy Forrest, Forrest Workshops & Strategy Road.
Strategic play – Diverse, or deep?
I get to work with an array of senior leadership teams, Boards and decision-making collectives. They sit, to varying distances, either side of a mean. To the Port side, the diverse. To Starboard, the deep. The diverse enjoy varied worldviews, experience bags and the multi-perspective benefits of heterogeneous and different. They consider from opposing vantage points, see potential consequences in a broader context and enjoy some protection from confirmation bias. But, they find it hard to reach consensus. There's a tendency to overweight the relative merits of the opinion of the vocal, where the giver isn't always possessed with direct
experience or expertise most pertinent to the topic. And the more holistically balanced collective of priorities they often land on can create integration challenges, inefficiencies and just "too much" or too vanilla. The deep enjoy the benefits of a cadre of similarly schooled, uniformly foundationed experts circling around a common theme. They can speak expertly, confidently, in a common lingo about a matter they all know something of, and, in the right vein, they go in as "a team of champions" who will make a well-informed call on the big narrow items. But they can lack a broader perspective. They risk drinking their own bathwater and clinging to the known because there's not enough external voice to call out that which they're just too close to see. And without a diversely experienced champion (or cohort)
for change, it's easy for the cadre to form into a synchronised marching platoon following the time-honoured tune emanating from the Chief's flute. Of course it's nice to have a mix of depth and diversity, but unless you're ready to run a broom through the boardroom (predicated on whether you genuinely understand where you're over- or under-weight), you've got what you've got.
Can you leverage other sources of depth and diversity without changing the bods around the table? 3 ways to go deeper? - Pre-reading, expert briefings and regular fodder pieces (like e-news or social feeds) creating a base level of knowledge of key topics in all
- Committees and tiger teams allow you to divvy CVs into the part of the plan where the individuals skills run deepest
- Strength of leadership to weight the inputs of the crew proportionate to their knowledge of a matter, while wise enough to let a contrary (albeit less deeply informed)
perspective act as an acid test
3 ways to go more diverse? - Exercises and inputs in the discussion forum that expose the crew to outside ways of thinking, different ideas and operating patterns (from guest speakers in alternative industries, to TED talks, to papers from different sectors, to weird hypotheticals)
- Drop old mate from finance into the marketing think tank; plonk supply chain manager into the HR discussion; put Captain Sales into the warehouse strategy session.
- Think more broadly about diversity, beyond gender and ethnicity. Education
& literacy, recreational pursuits, family sizes, CV combinations, age, levels of extroversion, passions, future career ambitions... there are lots of dimensions to consider differences (and the merits of bringing them to bear on a topic).
The perfect combination of depth and diversity is probably unique for every organisation, for the moment in time you're navigating, and it's still probably an unattainable asymptote. Still, likely there's real merit in striving to get closer to it, if just for the cultural message you send.
How good's that? Means you just have to splice them together! Onto it!
The Green RoomGood wood from smart guest contributors. This edition…. Jason Dunstone with his terrific new podcast series, "Real People", interviewing smart, interesting and (most importantly) real folk.
The room is almost full, the speakers are polishing their presos, the beer'n'bubbles is being put on ice, and we're readying to open the doors on an event unlike any other. If you're a leader of a business connected in any way to agriculture (food, beverage, fibre, and the myriad of industries that educate, supply or support them) or regional communities, then jump on the Eventbrite site and fill the last seats fast. Inform your strategy... chew on smart insights and inspirations from some remarkable professionals... benefit from bite-size diverse
presentations... network with the leaders changing the face of business in agriculture across our big brown country.... and beyond. An afternoon and $250, and you step clear of the pack. Don't be a dill - last chance. Click the pic to grab the opportunity.
Contextualise your SWOT...A SWOT analysis without context doesn't mean much. "Being 6 foot 6 with huge muscles" isn't much of a strength if the terrain ahead requires squeezing through narrow rock caves, or if your ambition is to be an Olympic high diver.
Before you dive in to assessing your strengths and weaknesses, your best opportunities and your biggest threats, set the context - what's happening on the terrain you operate on, and what more than anything are you trying to achieve? And with THAT in mind...
Be pro-agmat-ive…- Proactive - Get on the front foot. Look for impacts waiting to be made. Seek out opportunities to help, to add value, to apply your talents, to change stuff for better.
- Pragmatic - Deal with the reality of what's in front of you. Don't waste time wishing for better when working on the imperfect is the bit in your control. Circle of influence stuff.
- Positive -
Reflect on the things you've been able to make better, the sun that did shine the next day, and take that upbeat mindset into the fog, the clouds you're confronting, bullish it will (with a little helping hand from you) improve.
When you can't fit the team in frame, chances are you need to book a bigger room... (my bad).
Meet Strategy Road Associate Joslyn Hutchinson, Managing Director at The Engaged Space, a consultancy that specialises in delivering integrated business & people management solutions to drive strategy and business performance. Joslyn works with an array of client organisations to analyse workplace culture, employee experience and employee engagement, then tailors, implements and supports initiatives to underpin a higher performing enterprise. Check out Jos's work here - The Engaged Space.
3am is not the time to make big decisions.May to August is a seasonally busy time for a planning workshop facilitator. Lots of different projects on, lots of competing deadlines and challenging things to build. Throw in a few "life" curve balls, and you can find yourself staring at the ceiling in the wee small hours, mulling, tossing stuff over, letting it magnify in the dark and the quiet. A few weeks ago, I did something new to me. When something came into my head, I grabbed a pen and pad next to the bed, jotted down the topic and the ideas associated with it, and said to myself
"OK, you've captured it, you can deal with it in the morning". In about 7 spurts over an hour, I picked up the pen 1/2 dozen times and captured 14 topics. An annoying disrupted night, but each time something got written down, I pushed it away and moved on. In the morning, I read the topics. It's fair to say 4 of them were really pretty nonsensical in the fresh light of day. I left the list, went about a day's work, and came back to it again that night. 3 more items really didn't really have the sense of importance they seemed to have at 3am. Over the next week, only 3 of the items proved worth pursuing. Less than 1/4 of the things keeping me awake. I'm not sure I'd advocate the "write a list at 3am" strategy, but it was a great lesson. The stuff that
expands and feels massive on that dark, quiet piece of ceiling above your head... ... judge it in the light.
How amazing is the world now? Want to learn chess? Garry Kasparov can teach you, face to face. Basketball? Steph Curry. Screen writing? Aaron Sorkin. Free for 7 days. Masterclass. Suss it out here.
Luft balloons* (imagine...)
"Generosity" is something we all enjoy experiencing, and it comes in so many forms... - Reactive generosity - when something bad happens to someone (a house fire, a drought, an illness), and the GoFundMe page goes up or the hat gets passed around, there's a chance to give a little.
- Proactive generosity - before you're asked, when you see a chance to make things a little better and brighter for someone, just reaching out and offering.
- Silent generosity - when you leave it on their desk, without
a note, and you know, in your minds eye, the delight and surprise and sense of intrigue they'll experience
- Generosity of time.
- Generosity of tone (when you take that moment to put a smile in your voice, some understanding in your eyes, to compliment them, to deliver a message in the nicest way you can).
- Generous in forgiving / tolerance.. The don't really expect to be cut slack. But you can.
- Generous in opportunity creation. Connecting folk. Initiating activities. Inspiring others. Absorbing risk and investing effort to build something that's a scaffold for
others.
- Generous hospitality. Look after them, make them feel special, at home, valued.
- Generous feedback. You didn't have to give it, and they might ignore it, but you think maybe it'll be helpful, and you want them to be and enjoy "better".
- Generous sharing. Leaving more for others than you take. Distributing upsides across the community. Championing the causes others work hard for.
It's not all about putting your hand in your pocket, and it's not about the plaudits and recognition plaques. Space for "generous" in your activity set today? Onya.
Every so often... turn the slide deck off. Open the butchers paper, go old-school. Doesn't have to be pretty. Doesn't have to follow the sub headings here. But open the conversation, uncap the marker and get the contribution collision product up on the wall.
When you've been burning the candle...
Get outside. Find a view. Breathe it in. The little stuff really won't matter in a year.
If a mate has forwarded this free e-share to you and you’d like it once or twice a month, click here and type "sign me up, Scotty!" – thanks!
Thank you for reading! Forrest Workshops custom-builds and facilitates team workshops on topics ranging from strategic planning, leadership and sales practice development, to innovation, customer experience creation and collaborating with your supply chain in an evolving market. Based in Adelaide, serving clients nationally and internationally, from SMEs to Fortune 500s.
Committed to facilitating purposeful teamwork. Forrest Workshops For One are tailored Coaching & mentoring programs for leaders, business owners, sales and service professionals. High-touch, deep- and long-term impact support. Contact Troy Forrest from Forrest Workshops on 0430 308963 or troy@forrestworkshops.com.au for a discussion.
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