What You Get
April 17, 2009 by Mary Wynne-Wynter · Comments Off
My biggest issue with most of the media-psychology, coaching and pop new-agey methods, is that they’re reductionist. They aim for mass appeal with focus on the quick fix: point out what’s wrong, what its costing in some lack of fulfillment, offer advice to fix the problems and to attain the desired fulfillment.
But shallow methods and quick fixes aren’t transformational and the results don’t last. That’s because the quick-fix methods focus on the apparent trade-off for the client (or reader) and not on the hidden payoff.
Here’s a typical, if overly simplistic example:
The client hates his job but after years, or even decades of misery can’t break free. The trade-offs he makes are apparent to himself and to his adviser, or author:
- trade off the creativity for the steady paycheck
- trade off the adventurous for the familiar
- trade off the independence for the benefits
The analysis of the client’s problem and the advice he gets address the trade-offs he makes. With the global crisis, advice like this has reached a fevered pitch, and somehow feels the same for every problem or lack.
Just start, do it. This is your life. Set a goal. Take action. Be accountable.
So why is it that we’re drawn to and consume this obviousness? Because these methods don’t touch what we unconsciously hide and protect at all costs and that we can’t bear to examine: the beliefs that drive the choices that we make to get the payoffs to which we’re addicted.
An unconscious belief system operates like a psychic one-arm bandit leaving us penniless, but we can’t stop pulling the lever. In the grip of the bandit, we’re willing to accept the cost, an unfulfilled life, rather than examine our choice to identify with a lesser self.
Most of us are driven to some extent by old, unwanted beliefs that we chose at a crucial time in our development in response to a physically or emotionally traumatic event(s), real or perceived - it doesn’t matter. The longer they live in us the more exhausting it gets to keep pulling that lever to get the security and safety payoff that we think we still need. But we don’t need it anymore; that time is long past.
Self-awareness sheds a light on the beliefs and resistance that want more than anything to hide in the dark. Moving forward, and growing, doesn’t require re-living, remembering or analyzing the past. It does require uncovering, accepting, releasing and replacing the old belief machine that provides the old payola.
The requirement is the willingness to imagine: who would you be without the damn thing? The zorba kicks in. In my experience, its never a quick fix but the new, and often surprising and unexpected payoff makes it well worth the effort.
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Getting People To Use Sharepoint
March 4, 2009 by Mary Wynne-Wynter · Comments Off
When I was putting together the accompanying slides, a Seth Godin post kept popping into mind. This blog post was about email marketing, with and without permission. What stuck with me was his analogy that without permission, a marketer interrupts him at his email, which is where he lives, all day.
A powerful image. 
What must it feel like, I thought, for an employee who will need to change to a system like Sharepoint, that bypasses not just email, but also the personalized explorer and file storage system relied upon for years, or longer. It could feel much worse than being interrupted at home, and more like a home invasion.
That could a good place to start if you’re failing in your efforts to get more people using Sharepoint. Resistant peoples’ responses to change will be different, including: protectiveness, skepticism and abject fear. But those who are resistant will need time, space and your leadership skills and natural influence to get from where they are (home!) to where you want and need them to be. And that is the place of willingness.
Don’t Get Derailed, Get Intense
February 12, 2009 by Mary Wynne-Wynter · Comments Off
During times of extreme uncertainty and massive shifts, its human nature to have thoughts of panic and self-doubt. These become self-fulfilling only if you believe in them and identify with them.
Solo professionals are often alone and vulnerable to getting lost in thoughts triggered by events that are exploding in frequency. A deal falls through, there’s not enough money, inquiries slow down to a trickle or less, investors pull back, unexpected family needs show up, losses accumulate. And if that’s not enough, millions of other professionals are telling (and selling) other solo’s what they’re doing wrong and what they should be doing.
When you don’t separate who you are from the onslaught of triggered thoughts, you’re at higher risk of getting derailed. A precursor is a sense of urgency to do or chase something different, and its accompanied by a lot of anxiety, tension and doubt - paradoxically, the exact things you’re trying to get away from.
Its not possible to stop all negative thinking, unless you live perhaps in a monastery. But you can refuse to identify with the thoughts and the debilitating emotions that accompany them. You do that by observing them and feeling them for what are: thoughts, not you. And then you refuse to respond to them by unconsciously going off in an unwanted direction and getting derailed.
Resolve to replace urgency and scrambling with intensity. Urgency scatters energy and attention and inhibits poise and readiness to receive. Intensity is focused on intuitively choosing to do one thing at a time with the highest quality.
Nobody can tell you what that “thing to do” is. It could be, for example, producing a creative work, taking a walk, washing the car, helping a client, eating an apple, working on finances, being with other people, looking for a job, playing with kids, doing errands, taking a nap.
What’s important is that you merge with what you do and not with your thoughts about it which make you doubt your choice. Florence Scovel Shin tells us “Let God juggle your affairs”. You don’t need a religious orientation to accept truth in that statement and to feel a sense of relief.
We’re part of something that needs to happen. Although its huge, and beyond our knowledge, control and understanding, with awareness and intensity, we are the conductor and on the right track.
Photo credit:Pewari Naan Photostream
Leading Through Resistance
February 6, 2009 by Mary Wynne-Wynter · Comments Off
Whether you’re leading a company of one or hundreds through a period of uncertainty and change, you’ll reach a point where action is required yet met with resistance, even after a period of time to adapt to uncertainty.
A default response is fighting resistance with more resistance through boundaries, control and force of will. Lines get drawn for self-protection but backfire, further increasing fear, anxiety and hostility.
A different response is to meet resistance, and replace structures that no longer exist, by committing to and modeling for others the highest possible attention to quality in, and respect for doing what’s in front of you to do, including: making decisions, communications, actions and interactions.
Attention to quality may be easier and more expected and accepted in some areas, like providing customer service and team-building. In other areas it may be more challenging, for example: cutting costs, letting people go, dealing with financial loss and making downwardly mobile lifestyle changes.
In every case, attention to quality and respect means there’s awareness. Awareness is not a strategy, its a practice. You practice by noticing when negative beliefs, assumptions or expectations compromise your commitment to quality and respect for the humanity in yourself and others. These contradictory thoughts lose their power over you when you’re aware of them.
When that happens, you’re conscious that how you respond to challenges now, directs where you’re going and how great that experience will be for you, your business, your clients and your community and beyond.
Differentiate Your Professional Service Practice
December 4, 2008 by Mary Wynne-Wynter · Leave a Comment
Photo credit: Wessex Archaeology's photostream (coastal and marine set) on Flickr
I get asked over and over by some people about what kind of coaching and consulting I do. They seem to have a preconceived notion, or perception of it and then attempt to reconcile my explanation to somehow fit their worldview. Sometimes I can’t figure out if they’re curious and trying and wanting to understand, or just not listening.
But now I’m realizing that people are pulled out of their comfort level when they’re in the depths, and the depths is my space.
I work with people at the level of often hidden assumptions, expectations and beliefs. In organizations, its collections of those - the culture. I use metaphysical metaphors to support the change facilitation process. I shouldn’t be surprised that people want to stick their toe in the water many times before they risk getting a touch of the bends.
I’m blogging this because I’m getting a sense that there’s a growing desire, or movement, or response to series of crises, to go deeper: in life, business and self-awareness. I think its a great sign that people and businesses are showing willingness and readiness to move beyond the surface of their experience, and with a leap in faith, take the plunge into what’s deep and unknown…that with which we identify but which contradicts what we want and where we want to go.
I don’t believe that “going deep” is only within the realm of professionals who focus on “people” issues. Accountants, consultants, health professionals, lawyers, technology professionals, etc, can practice recognizing opportunities to serve clients at a deeper level. It starts with allowing more space for conversation and sharing, being present without an agenda, and being willing to think differently about everything we and our clients think we know.
Uncertainty is the new reality for our clients. We can help them make it their pivot point of power from which they can create and direct their change and growth, if we dare to be different.
VRM and latent buyer intention
September 15, 2008 by Mary Wynne-Wynter · Comments Off
I gave my Intro. to Social Networks for Small Business presentation over the weekend and like to open the workshop describing how the shift in power from seller to buyer has been the driving force. So I’m happy that I’m now following VRM, or Vendor Relationship Management, an emerging buyer centric platform. The ProjectVRM Blog: Developing tools for customer independence and engagement with vendors, provides a good overview. VRM is particularly interesting to me because its tied to the Intention Economy.
The Intention Economy is about buyers finding sellers, not sellers finding (or “capturing”) buyers. (Doc Searls)
Most of the VRM work that I’ve scanned is about how relationship, data, identity and transactional tools will support the paradigm shift to truly open markets, where sellers compete to fulfill the buyer’s stated intention. I’m most interested in VRM development with respect to how it will address not just the obvious, but also the latent, buyer intentions:
- Are intentions beliefs that direct thought and action?
- Can intentions direct action that is at cross-purposes to what is wanted?
- When do thought and action become habitual?
- Can negative habitual actions be changed as awareness of intentions increases?
This may be an area where conversations matter most to buyers and where sellers have the ideal opportunity to earn respect and trust. I’ll be closely following this work, thinking about latent intention scenarios, and how some of my existing program frameworks may be useful to the VRM Project.
Chain reaction of overwhelment
August 18, 2008 by Mary Wynne-Wynter · Leave a Comment
You know how some days you leap out of bed before dawn because you have so much energy and so many ideas? And then, by 10 a.m. you feel lethargic and let-down. You probably overwhelmed yourself. I get it. I’m a generalist which makes me very prone to the condition.
I was so excited at 5 a.m. about what I wanted to produce, that I took a rest day from rowing. Its now 11 a.m. and I have a headache, I feel like I’ve been working hard but have nothing to show for it, and I have to leave in 45 minutes for a meeting. All I can think about is “wake me when its over”. But what is “its”? Well, its just my thinking over which I have total control. In fact, at the end of the day, its really the only “it” that I have control over. But I choose to ignore that today.
So what triggers caused me to unwittingly flip my excitement over to anxiety, its shadow form? I’ll re-trace my morning:
- I read dozens of tweets by people I’ve been following and started to mentally compare myself to them, even though I have little in common with them and care less. I started to think that I’m not doing enough.
- I went on a support forum to review a thread about about a software problem I’d been dealing with but that I’d decided last night I could put aside for now because its fairly trivial. I started looking hard again for the “answer”. I started to think that my new site is not perfect enough.
- I browsed through some feeds and noticed a trend that annoys me: popular coach/consultants marketing their very expensive and exclusive secrets of “how to triple your business” to struggling solo professionals. I got angry, thinking about how I hate pyramid schemes. I started to think that these people are not ethical enough.
Urgency. Perfectionism. Judgment. And the chain reaction was set into motion.
I could feel it happening but chose to not hit the “kill switch”. Sound familiar? This comes up in my work with so many clients, in so many contexts and situations. I often hear people self-describe it as their ADD.
Why is it so hard to stop it in ourselves or to help others caught up in the chain reaction? Well that’s a huge learning that I want to share: its because we protect our hidden beliefs that counter-direct us away from what we want. And there’s hidden payoffs in protecting those beliefs…or, there once was.
That’s it. When the spinning starts, and the anxious feelings kick in, just remind yourself that you’re choosing the thoughts that are creating your reality in that moment. Stress is an indicator. A different thought is yours to choose.
The Structure Paradox
March 3, 2008 by Mary Wynne-Wynter · Comments Off
Recently, I read a quote but forgot to bookmark it. It was something about the “joy of being able to control your own time”. I’ve thought about it often because I talk to a lot of people transitioning to working independently and creatively, but who are discouraged and disappointed because they’re not seeing the results they want. So they tell me that they’re thinking about going back to being an employee because they realize that they “need the structure”. Its my job to help them examine that belief.
I do so, not to try to convince anyone that being an employee again is the wrong choice. It may be an excellent choice. But I will probe by asking: what does “I need structure” really mean? Is it about financial reasons and wanting a steady paycheck? Is it about feeling lonely and isolated and wanting to be part of a team? Is it about wanting technical and business support systems and professional space? Or fear of recession? Or wanting a 9-5 schedule? I generally get weak and unconvincing “yes” answers to those questions.
So if its not really about those, is the belief “I need structure” about needing to give away control of your time? I can always count on an initially definitive no! response to that question because it touches a nerve, or hidden truth. The paradox is that, for many who later say they need the structure of punching the proverbial time clock, wanting to escape the confines and controls of corporate cubicle life was the driving force for their transitioning to “going solo” in the first place. The effects of the limiting belief - resentment, dissatisfaction and stress, disguised as “I need structure”, show up in the home office just like they show up in the corporate cubicle. Its a cycle of frustration that reinforces the underlying belief in powerlessness.
How can the cycle be broken? I like the structure metaphor in this example; looking for it “out there” because limiting beliefs have over time, weakened the internal structure. But like crumbling blocks in a foundation, beliefs that contradict what is wanted can be uncovered, removed, and replaced; resulting in a powerful belief system and internal structure for professional and personal decision making and problem solving.
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