Tag Archives: vision

New job title – what’s that about?

31 Tuesday Mar 2020

Posted by in Uncategorized, Purpose and Service

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You may not care šŸ˜Š, or you may be intrigued about the new the job title Iā€™ve used on my profile Ā ā€“ Mission Controller.

What is a Mission Controller? In NASA terminology it is a person sat in Mission Control at Cape Canaveral who sits at a computer screen monitoring information, interpreting its meaning and transmitting the data and conclusions up the chain of command to whoever needs it, including the astronauts themselves, if necessary. What a Mission Controller does not do is decide what the Mission is. Nor does the Mission Controller (necessarily) tell the operative what to do. That is for the operative themselves to decide. The Operator takes the given information and, using training, experience and set protocols, does whatever is needed to continue the Mission.

That is the perspective I have used when choosing my new ā€˜titleā€™. As Mission Controller I will not:

  • Tell people what their Mission should be.
  • Tell them how to carry it out (unless a set, principled protocol already exists).

Those two elements are strictly within a client’s remit.

We tend, to varying degrees, to have a way of life dictated for us by others. Ā Everything we do, we do for, because of or with other people. Thatā€™s the interdependent reality. But how we deal with that is usually systematic rather than self-directed. Society demands that we deal with people in a certain fashion, but how we deal with ourselves should be entirely our own principled choice. We should decide as much as we can, for ourselves, what we are for.

My new purpose as Mission Controller will be to help people identify their sense of personal mission. It is to help them discover and commit to a vision that they will discover and design for themselves, Ā after which my purpose will be to provide advice and the occasional protocol for them to complete their mission. Unfortunately, geography and logistical difficulties will mean that I will not be able to monitor their commitment to your mission. That will be entirely down to their own self-discipline.

The mission they select, should they wish to complete it*, will have two specific elements ā€“ firstly, what they want to achieve (the Vision), and secondly, how they are going to achieve it (the Practices). I will not set out either of them for people.

I will provide advice on finding out what their mission is, learning how to achieve it, how to teach others about it (if they wish) and the potential pitfalls that may cause them to lose their way.

And once we have finished, success will be entirely down to them.

Good luck

Now, more than ever – Plan Your Future.

13 Friday Mar 2020

Posted by in Character and Competence, Time Management, Uncategorized

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Okay, yesterday I said Iā€™d only do one pandemic post, but circumstances change and so does our approach. Here is take 2. It’s more important than yesterday’s.

Viktor Frankl was a Jewish psychiatrist who was sent to the concentration camps in WWII. Famously, he was academically interested in why some people survived the camps, and others didnā€™t. notwithstanding the misfortunes of selection and random execution, the ones who werenā€™t so unfortunate either died, or they did not.

To cut a long story to the chase, Frankl concluded that the ones who lived were those who had a firm vision of their future. For Frankl himself it was a vision that he would teach what heā€™d learned to students, with a view to it never happening again.

Norman Cousins was a man who, according to Wikipedia, used his mental faculty to overcome a debilitating condition. It is said he made laughter one of his main medicines, along with a personal determination to overcome his personal, physical challenges ā€“ and he succeeded.

We live at a time when a virus threatens the existence of those physically unable to fight it. Iā€™ll admit it plays on my mind, as I have what may be one of those pre-existing medical conditions. But it isnā€™t just about me ā€“ I have two beautiful grandchildren, four lovely kids and a beloved wife. I canā€™t conceive of life without any of them, particularly the young. But that also means if Iā€™m gone, I donā€™t get to see them grow. So it is me, but itā€™s them too.

So now, more than ever, I think it is time to consider positivity, laughter, and a firmly envisioned plan for the future that will provide hope for us as individuals and, in the end, for all of us.

I have no doubt that despair does not serve the physical body, and I firmly believe that some people who died did so because they lacked hope, or a sense of purpose. They thought, ā€œIā€™m done here.ā€ Which in the case of the elderly may, for them, have a been some kind of satisfaction. Itā€™s not cruel or judgemental to say that. If it was, then the person who thought of the term for the dying of ā€˜Blessed releaseā€™ is equally evil. It is just a belief, no more.

Anyway, like Hemingway, I want to die only when I am all used up, and that isnā€™t yet.

Today is the day I carry out my planning for the week, and part of that plan will be to consider my long term future. What do I want to create in this world, what legacy do I wish to leave for those kids? How am I going to achieve that? Not just in terms of tasks but in terms of the way I conduct myself ā€“ hopefully with integrity, with the fullest congruence between my values and my behaviours.

Iā€™ll ask you all to do the same. Design your future as if all will pass as well as it can, for you.

At the same time, I will tie up my camel by ensuring that my immediate family is cared for, provided for, supplied and kept as healthy as they can so that if it does strike, they can be part of the 80% who just get a sniffle. But not, I hope, at the expense of anyone else. I will get enough for our needs, and no more. those who are stockpiling a yearā€™s worth of soap for the 14 days they may have to stay at home are selfish. No question.

Plan a spectacular future. See it in your mindā€™s eye and start working towards achieving your dream and towards leaving your legacy. Review and recommit to your Mission. Frankl and Cousins need your support. And your health and welfare may depend on it.

And if fate should decide otherwise, let me face it with integrity and set a good example.

All at sea, or well on course? It’s up to you.

19 Thursday Dec 2019

Posted by in Character and Competence, General, Time Management, Uncategorized

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ā€œWe all have some vision of ourselves and our future. And that vision creates consequences. More than any other factor, vision affects the choices we make and the way we spend our time.ā€ Stephen R. Covey

And the corollary of that is a lack of vision also affects the choices we make and the way we spend our time. Which also has consequences, consequences we would not ordinarily choose. I thin Jim Rohn put it best when he opined that people who have no sense of a plan work for people who do.

So why do many people drift about?

First of all, society. Philosophers suggest that we are the average of the 5 people with whom we spend most of our time, which means that what those 5 people think, say, feel and do diffuses into our own souls and creates ā€˜usā€™. Which would explain why people spend such a lot of time ā€˜socialisingā€™ by standing in loud, dark rooms imbibing intoxicants and consider that activity to be ā€˜creativeā€™. (In my world, every retirement ā€˜doā€™ starts in the same pub in Cardiff, 20 miles from where most of the participants live. As if there are no pubs nearer. Weird. And hugely unimaginative.)

In other words, the majority goes along with the majority. They talk the same, think the same ā€“ and end up with the same. I love my retired colleagues, but when you go to a meet-up for a chat, itā€™s allotments and holidays. Like theyā€™ve given up.

Secondly, the belief that talent is something you have or you havenā€™t. maybe. But the key to progress is the ability and willingness to learn. If you know what you want, learn what you need in order to get it, donā€™t just bemoan the lack of opportunity. Fortune, they say, favours the prepared mind. Go prepare.

In my own case, years ago I had the opportunity to provide training to others but had no training experience. So I joined a speakersā€™ club, attended courses and gained a training qualification. It is really not rocket science to learn. (Although school is wasted on the young.)

The third, tragic reason for drifting is ā€“ not knowing what you want (or not knowing that you are allowed to seek out what you want). Now that really is a challenge. Floaters (unfortunate term!) go with the flow and end up where the masses collect instead of discovering something wonderful, like the opportunity to contribute beyond oneself.

And finally, simple stubbornness. The number of floaters I have met who refuse to take training in self-development ā€˜because itā€™s American/pointless/pop-psychology/mumbo-jumboā€™ probably equals the number of people whose retirement wonā€™t be noticed because they just did what was expected and nothing else. And they probably didnā€™t do what was expected very well, either. Turned up, did the minimum, went home. (Although truth be told we all have days when we feel like that!)

Look, if you havenā€™t ever done an exercise designed to identify what could make you different, to stand out, to succeed, then go to this page and just take 30 minutes or so to find out. Buy a book from Stephen R. Covey, Tony Robbins, Charles R. Hobbs, Hyrum W. Smith or some-such (me?), and do the exercises and thinking they promote. Find out what you really want from life, then develop the plan that will make it happen. Then execute the plan violently, as Patton would say.

You might just surprise yourself.

Where ARE you?

17 Tuesday Dec 2019

Posted by in Time Management, Uncategorized

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Taken from the book Police Time Management, by me.

Ā ā€œWe need a sense of vision of we are to get something worth having. We need to have a goal or goals towards which we can strive. But in order to know where we are going, we also sometimes need to know where we are.

I remember many years ago when I was driving ā€œThe Big Vanā€ in support of officers anticipating the usual weekend public disorder in what was euphemistically referred to (in those days) as a Cowboy Town. The Big Van would drive around the extended Division, crewed by two divisional officers whose remit was to attend any disorder in support of local officers. This involved the van being staffed by officers from different town sections so that we could safely be expected to know the expanded area which we were expected to patrol.

One night, my partner and I stopped in what was ā€˜hisā€™ patch, and a young lad walked up to the open window on the driverā€™s side, apparently to ask my driving partner for directions. No sooner had my partner started to provide advice on how the lad could get to his stated destination than the said lad knocked my partnerā€™s hat off and ran away. Naturally my partner pursued him, alighting from our Van in order to do so. And equally naturally, they ran the way we had just come so I could not simply follow in the van.

I scooted over into the driving seat, laboriously turned the van and drove in the direction they had run, driving around a roundabout in order to do so. Then the call came that my partner had apprehended his prey and a struggle was taking place. He named the street he was in ā€“ which was familiar to him but not, as luck would have it, to me. Heā€™d run after the lad in ā€˜hisā€™ town leaving the officer from abroad (me) in the van.

I called for directions and was told by a control room operator to ā€˜go to the roundabout and take the second exitā€™. I started driving back towards the roundabout, and it was only as I arrived at that hazard that I realised that the person whoā€™d given me the directions hadnā€™t a clue where I was because I hadnā€™t told him ā€“ so how could he possibly have known which exit I had to take? In order to accurately get me to the required destination, he should first have asked me where I was. (Which may have explained my accident with a taxi, but thatā€™s another story.)

This is true in all journeys from where you are to where you want to be, both physical and metaphorical. If I want something, I need to know how to go about it, and I need to know what skills, knowledge and interest I have NOW that may need to be complemented if I am to achieve my desired result.

If I want to lose weight, I need to know how much I weigh NOW so that I can identify how much I have to lose, how I should lose it, and how I am progressing as time passes. I may also need to know why I am the weight I am so that I donā€™t repeat the mistakes that got me overweight in the first place. I need to look at what has led to NOW so that I can discover my route to the outcome sought.

In other words, in order to get to where I want to be, I have to take a moment to ascertain exactly where I am in order to deduce the route I need to take. The same applies in all areas of life, personal and professional.ā€

 

Take a moment to identify where you are now in terms of where it is you are going ā€“ you might find out you need to change direction if youā€™re going to get there.