To make a real decision you have to kill options
I learnt the other day that “decide” and “homicide” come from the same Latin root. “Caedere” is the Latin for “cut”. In “homicide” you cut a person (“homo”, literally a “man”). In “decide” you cut “off” (Latin, “de”). In other words a real dec
The creativity secret from our family guinea pig
Our family guinea pig, Fili, (named by my younger daughter after the dwarf) recently reminded me of one of the key secrets to creativity. But perhaps not in the way one might expect. Every day Fili (pictured above) gets put out in her run – which is basically a large cage with no floor or top. She […]
Some ideas for preempting “learned helplessness”
As I mentioned in last week’s post on attributional styles, I have been listening to the You Are Not So Smart podcast – and especially episode 52 on learned helplessness. It’s got me thinking about how learned helplessness can apply in various situations we encounter in our lives. And what we can do about it. […]
How your “attributional style” determines your effectiveness at work
How do you respond when something negative happens to you at work? What explanation do you give it? What meaning do you attribute to it? Psychologists think that we all have pretty stable “attributional styles” that come into play when we are confronted with a negative situation. Some of us will consistently bring a positive attributional […
A simple model of culture change
How do you go about changing the culture of your organisation or team? And what the heck do we mean by “culture” anyway? I’ve been trying to get my thinking straight about culture. This post outlines a “frame” for thinking about, and acting on, culture: a simple and practical way for a workshop to do […]