Was his (now mine) a la Dave Ulrich
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Creativity & innovation
This picture, from Dave Ulrich’s excellent presentation ‘Leadership and Human Resources: Trends for the future’ at the 2012 Regional Leadership and HR Convention, Institute of Human Resource Management, Nairobi in May 2012, besides making you wince if you’re the one who lost your car, is a great statement of perspective.
What do you see? A fancy car? An opportunity to hire a lawyer? Depends on your perspective.
What’s ‘yours’? What’s ‘mine’? And how does that influence perspective?
~~TGIF- each Friday I rejig & re-post a blog entry from my www.life-lenses.com blog, which is about enhancing our perspective & worldview.~~
Tags: creativity, dave ulrich, perspective
The Rock.Paper.Scissors newsletter is out: resources related to a Canadian Abroad
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Change management & wellness, Diversity & culture
From ‘Africa, This is Why I Live Here’
This month’s Rock.Paper.Scissors e-newsletter focuses on lessons I’ve learned as a Canadian living abroad. Missed the article? Check it out here. (Not on the monthly e-newsletter mailing list? Sign up for free here.)
As is tradition, with each enewsletter article I write, I include resources – both serious & tongue in cheek. On with the tradition ….
A Canadian Abroad Related Resources
- Test your knowledge & check out this crossword puzzle I made about living in Kenya. Send me your answers; prize to the 10th person who does so (a Life Lenses™ assessment)! (I’ll include the answers in the next newsletter.)
- Country insights; check out this website by the Centre for Intercultural Learning, that gives you valuable info about a ton of countries. It includes the perspective of a local & a visitor. Very cool.
Resources on the Lighter Side
- Idiot Abroad, is a TV show created by Ricky Gervais with Karl Pilkington. In this clip Karl (said idiot) teaches kids in South Africa & the kids choose the topic of risk (3:58min)
- Check out this classic clip of comedian Jim Carrey talking about Canada. Stereotypes anyone?! (2:03 min)
- Africa, This is Why I Live Here. To get a taste of the funny, poignant, frustrating & other experiences of living in Africa check out this fabulous facebook page (note, you need to have a facebook account yourself to access it).
- You won’t believe your eyes when you see what happens to this mountain biker. Only in Africa. (1:15 min)
Tags: centre for intercultural learning, derek sivers, jim carrey, karl pilkington, life lenses, ricky gervais, south africa, ted talks
Advice from a tree
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Communication, Conflict resolution
If you’re a regular reader, you know this blog is all about perspective. How what we see depends on what we look for. How what we think & feel depends on our priorities, on what makes it through our lens of perspective & priority.
A tool for becoming better communicators, conflict resolvers, creative collaborators & colleagues is to widen our perspective.
And that includes borrowing perspective from a tree.
From a Life Lenses™ perspective ‘go out on a limb’ is advice from a Go Life Lens™. ‘Enjoy the view’ is how a Mountain Life Lens™ sees the world. And Stop Life Lenses™ are prone to remembering their roots (because they are gifted at reflection).
~~TGIF- each Friday I rejig & re-post a blog entry from my www.life-lenses.com blog, which is about enhancing our perspective & worldview.~~
Tags: communication, Conflict resolution, perspective, stress, Wellness
The Rock.Paper.Scissors newsletter is out: a Canadian Abroad
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Change management & wellness, Diversity & culture
Leteipa, my Maasai friend & I, sharing a laugh in the Maasai Mara
This month’s Rock.Paper.Scissors e-newsletter focuses on lessons I’ve learned as a Canadian living abroad. (Not on the monthly e-newsletter mailing list? Sign up for free here.)
1. Living in Africa has been a wild & wonderful adventure. Kind of like the traffic. It’s a big deal to navigate in a city with the 4th worst traffic in the world, especially when driving on the left hand side of the road. On one hand it’s not uncommon for drivers to overtake other vehicles on blind corners. On the other hand when there are ‘jam’s (aka traffic jams), people are very gracious about informally directing traffic to help keep the cars moving. No matter how bad the traffic is there’s hardly a honk to be heard.
Lesson learned; be gracious amidst chaos
2. I’ve learned a lot about living with stereotypes & how weather can be a cultural stereotypical example. Canadians tend to think Kenya is hot & Kenyans tend to think Canada is freezing. I still chuckle (to myself naturally) when I see a Kenyan baby wrapped up in thick layers on, what I’d call, a hot day. Conversely, I’ve noticed going back for visits to Vancouver, I’ve found it oddly chilly.
Lesson learned: it’s all relative. Context is huge.
3. To a Canadian, where order & efficiency are gods, Nairobi addresses are something to behold. Many homes don’t have a numerical number. When asking for directions, a friend will say ‘oh you know, it’s by ABC plaza.’ This can be frustrating when you don’t know where the comparison landmark is. Also street addresses have a rhythm all their own. Numbers jump about like a cat on a hot tin roof. You may find yourself seeing house number 42, only to be followed by house number 112 & then 22. On a bad day, when time is tight & I can’t find my way, it drives me bonkers. On a good day I enjoy the adventure & space it provides to toodle around.
Lesson learned; loosening a linear approach & appreciating a zigzag approach is illuminating & refreshing.
4. I’ve had a bank account since I was a kid & I was one of the first people to get a coveted ATM card when they were first introduced. In other words I consider myself fairly financially literate. Living overseas means starting from scratch, including when it comes to banking. To withdraw money from one’s account here involves writing a cheque. To yourself. And when you do write a cheque, due to fraud prevention programs, it’s required to sign it not once but 3 times. Forgot to bring your chequebook? Can’t withdraw money.
Lesson learned; safety (in this case financial) can be inconvenient but it’s necessary.
5. You can’t talk about living overseas without talking about food. I’ve come a long way (1/2 way around the world) to come to know food that was in my backyard in the first place. Despite Vancouver being home to many Indo-Canadian restaurants, I never realized the delights of paratha & chilly garlic paneer.
Lesson learned; leaving your backyard can help you get to know it better.
6. On the other hand, when camping in the middle of nowhere & a particularly loud grunt or snort erupts, I love being so out of my element that I don’t have a clue whether to drop, run or yell. Camping & exploring the wildlife here (including cheetah, leopard, genet cats, gereneks & more) has been at the top of the list of favourite things to do. A friend recently said, ‘being able to go see lions on the weekend is pretty damn cool.’
Lesson learned; do more things that get you out of your element in order to stretch & grow.
7. Raising two kids in Kenya means they’re now TCK’s (third culture kids). In other words they combine their Canadian culture with Kenyan culture to come up with a unique culture. It’s some interesting view, to peek into their world & see how they combine the two into something new.
Lesson learned; learning through the lens of another is a great boost to your own learning.
8. Having a Masters degree in Education, specializing in intercultural conflict resolution was like prep school for living abroad. Understanding that what I call a ‘lie,’ can mean a Kenyan being reluctant to tell me ‘no’ is one of many interesting intercultural communication journeys to walk on a daily basis.
Lesson learned; there’s a delicate balance between moral relativism & being aware of the huge influence of culture.
9. I am grateful for my Canadian passport & the privileges it brings. Having been training UNDP Somalia staff in Nairobi precisely when the UN compound in Somalia was attacked, it’s sobering to live in & near places where violence is a reality. Knowing my citizenship is powerful & that the Canadian High Commission will help if I’m in a true jam is priceless. I am grateful to be Canadian most days of the week.
Lesson learned; we’re known as the ‘nice’ folks & when conflict arises, as it inevitably does, I draw on my Canadian ‘niceness’ to navigate my way through.
Some days, when I think my tongue will soon grow a callous from my biting it, the lessons are what Geneen Roth calls A.F.G.O. (another #@$’n growth opportunity). Most days however I’m gob smacked & grateful for this incredibly diverse, rich learning environment I’ve called home for the past two years. From a Canadian abroad, Asante (thank-you) Kenya for all the A.A.G.O.’s (another amazing growth opportunity).
Tags: culture, kenya, westgate
A fresh perspective on stress
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Change management & wellness
How stressed are you? What’s the weight of your stress? Depends on your perspective, which, it turns out, is related to a glass of water.
This story, along with being a great illustration of how we carry stress, is also a great illustration of the power of perspective.
A lecturer, when explaining stress management to an audience, raised a glass of water and asked,
How heavy is this glass of water?
Answers called out ranged from 20g to 500g.
The lecturer replied:
The absolute weight doesn’t matter. It depends on how long you try to hold it. If I hold it for a minute, that’s not a problem. If I hold it for an hour, I’ll have an ache in my right arm. If I hold it for a day, you’ll have to call an ambulance. In each case, it’s the same weight, but the longer I hold it, the heavier it becomes.
He continued:
And that’s the way it is with stress management. If we carry our burdens all the time, sooner or later, as the burden becomes increasingly heavy, we won’t be able to carry on. As with the glass of water, you have to put it down for a while and rest before holding it again. When we’re refreshed, we can carry on with the burden.”
~~TGIF- each Friday I rejig & re-post a blog entry from my www.life-lenses.com blog, which is about enhancing our perspective & worldview.~~
Making music, together, on a swing. Montreal style.
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Teambuilding
Montreal is cool. Way cool with these interactive, music making, cooperative swing sets.
Love the lights at night.
Lovely example of creativity, of music in motion, of exercise, of cooperative community spirit & playfulness all wrapped into one.
21 Balançoires (21 Swings) from Daily Tous Les Jours on Vimeo.
Tags: creativity, montreal, music, swings, Teambuilding
Warning: reflections in this mirror may be distorted by socially constructed ideas of beauty
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Diversity & culture
Our reflections, what we take in & process from our external world, are wildly distorted.
Period.
End stop.
After all, in the Victorian era, plucking a woman’s upper hairline, in order to give one a large forehead, was considered beautiful.
Our impressions are distorted by our culture, our sense of place, our geography, our time in history, our age, our ethnicity, our race, our gender, our socio-economic status, our religion & spirituality, our physical abilities, our intellectual abilities etc.
What’s curious & impelling, is that 9 times out of 10, don’t know we have our very own, made to fit, finely customized distortion filter. Being neutral is impossible.
What’s an in-your-face obvious pattern to a Mountain Life Lens™ is an obstructed, impossible to see mess for a Carrot Life Lens™. And what’s a bring-it-on-ease making, beautifully organized system to a Carrot Life Lens™ is a migraine inducing, constrictive jumble to a Mountain Life Lens™.
~~TGIF- each Friday I rejig & re-post a blog entry from my www.life-lenses.com blog, which is about enhancing our perspective & worldview.~~
Tags: beauty, culture, perception
How to get fired using Twitter
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Communication, Humor & comedy
The following post is from Mashable & goes to show how uh, dumbass some folks can be on social media, but also how the appropriate response can use humour & panache to get the point across.
Point taken?
This should go without saying, but we’ll say it anyway: Don’t ask for a drug dealer to deliver marijuana to your office on Twitter.
A 20-year-old in Canada chose to disregard this advice this week, leading to a a termination from work and a hilarious response from local police.
Sunith Baheerathan, an “aspiring mechanic” living in Vaughn, Ontario, posted this tweet on Tuesday, per The Daily Dot. He later deleted his Twitter account.
Baheerathan then fired off a string of tweets claiming the original tweet was a joke and that people “really gotta stop taking tweets serious lmao.”
The backtracking appears to have come too late, however. The manager at Mr. Lube, where Baheerathan worked — Shivanand Ramsawak — told CBC News on Wednesday that Baheerathan had been relieved of his duties “but would not confirm the reason or any other details.”
The official Mr. Lube account also posted this on Twitter, in response to the York Regional Police’s reply to Baheerathan’s original tweet.
@YRP Thank you to the York Regional Police for your help and great work. The matter has now been handled.
— Mr. Lube (@mrlube) August 14, 2013
While police have not announced any investigation of Baheerathan, this is the latest reminder that some things don’t need to be shared online.
Tags: humour, mashable, social media, twitter
Telling shiny objects apart from true illumination
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Change management & wellness
The amount of information available to us (both on & offline) is growing more than 65% each year.
Astonishing? Yes.
Depressing? Maybe.
Overwhelming. Could be.
In an IDC survey sponsored by Xerox, respondents said they spent up to 26% of their time dealing with the consequences of info overload. Before you throw up your hands in despair, make sure you put yourself in the driver’s seat. Do away with shiny object syndrome & focus.
Focus on the light – what comes to your awareness easily & naturally.
And focus on the dark – what lurks just out of range, what you perceive as ‘different,’ ‘other,’ even ‘odd.’ That’s where true illumination comes in.
~~TGIF- each Friday I rejig & re-post a blog entry from my www.life-lenses.com blog, which is about enhancing our perspective & worldview.~~
Tags: attention deficit disorder, shiny object syndrome
One Hundred Free Books
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Training & development
Photo Credit: See-ming Lee 李思明 SML via Compfight cc
It wasn’t so long ago, that if for some arcane reason I wanted to know the temperature in Mumbai, as a kid I’d have had to hope onto my trusty, rusty blue bike, pedal up the hill & around several corners to arrive at the local library. Pulling open the heavy door, I’d have had to walk into the slightly musty smelling, crowded room & hope the librarian was in a good mood to help me.
Now?
It took me 58 seconds. Which might seem long. (It’s because the weather app on my IOS7 updated IPhone actually has rain, clouds & more moving across the screen according to each city I’m looking at & I was a little mesmerized by that.)
Knowledge. Information. And ideally, by extension, learning, is merely a few fingers swipes away for many of us.
Like this site with 100 free books on Kindle.
I dunno about you but that’s the equivalent to a big batch of cookie dough.
Sweet, too much to take in at one sitting & something to savour long after you’ve imbibed.
By the way, it’s 30.
Degrees celsius that is.
In Mumbai.
Tags: kindle, training & development