Live like someone left the gate open
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Change management & wellness
Gotta love this little puppy. She’s up for exploration, engine is revved, gas pedal is to the floor.
Like a Go Life Lens™.
Action packed, try it, let’s explore, jump in, take a chance – all are important, natural, vocabulary to a Go Life Lens™.
On a good day, it brings exploration, spontaneity, embracing innovation, taking advantage of opportunity & manageable risk.
On a bad day, it can bring leaping before you look, crash & burn, didn’t think of that, oh dear!
Some days it pays to bust out, some days it pays to stay inside & ponder.
~~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: go lens, spontaneity
Inspiration without the saccharine after taste = Mama Hope
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Change management & wellness
Photo Credit: A. Pagliaricci ♦ via Compfight cc
Need a little inspiration without the saccharine after taste? Check out Mama Hope.
Here’s to the multi-dimensional, caregiving, infinite & infinitely inspiring leaders among us. Here’s to you.
Mama Hope believes that everyone should have a say in how they’re represented. When asked what they would make a film about, the women of the Nyamonge neighborhood of Chiga village in Kisumu, Kenya said, “Netball. We always see African women as sad and poor. We want to make a video about something we love.”
These women are multidimensional. Some own small businesses. Some farm, sell dried fish, make breakfast breads, sell fabric and scarves, or sing for a living. All of them are mothers and most are caregivers for orphans in their own home. They are leaders of water committees and microfinance groups. They also carry water on their heads for miles, live in one room homes with mud packed walls, and worry about paying their children’s school fees. Their ability is infinite and inspiring. Amongst all this, It’s practice four times a week and, at times, walking over four miles for tournaments. These ladies don’t mess around.
Tags: inspirational, mama hope
Fishbowl toilets- now that’s creative
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Creativity & innovation
If these fishbowl toilets aren’t an attention grabber I don’t know what is.
There are a variety of ways to see these tanks, from an environmental lens to a sociological one:
- Designed for Chinese families where space is at a premium, they’re marketed as a way to save space
- They use less water (the toilets use less water because of the displaced room for the fish tank)
- The company even claims the LED light used to light the tank can replace regular lights in the bathroom, thereby saving on the electric bill.
- And in an odd twist, the company also says that the fish can provide company for Chinese children (makes sense I suppose in single kid families – as long as junior wants to hang out in the bathroom)
Environmental. Sociological. It’s all in your perspective. What do you see?
~~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, environmental, sociological
Learning to see – design lessons from Anthony Rotolo
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Communication
- Creative Commons licensed on Flickr by: qthomasbower
Someone forwarded me this blog post by Anthony Rotolo. I love the emphasis on seeing. Anthony says ‘If we can observe a thing and understand why we react to it in the way that we do, then we can bring insight into our work, and so cause others to see.’
Anthony writes from the perspective of design but there’s much to be said for the importance of seeing – of seeing ourselves, our colleagues, our family, our friends, our enemies – in ways that illuminate the light of awareness & promote understanding – using the same principles he uses for design.
Check it out. It’s good stuff.
Designers are ever-learning to see. We view the world with the naked eye like everybody else. But we learn to see differently. This comes as a result of our training…
In our training, we learn the principles of design and these act as so many lenses through which we observe elements around us. Once we have a principle like Proportion (for example) inside of us, we see things differently because we notice the scale of one thing relative to another. This gives us insight into what pleases our eyes. So, we observe the golden ratio in the human body, and we apply it in our own compositions until they please us.
We look for contrasts in the world because contrast makes the world interesting. And then we look to achieve contrast in our compositions until we’re well-pleased with them, too.
We see the texture of trees, or of leather, or of a baby’s skin, and then we add texture to our compositions so that, through sight, we simulate the sense of touch.
We observe the colors of the world. Warm ones. Cool ones. Colors that evoke a reaction in us. And then we communicate the emotion of color through our work.
These are a few examples of the imperative of seeing. If we can observe a thing and understand why we react to it in the way that we do, then we can bring insight into our work, and so cause others to see.
~~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: anthony rotolo, design
Take a seat (in a ball pit) & make a friend
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Communication
What would you do if a sign invited you to jump into a ball pit & make a new friend?
People were invited to do just that via Soul Pancake & respond to statements written on the balls. Statements such as ‘share 3 things on your bucket list’ & ‘find one thing you have in common.’
Check out the reaction of those below. Do yourself a favour & watch the reaction of the woman when she finds out the unusual thing she has in common with her ball pit friend at 1:33.
Somehow the plastic balls help break down barriers & build community. An instant intimacy develops between strangers. Grins are plentiful. As is playfulness. Sweet.
Perhaps, instead of ‘all we need is love’, is ‘all we need are ball pits.’ Tra la la la la.
Tags: ball pit, humour, soul pancake
100% human – Labels are for clothes
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Diversity & culture
Labels are great.
They can take what’s complicated & simplify it. They can create community (any other mothers of teens out there? any other Canadians living in Kenya?). They can be shortcuts that bring ease. They can define & delineate. Like assessments. Like Life Lenses™.
Labels can also be dangerous.
They can bring shortcuts that create lazy, sloppy thinking. They can take what’s complicated & make it simplistic. They can create divisiveness. They can create rigid boxes that are impossible to get out of (fill in the blank: all _____ are bad drivers, or all _____ are good dancers). They can create walls where windows should be. Like some assessments (hopefully not Life Lenses™!).
Here’s to labels that are helpful & illuminating.
~~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: diversity, labels, perspective
Brave Leaps – create the life you want
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Change management & wellness
Photo Credit: jronaldlee via Compfight cc
I was recently interviewed for Tricia Hollyer’s Brave Leaps. It was an intriguing task – reflecting on the footsteps that have led me to this wild, tropical path, this time & place, living in Africa.
What’s a brave leap? In part it’s a process of ‘navigating hope & fear.’
“As someone who takes refuge in making multiple to-do lists, this was going to be one massive unknown. The desire for massive change though counter balanced anything and everything. Things weren’t working as they were & that was a huge motivator to change.”
Inspiration for Tricia came because she knew she’d been settling. “That I was holding myself small. And slowly, and with difficulty, pushed myself over that edge. I’ve leaped.”
And you? What brave leap have you taken or are contemplating taking?
Tags: brave leap, change, tricia hollyer
‘I would only believe in a God who knew how to dance.’ Friedrich Nietzsche
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Communication, Conflict resolution
- Photo Credit: AlicePopkorn via Compfight cc
Not many things come to mind that are as entrenched in opinion & perspective as religion.
Entrenched as in I’m right, you’re wrong.
Opinions such as My God rules, yours isn’t even on the radar.
Dichotomous. Black & white. Yes or no. Right or wrong.
I was drawn to Nietzsche’s quote & to the photo for these reasons. The photo combines such abandon with the discipline of many years of dedicated dance practice. The quote combines faith & fun.
Shaking it on the dance floor, loosing yourself to the music is a kind of communing, an abandoning, a surrendering … to faith.
Amen!
~~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: diversity, faith, friedrich nietzsche, perspective, religion
Learning concierge anyone? (via Jane Hart)
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Training & development
Photo Credit: oxfordian.world via Compfight cc
Below is an excerpt from Jane Hart’s blog post: Modernising the L&D function: From learning gatekeeper to learning concierge.
Love her concept of a learning concierge someone who facilitates other’s self-organized learning (for those not yet able to do this for themselves).
I’ve already talked about how helping to build new personal and social skills to work and learn effectively in a networked world will be a vital new area of work for T&D, but there is another new opportunity that I haven’t yet mentioned – and one that bridges the gap between directed learning (training/e-learning/blended learning, etc) and self-directed/self-organsed/self-managed learning; a service that is aimed at supporting the large number of people who are not yet proficient at organising their own learning. Enter the Learning Concierge service.
This service gets its name from the fact that it operates in a similar fashion to the concierge service for hotel guests. Here’s a very brief example of a hotel concierge in action:
A guest is looking to do some city sightseeing. She could simply go out exploring herself or first do some research on what to see, but if she wants some advice, she will might talk to the hotel concierge. In order to provide the best help to the guest, the concierge needs to understand what she is interested in visiting, how long she has got, and if she prefers to visit the sites herself or have a guide, and depending on her answer (and her budget) he might simply mark up some major sites on a city map, recommend a walking route, a hire care service, or even a tour bus or personal tour guide. In other words the concierge makes sure he makes recommendations that work for her.
So, a Learning Concierge service works in the same way, providing personal advice directly to workers on how they can address their own workplace learning and performance problems in the way that works best for them. Here’s a very brief example of a learning concierge in action:
A worker has identified a problem with her presentation skills in client meetings, so calls on the learning concierge service for some advice. In order to provide the best help, the learning concierge needs to understand exactly where the problem actually lies. He will also need to know if the individual would like to work on the problem by herself or with help and support from others, and then depending on her answers (and what funding she has), he might recommend some resources and articles, or suggest a presentation coach or mentor, or that she takes a masterclass or an online course. In other words the learning concierge makes sure he makes recommendations that work for her.
Compare this with the normal approach that T&D would take to dealing with this same problem – that is simply pointing the individual towards the online course on Presentation Skills hosted in the LMS library. So, a Learning Concierge service operates very differently to the traditional T&D approach. Here are some further features of a Learning Concierge service which demonstrate this.
- It is a PULL SERVICE – so people can chose to use it. Individuals are not obliged to use it if they are happy to organise their own learning – unlike most T&D initiatives which are PUSHED down to workers, who have no choice whether to use them or not.
- It is a PERSONAL service that recommends options that are TAILORED to the needs, preferences, time and budget of the individual(s) concerned – it does not apply a one-size-fits-all solution.
- It uses a PERFORMANCE CONSULTING approach to identify the core problem and recommend a range of possible solutions – it does not assume that training is the only solution to the problem.
- The service is INDEPENDENT of vendors and platforms – and particularly values the wide range of free or low-cost opportunities available on the open Web that are mostly overlooked by traditional training departments.
- The service is STAFFED by experienced learning and performance practitioners with wide expertise in performance consulting who understand the huge range of opportunities afforded by both formal and informal learning, social and networked learning, performance support, as well as collaborative team working. They are therefore able to save an individual hours of web search time as they have answers at their fingertips.
- The service responds QUICKLY to requests for help, as it recognise that people often need rapid support for performance problems – and can’t wait for weeks to be booked onto external courses or workshops.
- The services DOES NOT MANAGE or TRACK the activity that is chosen or undertaken by the individual(s) – instead it sees it as the managers’ responsibility to review the performance improvements and changes in the individual. It does however request feedback from the individuals concerned in order to refine the service to them in the future.
- The service is EVALUATED in terms of the quality of the service it provides – rather than on the number of people booked on courses or who have completed courses.
Tags: jane hart, learning concierge
Everyone smiles in the same language
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Communication, Diversity & culture
Life Lenses™ is all about building bridges across different perspectives. Bringing appreciation to ‘other,’ to ‘different.’
Frequently, when conflict is rife, when tempers are hot, when differences are many, when time is short and resources are low, differences can be the only thing on our radar.
While differences are vital, in fact it’s what makes our world hum & zing along, so are similarities.
It’s important to focus on differences that make a difference AND similarities that are significant.
So what’s significant? How about a smile to start. For after all, everyone smiles in the same language.
~~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, culture, differences, similarities