'Tis the days before Christmas
And I'm stirring and writing and figuring around here
To get as much done as possible
And close out this year.
So night before last
What do I do?
Watch a little TV.
Maybe you, too.
It's not my normal thing, TV.
But something inside was telling me
"Flip it on, flip it on
And see what you'll see."
And to much of my surprise
What do I find ...
The show that immediately came on: PBS News Hour. But not with Jim Lehrer. The story: "The Many Legacies of Andrew Carnegie" in which Paul Solman (NewsHour Economics Correspondent) interviews David Nasaw - a Carnegie biographer. Seems that Andrew was quite a multifaceted guy. Loved by some, hated by others - even to this day. He believed in survival of the fittest (socially speaking) yet he saw one of his missions as being to pull others along with him.
Proportionately speaking (considering the economy of his day) Carnegie gave away more money than Warren Buffet and Bill Gates combined for the betterment of his fellow human being. Yet, he simultaneously refused to raise his workers wages or give them a shorter workday. He was a complex man ... or as Vartan Gregorian, President of the Carnegie Corporation described him, "a man of contradiction."
I felt it an intriguing short episode - especially at this time of year - "the season of giving." I also felt it was significant given the that the Allied Ronin Leader's Retreat is just days away ... that this retreat was inspired in some ways by old legends of how Carnegie, Henry Ford, Harvey Firestone and Luther Burbank supposedly would slip away from their day-to-day business, get out in nature to camp with each other and talk about ideas. It was for them (I was told) a way of reflecting on life and stimulating their creativity for the future.
You can read the entire PBS interview by going to http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/social_issues/july-dec06/carnegie_12-19.html
An aside - It was a further interesting vignette given the roots of "human potential movement" from which has come the modern self-help, positive philosophy, personal and professional coaching, etc., etc., industry. All of this was in large part inspired by an early twentieth century assignment given by the great steel magnate, Andrew Carnegie, to a budding young author, Napoleon Hill. The result of which became one of the most sold books written in the English language - "Think & Grow Rich." For background on this see "The Laws of Success" by Napoleon Hill.
Friday, December 22, 2006
Thursday, December 21, 2006
"The Mental Game"
The following article is adapted from Lance Giroux's book "The Mental Game" - ISBN 0-9713892-0-9 available at www.AlliedRonin.com
Do you have a tendency, when you “make a mistake”, to immediately and silently chastise yourself? I've noticed this with a lot of golfers, including a pro that I was providing "mental coaching" for while he was preparing for the US Open qualifications. I noticed it when he was on the driving range and while he was on the course during tournament. As his faded to the right he would stand and shake his head. His face would tense and it appeared, even from the distance that I stood, that he was saying to himself, "I'm a looser." Do you sometimes do something like this, too?
Here's the first lesson and assignment I gave him to work on in this regard:
LESSON #1 - Mental Chastisement.
A human being expresses power through word. To our knowledge, no other creature on this planet has the ability to form and communicate an intricate language. Human beings define themselves and their conditions through word. And human beings CREATE a future for themselves through the way they use word. Word is the result of thought. The formation of word is the self-talk - and is PHYSICALLY MANIFESTED, DEMONSTRATED and REFLECTED in gesture. Often, the individual is unaware that he is doing this self-talk. BUT the self-talk doesn’t lie. It is there.
The body acts on the most hidden word. And it is demonstrated. Others see the self talk, and form agreements with the self talk. This is why individuals who are having a bad day can walk into the presence of someone who is happy and the bad mood changes as well as the experience of themselves and their results. And it’s also why someone who is having a good day can walk into the presence of someone who is in a terrible mood, and the terrible mood can wipe out the happiness that was present. WORDS HAVE POWER!... In fact - words are power.
When someone else forms an agreement with your word, they actually “assist” you in perpetuating that state. For example, if someone sees you physically demonstrating ease, comfort, confidence, problems not getting you down, lightness, etc.. they enter into an agreement with you that moves your state forward into the future... they add power to your state. Similarly, when someone sees you physically demonstrating up-tightness, discomfort, cowardice, problems getting you down, darkness, moodiness, etc... they enter into an agreement with you that moves YOUR STATE forward into the future... they add power in that state.
Your thoughts create a future into which you move. Other people’s mental energy adds substance and form to your thoughts. Those who really know what the Mental Game is will tell you -- “What ever the mind conceives and believes, it achieves” -- like it or not. (Napoleon Hill, who included this into one of the greatest best sellers ever written - “Think and Grow Rich” - didn’t invent that concept, he just reported on it.)
When you allow yourself to indulge in self disgust - you give others the ability to add to your own self disgust. When you indulge in self confidence - you give others ONLY the ammunition to add to your own self confidence.
ASSIGNMENT#1. Spend time each morning and each evening PRACTICING MENTAL RELAXATION. DO IT. Don’t think about it ...JUST DO IT. Don’t concern yourself with results right now. Don’t think about what others might think of you if they knew your were listening to some kind of recorded medidation ... or if they walked in on your “meditation”. JUST DO IT. YOU ARE PRACTICING CALMING AND STILLING YOUR MIND. YOU ARE EXERCISING AND EXTENDING YOUR MENTAL CAPACITY. What is more important to you - Your capacity to achieve OR your image?? "
Do you have a tendency, when you “make a mistake”, to immediately and silently chastise yourself? I've noticed this with a lot of golfers, including a pro that I was providing "mental coaching" for while he was preparing for the US Open qualifications. I noticed it when he was on the driving range and while he was on the course during tournament. As his faded to the right he would stand and shake his head. His face would tense and it appeared, even from the distance that I stood, that he was saying to himself, "I'm a looser." Do you sometimes do something like this, too?
Here's the first lesson and assignment I gave him to work on in this regard:
LESSON #1 - Mental Chastisement.
A human being expresses power through word. To our knowledge, no other creature on this planet has the ability to form and communicate an intricate language. Human beings define themselves and their conditions through word. And human beings CREATE a future for themselves through the way they use word. Word is the result of thought. The formation of word is the self-talk - and is PHYSICALLY MANIFESTED, DEMONSTRATED and REFLECTED in gesture. Often, the individual is unaware that he is doing this self-talk. BUT the self-talk doesn’t lie. It is there.
The body acts on the most hidden word. And it is demonstrated. Others see the self talk, and form agreements with the self talk. This is why individuals who are having a bad day can walk into the presence of someone who is happy and the bad mood changes as well as the experience of themselves and their results. And it’s also why someone who is having a good day can walk into the presence of someone who is in a terrible mood, and the terrible mood can wipe out the happiness that was present. WORDS HAVE POWER!... In fact - words are power.
When someone else forms an agreement with your word, they actually “assist” you in perpetuating that state. For example, if someone sees you physically demonstrating ease, comfort, confidence, problems not getting you down, lightness, etc.. they enter into an agreement with you that moves your state forward into the future... they add power to your state. Similarly, when someone sees you physically demonstrating up-tightness, discomfort, cowardice, problems getting you down, darkness, moodiness, etc... they enter into an agreement with you that moves YOUR STATE forward into the future... they add power in that state.
Your thoughts create a future into which you move. Other people’s mental energy adds substance and form to your thoughts. Those who really know what the Mental Game is will tell you -- “What ever the mind conceives and believes, it achieves” -- like it or not. (Napoleon Hill, who included this into one of the greatest best sellers ever written - “Think and Grow Rich” - didn’t invent that concept, he just reported on it.)
When you allow yourself to indulge in self disgust - you give others the ability to add to your own self disgust. When you indulge in self confidence - you give others ONLY the ammunition to add to your own self confidence.
ASSIGNMENT#1. Spend time each morning and each evening PRACTICING MENTAL RELAXATION. DO IT. Don’t think about it ...JUST DO IT. Don’t concern yourself with results right now. Don’t think about what others might think of you if they knew your were listening to some kind of recorded medidation ... or if they walked in on your “meditation”. JUST DO IT. YOU ARE PRACTICING CALMING AND STILLING YOUR MIND. YOU ARE EXERCISING AND EXTENDING YOUR MENTAL CAPACITY. What is more important to you - Your capacity to achieve OR your image?? "
Thursday, November 30, 2006
Allied Ronin: European Tour
November 25-27, 2006
These have been three days of teaching and touring in and around Krakow, Poland. The efforts of Pawel Olesiak and Pawel Bernas to bring the Samurai Game® to their aikido organization, Krokowskie Stowarzyszenie (www.aikido.pl), have paid off. Twenty people attended from various businesses surrounding the city, plus the main radio station serving this ancient capital of Poland. All as a result of email announcements sent out from the two Pawel’s (pronounced “pah’–vel” … which is Polish for Paul). Both 4th dan's they teach aikido and have formed a training organization for the specific purpose of changing leadership throughout Poland by use of the principles and physical techniques found in this martial art.
Sunday evening following my class a tour of Krakow was arranged which included the Wawel – ancient castle and home of one of Poland’s oldest monarchies. Then on to St’s Peter & Paul church, St Mary’s and St John’s and other point of historic interest. This city is filled with churches … attesting to the ability of a spiritual-base culture to withstand and overcome the old Soviet regime days … now frequently referred to by the locals as “the communist times.” Pawel Olesiak, now 40, told stories of what it was like for him to stand in long lines for something as simple as candy. Poland is different now. In fact, the youth I’ve encountered since then, many not old enough to know or recall “the communist times” only have their parents’ stories to understand what it was like. Prosperity and aliveness that looks to future growth is everywhere.
Monday morning was a different kind of tour. While there is much beauty to see everywhere in Krakow – enough to fill weeks of touring – I decided to view this country through a different lens. As beautiful and inspiring as the ancient capital is, the other end of the spectrum which represents the ugliness of human potentiality can be felt in another town just forty kilometers west – Oswiecim, or as the German Nazis of 1941 renamed it, Auschwitz.
I toured only Auschwitz I, as the other location (Auschwitz II – Berkenau) 3 km away, would have taken more time than schedules allowed. But the short tour of A-I was enough for me. Fortunately, a participant in a course I led November 18-19 in the San Francisco Bay Area had prepared me by suggesting I read Dr. Victor Frankl’s “Man’s Search for Meaning”. Frankl, a survivor of Auschwitz, recounts what it was like from an everyday standpoint of the captive. He then goes on to expand for the reader the brand of psychotherapy he founded – logotherapy – see
These have been three days of teaching and touring in and around Krakow, Poland. The efforts of Pawel Olesiak and Pawel Bernas to bring the Samurai Game® to their aikido organization, Krokowskie Stowarzyszenie (www.aikido.pl), have paid off. Twenty people attended from various businesses surrounding the city, plus the main radio station serving this ancient capital of Poland. All as a result of email announcements sent out from the two Pawel’s (pronounced “pah’–vel” … which is Polish for Paul). Both 4th dan's they teach aikido and have formed a training organization for the specific purpose of changing leadership throughout Poland by use of the principles and physical techniques found in this martial art.
Sunday evening following my class a tour of Krakow was arranged which included the Wawel – ancient castle and home of one of Poland’s oldest monarchies. Then on to St’s Peter & Paul church, St Mary’s and St John’s and other point of historic interest. This city is filled with churches … attesting to the ability of a spiritual-base culture to withstand and overcome the old Soviet regime days … now frequently referred to by the locals as “the communist times.” Pawel Olesiak, now 40, told stories of what it was like for him to stand in long lines for something as simple as candy. Poland is different now. In fact, the youth I’ve encountered since then, many not old enough to know or recall “the communist times” only have their parents’ stories to understand what it was like. Prosperity and aliveness that looks to future growth is everywhere.
Monday morning was a different kind of tour. While there is much beauty to see everywhere in Krakow – enough to fill weeks of touring – I decided to view this country through a different lens. As beautiful and inspiring as the ancient capital is, the other end of the spectrum which represents the ugliness of human potentiality can be felt in another town just forty kilometers west – Oswiecim, or as the German Nazis of 1941 renamed it, Auschwitz.
I toured only Auschwitz I, as the other location (Auschwitz II – Berkenau) 3 km away, would have taken more time than schedules allowed. But the short tour of A-I was enough for me. Fortunately, a participant in a course I led November 18-19 in the San Francisco Bay Area had prepared me by suggesting I read Dr. Victor Frankl’s “Man’s Search for Meaning”. Frankl, a survivor of Auschwitz, recounts what it was like from an everyday standpoint of the captive. He then goes on to expand for the reader the brand of psychotherapy he founded – logotherapy – see
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
Valuable Lessons from the Organizational Behavior Teacher's Society
Each year the Organizational Behavior Teacher's Society hosts a conference for it's members, some of the most influencial OB thinkers and educators in the world. Most who attend the Organizational Behavior Teacher's Conference (OBTC) hold a Ph.D. and are excellent teachers, many of whom are called upon to offer leadership programs attended by MBA candidates from around the globe.
I joined the Society in 2002 and attended the OBTC that year to co-present the Samurai Game® for conference attendees. This past June was my third conference and Game presentation there. Unlike other academic conferences where suits and business outfits are the order of the day - at OBTC a pair of Dockers or a skirt might be considered almost formal. It's not a place for dark auditoriums filled with high brow academitians waiting to slice and dice other presentors delivering research papers. Rather, this is a four-day cornicopia of exercises and lively discussions. Presenters share their best so that the rest of us can take it back home and put it to use in our consulting practices, or in trainings and classrooms. It's truly a win-win atmosphere ... education is at its finest. It's a fun (and often funny), rejuvenating and insightful four days.
Each morning opens with an "overall session" that most participants usually attend. This year one of these sessions was conducted by Dr. Karl Weick. Who is he? One of the most respected OB'ers in the world. Of him Diane Coutu (The Harvard Business Review) said in April 2003:
What can we do to better recognize and manage the unpredictable? Few people are better qualified to answer that question than Karl E. Weick, the Rensis Likert Distinguished University Professor of Organizational Behavior and Psychology at the University of Michigan Business School at Ann Arbor, and professor psychology at the university. Over the span of his career, Weick has become world renowned for his insights into why people in organizations act the way they do. His book The Social Psychology of Organizing, first published in 1969, turned organizational psychology on it head by praising the advantages of chaos, demonstrating the pitfalls of planning, and celebrating the rewards of "sensemaking." These insights were expanded in a later book, Sensemaking in Organizations (1995). Most recently, Weick -along with University of Michigan colleague Kathleen M. Sutcliffe - has turned his attention to Managing the Unexpected (2001). [Managing the Unexpected]
On the morning of June 20th I along with 200 other OBTCer's attended Karl Weick's overall session: "Drop Your Tools." What he had to say hit me between the eyes and in the heart. Weik proposed that people often take counterproductive action when faced with the chaos of radical change. He suggested that the tools (skills, methods, beliefs,ways of communicating, etc.) we spend so much time and money on to learn, use and own, can begin to "own us". If we do not remain vigilant these tools can become deterrents to our success. Thus in the very moments when needs are high for correct action we might find ourselves hampered by our habitual adherence to and/or an identification with a tool; and for the sake of the illusion of security we often don't deal with reality. By holding on to something we've paid dearly for and have now become identified with, Weick suggested, we can hinder (at best) or destroy (at worst) what's really important in our lives. The boundary that separates the "who that we are" from the "what that we use" becomes blurred. This is dangerous.
Listening to Weick open his talk about how hanging-on can be counterproductive was not a new idea to anyone attending his session. But as he employed an analogy and laid out the research he had done to illustrate this concept he got to me and to everyone else. What he talked about was down to earth, easy to see and understand, and it was profound.
Using well documented case studies Weick talked of highly skilled men and women who fight forest fires. He spoke specifically about those who lose their lives because of their refusal to Drop Tools when surrounded by immediate life-threatening danger. Even though these individuals and teams he spoke of knew exactly what they were supposed to do when ordered to "Drop Your Tools", a very high percentage of them took the opposite course of action and consequently lost their lives. Think about it ... well trained fire fighters running as fast as they can to save themselves, hearing the lifesaving scream from their team leaders to "Drop Your Tools" ... and even passing on the order ... yet blindly continuing to hang on to chain saws, shovels, axes, heavy ropes, blades and even gas cans. Holding tightly to weight that they have been repeatedly told will cost them precious seconds and could cause their death, these people attempt to outrun hell storms of caused by unexpected wind shifts, down drafts or explosions. Weick further showed evidence that is not unheard of to find that many team leaders who issue the "Drop Your Tools" order then slow themselves down and pick up the same tools that others have jettisoned. Some of these leaders died because they lost the split second advantage they needed to effectively survive a radically changing situation. Leaders who survive often relate how surprised they are to find themselves out of harm's way and look down at their hands to find a tool that wasn't theirs. On reflection some remember having picked it up thinking "it's too valuable to leave behind." Some have admitted that they even slowed down and looked around "to find a safe place to put the tool so that it (not I) could survive the fire."
As an outsider to fighting forest fires this can sound insane. But when I think about my own life and my own changes I'm no longer an "outsider." What happens to these fire fighters happens to many people in different scenarios. It illustrates that the value of a tool, technique, belief or way of being can and sometimes does bizarrely surpass the value of an individual's life.
Weick's comments first struck a professional chord in me. I found myself pondering: "What do I rely on to perform or advance my work? Am I willing to drop some of these things in order to progress, OR have I become so identified with my tools that they own me?" As he continued to speak, thoughts of my profession faded and I began to consider the person I am and the precious relationships that I have and want. Here I took a deeper look. As I write today I am still looking.
What have I relied on (in some cases sadly) as a means of survival when it comes to relationships? What tools (opinions or certainties) have I been carrying that address my responses to other people or about relationship, men, women, children, parents, lovers. What have I been carrying through my life that I thought was needed for success but now weighs me down? Have I become blind? Did I pick up tools to serve an important need back then which now no longer exists? I'm just hanging on out of habit? Do these tools really serve me, particularly in meaningful ways, with someone new? Where have I stopped being "the me that I am" only to become a blind operator of an embodied practice that was once learned, but now mostly protects me from worn out fears and past mistakes?
In a spirit of respectful service and growth, perhaps we could all consider similar questions.
Dr. Karl Weick's comments delivered at the 2006 OBTC are not yet available online. Rather than wait until they are, I decided to find out when he has used the "Drop Your Tools" analogy elsewhere. Here for your reading and thought is "Drop Your Tools: An Allegory for Organizational Studies", published in the Administrative Science Quarterly (ASQ), June 1996. His article challenged the ASQ examine the tools it was using that needed to be dropped.
Take time to hit the link to "Drop Your Tools". Read the article ... translate it into what matters for you ... give it some attention and think about it. Something valuable is being illuminated here.
Best wishes,
Lance
I joined the Society in 2002 and attended the OBTC that year to co-present the Samurai Game® for conference attendees. This past June was my third conference and Game presentation there. Unlike other academic conferences where suits and business outfits are the order of the day - at OBTC a pair of Dockers or a skirt might be considered almost formal. It's not a place for dark auditoriums filled with high brow academitians waiting to slice and dice other presentors delivering research papers. Rather, this is a four-day cornicopia of exercises and lively discussions. Presenters share their best so that the rest of us can take it back home and put it to use in our consulting practices, or in trainings and classrooms. It's truly a win-win atmosphere ... education is at its finest. It's a fun (and often funny), rejuvenating and insightful four days.
Each morning opens with an "overall session" that most participants usually attend. This year one of these sessions was conducted by Dr. Karl Weick. Who is he? One of the most respected OB'ers in the world. Of him Diane Coutu (The Harvard Business Review) said in April 2003:
What can we do to better recognize and manage the unpredictable? Few people are better qualified to answer that question than Karl E. Weick, the Rensis Likert Distinguished University Professor of Organizational Behavior and Psychology at the University of Michigan Business School at Ann Arbor, and professor psychology at the university. Over the span of his career, Weick has become world renowned for his insights into why people in organizations act the way they do. His book The Social Psychology of Organizing, first published in 1969, turned organizational psychology on it head by praising the advantages of chaos, demonstrating the pitfalls of planning, and celebrating the rewards of "sensemaking." These insights were expanded in a later book, Sensemaking in Organizations (1995). Most recently, Weick -along with University of Michigan colleague Kathleen M. Sutcliffe - has turned his attention to Managing the Unexpected (2001). [Managing the Unexpected]
On the morning of June 20th I along with 200 other OBTCer's attended Karl Weick's overall session: "Drop Your Tools." What he had to say hit me between the eyes and in the heart. Weik proposed that people often take counterproductive action when faced with the chaos of radical change. He suggested that the tools (skills, methods, beliefs,ways of communicating, etc.) we spend so much time and money on to learn, use and own, can begin to "own us". If we do not remain vigilant these tools can become deterrents to our success. Thus in the very moments when needs are high for correct action we might find ourselves hampered by our habitual adherence to and/or an identification with a tool; and for the sake of the illusion of security we often don't deal with reality. By holding on to something we've paid dearly for and have now become identified with, Weick suggested, we can hinder (at best) or destroy (at worst) what's really important in our lives. The boundary that separates the "who that we are" from the "what that we use" becomes blurred. This is dangerous.
Listening to Weick open his talk about how hanging-on can be counterproductive was not a new idea to anyone attending his session. But as he employed an analogy and laid out the research he had done to illustrate this concept he got to me and to everyone else. What he talked about was down to earth, easy to see and understand, and it was profound.
Using well documented case studies Weick talked of highly skilled men and women who fight forest fires. He spoke specifically about those who lose their lives because of their refusal to Drop Tools when surrounded by immediate life-threatening danger. Even though these individuals and teams he spoke of knew exactly what they were supposed to do when ordered to "Drop Your Tools", a very high percentage of them took the opposite course of action and consequently lost their lives. Think about it ... well trained fire fighters running as fast as they can to save themselves, hearing the lifesaving scream from their team leaders to "Drop Your Tools" ... and even passing on the order ... yet blindly continuing to hang on to chain saws, shovels, axes, heavy ropes, blades and even gas cans. Holding tightly to weight that they have been repeatedly told will cost them precious seconds and could cause their death, these people attempt to outrun hell storms of caused by unexpected wind shifts, down drafts or explosions. Weick further showed evidence that is not unheard of to find that many team leaders who issue the "Drop Your Tools" order then slow themselves down and pick up the same tools that others have jettisoned. Some of these leaders died because they lost the split second advantage they needed to effectively survive a radically changing situation. Leaders who survive often relate how surprised they are to find themselves out of harm's way and look down at their hands to find a tool that wasn't theirs. On reflection some remember having picked it up thinking "it's too valuable to leave behind." Some have admitted that they even slowed down and looked around "to find a safe place to put the tool so that it (not I) could survive the fire."
As an outsider to fighting forest fires this can sound insane. But when I think about my own life and my own changes I'm no longer an "outsider." What happens to these fire fighters happens to many people in different scenarios. It illustrates that the value of a tool, technique, belief or way of being can and sometimes does bizarrely surpass the value of an individual's life.
Weick's comments first struck a professional chord in me. I found myself pondering: "What do I rely on to perform or advance my work? Am I willing to drop some of these things in order to progress, OR have I become so identified with my tools that they own me?" As he continued to speak, thoughts of my profession faded and I began to consider the person I am and the precious relationships that I have and want. Here I took a deeper look. As I write today I am still looking.
What have I relied on (in some cases sadly) as a means of survival when it comes to relationships? What tools (opinions or certainties) have I been carrying that address my responses to other people or about relationship, men, women, children, parents, lovers. What have I been carrying through my life that I thought was needed for success but now weighs me down? Have I become blind? Did I pick up tools to serve an important need back then which now no longer exists? I'm just hanging on out of habit? Do these tools really serve me, particularly in meaningful ways, with someone new? Where have I stopped being "the me that I am" only to become a blind operator of an embodied practice that was once learned, but now mostly protects me from worn out fears and past mistakes?
In a spirit of respectful service and growth, perhaps we could all consider similar questions.
Dr. Karl Weick's comments delivered at the 2006 OBTC are not yet available online. Rather than wait until they are, I decided to find out when he has used the "Drop Your Tools" analogy elsewhere. Here for your reading and thought is "Drop Your Tools: An Allegory for Organizational Studies", published in the Administrative Science Quarterly (ASQ), June 1996. His article challenged the ASQ examine the tools it was using that needed to be dropped.
Take time to hit the link to "Drop Your Tools". Read the article ... translate it into what matters for you ... give it some attention and think about it. Something valuable is being illuminated here.
Best wishes,
Lance
Friday, November 03, 2006
A Review of "Conscious Business" by Fred Kofman
A review by Matthew Brannagan- an Allied Ronin affiliate
“Consciousness is the ability to experience reality, to be aware of our inner and outer worlds.”
Too few businesses concern themselves with the levels of consciousness present within their companies. Fred Kofman's Conscious Business: How to Build Value Through Values is an illuminating view of the effects a methodology grounded in values-based business practices and leadership can have on an organization, and their personnel. This well detailed book expertly weaves a principled approach to business etiquette with a developmentalist’s insight into personal growth. Key to Kofman's teaching is the concept that conscious actions and communications are a central component of a successful business, and a happy work force.
Born and raised in Argentina during a period of military dictatorship, Kofman saw at an early age the impact unconsciousness can have on the truth. He lived for many years in a place where the truth was distorted to control social order. Years later, while working as a researcher on organizational learning at MIT, he realized these same behaviors were at work in meeting rooms throughout the business world. In an effort to create some positive change in the workplace he formed his consulting business, now called Axialent, devoted to “helping leaders realize their true greatness and express it at work.” Conscious Business: How to Build Value Through Values is just one of his many contributions to that cause.
By weaving an elaborate tapestry of sound academic knowledge, and personally relevant stories he has created a text that should be required reading for all those wishing to achieve success in business. He illustrates beautifully the trappings that exist for a business that overlooks consciousness, while providing a fully equipped toolkit for organizations seeking to develop an approach to business that aligns with values as important to a businesses success as they are to the individuals they employ. From a social and cultural standpoint, his teachings extend far behind the framework of business relations, as he offers insights into communication, right leadership, integrity, and consciousness that are as relevant to relationships, families and communities as they are to the leading companies he represents.For businesses, however, he brings forth, with vivid detail, the intelligent and skillful means in which organizations can create an organizational culture that fosters responsibility and integrity, and values communication and accountability, while developing leaders whose strong ways of being will invite organizational success at all levels. This is where Kofman is at his finest as Conscious Business serves it’s readers with answers to questions for many of the scenarios that diminish the level of consciousness of businesses who are seeking to raise it.
Unique to this book is an approach rooted in what he calls the three dimensions of business: the task, or It; the relationship, or We; and the self, or I. Though most businesses focus almost exclusively on the task, or It, the teachings in this book implore organizations to create equanimity amongst these three dimensions. With this approach the I, We and It all contribute to who the organization is Being, what they are Doing, and what results they are Having, ultimately making an enormous impact on what the organization and its employees are Becoming.Later, Kofman outlines the ways we interact with one another at work, including:
• Communicating to understand each other.
• Negotiating differences to make decisions.
• Coordinating actions through mutual commitments.
Then he brings together the conscious and unconscious ways in which we can address those challenges. What he offers is a conscious approach to business, where responsibility and integrity can overwhelm, and overcome, unconscious means such as manipulative communication and narcissistic negotiation. By directing attention to who an organization is Being, and what they are Doing, positive gains are certain to be made in the results they are Having.
Among the many compelling stories utilized throughout the book, is the one of a manager, William, and his boss, Zack. In this all too common scenario Zack responds to difficult news from William by using the principles of unconditional responsibility, taught to him by Kofman, to manipulate and shame William. While Zack attempted to utilize a tool he had learned, he did not do so skillfully, and the result was an increased friction between the two. What is reminded in this book, however, is that business success is not the ultimate goal, in fact it is merely one of the many means that we utilize to pursue our happiness. With that in mind we must focus on what Kofman calls the “success beyond success”, or the alignment with our values and our happiness that is beyond the organizational success. This commitment to success beyond success encourages focus on essential integrity and happiness, which provides further support for a “leap in consciousness.”
In regards to consciousness, Kofman describes seven important qualities that are apparent in conscious business and individuals: unconditional responsibility, ontological humility, essential integrity, constructive negotiation, authentic communication, emotional mastery and impeccable coordination. The concepts are simple to identify, but difficult to maintain in practice, and Conscious Business provides a roadmap for organizations and individuals to not just learn what these concepts are, but how to incorporate them into one’s personal and professional practices. In so doing, readers will be able to meet the invitation offered at the end of the book to “take these skills and enter the market with helping hands.”
“Consciousness is the ability to experience reality, to be aware of our inner and outer worlds.”
Too few businesses concern themselves with the levels of consciousness present within their companies. Fred Kofman's Conscious Business: How to Build Value Through Values is an illuminating view of the effects a methodology grounded in values-based business practices and leadership can have on an organization, and their personnel. This well detailed book expertly weaves a principled approach to business etiquette with a developmentalist’s insight into personal growth. Key to Kofman's teaching is the concept that conscious actions and communications are a central component of a successful business, and a happy work force.
Born and raised in Argentina during a period of military dictatorship, Kofman saw at an early age the impact unconsciousness can have on the truth. He lived for many years in a place where the truth was distorted to control social order. Years later, while working as a researcher on organizational learning at MIT, he realized these same behaviors were at work in meeting rooms throughout the business world. In an effort to create some positive change in the workplace he formed his consulting business, now called Axialent, devoted to “helping leaders realize their true greatness and express it at work.” Conscious Business: How to Build Value Through Values is just one of his many contributions to that cause.
By weaving an elaborate tapestry of sound academic knowledge, and personally relevant stories he has created a text that should be required reading for all those wishing to achieve success in business. He illustrates beautifully the trappings that exist for a business that overlooks consciousness, while providing a fully equipped toolkit for organizations seeking to develop an approach to business that aligns with values as important to a businesses success as they are to the individuals they employ. From a social and cultural standpoint, his teachings extend far behind the framework of business relations, as he offers insights into communication, right leadership, integrity, and consciousness that are as relevant to relationships, families and communities as they are to the leading companies he represents.For businesses, however, he brings forth, with vivid detail, the intelligent and skillful means in which organizations can create an organizational culture that fosters responsibility and integrity, and values communication and accountability, while developing leaders whose strong ways of being will invite organizational success at all levels. This is where Kofman is at his finest as Conscious Business serves it’s readers with answers to questions for many of the scenarios that diminish the level of consciousness of businesses who are seeking to raise it.
Unique to this book is an approach rooted in what he calls the three dimensions of business: the task, or It; the relationship, or We; and the self, or I. Though most businesses focus almost exclusively on the task, or It, the teachings in this book implore organizations to create equanimity amongst these three dimensions. With this approach the I, We and It all contribute to who the organization is Being, what they are Doing, and what results they are Having, ultimately making an enormous impact on what the organization and its employees are Becoming.Later, Kofman outlines the ways we interact with one another at work, including:
• Communicating to understand each other.
• Negotiating differences to make decisions.
• Coordinating actions through mutual commitments.
Then he brings together the conscious and unconscious ways in which we can address those challenges. What he offers is a conscious approach to business, where responsibility and integrity can overwhelm, and overcome, unconscious means such as manipulative communication and narcissistic negotiation. By directing attention to who an organization is Being, and what they are Doing, positive gains are certain to be made in the results they are Having.
Among the many compelling stories utilized throughout the book, is the one of a manager, William, and his boss, Zack. In this all too common scenario Zack responds to difficult news from William by using the principles of unconditional responsibility, taught to him by Kofman, to manipulate and shame William. While Zack attempted to utilize a tool he had learned, he did not do so skillfully, and the result was an increased friction between the two. What is reminded in this book, however, is that business success is not the ultimate goal, in fact it is merely one of the many means that we utilize to pursue our happiness. With that in mind we must focus on what Kofman calls the “success beyond success”, or the alignment with our values and our happiness that is beyond the organizational success. This commitment to success beyond success encourages focus on essential integrity and happiness, which provides further support for a “leap in consciousness.”
In regards to consciousness, Kofman describes seven important qualities that are apparent in conscious business and individuals: unconditional responsibility, ontological humility, essential integrity, constructive negotiation, authentic communication, emotional mastery and impeccable coordination. The concepts are simple to identify, but difficult to maintain in practice, and Conscious Business provides a roadmap for organizations and individuals to not just learn what these concepts are, but how to incorporate them into one’s personal and professional practices. In so doing, readers will be able to meet the invitation offered at the end of the book to “take these skills and enter the market with helping hands.”
Thursday, October 05, 2006
A Lesson From Gettysburg
Dr. Jeff McCausland is a West Point classmate of mine and the Director of the Leadership In Conflict Initiative at Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA. He retired from the army as a colonel after a distinguished career which included commanding an artillery battalion in the First Gulf War; being on faculty at West Point and on faculty at the Naval Academy as the Class of 1961 Chair of Leadership Education; serving on the National Security Council staff in the White House; and being the Dean of the Army War College. Listen to CBS radio and occasionally you’ll hear their consultant, Jeff McCausland, answering questions about developing situations in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere in the Mid East.
About two years ago Jeff and I began discussing the possibility of combining our offerings: the Gettysburg experience which he has become very well known for, and the Samurai Game® which Allied Ronin uses in courses – corporate, public and at some universities. We believed it would make for an interesting seminar. In support of this we decided it was best for me to fly east and attend one of Jeff’s Gettysburg programs.
This past July I had the opportunity to join forty administrators and educators from the Walnut School District who traveled from southern California to participate in a week-long leadership experience. July 25th was dedicated to an entire day walking with Jeff on the battlefield. I’ve seen the movie about Gettysburg, starring Martin Sheen and Jeff Daniels; maybe you have, too. The tactics employed in this famous turning point of the American Civil War were part of the curriculum when I was a cadet at West Point. I’ve read articles and books and listened to organizational behaviorists lecture about it. To actually walk the battlefield, however, is a dramatically different thing...particularly with temperature, humidity and daylight conditions matching the four days in 1863, when the Army of Northern Virginia led by Robert E. Lee collided headlong with the Army of the Potomac led by George Meade in one of the most dramatic conflicts in American history. Books and films create an appreciative imagination. Being on the ground makes things come alive. There are many lessons of Gettysburg that are interesting to study. The Union commander Major General George Meade used democratic methods to understand and tap the strength of his generals and officers. By so doing he ran the risk of losing valuable time, but he gained the confidence and consensus needed to withstand an adversary that heretofore proved itself superior. Confederate Lieutenant General James Longstreet agonized with enormous internal conflict knowing that he should disregard Lee’s orders to attack the middle of the Union line on the morning of July 3rd. His loyalty to Lee dominated this turmoil and the resulting action cost the Confederacy thousands of lives. Some argue that Longstreet’s loyalty, though admirable, probably precipitated the psychological turning point of the war. Others fault Lee’s single minded belief in himself and his cause, and they say this created an unwillingness on his, Lee’s, part to read and see the soundness of Longstreet’s argument against and objections to making a suicidal assault. But rather than these great lessons, it was one incident that captured my interest and has me thinking today about the profoundness of small things and the influences we have and don’t have with each other.
I’ve seen the movie about Gettysburg, starring Martin Sheen and Jeff Daniels; maybe you have, too. The tactics employed in this famous turning point of the American Civil War were part of the curriculum when I was a cadet at West Point. I’ve read articles and books and listened to organizational behaviorists lecture about it. To actually walk the battlefield, however, is a dramatically different thing... particularly with temperature, humidity and daylight conditions matching the four days in 1863, when the Army of Northern Virginia led by Robert E. Lee collided headlong with the Army of the Potomac led by George Meade in one of the most dramatic conflicts in American history. Books and films create an appreciative imagination. Being on the ground makes things come alive.
There are many lessons of Gettysburg that are interesting to study. The Union commander Major General George Meade used democratic methods to understand and tap the strength of his generals and officers. By so doing he ran the risk of losing valuable time, but he gained the confidence and consensus needed to withstand an adversary that heretofore proved itself superior. Confederate Lieutenant General James Longstreet agonized with enormous internal conflict knowing that he should disregard Lee’s orders to attack the middle of the Union line on the morning of July 3rd. His loyalty to Lee dominated this turmoil and the resulting action cost the Confederacy thousands of lives. Some argue that Longstreet’s loyalty, though admirable, probably precipitated the psychological turning point of the war. Others fault Lee’s single minded belief in himself and his cause, and they say this created an unwillingness on his, Lee’s, part to read and see the soundness of Longstreet’s argument against and objections to making a suicidal assault.
But rather than these great lessons, it was one incident that captured my interest and has me thinking today about the profoundness of small things and the influences we have and don’t have with each other.
It happened over the course of a few moments on July 2nd, the second full day of the battle, along a small piece of ground at the very southern end of the Union line – a downward slope of hill called Little Round Top. Colonel Joshua Chamberlain and two hundred soldiers that remained of his once large regiment, the Twentieth Maine, held a make-or-break piece of turf for the entire Union army. Chamberlain had been ordered to stay put, and if he failed in his mission to hold this piece of ground all would be lost. In an effort to strengthen his position he told his B Company commander, a Captain Morrill, to drop off the side of the hill and “go out there a good distance and keep me informed.” But Chamberlain didn’t articulate what “a good distance” meant. That bit of information was left to the imagination of Morrill. Chamberlain wanted Morrill to venture only a short ways, take a look, AND to stay connected. However Morrill heard something a little different. And that little difference made ALL THE DIFFERENCE in overall outcome of the day’s action. He dropped off the side of the hill as instructed but then he just kept going, running his fifty some troops out of contact, up the side of another hill and completely out of touch with the man who had made the request and who desperately did not want him absent from the events about to unfold. Chamberlain must have been dumbfounded when he saw Morrill disappear, or perhaps he was horrified. But it was too late, and soon afterwards their enemy attacked. Has that ever happened to you? Perhaps not on this scale. But have you ever said something to someone and you thought what you had said was pretty clear and simple, and then you realized that for whatever reason the person you were talking to heard a very different message than what you had intended and soon they were off and gone and doing something you had never considered or intended or wanted or imagined?
Has that ever happened to you? Perhaps not on this scale. But have you ever said something to someone and you thought what you had said was pretty clear and simple, and then you realized that for whatever reason the person you were talking to heard a very different message than what you had intended and soon they were off and gone and doing something you had never considered or intended or wanted or imagined?
Maybe you are a parent and to one of your children you said, “Go down the street and find out what’s going on with your sister and let me know.” And your one child did. But rather than come back and tell you right away they got distracted and took a while getting back to you. Or maybe you said to your husband or wife or lover when they told you they were going to be late coming home, “Oh, that’s OK, no problem. Just get here when you can.” But when 15 minutes turned into an hour and a half, some old internal story of yours from your past, something that has created your internal map of who you can and cannot trust, crept into your thinking and you began resenting your partner. Or maybe you offered to someone who works for or with you that they “handle the situation and solve the problem.” Then when they did what they thought was best, and it didn’t match your methods, you stepped in to micro-manage and attempted to control things and before all was said and done you had a mess on your hands. Or maybe one day you said something very innocently to someone, maybe someone you loved, and the person you were talking to heard something that sounded like a voice from part of an unresolved or hidden past that had nothing to do with you, a voice that wasn’t you, a voice that you knew nothing about and maybe never will. And then that person cut off communication with you. You didn’t know why, and you still don’t know why. You can guess at the reasons, but you don’t know for certain. No matter how hard you try to find out the truth from them, they won’t say – maybe because they can’t or maybe because they just aren’t ready. There you have it – and you have to get on with life without them. Sounds pretty psychological, huh. Strange, you say? Actually, it is psychological and this kind of thing happens all the time. It may be quite a leap to put our everyday lives and communication on the same scale as the desperate situation that occurred July 2nd, 1863, on Little Round Top between two great opposing forces at Gettysburg. But the Chamberlain-Morrill episode did get me thinking.
Or maybe one day you said something very innocently to someone, maybe someone you loved, and the person you were talking to heard something that sounded like a voice from part of an unresolved or hidden past that had nothing to do with you, a voice that wasn’t you, a voice that you knew nothing about and maybe never will. And then that person cut off communication with you. You didn’t know why, and you still don’t know why. You can guess at the reasons, but you don’t know for certain. No matter how hard you try to find out the truth from them, they won’t say – maybe because they can’t or maybe because they just aren’t ready. There you have it – and you have to get on with life without them. Sounds pretty psychological, huh. Strange, you say? Actually, it is psychological and this kind of thing happens all the time.
It may be quite a leap to put our everyday lives and communication on the same scale as the desperate situation that occurred July 2nd, 1863, on Little Round Top between two great opposing forces at Gettysburg. But the Chamberlain-Morrill episode did get me thinking.
The fact is this – big situation or small situation- in life you can plan all you want, and you can think you are communicating, but ultimately you never really control much, and in the end all you can do is your best with what you’ve got. Which can really be quite a lot. BUT IT’S NOT EVEN CLOSE TO EVERYTHING THAT WILL IMPACT THE SITUATION. If you want guarantees, forget about it. There really is no such thing as a guaranteed outcome. Plans can start actions happening. But once the action starts, situations become dynamic and they change –like water running down the side of a hill – they gain momentum and alter course depending on what they encounter along the way; and most of what they encounter has nothing to do with what you put there- rather, it has to do with what was there long before you arrived on the scene. None of us live in vacuums. Other people have minds of their own, reasons of their own, and influences of their own and they take actions based on their own set of internal conversations. We do the best that we can with what we’ve got. What happened the late afternoon of July 2nd, 1863, after Morrill left to go off a good distance? A large Confederate force assaulted up Little Round Top. The Union’s Twentieth Maine Regiment fought as best they could but they ran out of ammunition. And knowing they would probably not survive the day, Chamberlain issued a desperate order to fix bayonets and charge downhill into an army that as far as he knew had lots of firepower. It was the best he could do given the situation and conditions and directive to hold his ground. And as he was charging down into what looked to be certain death whose company should appear to his left? Morrill’s! Coming down into the fray Morrill was fresh for action with over three thousand rounds of ammunition spread amongst his troops. He had been sitting atop a hill he was not supposed to be on. Maybe he was bored or worried. By one account he offered something like the following to Chamberlain when they finally had a chance to talk, “I thought I’d better come back and help, but you said to stay out there, so I did, and looks like everything worked out all right.” According to Michael Shaara who wrote a best selling novel about Gettysburg, Morrill thought it was the easiest fight he had ever been in; upon which Chamberlain told him, “Next time I tell you to go out a ways, don’t go quite so far.”
The fact is this – big situation or small situation - in life you can plan all you want, and you can think you are communicating, but ultimately you never really control much, and in the end all you can do is your best with what you’ve got. Which can really be quite a lot. BUT IT’S NOT EVEN CLOSE TO EVERYTHING THAT WILL IMPACT THE SITUATION. If you want guarantees, forget about it. There really is no such thing as a guaranteed outcome. Plans can start actions happening. But once the action starts, situations become dynamic and they change – like water running down the side of a hill – they gain momentum and alter course depending on what they encounter along the way; and most of what they encounter has nothing to do with what you put there - rather, it has to do with what was there long before you arrived on the scene. None of us live in vacuums. Other people have minds of their own, reasons of their own, and influences of their own and they take actions based on their own set of internal conversations. We do the best that we can with what we’ve got.What happened the late afternoon of July 2nd, 1863, after Morrill left to go off a good distance? A large Confederate force assaulted up Little Round Top. The Union’s Twentieth Maine Regiment fought as best they could but they ran out of ammunition. And knowing they would probably not survive the day, Chamberlain issued a desperate order to fix bayonets and charge downhill into an army that as far as he knew had lots of firepower. It was the best he could do given the situation and conditions and directive to hold his ground. And as he was charging down into what looked to be certain death whose company should appear to his left? Morrill’s! Coming down into the fray Morrill was fresh for action with over three thousand rounds of ammunition spread amongst his troops. He had been sitting atop a hill he was not supposed to be on. Maybe he was bored or worried. By one account he offered something like the following to Chamberlain when they finally had a chance to talk, “I thought I’d better come back and help, but you said to stay out there, so I did, and looks like everything worked out all right.” According to Michael Shaara who wrote a best selling novel about Gettysburg, Morrill thought it was the easiest fight he had ever been in; upon which Chamberlain told him, “Next time I tell you to go out a ways, don’t go quite so far.”
Reports from some captured Confederates suggested that they thought Morrill’s company of fifty-some men was some phantom Union regiment, maybe a few thousand soldiers, and being surprised by Chamberlain’s charge and now shocked this unknown “large force” they surrendered. Ironically, what’s true is that the people they surrendered to had almost no ammunition left.What would have happened had Captain Morrill followed the instructions the way Chamberlain intended? What if this error in communication had never occurred? What if Morrill had only dropped down a few yards off that small rise and stayed in contact rather than run up onto another hill and sit and wonder and wait and finally return? Perhaps he and all his soldiers would have used up their ammunition too when the Confederates made their gallant assault up Little Round Top. Perhaps the error he made actually saved the day. We don’t know and we never will...because we can’t...it’s not what happened. Chamberlain did what he did. Morrill did what he did. The battle turned out the way it did. There were no guarantees for either side.
Do the best you can do and keep doing your best. The rest really is out of your hands.
About two years ago Jeff and I began discussing the possibility of combining our offerings: the Gettysburg experience which he has become very well known for, and the Samurai Game® which Allied Ronin uses in courses – corporate, public and at some universities. We believed it would make for an interesting seminar. In support of this we decided it was best for me to fly east and attend one of Jeff’s Gettysburg programs.
This past July I had the opportunity to join forty administrators and educators from the Walnut School District who traveled from southern California to participate in a week-long leadership experience. July 25th was dedicated to an entire day walking with Jeff on the battlefield. I’ve seen the movie about Gettysburg, starring Martin Sheen and Jeff Daniels; maybe you have, too. The tactics employed in this famous turning point of the American Civil War were part of the curriculum when I was a cadet at West Point. I’ve read articles and books and listened to organizational behaviorists lecture about it. To actually walk the battlefield, however, is a dramatically different thing...particularly with temperature, humidity and daylight conditions matching the four days in 1863, when the Army of Northern Virginia led by Robert E. Lee collided headlong with the Army of the Potomac led by George Meade in one of the most dramatic conflicts in American history. Books and films create an appreciative imagination. Being on the ground makes things come alive. There are many lessons of Gettysburg that are interesting to study. The Union commander Major General George Meade used democratic methods to understand and tap the strength of his generals and officers. By so doing he ran the risk of losing valuable time, but he gained the confidence and consensus needed to withstand an adversary that heretofore proved itself superior. Confederate Lieutenant General James Longstreet agonized with enormous internal conflict knowing that he should disregard Lee’s orders to attack the middle of the Union line on the morning of July 3rd. His loyalty to Lee dominated this turmoil and the resulting action cost the Confederacy thousands of lives. Some argue that Longstreet’s loyalty, though admirable, probably precipitated the psychological turning point of the war. Others fault Lee’s single minded belief in himself and his cause, and they say this created an unwillingness on his, Lee’s, part to read and see the soundness of Longstreet’s argument against and objections to making a suicidal assault. But rather than these great lessons, it was one incident that captured my interest and has me thinking today about the profoundness of small things and the influences we have and don’t have with each other.
I’ve seen the movie about Gettysburg, starring Martin Sheen and Jeff Daniels; maybe you have, too. The tactics employed in this famous turning point of the American Civil War were part of the curriculum when I was a cadet at West Point. I’ve read articles and books and listened to organizational behaviorists lecture about it. To actually walk the battlefield, however, is a dramatically different thing... particularly with temperature, humidity and daylight conditions matching the four days in 1863, when the Army of Northern Virginia led by Robert E. Lee collided headlong with the Army of the Potomac led by George Meade in one of the most dramatic conflicts in American history. Books and films create an appreciative imagination. Being on the ground makes things come alive.
There are many lessons of Gettysburg that are interesting to study. The Union commander Major General George Meade used democratic methods to understand and tap the strength of his generals and officers. By so doing he ran the risk of losing valuable time, but he gained the confidence and consensus needed to withstand an adversary that heretofore proved itself superior. Confederate Lieutenant General James Longstreet agonized with enormous internal conflict knowing that he should disregard Lee’s orders to attack the middle of the Union line on the morning of July 3rd. His loyalty to Lee dominated this turmoil and the resulting action cost the Confederacy thousands of lives. Some argue that Longstreet’s loyalty, though admirable, probably precipitated the psychological turning point of the war. Others fault Lee’s single minded belief in himself and his cause, and they say this created an unwillingness on his, Lee’s, part to read and see the soundness of Longstreet’s argument against and objections to making a suicidal assault.
But rather than these great lessons, it was one incident that captured my interest and has me thinking today about the profoundness of small things and the influences we have and don’t have with each other.
It happened over the course of a few moments on July 2nd, the second full day of the battle, along a small piece of ground at the very southern end of the Union line – a downward slope of hill called Little Round Top. Colonel Joshua Chamberlain and two hundred soldiers that remained of his once large regiment, the Twentieth Maine, held a make-or-break piece of turf for the entire Union army. Chamberlain had been ordered to stay put, and if he failed in his mission to hold this piece of ground all would be lost. In an effort to strengthen his position he told his B Company commander, a Captain Morrill, to drop off the side of the hill and “go out there a good distance and keep me informed.” But Chamberlain didn’t articulate what “a good distance” meant. That bit of information was left to the imagination of Morrill. Chamberlain wanted Morrill to venture only a short ways, take a look, AND to stay connected. However Morrill heard something a little different. And that little difference made ALL THE DIFFERENCE in overall outcome of the day’s action. He dropped off the side of the hill as instructed but then he just kept going, running his fifty some troops out of contact, up the side of another hill and completely out of touch with the man who had made the request and who desperately did not want him absent from the events about to unfold. Chamberlain must have been dumbfounded when he saw Morrill disappear, or perhaps he was horrified. But it was too late, and soon afterwards their enemy attacked. Has that ever happened to you? Perhaps not on this scale. But have you ever said something to someone and you thought what you had said was pretty clear and simple, and then you realized that for whatever reason the person you were talking to heard a very different message than what you had intended and soon they were off and gone and doing something you had never considered or intended or wanted or imagined?
Has that ever happened to you? Perhaps not on this scale. But have you ever said something to someone and you thought what you had said was pretty clear and simple, and then you realized that for whatever reason the person you were talking to heard a very different message than what you had intended and soon they were off and gone and doing something you had never considered or intended or wanted or imagined?
Maybe you are a parent and to one of your children you said, “Go down the street and find out what’s going on with your sister and let me know.” And your one child did. But rather than come back and tell you right away they got distracted and took a while getting back to you. Or maybe you said to your husband or wife or lover when they told you they were going to be late coming home, “Oh, that’s OK, no problem. Just get here when you can.” But when 15 minutes turned into an hour and a half, some old internal story of yours from your past, something that has created your internal map of who you can and cannot trust, crept into your thinking and you began resenting your partner. Or maybe you offered to someone who works for or with you that they “handle the situation and solve the problem.” Then when they did what they thought was best, and it didn’t match your methods, you stepped in to micro-manage and attempted to control things and before all was said and done you had a mess on your hands. Or maybe one day you said something very innocently to someone, maybe someone you loved, and the person you were talking to heard something that sounded like a voice from part of an unresolved or hidden past that had nothing to do with you, a voice that wasn’t you, a voice that you knew nothing about and maybe never will. And then that person cut off communication with you. You didn’t know why, and you still don’t know why. You can guess at the reasons, but you don’t know for certain. No matter how hard you try to find out the truth from them, they won’t say – maybe because they can’t or maybe because they just aren’t ready. There you have it – and you have to get on with life without them. Sounds pretty psychological, huh. Strange, you say? Actually, it is psychological and this kind of thing happens all the time. It may be quite a leap to put our everyday lives and communication on the same scale as the desperate situation that occurred July 2nd, 1863, on Little Round Top between two great opposing forces at Gettysburg. But the Chamberlain-Morrill episode did get me thinking.
Or maybe one day you said something very innocently to someone, maybe someone you loved, and the person you were talking to heard something that sounded like a voice from part of an unresolved or hidden past that had nothing to do with you, a voice that wasn’t you, a voice that you knew nothing about and maybe never will. And then that person cut off communication with you. You didn’t know why, and you still don’t know why. You can guess at the reasons, but you don’t know for certain. No matter how hard you try to find out the truth from them, they won’t say – maybe because they can’t or maybe because they just aren’t ready. There you have it – and you have to get on with life without them. Sounds pretty psychological, huh. Strange, you say? Actually, it is psychological and this kind of thing happens all the time.
It may be quite a leap to put our everyday lives and communication on the same scale as the desperate situation that occurred July 2nd, 1863, on Little Round Top between two great opposing forces at Gettysburg. But the Chamberlain-Morrill episode did get me thinking.
The fact is this – big situation or small situation- in life you can plan all you want, and you can think you are communicating, but ultimately you never really control much, and in the end all you can do is your best with what you’ve got. Which can really be quite a lot. BUT IT’S NOT EVEN CLOSE TO EVERYTHING THAT WILL IMPACT THE SITUATION. If you want guarantees, forget about it. There really is no such thing as a guaranteed outcome. Plans can start actions happening. But once the action starts, situations become dynamic and they change –like water running down the side of a hill – they gain momentum and alter course depending on what they encounter along the way; and most of what they encounter has nothing to do with what you put there- rather, it has to do with what was there long before you arrived on the scene. None of us live in vacuums. Other people have minds of their own, reasons of their own, and influences of their own and they take actions based on their own set of internal conversations. We do the best that we can with what we’ve got. What happened the late afternoon of July 2nd, 1863, after Morrill left to go off a good distance? A large Confederate force assaulted up Little Round Top. The Union’s Twentieth Maine Regiment fought as best they could but they ran out of ammunition. And knowing they would probably not survive the day, Chamberlain issued a desperate order to fix bayonets and charge downhill into an army that as far as he knew had lots of firepower. It was the best he could do given the situation and conditions and directive to hold his ground. And as he was charging down into what looked to be certain death whose company should appear to his left? Morrill’s! Coming down into the fray Morrill was fresh for action with over three thousand rounds of ammunition spread amongst his troops. He had been sitting atop a hill he was not supposed to be on. Maybe he was bored or worried. By one account he offered something like the following to Chamberlain when they finally had a chance to talk, “I thought I’d better come back and help, but you said to stay out there, so I did, and looks like everything worked out all right.” According to Michael Shaara who wrote a best selling novel about Gettysburg, Morrill thought it was the easiest fight he had ever been in; upon which Chamberlain told him, “Next time I tell you to go out a ways, don’t go quite so far.”
The fact is this – big situation or small situation - in life you can plan all you want, and you can think you are communicating, but ultimately you never really control much, and in the end all you can do is your best with what you’ve got. Which can really be quite a lot. BUT IT’S NOT EVEN CLOSE TO EVERYTHING THAT WILL IMPACT THE SITUATION. If you want guarantees, forget about it. There really is no such thing as a guaranteed outcome. Plans can start actions happening. But once the action starts, situations become dynamic and they change – like water running down the side of a hill – they gain momentum and alter course depending on what they encounter along the way; and most of what they encounter has nothing to do with what you put there - rather, it has to do with what was there long before you arrived on the scene. None of us live in vacuums. Other people have minds of their own, reasons of their own, and influences of their own and they take actions based on their own set of internal conversations. We do the best that we can with what we’ve got.What happened the late afternoon of July 2nd, 1863, after Morrill left to go off a good distance? A large Confederate force assaulted up Little Round Top. The Union’s Twentieth Maine Regiment fought as best they could but they ran out of ammunition. And knowing they would probably not survive the day, Chamberlain issued a desperate order to fix bayonets and charge downhill into an army that as far as he knew had lots of firepower. It was the best he could do given the situation and conditions and directive to hold his ground. And as he was charging down into what looked to be certain death whose company should appear to his left? Morrill’s! Coming down into the fray Morrill was fresh for action with over three thousand rounds of ammunition spread amongst his troops. He had been sitting atop a hill he was not supposed to be on. Maybe he was bored or worried. By one account he offered something like the following to Chamberlain when they finally had a chance to talk, “I thought I’d better come back and help, but you said to stay out there, so I did, and looks like everything worked out all right.” According to Michael Shaara who wrote a best selling novel about Gettysburg, Morrill thought it was the easiest fight he had ever been in; upon which Chamberlain told him, “Next time I tell you to go out a ways, don’t go quite so far.”
Reports from some captured Confederates suggested that they thought Morrill’s company of fifty-some men was some phantom Union regiment, maybe a few thousand soldiers, and being surprised by Chamberlain’s charge and now shocked this unknown “large force” they surrendered. Ironically, what’s true is that the people they surrendered to had almost no ammunition left.What would have happened had Captain Morrill followed the instructions the way Chamberlain intended? What if this error in communication had never occurred? What if Morrill had only dropped down a few yards off that small rise and stayed in contact rather than run up onto another hill and sit and wonder and wait and finally return? Perhaps he and all his soldiers would have used up their ammunition too when the Confederates made their gallant assault up Little Round Top. Perhaps the error he made actually saved the day. We don’t know and we never will...because we can’t...it’s not what happened. Chamberlain did what he did. Morrill did what he did. The battle turned out the way it did. There were no guarantees for either side.
Do the best you can do and keep doing your best. The rest really is out of your hands.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
