The New Year has started different. I’m finding usual activities like resetting for the year ahead and setting intentions and goals is hitting me different. The energy around the new year is different too. How are you going? Have you hit a pause on New Year activities or are you full steam ahead? No rights or wrongs here. But, if you’re feeling different feels to what you’ve felt before, please know you aren’t alone.

I’ve been finding my own ways to work through the events and happenings. We will all have different ways of sitting / moving in and around it. Today I want to share the concept of Chosen versus Unchosen Change as understanding the difference between them helps us to respond more effectively to life’s challenges.

Chosen change is usually planned and intentional. Think changing jobs, buying a new home, moving to the country or deciding to exercise more. The change can still be difficult, but because we choose it, we feel more motivate and in control of the change we’re going for.

Unchosen change happens outside our control. It can be unexpected and emotionally challenging. In fact, it can really stop us in our tracks as it disrupts our day to day life and creates uncertainty around us. Think the death of a loved one, floods, fires, a bad season or money woes. There’s complexity around unchosen change that can hang around and really hit deep. 

Here are a few ways to work through unchosen change that I hope will help …

1. Acknowledge your feelings.  Try to name them eg anger, fear, sadness, disappointment. Don’t ignore them. Allow yourself time to process them knowing the way you will process them is different to the next person.

2. Focus on what you can control. In amongst all the uncertainty, take time to work out how to respond to the change. The goal here is to regain a sense of stability by working out that you can’t stop the change but you can choose your response to it.

3. Ask for help. Reduce your stress by talking to others. Share what’s happening / happened with family, friends and or those you trust. This can reduce your stress and make you feel less isolated.

4. Establish and maintain routines. Return to the basics here of eating, sleeping well, going for a walk and activating routines that give you structure during uncertain times.

5. Practise self care and give yourself time. Look for way to relax and reduce stress. Choose things that nurture and sustain you and do these. Take your eye off the clock and the need to “move on”. Instead, be patient with yourself and take time to recognise the unchosen change and that healing takes time.

Over to You

Take some time to reflect on these. Are any helpful to you right now?  

The post Can I Choose Change? appeared first on Ruralscope.

During the dinner, the leaders of the business spoke. They shared the key events and what they had been through and done to now have a successful business. It was hard to find a dry eye in the house as stories were shared, people were thanked and those that offered key support were recognised for their contribution. I found it really refreshing that both physical and emotional support were shouted out.

Imagine how we could each enhance the wellbeing of ourselves, those around us and our team or business etc if we celebrated achievements loud and proud. The end of the year is a great time to do this.

Here’s a few suggestions about how you could celebrate this year’s achievements loudly and proudly.

1. Start with recognising your achievements. You can only celebrate them if you take the time to recognise them in the first place.  This starts by turning on your identifying achievements mindset.

2. Keep an Achievements Record. This could be a list in your diary (as simple as a date entry dot point or two), a list you develop at a team meeting or a jar on the Smoko table where people write achievements and place them into the jar to be read out and celebrated later. There’s a real skill in being able to identify your own and others achievements. The more you practise it the more natural it becomes. Before long you’ll be seeing achievements everywhere.

3. Recognising your own and others achievements increases positive wellbeing. This is worth going for. A simple sentence like “Your contribution to x was amazing”, “I loved the way the team responded to your requests about x and y”, “Your actions reduced our weekly incidents total” etc bring the achievement into focus and offer hear and now recognition. People always feel good as a result.

4. Reflect on the achievements of the Month / Year / Season. I promote this with the leaders and businesses we work with. And it’s always a win. Snippets often end up on the whiteboard, in a newsletter or Xmas message to staff etc. It’s not what gets said but how people feel that gets remembered. And this is always a feel good activity.

5. Give a gift. Tap into what the receiver likes. From my experience the best gifts are a gesture of care. A small bunch of flowers, a mug and tea bag, an inspirational poster for the wall, a drink bottle, home made cookies, a hamper of goodies to eat etc.

Over to You

Take some time to think about how you will recognise your own achievements for the year and that of those around you too – one achievement at a time. Make them loud and proud!

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I love the work of social science researcher Dr Brene Brown and especially this quote of hers; “When you are in uncertainty, don’t tap out. Stay brave.” Well, I’m happy to share that with some major milestones and projects to be completed by mid December, I’m feeling uncertain and I really do want to just tap out for a while!!! So, here I am sharing some ways of staying brave in the face of fast paced uncertainty (ie crazyness) in the hope they might help you too.

1. Recognise when your pace changes and things get busy. Things might even feel a bit crazy. This is not the time to start something new. This is the time to focus on what needs to be done and to do it.

2. Routines are good for us. These bring a sense of direction and achievement. Routines can change when you’re busy – acknowledge this! This change in routine is not forever. It has an end point.

3. Check in with your self talk. And especially so when things don’t go to plan or mess up. Speak more kindly to yourself during these times than you ordinarily would. I’ve read many times that we are much harder on ourselves than anyone else would ever be. So lighten up – the person who is hardest on ourselves.

4. Speak up for what you need. No one is a mind reader, so when things are busy and it can all feel like things are out of control, take time to work out what you need. And then rally to make this happen.

5. Check in / de-brief. This could be with a family member, a trusted friend, a colleague or you can pay for this support. Paid support is extremely valuable when you looking for objective input / support without having to maintain a personal relationship in the mix.

Over to You

Take some time to think about how things are travelling for you right now. And if you’re in that busy / crazy time where you’re just not sure how you’re going to manage everything, then have a go at any of these 5 things. I’d love to hear how it goes and also if you have a suggestion or something that works for you.

The post Don’t Tap Out appeared first on Ruralscope.

I love this Leadership for Advocacy topic, and it appears many of you and others do too. I have received a lot of feedback about how practical the session was and this got me to thinking, that it’s time to strip back the academics of advocacy and allow it to show up in our everyday conversations. Real people, sharing real thoughts, stories and most importantly experience led opinions. It’s time to keep it simple and take the opportunity to be proactive and share our thoughts and ideas when, where and with who we can (and always with purpose).

There’s a ping on my phone – I’ve just received a message from a webinar attendee who used a tool I shared and said “WOW it really works, I feel great and I’m going to use this again and again now”. I’m going to share a few observations about Leadership for Advocacy with you here now.

1. Having a tool to form and share your opinion is critical. Very few of us are short of words, it’s how we use them that matters. We need to share our point and offer up some data / story to go with it. One without the other is likely to leave people confused and the impact of your conversation / meeting / presentation lost.

2. Clarity is good for us. It brings purpose to what we are doing, who we engage with and what we say. As a believer that advocacy is for everyone and occurs one conversation at a time, being clear about what you stand for, what you have an opinion about why you want to share this is super important. Stay too general and it will all become a little mellow and impact will be limited.

3. Mindset is key. We did a quick exercise on the Webinar that gave people the opportunity to assess their advocacy mindset. People marked themselves on a continuum between two capabilities like Reactive ……………. Proactive etc. It took no time at all for people to get a measure on what capabilities to put focus on to build their advocacy mindset further. Ahh the joy of slowing down and taking time to be honest with ourselves. This is where all good growth and change start.

4. Offering opinions with emotion can provide a positive charge. So can tone of voice and the speed you speak at. Did you know that if you are face to face, body language accounts for about 48% of your overall communication, 38% for vocal tone and only 7% for the words you choose. And repeating words or sentences to make a point or even saying one word louder than the others can create a ‘hearing it in bold’ type experience for the listener. Mmmm that’s food for thought right there.

5. I know from experience that the clearer my purpose and the more planned I am, the clearer the messages I share are. And I also know that having a tool to align or hang my opinions / words on really matters. Being able to speak under water is no strength if you can’t make the words count! Hence, my top hints for today are to speak for impact when it matters and develop a few tools to help out along the way.

Over to You

Take some time to think about adding advocacy to your string of leadership capabilities – one conversation at a time.

Until next time!

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1. Prepare to Share

As you soon as you register to attend the conference, take time to learn about who is going and who you would like to meet, catch up with etc. Make a mental note about topics that interest you in the agenda and head to those sessions. Instead of taking notes like you would in a meeting, switch it up and make a list of actions, write down the social media handles of speakers or a list of key learnings. And take some photos of these sessions or when you catch up and meet the speaker afterwards. YES, you should do this! This means you have all the information you need to share the outcomes of the conference session with others. You can share a short email update back at work with colleagues, write a short article for your work newsletter and post on your social media accounts as well.

2. Follow Speakers on Socials

Find speakers you really enjoyed online. Click follow them so you can stay connected after the conference. Share their profiles with others you think might be interested in them and their work.

3. Write a Thank YOU

Send an email to the conference organisers and thank them for their work. They are usually volunteers so the thank you goes a long way. Let them know your highlights and how you have already benefited from the speakers and conference activities.

4. Action Your Action List

It’s likely you have come back with a list of actions you want to take. These will have been motivated by conference speakers or sessions. It’s time to action the list. Use it as a checklist and start ticking off the actions. Don’t overthink this. If you wrote the action at the conference, then it’s worth putting into action now. First week after conference is perfect timing for this.

5. Check out Websites

I know we are all very quick to jump on socials on our phones either during or after the conference, but take some time to get to know the people and topics you resonated with further by taking a look around their websites. You’ll usually find blog posts or research outcomes etc there and you can then use these as you share information with others. The key here is to be of service and share things that others will find useful. Especially those who couldn’t go to the conference like you did.

6. Build and Maintain Your Networks

You will meet lots of people at the conference. Make a note and follow up with those that you promised you would. Opportunities can come from knowing others and importantly from them knowing you. So this is the time to be assertive and follow up with them, ask them for a coffee or a face to face or ZOOM catch up. No need to have anything to sell here, just a catch up.

Someone once told me that it doesn’t matter how many people you know that’s important, it’s how many people that know you!

Over to You

Which of these tips resonate the most for you? What are you going to do about them? Remember to give and gain the most you can from the conference you attended. We love it when people reach out after an event and say hello. It all goes towards building positive networks. His doesn’t happen unless you make the first move. Please take one or two or maybe even three things from this article and put them in place today. Good luck. And please feel free to reach out to me here if you think I can help in any way.

Until next time!

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I think that if you’re willing to ask these questions then you’re ready to get started and take on the leadership challenge. Afterall, if you don’t push the start button on this, how will you ever know just how far and fast your leadership can go? It all starts with believing in yourself. Today, I’m sharing with you the top 5 lessons that I’ve seen work for emerging leaders over the last 20 years – YES these are tried and tested.

LESSON 1 – Keep a Notebook

We are exposed to leaders every single day – either face to face through our job or business or via social media, TV, books, documentaries and newspapers. And it can be through your personal life too. Take each opportunity to watch, listen and jot down things that these leaders say or do that can apply to yourself or where you are at right now on your leadership journey. And then on a regular basis go back over your notes, highlight those that resonate and then there’s just one more step. And this is the most important really … take the idea to an action and write it into your own leadership action plan. And just in case you are wondering I think everyone should have a Leadership Action Plan no matter where you are on your leadership journey.

LESSON 2 – Develop your Leadership Language

Effective leaders communicate well. They’re able to understand complex items and communicate them in a way that most people will be able to understand. This means;

Increase your leadership vocabulary. Choose your words wisely – make sure they fit who you are and start using them. Ensure you use words that are easy for people you are talking to understand.

Know when to use “I” and “We” and know that when you use “I”; for example, “I will take the lead on inducting new employees into the team” – you are highlighting yourself. And when you use “we”, you are highlighting the value of the team. It’s important to choose which one to use with who as you don’t want to be seen as big noting yourself all the time! 

And Reflect back to people what you hear them say so they have confidence you have actually heard what they’ve said. This is really important, as its how people feel that is important to whether they will act or NOT.

LESSON 3 – Fast track your career or business is Show Commitment and Dedication to Something 

Get your teeth into a task or project and keep at it even when it gets tough. Infact, it’s even more important to stick at it when things get tough – this helps you push through where the majority would stop. Taking on a task or project – especially a difficult one and seeing it through will shine a positive spotlight on you. And you want this. You don’t just want to show up like everyone else, you want to show your strengths and difference. You want to stand out for all the right reasons. It won’t take long for others to notice this and want you on their team or to have you manage a project for them.         

LESSON 4 – Take Considered Risks

Choose your time and place to challenge the status quo. This shows you aren’t scared to say what you think and that you have an eye for doing things differently. Others will see that you are committed to innovation and creating positive change. Back this up with a vision and a plan and get implementing.

This might sound simplistic so I must say something really important here…

I’ve worked with plenty of people who have been able to brainstorm, bring up and challenge new ways of doing things; BUT it’s when you are able to do this AND implement actions to bring about the change that the magic happens.

LESSON 5 – Build Your Network.

I want to start by saying this is not about how many business cards you have or how many listings you have on your database, instead this is about how many people actually know you! Interacting with others is the only way to build you network and your profile, there is no way around this. And each time you do it, someone is likely to make a decision on whether there is value in connecting with you again. This is where you come in! 

• Give people a call and ask them for advice and input 
• Include them in collaborations with you – this could be as simple as asking if you can quote them in an article or if you can share something they’ve said in a future meeting
• Reach out to mentors – where you can ask for feedback about your profile and leadership and what you can do to polish your leadership traits.

OVER TO YOU

So how about it, do you want to stop wasting time and grow into leadership so you can lead and impact even more positive change? If it’s a YES, then please know you can do it and start taking notes and putting in place some actions today to help you get there. And if you’d like to check out our programs and how to work with us, click here.

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