No Seriously - Smile : )
A colleague (Philip) said something quite profound last week. It was especially wise given that he is up to his hip pocket in deep corporate doo-doo, very seriously negotiating with the AusTaxOffice, his bank, and assorted creditors.
Philip said : Not one shred of evidence supports the notion that life is serious.
Philip's small enterprise will unquestionably survive its current squeeze. The payments for foreign contracts will come through and money will roll down the chain to suppliers and all other creditors. Trade will grow.
Why is it that so many other small organisations in similar circumstances have foundered and sunk without trace - lost at sea with no survivors ?
One too-common reason is their Attitude to Adversity.
When confronted with any situation requiring a decision, there will be an array of options. Being of the human rather than robot species, we always have choices.
We also have different processes of thinking that we can use in looking at the various options and deciding which is the best one at that time.
We can be very analytical, studying all the 'facts' and weighing up the pros and cons of each option. All solid left-brain reductionist thinking.
Or we can look for and listen to what our gut reaction is. We can use our intuition, our gut feeling, about the choices at our disposal.
Business leaders, particularly of the male variety, are not encouraged to use or admit to using their intuition.
Pity, because as a Harvard Business School study demonstrated way back in 1989, the top Fortune 500 CEOs ranked "following their hunches" as their most important factor in making all major decisions concerning their organisations
If the situation requiring a decision is a sticky or uncomfortable one (like enforced down-sizing or dumping a pet project), we often react negatively. Gloom and doom thinking.
We get bogged down in the muck of the situation. We limit our vision to seeing mostly the muckier options. We discount the validity or appropriateness of the more good-news options.
Philip, on the other hand, pursues the positive options and keeps his mindset or attitude very balanced. He keeps his sense of humour.
He can see the funny side of adverse situations and thereby stays on top of them. He controls the solutions, they do not control him.
His organisation will survive and succeed.
Watch how the people around us react to negative situations. Listen to the politicians. The economists. The reactionaries. Huge gloom and doom. Everything they say is ponderously serious. They are ponderously serious.
They will not survive. As I say in my seminars, the future is for those who show up. The best future is for those who show up with a smile.
Business News 27 Oct 1995
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