FORWARD21: #12
FORWARD21 is a weekly newsletter with top hand-picked forward thinking human and workplace advice and resources for 21st-century executives, leaders, and change agents.
New Conversations Are the Core Mechanism that Enables Us to Create Better Futures
I am fortunate to have spoken with so many leading-edge business and thought leaders. My questions and the way I do the interviews seem to help leaders share the deeper side of their work and how they see the world.
One of the cumulative impacts of having this experience is that it heightens and advances your own more profound understanding of the human condition and your conditioning too.
Why is this important?
Because it brings about a deeper understanding and capacity to have new conversations.
When I started having new conversations⏤initially through my interviews at 5 Minutes to Process Improvement Success and Exploring Forward Thinking Workplaces⏤I was surprised (or maybe even shocked) at what I was hearing and learning.
In time, I realized that I was creating the conditions for new conversations to occur and for wisdom to emerge.
All of which remarkably begins to change you from the inside out.
And when you change from the inside out, what goes on inside quiets down. You become more open and less reactive⏤and less judgmental.
Or, as Aviv Shahar says in my interview with him, you begin to “appreciate the human condition and your own conditioning too.”
This remarkably leads you to bigger and more empowering new conversations.
A Place to Start
Getting to a place of greater self-insight and doing the work I am doing is for me the place Aviv points to in this quote:
Whether people know it or not, they long for self-insight and for getting themselves back. When you get yourself back, that’s a big part of perhaps what you’re looking for. Because inside it, you get to appreciate the human condition and your own conditioning too.
I’d suggest this is a place many are looking to discover to move their lives and what they care about forward.
Getting yourself into new conversations is a fantastic way and perhaps unexpected way to harvest who you are and the creative part of you.
It also connects you to the field where new ideas and everything else comes from. You become a vortex or focal point for a conversation and a new future to unfold.
We can all enter this space.
One of the more interesting events that unfolded during this interview was when Aviv decided to turn the tables on me ask me to share “the why” behind my opening question.
I shared with Aviv that for the third time in my career after getting a transformation project to a point of success, new executives take over, and all the work that was done falls away. So that’s when I set an intention to have an impact on how organizations transform.
One of the first things I came up with was an interview series called 5 Minutes to Process Improvement Success. The leading question was, “What is your best Improvement strategy that has worked really well for you?”
From the beginning, I rarely got an answer about process improvement. It was always something deeper. It was all about trust, understanding the status quo, and things of that nature. It surprised me (and others), and that ignited an inner leader journey for me as I started to look at the deeper side of things.
After I did 50 interviews, I felt this was never about process improvement, and it was silly to go on in this direction. I set it aside to see if something new would show up. A year and a half later, a new set of questions came together.
In response to my explanation for my opening question, “How do we create workplaces where every voice matters, everyone thrives and finds meaning, and change and innovation happen naturally?” Aviv suggested the following rephrasing:
Imagine a workplace where every voice matters, everyone thrives and finds meaning, and change and innovation. They happen naturally. Imagine such a workplace. Now tell us please what had to become true to enable such an emergence.
Aviv responded with a fascinating series of answers that I encourage you to read in the full interview.
Here are a few of my favorite takeaways from the interview:
Key Takeaways
- If we reframe our questions so that they are anchored in a desired state rather than in a place of want and scarcity, we can bring forward the intelligence and energy to address the want.
- Nothing energizes and liberates people more than the opportunity to shape and create their own future.
- People long for self-insight and for getting themselves back, which can bring you to a place of appreciating the human condition and your own conditioning.
- When we are given the opportunity to influence and shape our destiny, it unleashes incredible power, creativity, and resourcefulness.
- Imagine a day at work when you feel energized and excited about what we are doing here and about your contribution. Describe what you’re doing.
- We lead and transform our environments and organizations through conversation.
There’s a lot more in the full interview, so I hope you will pick up a copy of The Future of the Workplace and discover how to create better futures with Aviv Shahar!
What people are saying about The Future of the Workplace –
Clear, unvarnished learning from the experience of others, Bill’s book is a solid read.
Jon Kesler
Principal for Enterprise Transformation, MITREFORWARD21: top articles that got my attention
How to Have Conversations that Trigger Game Changing Results⎜Aviv Shahar and Bill Fox
In part two of my conversation with Aviv Shahar, we talked about his book Creating New Futures. In this conversation, Aviv shares a powerful story that led him to discover the profound ability of conversations to create a better future.
What difference does it make when you fully internalize that conversations are game changers?
First, you will show up to work remembering that conversation is a two-way exchange, so you will work as hard as you can to not allow the conversation loop to be broken
Second, once you recognize that conversation is your currency as a leader, it empowers you to ask what is the conversation I must be in?
And third, it leads you to the next realization, which is if we stay in the same-old conversation, we will by definition and by design end up where we already are.
Note: This content was not included in my book The Future of the Workplace, so it is fully available on the web.
Wicked Leadership ⎜Miljan Bajic
In this insighful article by Miljan Bajic, Bajic shares his thoughts on a meeting with the leaders of a large publicly-traded company as they wrestled with implementing a change initiative in their organization.
“The challenges of organizational change are complex and entrenched that there is no single solution. These types of challenges are often called wicked problems,”
⏤ Miljan Bajic
I couldn’t agree more.
A Maverick Futurist’s Vision ⎜John Renesch
In this short video, John Renesch says contrary to the way most people think today, the biggest crisis in the world is not climate change, politics, or any of the other global threats in the headlines these days. The biggest crisis in the world today is the lack of effective leadership.
John says that:
“The leadership being called for today is not making the most of circumstances but rather creating new circumstances that serve the conscious evolution of humankind.”
John Renesch calls this conscious leadership. I call it forward thinking leadership. We are talking about the same thing.
FORWARD21: books
Creating New Futures⎜Aviv Shahar
Aviv’s book will awaken you to the opportunities presented by starting your own inquiry about the future, and the creative power of practicing the art of conversation.
Below are a few of my favorite highlights from the book:
“Conversations are game-changers. Through conversations we transform ourselves, those around us, and our environments. Ultimately, conversations allow us to shape possibilities, choose the best future imaginable and make it a reality.”
“Then there are the conversations that fundamentally are different. These are conversations that open people’s minds, help them look forward, and impel them to create meaning and see possibilities. They are about building what’s important for everyone involved. These conversations create miracles: spontaneous change, rapid transformation, and profound results.”
“The conversation you start with your team today may unleash the movement that will change your future and possibly create dramatic new experiences for your organization and your customers.”
In Closing
Thanks for reading. If you like this newsletter and want to support it, please consider forwarding it to someone who’d benefit from it or consider buying a copy of my latest book The Future of the Workplace.
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To your great work life & success!
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