Month: February 2015

A lap for the team

The Taupo Great Lake Relay is a 155 kilometre running relay.  There’s 18 legs (and aching legs at the end) with hills up and down, flats, dangerous cliff runs, heat, exhaustion, pulled muscles and lots of fun. When our work team went over the finish line the DJ said we’d been supporting the event for at least twelve years.

You need a team to get all the way round.
Lake Taupo is big – you need a team to get all the way round.

I don’t think that there was anybody there from that first team – in fact every year the team is different, but for the three years I’ve participated, I’ve felt the same enthusiasm, connection and commitment.

I’ve run plenty of team building and development sessions and one of the issues which always comes up is “what do we do now that Sarah has gone?”, or Lance has joined?

Should we start all over again and do a new charter, vision and values or what? And what of the cynics who say that the team building is artificial anyway and not necessarily relevant to the work?

A event like the relay this weekend teaches us quite a bit about the process of team building.

You need a goal. All members have a role and if you remember the goal, you should find that part to play that suits – no passengers on board. Flexibility is important – a support person took a leg of the relay today on account of an injury – perfect! it doesn’t matter if you haven’t been there before – others have, go with the flow but new ideas are welcome and expected.

I bet if someone from the team twelve years ago had come along and checked us out, it would be much the same experience that they had all those years ago.

They’d be welcome, just like the newbies were today, and we’d find a role no doubt.

So if you’re new to the team, watch, think about the purpose but get in a do something for the team.  Before you know it you’ll realise you are the team. That’s team building.

Stephen

A summer’s day in the city

You don’t need to go away to enjoy an exotic summer’s day. There’s so many cruise ship tourists downtown at the moment, stepping out for lunch it can almost feel like you’re on holiday.

I got chatting to a couple from England on the escalator in Westfield Downtown the other day. They were staying in Mt Eden, visiting their daughter and family.Summer in Auckland

“This place has changed a lot since we were last here seven years ago” he said, “there’s well a lot more, feels like a European city now and there’s you know…“, more people I offered “yes a lot more people, it’s really gone ahead“.

We parted after this brief exchange. We’re all ambassadors for our country and city. I didn’t really have much to add, they were clearly loving their time in Auckland on a hot summer’s day and wanted to share their enthusiasm.

It’s easy to ignore the pleasure of what we have every day. Outsiders can see it quite differently.

On a summer’s day in the city.

Stephen

Who knows you?

Not who you know. That’s what was suggested to me at lunch time with a challenge “there’s a blog for you!” He’s not wrong. It got me thinking. The idea is that if you need to spread the word about yourself then it’s a far better measure of who is talking about you than who you can connect with.

The power of leverage. But it raises a more significant question. What are you known from? What might be being leveraged In a wider network? Or maybe it doesn’t matter: “There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about”.

In a strategic approach to marketing yourself you will want to grow connections (virtual and real) and ensure people are talking about you, and what you have to offer.

An authentic leader won’t be too concerned about the message which is being spread but rather they will embrace Wilde’s message, comfortable about the message which is spread.

But more importantly, the authentic leader will have answered the question posed by my friend and this blog.  By making certain they know themselves first.

So yes, it’s a blog alright! About you. And me.

Stephen

Competition for Carlton

Saving up my paper round money I bought the beautiful Raleigh Royale 5-speed from Linwood Cycles, I think for about $145. It was a lovely machine, I wanted a ten speed but this was the machine on offer at the right time. It got stolen once by local ratbags (who turned into more serious criminals I learned), but I recovered it. So when I traded it up for a Carlton Competition from the bike shop in Papanui Road, I memorised the serial number and for some strange reason that number has stayed with me.

Rides up Dyers Pass Road, all around the Port Hills and Banks Peninsula, no helmet but toe clips to add power. I was so taken with it I kept it in my bedroom. Gleaming white and fast.

A few decades have gone by and I’m back on a road bike. The principle is the same, but a few things have improved. Weight, combined brake and gear shift levers, smoother gear shifts and a computer that tells me things I don’t yet know what they are (but apparently if I keep it at 80 then I’m having a good workout I think). The tyres seem pretty skinny and although there’s a puncture repair kit under the seat the Uber App might be the solution if I’m on my own when the inevitable happens! Chris at Cyco told me that you don’t glue patches onto the inner tube any more! Crushed. Toe clips have been replaced by clip in shoes and so far so good, I haven’t forgotten to come out at the lights.

Cycling is really so so much fun and being back on a commuter bike for the last 18 months I’ve learned quite a bit, with mostly good experiences. The road bike though, takes me back to being a teenager and the freedom I felt on the bike then is back.

I never articulated to myself at the time that it was freedom-giving, but for sure that’s what it was then, and what it is now.

The Carlton was a beauty at the time, just as the new one is special now.

So although Trek won’t be coming into the bedroom anytime soon, it’s a link back to an early experience of a most important value that so many don’t have.

Stephen

p.s.  Linwood Cycles is still there, by the look of Google Maps in the same place.