It’s 1.00am on Saturday morning at Apia International Airport waiting for the departure of my flight at 2.00am. To be more precise, the plane from NZ needs to arrive first, before it can think about turning about and going back. Half the departure lounge has emptied out for the other airline and it’s a hot, tired bunch of people waiting in the humidity here.
I arrive back at 5.00am on Sunday morning so pay back for my three-day weekend – I only get a one day one and then we start our Wisdom Retreat for Senior Leaders at midday. So it’s all work and no play for me right now.
Speaking of all play 59 years of marriage my parents celebrated Saturday. A fine achievement!
It’s a very friendly place Samoa – well that’s been my experience this week – the pace is slow, the driving is excruciatingly slow at times: Island time is alive and well.
I got to know a couple of taxi drivers who would take me to dinner and then return, worrying about payment on the return visit – Mapu and Snoob. Last night Snoob’s, wife was in the car on way back from the Restaurant. She had just finished work.
Boarding soon. I’ve enjoyed the week, the training went well, this Palangi was treated very well and I hope I’ll be back. But I like home more – and that’s how it should be I reckon!
If you travel to Samoa from New Zealand you travel back in time – 23 hours at the moment to be precise – and if like I did last Sunday evening, you travel on Sunday evening you get two Sundays. Which from what I could see if you were local, means that you would spend two days in a row going to church and I imagine, having quiet family time. The missionary colonialists could not have imagined such success to convert the locals to Christianity. It would appear as a miracle beyond their wildest expectations. In my hotel two of the six channels available were showing local church services.
A Samoan waterfront run
When Monday arrived the deserted town of Apia surged into life with uniformed police maintaining or watching – I couldn’t tell – traffic flowing in this busy harbour-side town. I found coffee too – at the curiously named Sydney Side Cafe – and everyone I spoke to commented how hot it was. Really? We are in the tropics man. Am I the only one that knows that?
I’ve been warned when I start my training delivery tomorrow that they might only want to talk about the Rugby World Cup. That’ll be okay – Manu Samoa did their nation proud, give or take a tweet or three but who really cares? I’ve had a couple of jogs to get the muscles moving after the Auckland Marathon. I haven’t seen anyone else out running and if I lived here I’d start a running group – there’s a lovely waterfront that looks like it stretches well out of the town that would be good for out and backs. I’ve been here before, a few years ago and there are some new buildings and they now drive most of the time on the left side of the road (airport transfers in the middle of the night excepted!).
Samoa is moving forward on 29 December 2011 – by a whole day to align its time to New Zealand – that would be a great opportunity to say to the world that it’s moving forward in a number of other ways too. The work I’m doing here is in a very small way part of Samoa up-skilling itself for wealth prosperity and dare I say it, happiness. Not sure about that part as everyone I see seems pretty happy with their lot.
People seem pretty happy at the hotel though like other Pacific nations I’ve been through, I can see from my runs around Apia that the Hotel is not like the locals live at all. There were families out walking this evening, raw smoke from open fires and the next generation of Rugby players mucking around by the harbour with shirts off. All in all pretty laid back and easy feeling.
We drive ourselves pretty hard most of the time – well I feel I do – and there’s rewards and satisfaction from achievement and goal setting. Happy though? It’s a very difficult thing to measure by observing such difference in societal norms. Maybe I’ll get a better sense in the morning when I interact at a more meaningful level with local professionals. And great food for thought at our Wisdom Retreat for Senior Leaders starting the day I return.
Looking forward. And if you want your three day weekend, you’ve only go about 6 weeks to do it.
Stephen
ps I’m back after RWC2011, Auckland Marathon and some manic work commitments!
If you’re not wearing an All Blacks jersey on Sunday evening with the numbers 1 – 22 on it then like me and most of New Zealand you can have very little control over the result at Eden Park. Should anyone be anxious about what they can’t control and won’t directly impact them (arguably of course!)? Leaders who grow and develop others, and place trust in their teams shouldn’t be anxious about whether they will perform. They know that they will, partly because the leader does trust them. Which is probably why Graham Henry said he had nothing to say to the team immediately prior to the game. That’s their time he said.
Last Saturday, there were many wound up people, including in my home! Hearts thumping as we sat down to watch the All Blacks demolish our near neighbours. At the end it was decided that the Cup was more or less ours, that the All Blacks couldn’t lose now, after such a performance and how poorly the French had played.
But quickly the anxiety crept back in: What if the French played really well? What if the ABs froze? Well, what if they did? Surely this All Blacks team are the best that they can possibly be and better than any team in the world right now. We know that. They know it, and partly because they don’t take it for granted. I trust them to do their best which will win them the game and the cup and make them World Champions for the next four years (at least).
I trust them because they’ve got all the resources, learnings and support that the best Rugby country in the world can give to the best 22 players in the world. I’m excited, but I’m not anxious: not because I can’t control it, but I know the best people are in control.
If you’re leading a team and you trust them you can relax and enjoy the fruits. If you don’t trust you’ll micro-manage, control and destroy any chance of great success.
If that doesn’t convince you imagine two businesses going for a big contract. Business A intends to delight and make money and opportunities for itself and all those it connects with. The other Business, say Business F has a strategy to undermine Business A before it gets to the tender stage. Like two teams going into a game: One is prepared, fit and has proven strategies that encourage fast try-scoring opportunities. The other reckons they’ll attempt to stomp on the foot of the captain of the other team. I know who I’d back! With a 22+ points lead at fulltime is what my money at the TAB is on.
Visiting Grandma (and Grandad till he died in 1967) in Auckland in the 1960s and 70s were great times. The memories are not complete without reference to the sound of the mantle piece clock sounding every 15 minutes. After Grandma died in 1990 I took over the clock which after 50 odd years of service had stopped functioning. It wasn’t until this century that I had it restored to it’s former glory though somehow I don’t have the same ability to sleep through the chimes every 15 minutes that Grandma seemed to, so I don’t wind up the chimes or on-the-hour bells.
It’s incredible how the sound of the clock can bring back so many memories, both in time and space and when the dear old clock stopped working a few weeks ago it was off to the Polish watchmaker in Queen Street who restored it originally for me. Grandma was a no nonsense person who said what she thought when she thought it and didn’t go for ceremony or emotion. Watching the celebrated New Zealand pianist Michael Houston in full flight on the TV once she remarked: “Why doesn’t he keep his head still – he’s only hitting the keys, all that moving around is quite unnecessary!”
The message from the watchmaker was one Grandma would have appreciated. Listen to it here: Watchmaker message. Priceless. Just what you’d expect. It’s a full service required – $400 – but that’s a small price to pay for keeping all those memories alive.
We should look forward and live in the present. But we are made up from the past too.
Stephen Drain's Leadership Blog 