It’s now over 10 years since I virtually work up one morning and decided to book myself on a holiday to Japan.  My original plan was to go by myself , however, a friend intrigued by the idea asked if she could come along and we went along together.

I must say, I was really and truly pleased that she came because aside from the fact that she is generally good company, it was the first place that I ever visited where most of the people I encountered spoke very little English. Whilst her task for the trip was to make all the arrangements and decide on the must go places to visit, for some reason I was given the task of learning Japanese.  I task that I failed miserably at achieving.  As a result we spent a lot of time bowing to people, smiling and pointing to things.

The exception was when we were introduced to people who were referred to as English experts. Then we had the opportunity to speak English, the only thing is sometimes the expertise of the experts was quite limited.

Under such circumstances I found myself adopting a very bad and to be honest rude habit – I would speak louder or speak slower as if that would really make any difference.

I was reminded of this recently during a conversation that I had with an associate when I got frustrated at my inability to get my point across and ended up having a rather frustrating conversation.

There were three key points that I learnt from this conversation:
•    People have different communication styles. Adapt your communication style to your audience. You have more of a responsibility of communicating in a manner that is clear to them than they have of interpreting and understanding your message
•    If the person that you are speaking to does not agree with or understand the point that you are trying to make, no matter how frustrated you may be, repeating the point several times will not make any difference. Neither will speaking slowly or shouting.
•    No matter how important your message is, if the person you are speaking to is not receiving, don’t try and force it down the person’s throat.

Selah ☺

Copyright 2012. This document is the specific intellectual property of Susan Popoola. Content may not be reused or reproduced without the specific permission of the owner or a reference to the source.

I drove down to Milton Keynes Shopping Centre earlier today for a meeting with Waterstones about my new books.

I hadn’t realised that the Sainsbury’s Sport Relief Mile was taking place in the City Centre.  This led to some closed roads and the need to do a bit of meandering to get a parking spot.

Having parked my car I walked towards the shops only to get caught trying to cross the road by some of the event’s participants running along the road.

Being that it was such a lovely afternoon and I had plenty of time on my hands, I stood relaxed waiting for the participants to pass by, listening to the beating of the African drums being played by the side of the road as it did so.

As I stood watching it was fascinating to see the diversity of the participants from those in costumes to the other participants of different ages – parents with children and people just going along by themselves.  There were those that were running and also those just walking along. There was even a lady with a pushchair.

All of them were just walking towards a destination at their own individual paces.  As they finally all passed by and I crossed the road, I found myself thinking – as we all go in the new week, let’s keep on moving by whatever means necessary, regardless of whatever odds we may encounter.

Selah.

Copyright 2012. This document is the specific intellectual property of Susan Popoola. Content may not be reused or reproduced without the specific permission of the owner or a reference to the source.

In recent times there has been constant talk within Human Resources (HR) circles about the importance of Employee Engagement.  To be honest even though we may have used different terminology in the past, the concept is really nothing new.

After all, it’s in the bid to engage employees, to retain them and attain the best results from them we talk about empowerment, delegation and at a more sophisticated level Distributed Leadership.

I’m an advocate for empowering employees and staff in general, but at the same time I feel the need to say that there is a need for a certain caution. It is great to have an engaged, empowered workforce, but it is equally important for staff to understand the limits of their responsibility.

There is a need for their to be clarity around the boundaries – where does delegated responsibility end and at what point should they be referring to someone more senior before making decisions.  This is aligned to their knowledge, capability and experience.  Necessary limitations of delegated authority also go beyond this to encompass the implications of decisions or actions that may be taken.

It is critical for any leader to remember that no matter how much you delegate, the buck ultimately stops with you. That is you can delegate a degree of authority, but not the ultimate responsibility.

Copyright 2012. This document is the specific intellectual property of Susan Popoola. Content may not be reused or reproduced without the specific permission of the owner or a reference to the source.

I was at a game of Basketball – MK Lions against  the Leicester Raiders on Friday.  Unfortunately, MK Lions didn’t win – we lost by a miserly 3 points. I’m not going to give you a full analysis of the game,, but I must say it was a good game – full of energy both from the players and the supporters.

Copyright 2012. This document is the specific intellectual property of Susan Popoola. Content may not be reused or reproduced without the specific permission of the owner or a reference to the source.

The prettiest smiles hide the deepest secrets.The prettiest eyes have cried the most tears. And the kindest hearts have felt the most pain ~ Will Smith

 I must say – last Sunday was surreal.  I woke up too early at 5.30am. Playing around with Twitter on my IPhone I noticed that Whitney Houston was trending.  Strange, I thought, as I’d been playing the “Waiting to Exhale” CD just before I went to bed.

The news that Whitney had passed away left me feeling void. I quietly read the growing commentary and listened to the news as she was eulogised. Later that morning, I noticed that Bobby Brown had started trending. Largely it was people raining insults on him and blaming him for Whitney’s death.  Sad I thought – he may not have been the best influence on her, but he was Whitney’s choice.  Besides which, it’s over 4 years since they’ve been divorced so ……

Whitney’s passing was really enough for one day, but it does not reflect the totality of what made my day surreal. You see later that evening I noticed from online messages that people were searching for someone within my network who had left messages on his Facebook page that indicated that he was contemplating suicide. Looking at the recent history of his communications, the signs were there that he had been crying out for help.  Unfortunately, it seemed that no one had picked up upon the extent of his distress.   Fortunately his attempted suicide failed as he was found on time – he is now in hospital.  The messages of love, support and appreciation of him as a person are now pouring in.

If not for the actions of those that went on a search for him, those messages could, however, have been for another person – highly valued and appreciated but lost to the world. He or we depending on how you view things was/were (respectively) lucky, blessed, fortunate or what have you.

The problem is it’s a tough world. I said this to a friend yesterday and her response was – “and it’s getting tougher.”  It seems that when things get tough our natural response is often to knuckle down and focus on sorting ourselves out – leaving others to take care of themselves. Fair enough you might say, but aren’t we supposed to be strongest when we pull together?

Even though I’m both an introvert and a very private person, I know that I’ve best overcome problems by talking to someone that I trust about the situation. At the very least the conversation has helped to put things into perspective. More often than not the conversation has generated an idea or two, which has helped to move me forward.

Yet in conversation, on the odd occasion I have mischievously responded to the question “how are you?” by responding not very well.  Because the person that I ‘ve been speaking to has expected the response of “fine, thank you” more often than not they have responded to what they expected to hear rather than what I have actually said.  Now, I know that the example I’ve given is just of me being mischievous, but how often do we miss the underlying message of what it is that people are actually saying to us when we talk to them. Not so much because we don’t care, but more because we’re caught up with our own lives and challenges.

I believe that now more than ever is the time for us to look out for each other. To let the people around us know that we care, that they are precious and will make it through whatever it is that they may be going through. In fact, people don’t need to be facing a challenge to need support– at times it’s about the strength to face the churn of everyday life or the courage and confidence to achieve a goal and move on to the next level of success.

I’m writing this on St Valentine’s Day – a jolly good day to make a start, I’d say. However please do remember the people that may be struggling and in need of a friend, a hug or a simple smile are not always the most obvious. I’ve seen a person crying virtually unnoticed in a crowded room. The single person next door may actually be content in his or her singleness. Yet I’m still struck by the story of the person who told me that the worst form of loneliness is crying yourself to sleep each night, due to the person sleeping next to you.

I think  that ultimately the key is to learn to listen to both what is said and what is not without judging or assuming.

Selah ~ Happy Valentine’s Day People!

Copyright 2012. This document is the specific intellectual property of Susan Popoola. Content may not be reused or reproduced without the specific permission of the owner or a reference to the source.

I was up late on Friday night – I couldn’t sleep. I therefore logged on to twitter  -just to see what was going on.  I noticed that Stan Collymore was trending together with someone named Tom Adeyemi (who I hadn’t previously heard of).  Bored and with “nothing better to do” I clicked on each name to find out why they were trending.

First I clicked on Stan Collymore’s name.  I discovered that with no apparent reason, someone had decided to rein racial abuse on him via twitter. Stan had got fed up with it and reported it to the police. As a result, the man in question had deleted his twitter account. Stan had, however, had the foresight to take photos of the abusive messages, which he posted on twitter. After a visit from the police, he also posted part of his police statement – I guess to make it clear that he would not tolerate such behaviour.

Reading the commentary on this case, a number of people expressed shock at the language and behaviour of the perpetuator who was described as a 21-year-old law student. Others commended Stan for dealing decisively with this case. I was, however, somewhat befuddled to find that there were a number expressing the view that Stan should not have dealt with the situation in public and posted the comments and/or he should have said nothing in public until the matter was resolved.  I was befuddled because I wondered what made people think that how he dealt with the matter even required commentary. Was it not more pertinent that such abuse had taken place than how he decided to report the situation?  Furthermore, I believe it’s important that we are made aware of what is really going on.

Before I talk about the case of Tom Adeyemi, I’ll explain why.

Back in November 2011, a woman was recorded swearing abusively on a tram in Croydon.  Punctuating every other sentence with the F word, she was addressing the passengers that she saw as foreigners and not English, telling them to go back to their own countries.  I don’t know what set her off, but she was later arrested.

Shortly afterwards I posted a thought on twitter, pondering “I’ve been reflecting on the racist ranting of the woman on the Croydon tram – I wonder what % of the British population share her views”

Someone responded saying “Very few I think (and hope)”

I was a bit surprised by what I will describe as his innocence and went on to say “I suspect there are many that share the concerns of the Croydon tram woman. Difference is it’s not publically expressed”

Separate from this, the recent trials and convictions in the Stephen Lawrence case have brought the issue of race to the forefront. The challenge of this is that it’s possible for people to conclude that this was a negative era in our past for which justice has now been done allowing us to close the chapter and move on.

The truth, however, is that although fortunately we have most definitely come along way, we still have a long way to go.  This is not only illustrated by the Stan Collymore case and the Croydon tram incident, but also the case of Tom Adeyemi.

So back to my Twitter explorations… I clicked on Tom Adeyemi’s name and discovered that he is young football player who it seems was racially abused during a football matched. As illustrated by the photographs taken of him immediately after the incident, he appears to be so distressed by the incident that he is virtually in tears. I don’t know what exactly it is that was said to him, but it seems that as result of the incident the game was actually paused for a few minutes.  As you’ll probably be aware there have also been other cases in football as of later, with some interesting responses from some people in positions of authority who have at times belittled the situations or who have without question tried to protect the player against whom allegations have been made.

There is no question, we have come along way, but I believe we need to be honest and recognise that we still have a long way to go.  I’m particular concerned that the alleged abusers of both Stan Collymore and Tom Adeyemi are both very young i.e. 21 and 20 respectively.  I mention age, because at that age they are more than likely to have grown up and schooled with people of colour.  The 21 year old is said to be a law student. It’s early days yet and this is yet to be the confirmed, but assuming he is a law student how well is our education system working in enabling young people to have a more positive view about race or are other influences just too strong? Before you say anything, I’ll reiterate – yes, I know its early days and I recognise that some may say that these are isolated incidents.  I will, however, respond and say that I don’t believe I would have to look too far to find similar incidents (unreported and/or with less public figures) across the country.

The tram case still weighs heavily on my mind as whilst regardless of what set her off, there was no excuse for that ladies language or behaviour, there are concerns that she expressed in relation to foreigners, jobs and immigration that are shared by a number of people in this country.

#Selah

Copyright 2012. This document is the specific intellectual property of Susan Popoola. Content may not be reused or reproduced without the specific permission of the owner or a reference to the source. Opinions may be generated

It’s difficult for me to keep count of how many films I watched over the last Christmas period. So I’m sorry to tell you that I can’t tell you what film I was watching when a man told a young lady struggling to find her way in life that “We learn by doing”

To some extent, it doesn’t really mater what film it was anymore.  The important thing is that it resonates with real life – most especially as we’ve come to a new year.  The beginning of a new year which if we are to be honest, just like others we see as a special breakthrough year.  We make new years resolutions, we make lists targets. We have all sorts of aims, process – you name it, in  order to make this a better, more successful year.  We wish each other all the very best; hoping and praying that dreams will come true.

Don’t get the wrong impression, in many ways I’m in the same boat.  I do believe luck changes, breakthroughs come, dreams come true and God answers prayers.  The only thing is I also believe that more often than not there is a requirement for us to do something extra, different or differently to get that result.

I don’t know about you, but I know that sometimes I’m held back by the fear of making mistakes and getting things wrong – what if I fail? Or for some there’s the concern that others may not see our genius and believe in us.  But going back to the film that I mentioned, the truth is we learn by doing, I’m also becoming increasingly aware that if our intentions are right and we are not reckless, we’ll find that the right people will support us along the way.  I therefore intend to just put myself out there more and learn as I go along.

Critically though, I intend to do so using three key sights as I go along i.e. Hindsight, Insight and Foresight.

You see, whilst I watched a fair number of films over the Christmas period, I also did quite a bit of reading on British Social and Economic history in preparation for a new book that I am working on.   From doing so the criticality of the sights became apparent to me.

A common response to actions of leaders that didn’t quite workout the way they were planned was “with hindsight” he or should might have..   i.e. reviewed retrospectively – understanding the nature of an event after it has happened.  Or a fuller dictionary definition that I believe makes it even clearer is: recognition of the realities, possibilities or requirements of a situation, event, decision etc after its occurrence.

The truth is we don’t have the benefit of hindsight for past decisions.  However, whilst we should never dwell on it, we should reference past occurrences as part of our learning for the future. The saying that “history repeats itself” is frustratingly true when it refers to things that we’ve got wrong in the past.

Hindsight should become part of the basis of our insights and foresights to enable us to successfully move forward. In other words I believe that beyond the simple process of learning from our current actions we must learn from the past otherwise we do become reckless and  have a negative impact not only on ourselves, but also others who are affected by our actions.

I believe our insights or intuitive understanding provides us with a grasp of the inner nature of things comes partly from our inner being, but also from our understanding of past experiences.

If we take the above and marry it with a bit of foresight i.e. planning and mental preparedness though there is still a bit of a risk we have a good basis for pressing forward and for greater success.

Wishing you all the very best for 2012

Susan

Copyright 2012. This document is the specific intellectual property of Susan Popoola. Content may not be reused or reproduced without the specific permission of the owner or a reference to the source. Opinions may be generated

Did you know…
£5 provides water for a family for a week?
£10 pays for a rural health care worker for a week?
£25 feeds a family of six for a month?
£50 pays for a sewing machine?
£100 empowers a widow to set up in business?
The Akabusi Charitable Trust Literature

If for no other reason, if you watched the 4 by 400m relay at the 1991 World Championships at Tokyo you will have heard of Kriss Akabusi.  Since the end of his athletics career you may have seen him on television on programmes such as Record Breakers, heard him on the radio or had the privilege to hear him give a motivational talk at an event.  Even if you do know all of this, you may not be aware that he additionally Chair’s a Charity, “The Akabusi Charitable Trust”, that works to promote the social and economic development of communities in poverty in Nigeria.

I say he Chair’s the Charity, but he’s role doesn’t stop there – amongst other things he is actively involved in fundraising for the Charity and in 2010 he led on a Charity Bike Ride from Edinburgh to London aimed at raising funds for the Charity.  Having done what I could to support Kriss on the Bike Ride, a few months later, I received some information which outlined the difference that various amounts of money could make, starting from £5 to the impact that a £100 could have on the life of a widow.

£100 could enable a widow to set up a business I read. I’d like to do that I thought i.e. have the privilege of helping to transform someone’s life. It was just another one of the many ideas that I develop.  More often than not, I think of things that I could do that might be great ideas, but just put them aside. I don’t know if you’re anything like that too?  The only thing is that with this particular idea, the next time I went into the office of the Charity I took my cheque book with me.

“I’d like to sponsor a widow”, I announced. Everyone looked at me. “Your literature mentions that £100 can transform the life of a widow” I stated.  “Find me a widow to support” I went on to demand as I wrote out a cheque for £100. Obediently the next time Kriss and another trustee went to Nigeria to monitor the work of the Charity, they identified a struggling widow and through one of the Charity’s partner organisations supported her in setting up a small business which enabled her to support her family and ensure that her children went to school.  Her life, her prospects and that of her children were transformed.

As a result, the Charity decided to set up a project  – Woman2Woman; to enable women in the UK to support women in rural Nigerian communities.  It’s early days yet, but already there are a growing number of women whose lives are being transformed through this project. I’m humbled by the knowledge that this project developed because I did something with a simple idea that I had.

I’m therefore writing this for two reasons. In the first instance you may have one or two ‘simple’ ideas of you’re own that you’re sitting on. I would like to encourage you to go for it, put yourself out there – you just don’t know what will happen.

Secondly, a seed has been planted, i.e the idea of transforming lives of Nigerian widows and those of their families through donations of £100. In my head, the idea is beginning to develop that this could actually become something phenomenal that transforms whole villages and I was just wondering if you would be interested in being a part of this?

#Selah

© Susan Popoola MA CIPD FRSA
Conning Towers Ltd
Leveraging the Power of People

Managing Staff Through The Tough Times

While there are businesses that may be thriving, the recent recession and its aftermath mean that it’s been a tough few years for a lot of businesses.  If we are to be honest things are likely to remain tough for the next few years as we contend with Government cuts, problems with Europe and what have you. The natural instinct under these circumstances is therefore to knuckle down and focus – expecting those that work for us to do the same thing – grateful that unlike so many others they have work.

The tendency is to put structures and processes in place to ensure that we things work both effectively and efficiently – this is something I highly recommend. I also advice on the need to become more stringent about absences and what staff do within work time – this is something else that most businesses will probably be doing now. Additionally most businesses will also be becoming more focused on targets and expect staff to have the same focus.  All of this is perfectly understandable and logical – after all unless a business is run on volunteers and unpaid interns, the people working with you are being paid to get a job done in what is now a very competitive market.

I do believe, that it is, however, important to remember that just as businesses are going through a tough time, so are a lot of people that work with us.  What with the increased costs of living and the possible unemployment of a partner; close family members and/or friends,  this can all very easily serve to put pressure on those fortunate enough to have a job.  This type of pressure on staff may also be enhanced if you have already had to implement reduced hours or a pay freeze for a few years.

So yes, do expect the best from your people, but also please be a bit sensitive too.  Where possible take the time to understand their circumstances. Allow for a little flexibility within your structures and processes if it will help them without being detrimental to the business.

Fundamentally communicate with them on the position of the business, the plans that you have for the business i.e. the strategy and the logic behind it. Be open to their input and ideas – they may actually be the source of input that makes all the difference to your business.

In balancing the requirements of your business with the needs of your staff, I believe you will attain their crucial support and their vey best through the on going tough times that we are all faced with.

Copyright 2011. This document is the specific intellectual property of Susan Popoola. Content may not be reused or reproduced without the specific permission of the owner or a reference to the source. Opinions may be generated

Many moons ago, in the year 1983 during the era of apartheid South Africa, a young South African girl moved to England, claiming British citizenship so that she could run internationally as South Africa was excluded from international events due to it’s apartheid policy.  When she ran at Crystal Palace the following year it was controversial, but she had ever right to do so as the fact that her grandfather was British gave her the right to British citizenship.

Over the years that have followed there have been numerous different athletes originating from or born in different countries who have represented Britain in International athletics. It’s therefore quite bemusing for people to speak of ‘plastic Brits’.

I must say I am, however, somewhat fascinated by Tiffany Ofili-Porter who says “I could have run for America, I could have run for Nigeria but I choose to run for Britain because I appreciate the support they show for athletics”

The truth is that the diversity of her background and options is very representative of modern day Britain.

Ref: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/olympics/8680043/London-2012-Olympics-US-born-Tiffany-Ofili-Porter-seeks-to-dispel-myths-after-switching-allegiance-to-GB.html

Copyright 2011. This document is the specific intellectual property of Susan Popoola. Content may not be reused or reproduced without the specific permission of the owner or a reference to the source. Opinions may be generated