This material comes from a keynote speech given about how it is our differences which will organizationally will be the transformational synergistic difference which will make all the difference ultimately.
- I have gathered some lateral thinking puzzles which I will distribute to table as the small group activity (do you have a sense of how many table there would be and how many at each table?) So the goal is either as many potentially feasible answers – or best creative answer.
Example:
You are in a room. There are two strings dangling from the ceiling on opposite sides of the room. You need to tie the strings together but there isn’t enough string to walk over holding one and grab the other. However the two strings will meet in the middle. Your tools are a ladder, a pair of plyers, and a box of matches. How will you tie them together?
This puzzle has claims to be the best of the genre. It is simple in its statement, absolutely baffling and yet with a completely satisfying solution. Most people struggle very hard to solve this one yet they like the answer when they hear it or have the satisfaction of figuring it out. After the question and answer session I will tell you the typical “answer” and the most creative answer I have heard.
Pre-Speech About Me who I am and why I am qualified to talk to you today
It’s Not about me Story of Beth Thul and how I came to be here. It was her as well as the goodwill love that I have with those in my work relationships which allows me to be here
Show the video Streets Vs Roads Derek Sivers.
- The goal of working on these lateral thinking puzzles will be divergent thinking. Divergent thinkingis a thought process or method used to generate creative ideas by exploring many possible solutions. How many different answers could be possibility right OR the most creative answer verses the right one answer in this situation. I have a great example of a best creative answer which always comes from people of different cultures or the best tend to be from folks who are neuro-diverse (people with autism, Aspergers, etc) when I asked them where the top of the world was they said “the Crust” such a great answer!
- Then the idea is to pivot to different cultural practices and how they can create new, different, and better thinking. The theme for the keynote will be Our Difference is the Difference.
- The goal is next to find some ways in which we all fall into patterns of thinking or operating which keep certain people or ideas on the fringes.
Some examples of these patterns are and happen in:
In hiring more and more HR folks are looking into hiring folks are realizing they need to do so without looking at them. The subtle in-and-out grouping that happens in these spaces over and over again favors one person over another. The pattern here is favoring those identities with which we are most familiar. We are hard wired to favor folks who we can identify with our own in-group – the problem is – those folks think just like we do and we cannot innovate with those we agree with.
Answers like why do you do it this way – Because we have always done it this way. The pattern here is “the” current way is the only way. Its change resistant – it fails to recognize things can get better when change occurs. Continuous Improvement is our goal – leadership is a process not a position.
Managing to the rare exception rather than the common rule. The pattern here is wasting a lot of time on what “could” be rather than what most likely is.
The sad us vs them mentality which can exist on all job sites if we are willing to be real, there can be a distrust of those who don’t get their hands dirty, AND a perception that micro-management vs empowerment is the way to lead. We all work better under empowerment vs. rigid control. The pattern here is not believing in your team and thinking you can do someone else’s job better.
Those subtle messages which women hear on a day to day basis about who leads, and who have always lead verses being welcomed and appreciated into what had been primarily male spaces. Men too have benefited from women in the work place with the addition of more holistic and system thinking. Just because a job was turned around quickly efficiently and under budget means nothing if you burn through your crew and you churn through people faster than what had been traditional capital items. The pattern here is some “spaces are thought to be more suited for one gender over another – where the truth is we have found over time that all spaces are improved with different points of view.
Women are still interrupted more than men – I fact I still struggle with. Still with two ears I need to learn to shut my mouth and listen. BTW there is an app for that now GenderTimer promotes gender awareness in social groups and workplaces. GenderTimes show you clearly who is talking the most, and helps you see and discuss these patterns. Seeing that reality helps people change and improve. But I will come back to this to talk about how these patterns have harmed me in my relationship even being an expert on issues related to Diversity and Inclusion – we are all still learning. The pattern here is when certain people’s voices are valued over others the subordinated voices learn to stop trying OR even worse go elsewhere!
People avoiding conflict because no one ever told them things really do not fundamentally improve unless there is disagreement. Cooperative Conflict is the very spark of innovation. The pattern here is we don’t know how to do conflict well with one another.
Management thinking which is top down only verses Leadership thinking where all stake holders have the ability to make the project better. There pattern here is folks with high salary or greater management responsibility mean they have a greater capacity for leadership – which stifles creative synergistic leadership.
- The next idea would be to pivot to asking about who tends to get heard in meetings. And then asking the question over and over again until they hit my level of desired loudness which they will not know. This will be to point out how we always tell people to “speak up” rather than slow down and ask their opinions, and how annoying it is to hit another person’s standard rather than ask them what they think and making a space for their voice. For example Dr. King almost never spoke in small groups and listened the entire time only asking questions to other quiet folks – as he was an introvert, but since he listened the whole time, he had the best suggestions and was able to incorporate almost all other thoughts and suggestions. Lastly here the pattern is making people adjust the dominate norms (which is well outside their strengths area) rather than taking the time to adjust to those strengths we sorely need.
- The last thing I want to leave you with is YOU must go outside your comfort zone, outside your normative experience to find – the difference. One of the worst things we learn to do to ourselves and others is to value one person more or less than yourself.
Show the photos of the diamond and the coal. As what is the difference between the two things? One is valued more than the other. BUT in reality we can only spot “finished” diamonds. We only see diamonds and recognize them when presented in the pattern we expect to see them in.
Real diamonds look like this:
When I see this photo of a real diamond I think about how people see people who are lower class. Dirty, rough, unrefined. They don’t see them for what they are, resilient – tough – hard – able to overcome pressure. After all I diamond is coal who learned to suffer stress well.
Meritocracy is the holding of power by people selected on the basis of their perceived ability – rather they fit a narrative of having “earned it”.
But I think we truly fail to see who started when, where, and with what. We can say people who started with huge beneficial advantages “earned it” – over people who due to a lack of wealth, mentors, resources, have had to overcome time and time again situations and circumstances which would frankly bring me to my knees. People in a lower socio-economic class are seen as dirty, unrefined, unpolished – when in truth they are strong and resilient in ways others cannot understand.
But we tend to favor certain abilities over others and don’t see the benefit of atypical experiences or how if you don’t immediately “fit” the notion of how someone should perform in a specific way that there isn’t another way around that issue.
Truth is I would rather take a grinder every day of the week over someone with “talent”. Talent people learn they can turn it on or turn it off. Where as less talented people, folks who have overcome some things, rough folks, unrefined folks learned you have to show up – and show out every single day. Because they don’t see you, they don’t know your story, they don’t know you have been through some things, they don’t know you are an overcomer, and that when it comes to dealing with change or finding creative answers it was what they have always done because that is how they survived.
My example of this are the DACA kids. I can’t imagine going to school without the benefit of loans, paying upwards of $500 – not counting legal fees on my minimum wage job every two years. Paying taxes for benefits they may never receive. Just for the opportunity to be here and survive. Just for a SSN or for those with that entrepreneur spirits with an Employer Identification Number. I am telling you these people will be some of the most successful people we will have ever seen. Because though lower class – they are resilient and strong in ways I never want to have to be tested.
You see those folks are different. And too often diversity – different – many have learned over time that to them that means not me. That means threat, that means outsider. But also I have not met anyone when they are allowed to be their true selves isn’t different a little bit. They have just learned over time to hide it. To put it under a rock to play act just get by.
Let us face it in our work we are in relationship with one another. But we get so interactional with these people that we spend 35% of our lives with.
Take a second: Think of the people in the world that matter most to you. Think of your best friends. Think of a funny story of the two of you together, or one of your best days. If you have a partner think of how much you love them. If you have a pet think of the first time you met them and all of the memories you have made since.
Now think what would have happened if you had only considered a one-time interaction. Think if in those moments you thought – I am not trying to add the demands of a new friend right now.
At work too often we choose an interactional thinking with our co-workers. We don’t make the choice to have a sense of being in relationship with those people we spend so much of our lives with.
It reminds me of Clark Kent and Superman. At work I think we Clark Kent life. See in order to be accepted at work Clark Kent has to play down who he is. He cant be his full self. He has to be the small bit of who he thinks he needs to be to get acceptance at work.
And folks get worried about me talking about love at work. But how many super people are there who cut pieces of themselves away just to fit in? How many of us shrink into expected ways of being because we don’t feel the belonging of others to be our best selves. It is simple we need to feel belonging and to give the gift of belonging means we have to be in relationship with those we work with. We must practice a sense of radical acceptance with them.
We all have had the experience of being on amazing teams where the energy and productivity just hums with synergy. Those dynamic teams of selflessness where we see needs and just move to fill them without asking. Where no one keeps track of who did what when, where we do what is best and right for the benefit of the team.
That difference isn’t free it costs something. It costs being difference to allow people to be their whole and true selves.
But my friends it is that DIFFERENCE is what we need so badly. Because the world seems to be changing faster and more than ever. And it will be those who learn how to embrace that Difference – which will make the largest difference.
Because it is that Difference – which will prove to make all the Difference…
- I would then wrap up the speech with the idea that it is our Differences which ultimately will be the difference maker in our collective efforts. I wouldn’t be here without Beth, without Tammy, without Dr. Rubin and Dr. Chapman – those people and these relationships were my difference to be here with you. With different idea, notions and examples (some of which I will use from dialog from the audience at the event).
Post speech – it is that difference which is the difference. Just like Beth here was different, just like my work collages and our relationship is different.