Karl Edwards presents Working Matters

Author: Karl Edwards

  • Thought Leaders Unpacked -> The Soul of a Leader #3: Daring to Dream

    thought-leaders“While many people think of reality as the enemy of dreaming, in fact, hard-headed reality must ground dreaming.” (p. 53)

    I‘ve long struggled with the tendency of dreamers to begin their process with tidy utopian ideals disconnected from the complex and messy realities of human frailty and inevitable systemic dysfunctions.

    The approach, (while the bread and butter of political campaigns,) is naive. Noble maybe some of the time… naive all of the time.

    The implementation of utopian ideals cannot help but be as messy and broken as the people and systems that embody them.

    While other thinkers have observed the importance of beginning the dream with a frank assessment of one’s presenting realities (e.g. Peter Senge, The Fifth Discipline), core to the Christian worldview is the possibility that such honesty need never be the end of the story. Problems are never a death sentence, fate, or doom. They are simply facts.

    As mere facts, they can be brought out into the light and examined. Turned over and over and looked at from a variety of angles. Underlying causes can be explored. Complicating circumstances, personalities, and effects can be examined.

    No matter how disastrous, disappointing or desperate the results of our (more…)

  • Loving Monday: Wind Down, Wind Up

    loving_mondaySummer comes to its official end with the commencement of the new school year.

    The season of swim lessons, out of town guests, and vacations (even if you didn’t take one) fades as a new cycle of plans, projects and intensity comes into focus.

    This cycle is a good thing. It doesn’t work to be intense all of the time. Energies need to be renewed, refreshed and restored. The relaxed space makes room for new ideas to germinate and hidden stale patterns to become visible.

    Alas, though, it is time to wind down from this season of rest and overlapping vacation schedules.

    Using the calendar to guide our own rhythms of planning, intensity and reflection can be of enormous help. Instead of re-creating the wheel every year, the calendar provides a pre-made structure around which to work. It provides an almost go-with-the-flow component the hard work of strategy, planning and focused effort.

    With school back in session, it is time to wind up. Gather the troops, set priorities, agree on deadlines and standards, and push forward with everything you all have in the way of passion and skill.

    It’s Monday. It’s the Fall season. It’s time to wind down from one season and wind up for the next.

    Loving Monday is a weekly column designed to encourage us to step into our weeks with an intention to show up authentically, engage fully, and choose to make it a good week for ourselves. Explore past columns here.

  • Quote to Consider: Contentment’s Shrewd Secret

    quote-to-consider“True contentment is the power of getting of any situation all that there is in it.”

    G. K. Chesterton

  • Listen In -> Confrontation for Those Who Don’t Like Confrontation #3: Unacceptable Work

    Let’s face it, even on the best of teams there are times when someone’s work is unacceptable.

    It’s going to happen. It’s a workplace reality. All the training in the world cannot eliminate these instances of below-standard quality, timeliness, accuracy, thoroughness or judgment.

    In this week’s conversation, Claudia and I discuss how to talk calmly about (i.e. confront) unacceptable work.

    We don’t have to act like parents scolding a wayward child. We don’t have to act like betrayed slavemasters punishing those beneath us. We don’t have to act like apologetic nursemaids afraid to create a new problem where we are trying to fix a current one.

    When the normal and the ordinary happen, like unacceptable work, then a straightforward and work-focused conversation needs to take place.

    Listen in.

    Just now joining the conversation? Catch up on the entire series here.

  • Thought Leaders Unpacked -> The Soul of a Leader #2: Finding Partners

    thought-leadersThis chapter was a challenge for me.

    At first blush, I don’t seem to do partnership very well.

    It’s not that I have anything against partnership, sharing or working with others. In fact, I’m a big believer in the complementary nature of people’s interests, skills and working styles.

    But the fact remains that partnership has proven elusive.

    Benefiel offers three phases of extending one’s hand in partnership.

    1. Speaking the heart’s truth
    2. Seeking resonance
    3. Inviting partnership

    Speaking, seeking, and inviting.

    What though, if one (me) is running into bumps in the course of the speaking, seeking and inviting?

    What if one is getting blank stares when speaking one’s heart truth?

    It could be an issue of vocabulary. New ideas are sometimes outside of people’s perceptions. Bridging vocabulary needs to be found before understanding can happen.

    What if one is getting only polite nods when seeking resonance? How do we locate those who will appreciate, understand and get as excited as we are about our idea?

    For some of us this is a real conundrum. It’s wearying to tell the story so many times with so little to show for it. How do I keep my spirits in the game? What is my learning edge here?

    And finally, what if one’s ideas are new enough that the search for partners is more like looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack? Not all new ideas are good ideas. And yet one cannot simply give up on a trajectory that includes one’s heart truth!

    I have more personal reflection to do.

    It seems so straightforward and simple when reading Benefiel’s articulate descriptions. And maybe it is. Maybe I simply need to reconnect with the power of my heart’s truth, muster the courage to tell my story again and again and again, and risk working with those who share some if not all of my vision and passion.

    What is your learning edge when thinking about finding partners? What was your main take-away from this chapter?

    Each week I post my reflections from one chapter of The Soul of a Leader by Margaret Benefiel. My reflections are my own and are intended to generate conversation, catalyze additional thinking and encourage mutual learning.
    If you are just joining the discussion now, welcome! Catch up on the entire series here.

  • Quote to Consider: What is Peace the Presence Of?

    quote-to-consider“Peace is not an absence of war, it is a virtue, a state of mind, a disposition for benevolence, confidence, justice.”

    Benedict Spinoza

  • Listen In -> Confrontation for Those Who Don’t Like Confrontation #2: Inappropriate Behavior

    Awkward.

    Offensive.

    Destructive.

    Some people seem to live as if they’re the only ones on the planet.

    They are oblivious or insensitive to how their behavior affects others.

    How then do we communicate that their actions or words hurt, offend or harm us?

    Suffice to say that waiting until you blow up in an explosion of rage is not very effective.

    What is appropriate when confronting the inappropriate?

    This week Claudia discuss confronting inappropriate behavior in the workplace.

    Listen in.

    Just now joining the conversation? Catch up on the entire series here.

  • Question of the Week #18

    Whose day would be transformed if you paused in your busy schedule and expressed interest in their work?

    The Question of the Week is offered to increase awareness of one’s personal leadership practices and encourage experimentation with creative alternatives.

  • Quote to Consider: Turning Obstacles Into Propellers

    quote-to-consider“He is the best sailor who can steer within fewest points of the wind, and exact a motive power out of the greatest obstacles.”

    Henry David Thoreau

  • Thought Leaders Unpacked -> The Soul of a Leader #1: Following the Heart

    thought-leaders“What possible good can result from venturing into the unknown?”

    Margaret Benefiel thus thrusts us into the crux of the leader’s conundrum. We do not all traverse paths paved and mapped by others. Increasingly in today’s ever-changing world, we find ourselves in new territory, exploring not yet imagined possibilities.

    If knowing or controlling the outcome is a prerequisite for leadership, then we are trapped before even beginning. How does anything new ever break in? If the end has to be determined and proven before we begin, there is no means for experimenting with the new, strange or different.

    Benefiel’s bold assertion is that the heart can be trusted as a leader’s compass in charting strange territory, discerning the need for change, and trying entirely new approaches.

    Anyone reading here probably already believes that leadership is not a mechanical catalogue of techniques that one masters and implements with precise and reliable effect.

    What if leadership derives its very nature, form and power from the particular individual who enacts it? What if leadership were an embodied dynamic?

    Suddenly the importance of what sort of person this leader is becomes significant. The quality of one’s character limits or enhances one’s capacity (more…)