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Thursday, October 27, 2005 |
Gazing into the Future
Predicting the future must be tough duty. Especially when your
ideas about tomorrow go into print. More often than not, these personal
glimpses are wrong and it's so easy to poke fun. But when you stop and
think, everyone wants to know what the future will hold. And so some
brave souls are willing to create an imaginary look ahead.
It seems that our future, at least according to some predictions, will
be filled with much more useful cell phones and sustainable fuels. I'm
not so sure about the cell phone thing. Maybe I want a GPS capability
so that I can be easily located and maybe I don't. But I do want to
travel in vehicles powered by hydrogen or solar or something that
polutes-not-at-all and doesn't cause me sticker shock at the pump. So I
hope someone gets busy and solves this fuel problem before we resort to
the horse-and-buggy era.
Of course, with great cellular phones, maybe spending time in the buggy wouldn't be all that bad.......
9:55:26 AM 
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Principle of Influence
The first time I heard the term -- principle of influence -- was 25 years ago listening to a Mike Vance
tape. Funny how Senge, Gladwell, Friedman et. al. go back to influence
so often. It's been 14 years ago or so since I first picked up
a copy of The Fifth Discipline. In the audiobook version, Senge discusses the idea of influence in building his vision of a learning organization.
Amazing how something becomes so familiar and yet, after a decade or
so, can seem so fresh. Influence is based on mutual respect,
inquiry, support. Control is the likely opposite of influence. Control --
do it because I said so -- is a substitute for influence, too often used and too ineffective. Control
is for children, and, as the parental unit for a few adult humans, I
can attest to the fact that control is a futile pursuit. It is
likely, bordering on certain, that at some point control instills fear, reinforces fear, and
causes retaliation.
Managers need to give up on the notion of control. Influence is all we
have as an effective tool. Change must be made from a Control/Fear
model to an Inquiry/Influence approach. There can be no question here.
The only thing open for discussion is HOW?.............
7:17:44 AM
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© 2005 Jim Stewart
Last Update: 10/27/05; 9:55:59 AM
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