Mistakes, Spirals of Doubt, and Perspective (5-2-18)

This blog has always been part diary, part therapy, and part random thoughts.  I wanted to share all of those with you in this entry about mistakes, spirals of doubt, and gaining perspective.

I woke up yesterday and sent my normal Wednesday email on a Tuesday out of dumb early morning confusion.  It was a simple mistake, sending an email at the wrong time.  I’m sure we’ve all done something like that.  Later on that morning in a meeting I met a new teammate and called them by the wrong name.  It was a simple mistake, something we’ve all probably done at one point in our life.

You’d assume that I’d just shake off two stupid mistakes and move on with my life, but I couldn’t.  I have no idea why, but this was the trigger that allowed all the voices of doubt to creep in.  It’s like I was able to go from competent person to a complete incompetent hot mess in 3 seconds.    Before I knew what was happening I was spending the day analyzing, over analyzing, and revisiting everything I had done wrong or maybe could have done wrong over the past few months.  I thought about the meeting two weeks ago when someone asked me a question and I didn’t know the answer off the top of my head and how I had to look up the answer in the meeting and how that just showcases I’m not smart.  I thought about the survey I’m building and how I’ve solicited feedback, and how if I was good I should have been able to see the weak points in the survey and corrected them preemptively without needing the feedback.  I thought about the market research I’m running and how it wasn’t playing out the way I thought it was, and how that suggested I must not be very good at my job if I can’t predict these things.  I became overly concerned with the questions I was being asked and whether or not I was doing good enough answering them.  I just couldn’t make things click right.  I replayed every mistake I’ve made in the past two months over and over and over again. 

You could be wondering where I’m going with this.  I’d like to take this in a few directions. 

  1. Maybe this whole experience is just something my crazy brain does, but if you’ve ever felt this way know you aren’t alone. 
  2. It’s amazing how I gave two small insignificant mistakes I made on a Tuesday morning so much power over how I felt for the rest of the day. 
  3. In order to pull out of the tailspin I had to pull my head up and get perspective.  In the grand scheme of things, do any of the things I mentioned in the previous paragraph matter?  No.  People got my blog a day early and still sent cool responses.  If anything that’s an early win.  I forgot a guy’s name, and he’ll probably forget about that by tomorrow.  I didn’t know the answer when I was asked something a couple of weeks ago, and if that’s the biggest screw up I make on the job that would make me the best employee my company has ever seen (In all reality, could I be the best looking employee we have?  Maybe.  Most talented, probably not).  The survey I’m working on requires a lot of great brains, so how arrogant would it be of me to think I’m smarter than an entire team of awesome people?  The market research I’m running isn’t playing out to my predictions, and that’s why we do research to actually test a hypothesis.  If I was 100% sure I was right, we wouldn’t be doing research. 

All in all, two stupid mistakes made on a Tuesday were a good reminder that I’m human and that as a human I can sometimes get way too overworked about insignificant things.  It was a lesson in perspective without feeling real pain, so I’ll take it.

The challenge: If you feel yourself falling into the downward spiral of self-doubt, how will you find perspective to reset and move forward?

#Embrymistakes=bonusmessage                #SometimesI’mahotmess              #Justkeepingitreal              

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Prioritization and Trade-Offs (5-30-18)

This is the last in the series about prioritization.  We began by thinking about oil changes and prioritizing taking care of ourselves.  Then, we reflected on what we truly value, because that is the only way we can prioritize things.  Last week I shared what I’ve learned about prioritization from market research.  This week we will think about prioritization and trade-offs.  Once again, special shout out to Kathleen Pearson for being the inspiration behind this series.

Let’s pretend for a moment that you were planning a house party for about 10 people.  You have a budget of $100.  Ideally, you want to have invitations, food, drinks, party favors, and decorations.  Would you dedicate $20 to each thing I just listed?  Probably not.  It wouldn’t make any sense for you to treat each of the 5 things like they were completely equal when they have different values.  Depending on who you are and how you value those things, you would split up your money accordingly.  As you spent your money you’d continue to weigh the trade-offs.  As an example, every dollar spent on beverages is a dollar you can’t spend on something else.  If the party was for my friends, I could spend most of my money on beverages and food, and it would be an awesome party.  If the party was for my daughter’s birthday, I would allocate the money differently, and probably spend more on decorations and party favors.

You probably see where this is going.  We face the above situation in work all the time.  Instead of planning a party we are trying to achieve a business objective.  Instead of $100 dollars we have finite resources.  Instead of food, drinks, etc. we have projects, tactics, etc. to invest in.  Unlike the house party situation, I feel we often fall into the trap of trying to do everything at work.  As I mentioned last week, I’ve fallen into this trap because I’ve tried to impress people.  Sometimes, I also fall into this trap, because I don’t think through the trade-offs we can make.

Usually, there are three main things you trade-off: speed, quality, and cost (time and/or money).  It’s extremely rare to be able to have all three.  If you have something fast, it’s usually going to be expensive or it’s not going to be perfect quality.  If you have something of perfect quality it’s either going to take a long time to create and/or it will cost a lot.  I know that we like to pretend that the world doesn’t work this way, but it does.  We have to get comfortable that we live in a world of restrictions and as we face these trade-offs we need to do a better job of understanding what we are willing to sacrifice.  For example, I know people always want an A+ on quality, but are there times where a B is acceptable?  If it is, we can probably move faster and be cheaper.  Bottom line, the better I understand the trade-offs I’m making, the more equipped I am to make better prioritization decisions.

The challenge: Do you understand the trade-offs you’re making?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Chess and Leveraging Strengths (5-1-18)

This will be the last in the series inspired by board games.  We started with Checkers and making sacrifices, moved to Battleship and leveraging our knowledge, explored Chutes and Ladders and how we are playing on different boards, and last week was about Connect 4 and searching for connections.  This week, I’d like us to think about chess and leveraging the strengths of the various chess pieces. 

In case you’ve never played chess, the objective is to trap the opponent’s king in what is called checkmate.  Each side has 16 pieces consisting of 8 pawns, 2 rooks, 2 knights, 2 bishops, 1 queen, and 1 king.  For example, a bishop moves diagonally, while a knight moves in an L shape, jumping over pieces.  All the pieces are different, and they all have value.  If you want to be successful in chess you need to understand how the pieces move, so you can leverage their strengths. 

You’re probably already seeing some of the connections already.  There are all kinds of people in our lives and on our teams, and each of these individuals is gifted in different ways.  If we want to capture the king and achieve our goal, we need to understand the players we have around us and leverage their strengths.   To continue with the chess analogy, it doesn’t make sense to make everyone move diagonally like bishops.  Maybe some people are knights, who use their knack for maneuvering to get around problems.  Maybe some are pawns, who are always willing to be the first to step out front and plow the way forward.  Maybe some are queens with the vision to move across the entire board.  Think about yourself for a moment.  How often have you been on teams where your context, experiences, skills, etc. have truly been leveraged?  What was that like?  I’ve been on some teams where I feel my uniqueness was valued and it made me feel incredible and as a result my work was great.  I’ve also experienced the opposite and that was pretty crummy. 

As we lead and work on teams, it’s up to us to figure out what others bring to the table and how we can help them be in a position to best leverage those strengths.  Think of some of the people you work with.  What do they bring that you can leverage to make you and the team better?  Maybe it’s a skill they have, work experience, life experience, a point of view, etc.  Do they know you value that in them?  What are you doing to leverage this magic? (Seriously, challenge yourself to come up with a very tactical answer.  If we’re being real with each other, if we can’t come up with a solid answer in like 5 seconds about what we are specifically doing to unleash the skills we all bring, we probably aren’t doing good enough in that area.)

The challenge: How are you helping people unleash and leverage their context, experiences, skills, etc.?   

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Connect 4 and Making Human Connections (4-25-18)

Last week was about Chutes and Ladders and recognizing that we all play on different boards.  This week we are going to reflect on Connect 4 and searching for connections.

In case you’ve never played Connect 4, it’s kind of like Tic-Tac-Toe.  The goal is to get 4 in a row.  In order to do this, you have to look for connections.  In this game, things can connect vertically, horizontally, and diagonally.  Alice recently received this game for her 6th birthday, and as she started playing she initially didn’t ever look for connections diagonally.  Instead, she just focused on horizontal connections, and didn’t look further than this.  This led to her missing opportunities.  Over time, she’s learned to do a better job of looking for all kinds of different connections.

You might be wondering what this has to do with anything.  I think that life is often like a long game of Connect 4, where one of the goals is to connect with other people.  In Connect 4, you might make connections vertically, horizontally, or diagonally.  I bring all of the above up, because it is our responsibility to always look for ways to connect with each other. 

When it comes to connecting, there are some people I connect with faster than others.  These are usually the people who most closely resemble me and where I am in life.  While this is true, this doesn’t mean I should give up on connecting with other folks.  What this means is I might have to look and work harder to find connections.  Much like Alice, instead of only looking for horizontal connections I need to expand my thinking to find the diagonal, vertical, and other connections that exist.  We are all people, so at a foundational level that’s a powerful enough connection to at least getting started.  On top of all being human, as people we are all multi-dimensional.  For example, maybe we connect, because we work for Lilly.  Maybe we connect, because we are both parents.  Maybe we connect, because we are both nerds, love food, enjoy writing, watch similar movies, are both the oldest in our families, have been on awkward dates, love music, worked in a family business, have been through some similar struggles, etc.   I firmly believe that if we dig long enough, we can find a dimension we can connect on, and once we connect then the magic happens.

Something to ponder- I’m sure many of you have heard about what happened with two African American men who were wrongfully arrested for hanging out in Starbucks waiting for someone.  You can click HERE if you haven’t heard their story.  They were arrested, because a manager called the police to remove them.  I’ve sat in Starbucks and other establishments waiting for friends before and never had issues.  I can’t think of any of my white friends ever having issues.  I talked about this with a few colleagues last week, and I view this as a lack of connectedness problem.  I believe the manager called the police, because she saw these men as others and outsides, which to me suggests that she didn’t see connections with them.  I wonder if she would have stopped first to think of how she might be connected to these men, would she have felt the need to call the police? 

The challenge: Are you searching for all the ways you can connect?  Are you letting things get in the way of seeing how you connect with others?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Chutes, Ladders, and Different Lives (4-18-18)

Last week we thought about leveraging knowledge and Battleship.  This week we are going to reflect on the different lives we lead by thinking about Chutes (slides) and Ladders.  Chutes and Ladders is a game to see who can get to the final square first.  As you move around the board you’ll land on squares with ladders or chutes on them.  Ladders are like shortcuts that help you advance.  Chutes are the anti-shortcut that cause you to fall back spaces.

Let’s pretend you and I were going to play the game with a twist.  Let’s pretend you and I played the same game, just on different boards.  We’d still use the spinner and follow all of the same rules.  The only difference is that you’d play on one board and I’d play on another.  If this was the case, what would be the first thing you’d wonder about?  I’m assuming you’d want to know if the boards are the same.  I bet you’d be curious to see if my board had more chutes or more ladders than you.

You might be wondering where this is going.  I’d say that life is a lot like a game of Chutes and Ladders, where we are all playing on different boards.  Some boards have more ladders than others and maybe even ladders that are better shortcuts.  Some boards have more chutes than others and maybe even chutes that make people fall further.  There is no guarantee of success in this game (life).  Just because a board has more ladders, it doesn’t guarantee success.  Also, just because a board has more chutes, it doesn’t guarantee failure.  At the same time, we can acknowledge that your board shapes your life and we can acknowledge that the more ladders you have the greater likelihood you have for success.  In the game example above I had us imagine playing on different boards.  What does your board(life) look like?  What ladders do you have?  What chutes do you have?  Think about the people around you.  How is your board similar to theirs?  How is your board different?  How does your board impact the way you live and experience life?

I’m a straight white male, married with kids, middle class, American, from a small town, fairly intelligent, some athleticism, average looks, relatively healthy, in a job where I make enough money that I don’t have to spend my time being anxious about money, from a home filled with love where my parents have been married for over 30 years.  If I’m being honest with myself, those are a lot of ladders in my favor.  It’s really tempting and really easy for me to look at other people and say, “They could easily be in my place if they only do X, Y, and Z.”  The fact is it’s not that straight forward or simple.  Yes, I work hard and have made a lot of the right choices in life, but I can’t deny that those ladders (many I don’t have control over) have helped me and will continue to help me.  I can’t deny that some people have chutes that will never show up on my board.  Does your hard work and the choices you make impact you?  Yes.  At the same time, your life’s chutes and ladders impact you too.  As I reflect on my ladders and my experiences I think of the wisdom a friend once shared, “Don’t feel guilty about your experience.  Just understand that is YOUR experience and not everyone lives the same way.”  The more I can do this, the more I can understand the people around me, and the better human/friend/teammate I can be for them.

The challenge: Do you understand what your board looks like and how it shapes you?  Are you taking the time to understand and appreciate other people’s boards and how they shape them?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Battleship, Taking Shots, and Leveraging Existing Knowledge (4-11-18)

Last week we kicked off a series inspired by board games with the classic game of checkers and making sacrifices.  This week is about leveraging knowledge as we reflect on Battleship and taking shots. 

When I was a little kid I played more than my fair share of Battleship.  In case you haven’t played, it’s a two player game where your objective is to sink all of your opponent’s ships.  There are two boards.  You can see your board, but you can’t see your opponent’s board.  Each board has a grid of letters on the left side and numbers on the top.  You would call out a letter and number combination like B1.  Your opponent would tell you if you missed or if you hit their ship.  If you missed, then you knew you had to try another area.  If you hit the ship, you knew that you needed to take shots in the nearby surrounding area.  It might take you another shot or two to know exactly where the ship is, but you wouldn’t have to start over.  You could leverage the knowledge you had and keep firing shots until the ship sank.

So how exactly does this connect with work?  In some ways work (especially marketing) is like a game of Battleship.  Essentially, you have a board and you are calling out shots (launching some kind of customer solution) and hoping that they hit (fulfill the need of a customer).  In the very beginning you might be playing on a completely unknown board, like if you were entering a new disease state.  However, we are usually playing on boards that we already know a lot about.  Often, we are playing in situations where we can leverage 3rd party data, previous learnings, and our own tribal knowledge as a starting point before launching a “shot”.  In many situations we have already had a “hit” and need to build off of that instead of blindly searching for new ships to hit.

The question is how often do we search for this knowledge and leverage it before blindly launching solutions?  Have you ever been in a situation where you’ve said, “Why are we reinventing everything?  We already know X and Y, so why aren’t we starting there?”  Have you ever been in a situation where you’ve heard someone say, “That was a miss a few years ago, so why are we revisiting it now?”  I know that I’ve asked those things, and I’ve also been the one who has tried to reinvent the wheel.  It’s easy to get caught up in the feeling that everything you do should be novel and amazing in order for it to be valuable and recognized.  At the same time, starting from scratch isn’t very efficient.  You know when to go explore vast new areas and when to leverage the knowledge you already have.

The challenge: Are you blindly launching shots or are you leveraging the knowledge that exists to be more efficient?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Checkers, Jumps, and Sacrifices (4-1-18)

This week I’d like to start a series inspired by board games.  Hopefully it doesn’t leave you bored (<-see what I did there?).  We’ll begin by thinking about checkers, jumps, trade-offs, and making sacrifices.

Recently, I taught Alice, who turned 6 yesterday, how to play checkers.  It’s a great game, because it has strategy and it’s still fairly simple to play.  In case you’ve never played, the objective is to capture all of the other team’s pieces.  Essentially, when an opponent’s piece is in front of your piece you make your piece jump over it, and you remove the opponent’s piece from the board.  When Alice plays, she loves jumping other pieces, but she HATES having her pieces jumped.  She’ll do everything in her power to avoid being jumped, which often leads to her losing games.  She loses games, because sometimes the best move on the board is to sacrifice one of her own pieces in order to set herself up in a more powerful position.  Slowly, she is learning that sometimes the best move is a sacrifice.  Sometimes the best move to make is to allow me to jump one of her pieces, so she can do a double jump and take away two of mine.

You might be wondering where this is going.  I would argue that life and work are games of strategy.  They are games of moves and countermoves, games about anticipating things and reacting.  Much like Alice, it’s easy to become obsessed with jumping, constant activity, conquering, and going after everything that looks like an opportunity.  However, sometimes, it doesn’t make sense to do that.  Do you ever run yourself ragged trying to make every “jump” only to realize it’s left you in a weaker position?  I know I have.  Over time I’ve learned that sometimes I need to be willing to give certain things up.  Over time, I’ve come to accept that sometimes I need to sacrifice something in order to be in the strongest position.

Now if we look at work, think about marketing as an example.  Marketing is a game of strategic trade-offs.  Working in research, I have access to reports and things that reveal all kinds of weaknesses and opportunities at any given moment.  Essentially, there are always tons of jumps we could make.  However, if you try to make every jump you lose.  Instead, you have to sacrifice some things.  Sometimes, you have to allow your competitors to have certain things, so you can stay focused on your strengths.  Sometimes you have to refrain from spending time, energy, and effort in one area, so you can focus all of those things in a another area that will help you be victorious.

The challenge: Are you always going after every opportunity or are you intentionally making trade-offs?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Emotions, Intentions, and Impact (3-28-18)

This will be the last in a series about emotions.  We started by thinking about losing vs. finding emotions and our real selves.  Then we thought about channeling emotions.  Last week was about emotionally charged conversations and being careful vs. ending the conversation.  This week is about emotions, intentions, AND impact.  

Imagine that Steve is standing in the hallway.  Bob is walking in Steve’s direction.  All you can see of Bob is his back.  It looks like Bob has tripped and as he stumbles forward he hits Steve in the face.  Steve instantly has a big bruise and yells out in pain.  If I made you tell me right now, WHAT would you tell me happened and WHY would you say it happened?  I can tell you for sure that Steve has been hit in the face and that he is in pain, but that’s all I really know.  After that, we can’t be 100% sure of what happened. 

The answers to what happened and why it happened won’t eliminate Steve’s pain.  Steve is feeling pain, and I can’t take that away from him.  Steve’s pain still matters whether it was an accident or on purpose.  However, understanding what happened and why it happened is important, because it will dictate the course of action moving forward.  If it was a pure accident, Bob apologizes and then Bob and Steve probably move on.  If Bob hit Steve on purpose, Bob may or may not offer a fake apology and the relationship will be damaged.

So what does this have to do with work and emotions?  I feel for the longest time we have been told that when it comes to harming others through words or actions that we should focus on intent VERSUS impact.  Instead, I think we need to consider intent AND impact.  The nuance sounds subtle, but it makes a huge difference.  When we talk about intent versus impact we can often explain away things, like, “Suzy didn’t mean any harm when she said that.  You should just forgive.”  When we look at intent versus impact, it’s like we try to explain away pain as if it doesn’t happen as long as the person had good intentions.  The fact is whether the person has good intentions or bad intentions, the pain is still real.  The pain is still hurtful.  The pain still matters.  Intentions can’t take the pain away.  Intentions can only impact what the next steps are.  If I hurt you and you believe it was unintentional, we’re probably more likely to find a way to talk through it and improve our relationship.  If I hurt you and you believe it was intentional, then you are probably less likely to want to talk to me about anything.

I’m guessing we are all Bob from time to time, I know I am.  I sometimes make mistakes, trip, and say or do things that are unintentionally harmful.  These things are especially likely to happen when I’m brave enough to “leave the oven on” and tread into emotionally charged conversations.  When I do make mistakes, I need to take on the responsibility of apologizing and doing what I can to help heal the relationship.  I am also Steve sometimes.  I get hit in the face by someone/something and feel hurt/angry/upset.  In those moments, my first instinct is to feel anger and ASSUME THE WORST of the other person.  Then, I realize I need to take a step back, because the movie playing in my head might be the truth or it might not be the truth. 

The challenge: What assumptions are you making about people’s motivations and intentions?  Can we seek to understand the situation before passing judgment? (I don’t always do this part as well as I should.  I hope you are better than me.) 

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Emotionally Charged Conversations and Making Lasagna (3-21-18)

Last week was about channeling emotions.  This week we are going to reflect on emotionally charged conversations and using an oven.  Let’s pretend that you and I were baking lasagna.  You put the lasagna in the oven, and I instantly turn the oven off.  I explain that the oven is hot and can burn you or maybe we’ll burn the lasagna.  While this is true, you’re confused and you say, “But we have to bake the lasagna.”  You turn the oven on, then I promptly turn it off.  Finally you say, “Andrew, you can’t bake the lasagna without any heat.”  I say, “You’re right.  The oven does get really hot though, so let’s make sure we are careful when we’re dealing with it.”  After I say this, I grab some heating pads and oven mitts for us to use.

You’re probably wondering where this is going.  In our company (and I’d argue in our society) we are at this turning point where we are talking about building culture more than we ever have before.  Much like baking lasagna, we are combining a lot of different people, thought processes, etc., and we are having conversations now that are new to a lot of us.  These conversations can be scary and awkward.  The conversation is the hot oven.  The hot oven is required to bake the food, but at the same time it can burn us or the lasagna (our relationships).  As we continue to have these difficult conversations, it’s tempting to turn off the oven (stop the conversation) to be safe from the heat (the tension, nervousness, etc.), but the fact is we need the heat.  Without the heat, we will never finish baking.  Instead of stopping these conversations, we need to think about how we can have them in a careful and attentive way.  Instead of oven mitts, we could use love and care.

Embry confession aka my flaws.  When I first started reflecting on this topic I said, “I never shy away from talking about stuff.  I never stop the conversation,” but then I realized I was lying to myself.  I’ve shut things down before and still do from time to time.  Sometimes I don’t even realize I’m doing it.  Here are 5 ways in which I’ve messed stuff up and continue to mess stuff up.   

  1. I’ve fallen into the trap that my point of view is the only one, so I’ve shut down opposing points of view by not really listening. 
  2. I sometimes view people challenging my views as attacks, which has led me to becoming defensive and turning a conversation into a battle.
  3. I’ve fallen into the trap of saying, “I already know them and their narrative,” so I’ve closed myself off to what others have said.
  4. I’ve been worried that something might be taboo to talk about, so rather than talk through it to find understanding, I stopped to avoid any potential awkwardness.
  5. I’ve been afraid to admit my shortcomings.  I don’t like to think of myself as racist, sexist, etc. so when people have talked about ways in which the dominant culture I’m part of can be that way, I’ve been quick to say, “Well, not me.”  When people have mentioned things I’ve legit done, I’ve been so quick to make excuses, quickly shutting down any real chance of connecting. 

All of the examples above are things I’ve done that have prematurely stopped important conversations from occurring.  Be honest with yourself.  Do you ever do any of those above things?  Over time I continue to learn that while I might be nervous or anxious or the conversation is filled with tension, the answer isn’t to turn off the oven.  The answer is to proceed with caution, using care and love, while understanding there’s always the chance I could get burned.  There’s always the chance I could make a mistake and hurt others.  It’s messy and complicated, but that’s the price you pay when you are trying to make something amazing.

The challenge: Are you turning off the oven or are you baking carefully?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Emotions and Building a Predictable Culture (3-14-18)

Last week we reflected on controlling vs. channeling emotions.  This week I was us to think about emotions, culture, and predictability.  This week’s blog is inspired by comments made last week by Nils Hartmann (Senior Director Global Diabetes).

For those of you who don’t know, I have two little girls Alice (almost 6) and Violet (4).  In a world full of chaos and change, I feel it’s my job to ensure home is predictable and dependable in certain ways.  For example, it’s important to me as their dad that they always know without question that I love them.  It’s something they should be able to count on day in and day out.  Even when they break stuff in the house, argue with each other, do something stupid that gets them hurt, get on my last nerve, etc. I love them.  My desire to create predictability for them isn’t about removing all potential pain or heartache in their life.  Pain, heartache, and failure will come and they’ll need to experience those things.  My desire to create a predictable and stable environment is about ensuring that they know that whatever happens, I’m here for them.  It’s important for me as a dad for them to know that I care, because that becomes the foundation we can build our relationship on. 

You might be wondering where this is going.  The above story has parallels to a conversation I had last week about building culture with the Trulicity team.  During the conversation, we started by talking about what culture is and eventually we moved on to talk about why culture is important.  This is when Nils jumped in and said something along the lines of, “If you have a good culture it creates predictability and that can be a good thing.”  I had never thought about it like that before.  Nils expanded on this thought by explaining how the predictability comes from a culture of mutual caring and respect.  It’s when you know that the person sitting across from you has your best interest in mind when they work with you.  It’s knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt that the people around you care for you.  If you know these things with certainty, then this gives you a level of safety and comfort you don’t have otherwise.  If you have that safety and comfort, you can be freer to be you and do you.

As I reflected further, I realized that as a parent I’m in charge of the culture that I create at home.  As the opening story in this week’s blog suggests, I’m trying to create an environment of predictability and stability, so my girls can be themselves and grow up to be kick ass women.  I create this environment by consistently SHOWING that I care in small and big ways.  After realizing that I do this at home, I started to ask myself if I’m consistently creating an environment of predictability and stability at work, where people can be themselves and “grow up” to do kick ass things.  I do some things well at work, but I know I can always be better.  What about you?

The challenge: What are you doing to create a culture that is “predictable”?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry