Leading Through Transformational Times

Reflecting on my last post, Surviving in Transformational Times, it seems that an essential element for survival is the emergence of a strong leader. What makes someone a strong leader? What do they need to do? How can they support their people?

Not all leaders are created equally – there are different types and styles; each with their own strengths and challenges. According to John Gardner, “the first task of a leader is to keep hope alive,” and that’s exactly what transformational leadership does. Leaders with this style have integrity and a clear vision; they encourage, support, and inspire others (see http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newLDR_84.htm for full details).

There’s a difference between leaders and managers. Good leaders aren’t always effective managers and vice versa. According to the Mind Tools article, good leaders focus on inspiring others and providing vision (i.e., transformational leadership activities), whereas mangers focus on the details and logistics of implementing that vision (i.e., transactional leadership activities).

For helpful tips on leadership and supporting individuals see 10 Tips for Supporting People.

Swedish National Railways High Speed Trains Operation in Winter Conditions Added

The second mostly commonly asked question to me after "Will Canada Ever Have Modern Passenger Rail Service" is "How do high speed trains run in winter conditions"?

We have loaded on the High Speed Rail Canada Website under the News Section tab, and in this blog, the Swedish National Railways 2006 study titled, "High Speed Train Operation in Winter Conditions". It is an excellent paper explaining the various elements that could play a factor in operating high speed trains in the winter.

Our mandate is to educate Canadians on high speed rail and this paper certainly adds to our body of knowledge on this subject matter. Paul Langan

Movember

One of my favorite things that happened on a routine basis with my teammates at Ohio State was when they would start sentences with either the words “real talk” or the much more entertaining and hilarious phrase “on some real s**t.” By starting their sentence with one of these phrases, they are basically telling everyone, “I was just messing around with everything else I have ever said in my life. That all means nothing compared to what I’m about to say, so please give me your undivided attention because I’m going to talk about something that is more serious and more important than global warming, AIDS, and Wrestlemania combined.” What made this so funny to me was that each and every time one of my teammates led with one of those phrases, they always would inevitably follow it up by saying something that couldn’t possibly be more irrelevant. Because of this, it was common for one of them to walk into our locker room after practice, get everyone’s attention, and then say something along the lines of, “Real talk, Martin had me rollin back in the day.” Sometimes, if they really wanted to drive the point home, they’d even throw in “and that’s on my momma” for good measure. Some people just know how to eloquently present an argument.

Having said all of that, it’s time for some real talk. My favorite month of the year, Movember, starts on Monday, which means on Monday it’s time to quite literally separate the men from the boys. Those of you who have been members of the Trillion Man March for awhile surely remember Movember from last year. If you’re new to the party, though, and don’t know about Movember, check out my blog post from last year that explained everything. Here are a few important paragraphs for those of you who are too lazy to simply click on a link:

It was brought to my attention by a few members of the Trillion Man March that the month of November marks a very important time for lovers of mustaches and haters of prostate cancer. That’s because November has been dubbed “Movember” by a couple of Australians, which may initially sound like a month-long tribute to GUTS announcer, Mo Quirk, but is actually an event that was started to raise prostate cancer awareness (apparently “mo” is an Australian slang term for mustache). I thought Movember was just another event started by guys in high school who wanted an excuse to grow out their peach fuzz without upsetting their moms, but as it turns out, Movember is actually the biggest charity event in the world that is targeted exclusively for men, having raised over $47 million to date. It’s like the men’s equivalent of Race For The Cure, except instead of using your legs all you have to use are your upper lip hair follicles.

Even though one out of every six American men will get prostate cancer at some point in time, it should be noted that I can’t think of anyone close to me who has ever had the disease. I’m not trying to get you to care because prostate cancer has personally destroyed my life by inflicting the people around me. It’s not like that at all. I’m just trying to get you to care because Movember provides a great opportunity to have an excuse to grow a mustache and also provides a great opportunity to raise awareness for a good cause. You can become a better person simply by growing out your mustache. Call me crazy but I think this might be the epitome of a win-win situation.

In short, Movember is an initiative to raise awareness and money for prostate cancer research. Prostate cancer is to men what breast cancer is to women, only more people care about breast cancer because, well, breast cancer affects boobs and everybody loves boobs. Since there isn’t as much of a focus on prostate cancer in this country as there is on breast cancer, the main goal with Movember is basically to show people that a man’s prostate can be just as sexy as a nice pair of hooters. Naturally, this is done by growing mustaches.

So here’s the plan. Since statistics say that at least 500 people reading this will end up getting prostate cancer at some point in their lives, I’ve decided that the Trillion Man March needs to do its part to kick prostate cancer in the nuts and give it the fiercest powerbomb of all-time. This can be accomplished two different ways.

Most of you are either in high school/college or have recently graduated college, which is another way of saying that most of you are ridiculously broke. Shoot, there are probably some of you that have been out of school for years and are still broke because you either have spending habits like my former OSU teammate, Daequan Cook (I heard rumors that he bought 13 flat screen TVs for just his living room immediately after signing his first NBA contract), or you have more likely fallen victim to the terrible economy. This first way of helping out doesn’t apply to you, so you can stop paying attention for a second. But, for those of you who have somehow found a way to successfully pay off all those student loans that went towards countless Trapper Keepers and Lisa Frank products, this first way of helping out just might be for you. The ultimate goal with Movember is to obviously raise money for prostate cancer research, so if you are in a financially stable place, you can help make this happen by donating whatever your heart desires. One member of the TMM, Matthew, took it upon himself to make a group on the official Movember site, so if you do want to make a donation, please click on this link, fill out the information to join Matthew’s group, and donate like your life depends on it (because it very well could someday).

As for those of us who aren’t rolling in the benjamins (the cool kids still say that, right?), we get to take on prostate cancer in a much more exciting way by growing out our mustaches for an entire month (it goes without saying that it’s perfectly fine to both donate and grow a stache). I’ve already pointed out that a majority of the Trillion Man March falls into the “dudes who are broke, man” demographic (myself included), which means that a majority of you will probably be taking part in Movember just by growing your stache. And since mustache growing will be the main way the TMM participates in Movember, I’ve decided to have a contest to establish who in the TMM is the manliest man of all. The only rules are as follows:

1. You must shave your entire face (excluding eyebrows) down to the skin on October 31st. This is on an honor system. If you know you can’t grow an awesome stache, it’s ok. Just do the best you can. But whatever you do, don’t be a jealous doucher and cheat.
2. Your stache can’t connect to itself or your sideburns anywhere on your face. If this happens, you have either a goatee or a beard, which means you no longer have a stache.
3. The best mustache doesn’t necessarily mean the longest mustache. Creativity is taken into account, so doing something like this is every bit as impressive as growing a Sam Elliott stache (ok, so not really but you get what I’m saying here).
4. Send me pictures of your stache throughout the entire month of Movember and I’ll post them on the blog as we move closer to judgment day on November 30th.
5. The ultimate winner will be decided by a TMM vote and will win a case of Barbasol shaving cream for being so manly, as well as a free shirt (your choice between either CLUB TRIL or FUNDAMENTALS MONTAGE!!!) for being so awesome.

Just so you’re mentally prepared, this is what you’ll be up against:

“Who wants a mustache ride?”

Based on past experience, I know that many of you work for companies or bosses who suck and won’t let you grow out facial hair of any kind for any reason. The unfortunate reality about the world we live in is that some people just don’t get it. If the economy was better I would coerce you all to participate anyway, but getting fired seems like an awful idea right now, so I won’t give you too much trouble for not participating. I truly am sorry. Fortunately, most of the TMM is comprised of college-aged guys whose only responsibilities are to skip class and get drunk, so they can pick up the slack.

Obviously the women of the TMM also can’t take part in the mustache contest because you all can’t grow mustaches (unless, of course, you’re an elderly librarian or lunch lady). If you have your heart set on doing something for Movember, I suggest you make a pledge to yourself to only party with guys who have mustaches all month. If you’re a high school girl, refuse to give your class ring or go to the school dance with any guy who doesn’t at least have a little peach fuzz. If you’re a girl in college, take a stand and only let guys with staches do body shots off of you (that would probably feel better for you anyway – not that I’d know or anything). You get the idea.

Finally, I thought I would address something that might be giving a few of you cold feet. Some of you might be asking yourself, “How exactly does growing out my mustache for a month do anything to help prostate cancer research?” Good question. Your mustache serves as a walking advertisement to raise awareness for prostate cancer. A lot of men don’t know all that much about the disease, so half of the battle is just spreading the word. Here’s an example of how your mustache can achieve just that:

Friend: “Dude, nice mustache. You look like a pedophile that molests little kids.”

You: “A) I’m trying to raise awareness for prostate cancer by celebrating my manhood, and B) Your redundancy makes it obvious to me that you have no idea what the word ‘pedophile’ means.”

Friend: “Oh my bad, I didn’t know you worked for the grammar police. And who cares about prostate cancer? Getting rid of breast cancer is obviously much more important. Last time I checked, I’ve never gotten a pants-tent from looking at Pam Anderson’s prostates.”

You: “You are the single dumbest person I’ve ever met in my life. You should care about prostate cancer because it is the most prevalent cancer for men and affects millions of guys all over the world. It should be more important to you than breast cancer since, ya know, you’re a guy which means you actually have a chance of getting prostate cancer. Sure breast cancer research is important, but you’re never going to have to worry about getting breast cancer since dudes don’t have boobs. Well, except for Tony over there.”

(NOTE: I know that guys have breasts and can get breast cancer. Just go with me on this one.)

Tony: “Ha. Ha. Real funny. Dick. For your information, I’ve started a new diet that is actually working really well for me.”

Friend: “Oh really? What do you call it? The FATkins diet?”

You: (laughing) (high five your friend) “Good one, dude. Yeah, Tony, sitting on your ass playing Halo every day and falling asleep to anime porn every night isn’t much of a diet.”

Tony: “You guys are jerks. I’m offended and I’m leaving.”

Friend: “I would say, ‘Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out’ but chances are you actually need that to happen cause it will help you get unstuck after you get your enormous hips wedged in the doorframe.”

Tony: “I hate you both. While I’m gone, I suggest you both go die.”

You: “Tony. Got. Served.”

Friend: “Yeah, we totally served him. What a doucher. Look. He left his Halo game paused. We should go play it and ruin it for him. And maybe you can tell me more about this prostate cancer thing you were talking about earlier.”

You: “Deal.”

Real talk, Tony sucks. And that’s on my momma. __________________________________________________

After I called out the walk-on community with my last blog post, tons of walk-ons around the country emailed me to sign up for The Belt. This is very encouraging, but I still think we need more guys. So again, please email me if you are a Division I men’s basketball walk-on. Even if you aren’t eligible for The Belt, you can still help out by writing a Facebook message or something to the walk-ons for your favorite basketball team that will let them know about this awesome contest.

(I know that paragraph was copied and pasted from last time but it still applies, so shut up. Plus, I’m pretty sure it’s perfectly fine to plagiarize your own work. If it’s not, I should probably give back my college degree.) __________________________________________________

Your awesome YouTube was sent in to me by Evan T. (no, not The Villain). There’s your shout-out, Evan. And here’s your video.

Proud To Be An American But Even Prouder To Be A Buckeye,

Mark Titus

Club Trillion Founder

Learning from Diversity

On the West Coast of Canada, we are surrounded by diversity. I live in a village just an hour from Vancouver – our community is rural, much of the local work is agricultural. Some of our neighbours have lived here for generations; others have recently arrived from India, Viet Nam, Mexico, or China. There’s a Vietnamese Buddhist Monastery on the corner of our street and the first Mormon Temple in BC nearby. Along with countless Christian churches, a Sikh temple is also an important spiritual centre for many members of the community.

Sadly, however, members of each of the ethnic communities tend to live in isolation. Although children attend the same public schools, many other community activities tend to be less integrated. Of course there are a few intersections – for example, the produce market that I shop at has an extensive selection of ethnic foods from India, Mexico, and Germany. However, even most workplaces are quite homogenous – resulting in many local residents never learning to speak one of our official languages (in the West, more typically English than French).

Within the Life Strategies team, we speak and write about diversity and have developed tools to support diverse workplaces (e.g., www.embracingdiversity.ca or www.diversityatwork.ca). We teach courses on Managing Diversity, Understanding Diversity, Global/International Careers, and The Immigrant Experience and have a multicultural specialist stream in our Career Management Professional Program (http://www.lifestrategies.ca/services/courses/career-management-professional-program-cmpp.cfm). It continues to amaze me, however, that the students we attract to those courses tend to be those who themselves come from minority cultures, have immigrated to our area, or are already working with immigrant clients. It’s difficult to reach “mainstream” students...

The 4 Stages of Learning Model reminds us that we simply don’t know what we don’t know. Therefore, until we experience the benefits of diversity at a personal level, we likely won’t choose to learn more about it or advocate for more inclusive workplaces or communities. I’ve recently returned from attending the Jiva conference in India – Jiva means “life” - the photo on this blog is me arriving by auto-rickshaw on the first day of the conference. The conference was co-sponsored by the Promise Foundation in India and the International Association of Educational and Vocational Guidance. There were 442 delegates from 32 countries – many of them knew nothing about Canada, just as I humbly realized I knew very little about most of their countries.

On our return from India, we visited the World Expo in Shanghai, China, with contributions from more than 242 countries and international associations. Think about that number! Gerry and I have visited, lived, or worked in only 55 countries (and, that’s quite high compared to most people we know). In 3 days, it wasn’t possible to visit more than a few of the pavilions, but we learned much about countries and cultures that we knew little about before. As a result, we’ve been inspired to add Kazakhstan to our future travel list – their pavilion was great!

So...how can you learn from diversity? First, I encourage you to put yourself in a position of being a minority. Take opportunities to travel (and don’t stay only in Western hotels or all inclusive resorts – mingle with the locals!). If travel isn’t feasible, eat at ethnic restaurants, attend cultural events or festivals, read books (I’ve just finished Echlin’s “The Disappeared” about Cambodia), or take a course that will help you better understand the amazing gifts that diversity brings to our lives in Canada.

Value/Goal Alignment - An Important Component of Employee Engagement

Some of our recent entries have introduced factors from our model of employee engagement – Appreciation, Contribution, and Commitment. The remaining factor – Alignment – relates to the need for workers to align their values and goals with the organization.

A wide range of career development literature exists which outlines the importance of connecting personal values with organizational values. The popular Wheel framework (Amundson & Poehnell) lists values as one of eight factors to consider in career decision making. As career practitioners, we are very aware of the importance of values when it comes to career “fit.” Whether through formal standardized “tests” or informal checklists and card sorts, we encourage clients to reflect on their values and ensure their work (i.e., specific job/tasks) and/or their industry or employer of choice will share those values. Or, at least, not impede on those values to any great degree.

Alignment of personal and organizational goals is just as important. As individual workers, we set goals for our careers – from wage increases or promotions to achievement of educational goals or industry certifications. Do we ever consider, however, whether those goals make sense when aligned to what our organization is hoping to accomplish? For organizations, this notion of alignment is often called goal cascading – goals are cascaded down from leadership to management to department, to work teams or units. From an employee engagement perspective, however, it’s important to take one more step – checking in with individual employees to ensure that they each understand how their jobs align with organizational goals.

Consider your organization’s future goals, vision, or strategic direction. Is there alignment with your personal and professional goals? If not, explore any disconnect. While you may be able to influence your organizations’ goals, if you don’t find sufficient alignment it may be time to examine whether or not your personal and professional goals can be met within the context of your present workplace. Organizations benefit from engaged employees – if there isn’t alignment between you and your organization, it will be increasingly challenging to stay engaged. You may need a better understanding of your organization’s goals and direction in order to get excited and buy-in. However, if the new direction simply isn’t a good fit for you, it may be time for a gracious exit. Either option is good career management.

Inside ICE high speed train -London to Germany BBC News

Surviving in Transformational Times

Career practitioners in BC are experiencing transition, just like the clients they serve, due to changes in funding to career service centres, where many practitioners are employed. Contracts are ending and without funding renewal, many programs/businesses are shutting their doors. As such, practitioners themselves need to adapt to survive in the new framework. But adapting isn’t an easy task, and in changing times, it’s difficult to know what needs to be done and what skills are necessary to be successful.

It’s important to remember that, “change always comes bearing gifts” (Price Pritchett). For career practitioners, this transition has sparked a renewed commitment to professional development and professionalization of the field through certification (i.e., BCCCDP). It has also spurred strategic partnerships and alliances among existing organizations seeking shared contracts under the new framework.

However, more importantly, these changes have highlighted the value for career practitioners to “practice what they preach.” To be planful and open to new experiences, to engage in networking and learning opportunities, and to face change with an open heart; all concepts of Krumbotlz’s Planned Happenstance Theory, an emerging career theory practitioners use with their clients.

The forthcoming publication, Leadership Lessons for Transformational Times by Life Strategies’ Deirdre Pickerell and Roberta Neault, will engage the reader in examining leadership beliefs, experiences, and goals, as well as support leaders and managers through change, regardless of the sector.