Wise Wednesdays

It’s Wise Wednesdays! What do Nicki Minaj, Rihanna and an Oxbridge medic have in common?  If you've often felt out of place, you may have the explorer gene and like to push boundaries... A song by Nicki Minaj and Rihanna caught my attention recently (Fly). I don’t listen much to pop music, nor follow the media; but sometimes a melody or line resonates so strongly that it’s almost hypnotic. And importantly, it becomes a source of inspiration sustaining motivation and courage. What's your theme tune of the moment? I try and rap like Nicki Minaj about this in the video below. I try and rap like Nicki Minaj about this in the video below. ​ ​ Visually, the video juxtaposes the feminine, the garish and strange with desolate destruction and this gives the last few seconds of the video their power. The resolution comes with the return of mother nature... In terms of the lyrics, important concepts related to courage are sung: living with uncertainty; fearing the unf...

In today’s labour market, you are effectively a company of one.  You don’t have to be an entrepreneur to think like one and organisations are encouraging employees to be entrepreneurial. In fact, the NHS has just launched a  Clinical Entrepreneur training programme . Indeed, talk is growing in the corporate sector around the concept of self-management/distributed leadership/holacracy to free up the energy of employees and encourage innovation – see this  Harvard Business Review article . Innovation aside, the era of lifelong jobs and secure pensions is slowly but surely coming to a close. If you want to have a fulfilling career you now have to find your own way in the market place of jobs and turn uncertainty into opportunity – just like an entrepreneur. Daniel Priestley, in his book The Entrepreneur Revolution, makes a great case for why this is the way forward in terms of conscious leadership through business that will improve our global econ...

How do you tend to deal with uncertainty? Most of us hate it when our world gets shaken by an event. Yet, we appreciate it when an unpleasant situation suddenly goes away. Both scenarios involve uncertainty but the former, we call “a problem”, and the latter, “a nice surprise”.    What’s your risk appetite?... TEST YOURSELF:  For example, if you want a particular type of job, which approach do you take? (A) Wait until you have to apply for a new job and, apply for jobs that you are likely to get. Perhaps you mentally compute what the odds of getting it are (e.g. you know how many other candidates there are and investigate their profiles) or even wait until you know you have the best chance of getting it.   (B) Trust that the job is out there and apply as soon as you know that this is definitely what you want to do. You build up all the skills you need as fast as you can. You don’t care what the odds are so much; you trust that it will work out. ...

Career crises are becoming the norm. They still remain stigmatised; yet, a  growing literature  is beginning to document this phenomenon objectively, and its relationship to mid-life crises in general. If you are between 30 and 40 years, you have a 1 in 2 chance of being in a mid-life crisis right now! (according to  one UK study ) Career crises also seem to take place earlier in life ( 35 is the new 50 ). Of course, this doesn’t help in finding the answers to the deep questions that these crises elicit. However, the research findings provide some perspective. Read on or take a look at the short video for a few quick insights and reassurance. And now the good news! Career crises appear to resolve of their own accord   after a few years (once we hit our 50s). If you don’t want to wait that long, you can be mindful of the process and bear these three things in mind: 1) You’re not alone:  As the statistics above show,...

How do we know when we are overworking and when we are being dedicated? Things would be simple with set working hours that we respected or if we just relied on being accountable to family (loved ones give direct feedback when they feel neglected). But what if you don’t have an external accountability mechanism or wish to use something more internally based? Is it possible to have an internal body clock that tells you when it is time to work and when it is time to rest? Do this little test to find out if you're more likely to be a workaholic (watch video). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mq1NwKfFcOc Habits are hard to break for positive and negative reasons In the past, human activity was mainly agricultural and governed by seasonality. Even today, our creativity is cyclical with phases of rest being integral to the process (if fact, if you procrastinate, you should ask yourself whether you are disrespecting your creativity cycle). But this is a topic for a...