Would your team tidy up a stadium? 🚯
Litter picking, eco communes & your team
Japanese and Senegal fans clear up the stadiums after their respective World Cup games. Japanese fans were also spotted doing this at the Rio 2014 event.
This week the internet exploded over the Japanese football fans who tidy up the stadiums after games. You can see them (complete with BYO bags) collecting all the rubbish and mucking in together to clean up.
Some further research showed that the Japanese fans see "football as a reflection of culture" so their behaviour is aligned to this.
This week I also watched the thought-provoking documentary "A Simpler Way: Crisis as Opportunity" which follows a group of people move to East Gippsland (a region in Victoria, Australia) to live in a more environmentally sustainable/minimal impact way.
The documentary covers the challenges the group go through as they live together without a lot of the conveniences and routines of their 'normal' lives.
But what does this have to do with leadership?
Both of these examples served as a reminder that most of us don't live in communities anymore. We don't have to practice social skills in order to merely survive; we've outsourced most of this to technology or negated it altogether.
Unlike the Japanese football fans, we also often don't have a link to a particularly strong culture or 'way of being' to align our behaviours to.
You only have to look at some communal office kitchens to know this community behaviour is NOT widely adopted.
So when faced with the social challenges of the workplace - one of the few places we still need to operate in 'communities' - we don't know how.
We do and say strange things. We react badly. We avoid.
This is not a call for you to take your team to live in a remote commune (although feel free), but an invitation to think of the community & culture of your team;
What behaviours define your team?
What are the 'unwritten rules' of how your team work together?
Do you understand each others motivations, aspirations and challenges?
Do members think 'team over self'?
Are individual strengths and development areas used to get the best outcome for all?
Do you share meals together?
This is also not about saccharine 'feel good' team cultures, but ones where everyone thrives with the ability to perform at their best, together.
 How would your team define their culture? Â
"We can change culture if we change behavior."
Dr Aubrey Daniels
Catch up: This week on LinkedIn
Delegate or Die - half day workshop
I know, nobody can do it as well as you can.
But you know as well as I do, that nobody can do it all (even you).
If you find yourself overworked and overwhelmed by all the things you need to do, this half-day masterclass is for you.
In this practical session you’ll learn….
• The benefits of delegation
• What’s stopping you from delegating
• What tasks you should delegate
• How to stop getting in your own way
• The key steps of delegation
You’ll bring your own examples and we’ll workshop how YOU can delegate like a boss and go back to the office with a strategy for success.
When: Thursday 9 August, 08:30 - 12:00
Where: Library at The Dock, 107 Victoria Harbour Promenade, Docklands, Melbourne, VIC
Early bird tickets are $59 (usual price $79) so get in quick – space is limited to make sure this is an intimate and practical session.
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Want to see your management or leadership challenge addressed with helpful advice and resources? Email me at steph@stephclarke.com and let me know what topics you'd like me to include in future newsletters.
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