Achieving a goal, may not be the goal
After a star-filled sky helped me find perspective at the end 2020, I turned to philosophy for some more practical advice with which to stride into 2021. I read, and was enthused at the stoic tradition, and laid those books down with a single idea that kept looping in my thoughts, ‘It’s worth reducing my […]
Was 2020 actually so different to 2019?
As 2020 was peaking over the horizon with sun-like hope, I asked my colleagues to share their reflections of 2019 and their hopes for 2020. Of course this year has been unprecedented, but re-reading these 11 months later has made me think that maybe 2020 wasn’t as much of a u-turn, but possibly just an […]
Writing might save your 2021!
Writing is my form of therapy. It’s not a chore, nor a requirement. In most cases I write with no audience or desired recipient of a message in mind. I suppose I could keep it all to myself (and I often do) but knowing that a reflection, muse or rant may be read by an […]
Re-treading Fear with Courage in 2020
The sky had draped a grey cloud over False Bay, Cape Town, and ash-green lines of marbled swell pulsed towards the shore. Standing on the beach, I imagined guiding my fibreglass board across the soft water, and was itching to get into the sea. The soft hue of dusk dulled my vigilance and I ignored […]
Moral Potency will shape our ‘better normal’
As the Covid-19 pandemic spun out of control, and a hurricane of germs blew across the globe, I watched a news clip of an Italian street artist musing on the state of his village. When asked how he was coping with his ghostly streets, he simply replied: ‘If I worry about it, or don’t worry […]
A Better Set of Lenses
By Steve Hall Let me tell you a story about Christian Cooper and Amy Cooper. They are not “The Coopers”, in fact they are unrelated in a host of different ways, but they share a surname and a recent incident in Central Park, New York. Christian is out bird watching. He has a bicycle helmet […]
When the world around you changes
We’ve all faced change in super-charged fashion and pace in 2020. Whether it’s been quarantined in our houses, dealing with homeschooling, or attempting to pivot our businesses towards relevance, there has been not a single, city dweller across the globe that has been spared the impetus to confront a change in their perspective and way […]
The possibility to thrive in a crisis!
We celebrated our daughter’s 1st birthday on the 1st of September 2008 and deeply appreciated how well we had embraced her into our lives. My wife had quit her consulting job to be a stay-at-home mom and I was entrenched in an exciting, high- prospect, software business. I was heading a small sales team, had […]
How may our past becalm our thoughts of the future?
The world has ground to a halt and entered a prolonged and unexpected hibernation. We are all being forced to live in transition from an old world towards a new reality that requires deliberate translation of hope to practice. The climate crisis and Coronavirus will surely be defining moments of our century, much like the […]
Why young graduates don’t need Leadership Development
One of the most rewarding periods of my early career was working with young adults in business. For almost 8 years, I had numerous opportunities to guide and mentor bright and ambitious professionals on multiple graduate development programmes. They were smart, brimming with technical and functional theory, but low in experience. Many were armed with […]