You Are My Sunshine

During his lifetime, Mao Zedong aka Chairman Mao gave many inspirational speeches.

Mao’s speeches were crammed with more bon mots than a warehouse full of Christmas crackers.

Someone rather cleverly decided to capture his smartest epithets and published them as his Little Red Book, which now lines many a well stocked library shelf.

Particularly apt, after the year we’ve had, is “Wish for the sunshine, but build dykes anyway.”

It’s easy to allow fatigue and a few bad experiences to colour your perspective on the world.

But it’s more important that you turn those experiences into learnings so that you’re better prepared next time around.

That way, you can focus all your energy on being upbeat and optimistic, safe in the knowledge that you’re ready for anything.

Paper Paper Everywhere

Whatever happened to the paper-less office?
Twenty years ago we were sold a vision of the future, where everyone had a tidy desk and information would be stored electronically.
I’m still waiting.
A desk covered in papers is energy-sapping and can induce restless memory syndrome
(like restless leg syndrome but with fewer chances that you’ll kick someone).
It’s almost impossible to focus or concentrate when you have papers piled up on your desk.
Every time you look at the papers, your brain is trying to make sense of them.
What a waste of energy.
The least you can do is have a clear desk policy and tidy it up before you go home at night.
And take solace in the fact that everything’s backed up on your computer.
You’ll be amazed by how much more efficient you can be.

Win Quickly, Lose Slowly

I was recently reminded of an old friend I had back in primary school.
His name was Alan Harvey, and he had the strange idea that you only had a certain number of breaths in your life. Maybe he was getting mixed up with heartbeats (here’s the other story)
Anyway, you’d often see him, when he though no-one was looking, holding his breath as long as he could, trying to prolong his life, even as he turned beetroot red.
As much as I laughed at the time (I was cruel), I now find myself thinking a little bit like Alan.
Only my non-renewable resource is energy.
At work it’s in limited supply and needs to be used carefully. An hour long meeting can be a waste of time and can drain everyone’s energy.
There’s a finite amount in any pitch, so the pitch team need to use it wisely.
One of the ways to build toward successful pitch results is to keep energy levels up, instead of running them down.
That means stay positive, short, lively meetings, and fun wherever you can find it.