INSIGHTS

So wrong it was still nagging me overnight. The problem wasn't the perspective I had to share. It was that I shared it too early. And maybe too bluntly. If I'd had the self-control to let the other person keep talking, it would have been an entirely different conversation. But I just wanted to share. I had something I really cared about and I was primed and ready to go. Like I'd pulled back the rubber on a slingshot: loaded, ready to release. Classic Moment of Truth. The iron

Their arms are crossed. There's a scowl on their face. They're giving you the distinct vibe that Captain Barbossa eloquently captured in Pirates of the Caribbean: "I'm disinclined to acquiesce to your request." These types of conversations are hard, aren't they? This week I delivered a Masterclass at NZGCP's VentureEd on retaining your balance in high-stakes conversations. One of the bonuses was getting to sit in and learn from some of the leaders in this community on how the

They’re flustered. Distracted. And not making eye contact. You can tell they just want the meeting to be over. And unfortunately, their lack of confidence tells a story louder than their words. You can tell when someone's truly confident, can’t you? Their eyes are up. Their attention is out. There's a sense of calm. When we have genuine confidence, we are less conscious of our own performance and more conscious of what's happening around us. Attention out. Not attention in. A

I’m delivering a keynote on confidence tomorrow - Confidence Shift: it’s in the doing, not the wishing or the waiting - and sitting here on the flight I’m reminded that the path to confidence can feel a lot like discipline. And there’s no doubt it requires it. As they say in NZ, Do the mahi (work), get the treats. And yet, this whole discipline thing feels a bit heavy, doesn’t it? More stick than carrot. Which is why this quote from Luciano Pavarotti leapt out at me while on

Sherlock Holmes said it. And he’s right. We’re all told to read the room. But we can’t read what we haven’t noticed. We can’t read a person we haven’t observed. Seeing is passive. Observation is active. Which means we do a lot more of the former. Which is a problem for those conversations that matter. Take Bob. He walked into his stakeholder meeting on autopilot. A few talking points. Feeling good. Ready to go. What he didn’t notice: his stakeholder was talking less. A few mo

Are we controlling the living daylights out of trust? You can feel it in your chest. If you don't step in, Bob is likely to screw this up. You can already see the mess you'll have to tidy up. He just hasn't handled these situations like you have. And so you lean over - literally or metaphorically - and take the controls. You might notice a look of surprise on Bob's face. Maybe relief. Maybe consternation. What you haven't noticed, though, is that this was a Moment of Truth in

We might be watching our team's performance. But are we monitoring what they're carrying? There's an uncertainty-shaped weight that is being lugged around the office. The World Bank refers to it as Structural Uncertainty. World Commerce & Contracting refers to it as a New Operating Reality. And we are all coming to grips with it: a world that feels less predictable than ever before. And how it's being felt is worth naming: FRAGILE - environmentally, the systems and certaintie

We’re lugging it around. We first grabbed the handle after that conversation with Jeff. He was running hot after a meeting with Bob from the procurement team. Bob had pushed all his buttons, so Jeff needed to download. Which he did. Loudly. With gesticulation. You couldn’t help but catch some of the spray. So now you think differently about Bob and, truth be told, about procurement as a whole. You’ve never worked with Bob, never talked to him, but now you’re wary of him. It's

Words like guarded, uncomfortable, vague and awkward. That's what the room said today when I asked how the unspoken feels in a commercial conversation. And yet those elephants in the room end up trampling all over projects, relationships and deals, not because the issues are unfixable, but because nobody tackles them. Unlike wine, baggage doesn't get better with age. Even airports know that untended baggage is a problem. What do we think works? Don't mention the war. Hold you