Read All About It!

   I read a book this weekend. A whole book. In 2 days. This is unprecedented for me. Usually when I start a book I languish over it for weeks. Months. Years, even. Part of it is because my days are usually so adrenaline-filled (running around the office attending to "fire drills") that by the time I sit down, it's lights out. I don't do sedentary activities, even if said activities might be good for me. The other reason is that I am highly experiential. I'd much rather learn something by doing rather than by reading about it. I quickly get bored & my mind starts wandering as my eyes skim the words, and when I get to the bottom of the page I realize that I have no idea what the *H* I just read.
   But this book ("Leaders Make the Future" by Bob Johansen of IFTF: Institute for the Future) was important. I was assigned to read it for a class in which I'm enrolled at work; a class that is actually a ginormous honor to even be invited to attend. So I resolved that I'd finish this one before the class started tomorrow. I read some on Saturday afternoon & evening, but with an unexpected foster puppy in the house, it's not terribly surprising that I didn't get far. It was all up to Sunday.
   Mother Nature had my back. The heat wave finally lifted, and this morning was absolutely gorgeous. I got up at 6:30 (actually, the puppy had me up at 4, but I managed to get back to sleep for a bit—after relegating him to the garage!), made coffee, fed the dogs, and we all headed outside. I sat at the table on the deck, my feet up in a chair. (Next to Lobo, who pretty much behaved himself.) The temperature was perfection. It was bright & sunny, but I had shade until noon under the umbrella where I was sitting. The hummingbirds were especially active, so I took occasional breaks to try to catch photographs of them, which helped capture my interest.

   And much to my great relief, the concepts in the book were actually quite eye-opening. It poses that tomorrow's world will be even more volatile, uncertain, complex & ambiguous than it is today, and forecasts 10 years into the future to what the 10 most critical leadership skills will be. I was happy—and a little surprised—that several of them are traits that I feel are innate to me: immersive learning ability, bio empathy, quiet transparency, clarity, rapid prototyping & maker's instinct. Of course, the challenge is to determine how to best leverage each of them to improve my skills as a leader, which can be trickier in a work context than a personal context. But I was glad that I had been recognized as someone who has these traits, and that Hallmark was investing in me (again). I'll get a lot of hands-on practice in the all-day work sessions with Bob & his colleague Rachel in the next 2 days.
   I'll share my favorite quote, which served as the introduction to one of the chapters: "One should... Be able to see that things are hopeless yet be determined to make them otherwise.". -- F. Scott Fitzgerald

   Turns out that leadership runs in my family, too. My aunt Martha just sent me a link to an interview she gave to Cleveland Foodie blog. Re-reading it, it's interesting how the same skills apply in such a different context: social expression product creation vs. seafood sales. Go Marty!

   And I should mention, too, that in his book, Bob calls out the bio-empathy & the leadership of my hero Cesar Milan, famous for his "exercise, discipline, affection" approach to dog (and people!) training. So without further ado, a few more photos of Lobo: