How will the Olympics change the way that you work?

This year’s Olympics and Paralympics will be the biggest sporting events to hit the UK in living memory and already Olympic fever is building. However the Olympics will present a number of challenges to managers and leaders. Not least the possibility of having to manage disrupted travel, increased absenteeism, loss of focus and dealing with heightened emotion. There will also be employees who may not be interested in the games but who could still be affected by the actions of others.

Whilst such a major event could pose problems none of them are insurmountable. Much has been written, and there is plenty of guidance available, to manage the logistics of having to travel into London, hosting virtual meetings, equipping people to work remotely and creating policies to manage unexplained sickness and absence. Everything that a good manager might need is out there somewhere waiting to be planned, organised and implemented. How about the leadership side of the equation? A useful model to use to consider that balance between management and leadership is the view presented by John P Kotter:

Management:
Consists of planning and budgeting; organising and staffing; controlling and problem solving in order to produce a degree of predictability and order. It has the potential to consistently produce the short-term results expected by various stakeholders (e.g., for customers, always being on time; for stockholders, always being on budget).

Leadership:
Consists of establishing direction; aligning people; motivating and inspiring in order to produce change, often to a dramatic degree. It has the potential to produce extremely useful change (e.g., new products that customers want, new approaches to labour relations that help make a firm more competitive).
Source: A Force for Change: How Leadership Differs from Management. John P Kotter © 1990 The Free Press

Potential2Achieve have considerable experience in working with organisations to move to a more flexible way of working, see our case study Supporting cultural change through workspace design for more detail. We work with leaders and teams to create and build the culture that supports long-term change, often this can be as a result of needing to manage a short-term immediate need. Good leaders will use the Olympics as opportunity to engage positively with their people, setting a future direction, increasing engagement and encouraging mutual respect and goodwill.

The Olympics presents a unique occasion to bring about long term change in the way that people work and to create and embed a culture of engagement. If nothing else the Olympics provide an opportunity to lift the spirits of the UK during this tough economic climate and encourage people to come together. We say let’s embrace it, what do you think?

Do you work with sleepwalkers?

Wow, what a busy Summer it is turning out to be! Here at Potential2Achieve we continue to work with great clients on fascinating projects and contracts. We feel privileged to work in diverse workplaces and meet many interesting characters along the way.

We are often called upon to help inspire those who need to re-energise, or who are maybe not as positive as they could be about their workplace. The way these people are described to us matches them to the Sleepwalker and Neg-Ferret characters that Adrian Webster features in his Polar Bear Pirates books. We are sometimes engaged to work with teams who are finding it difficult to take the first steps on their journey to Fat City - those sleepwalkers that need awakening!

For those who haven't seen him in action, below is a short video where you can experience Adrian talking about some of those very characters.

We hope you enjoy it. If you recognise anyone in your organisation and want help to inspire change then contact us urgently!

BLOODHOUND SSC

BLOODHOUND SSC

It’s not often that you find something or someone so in line with your own thinking that it makes the hairs on the back of your neck stand up. We saw and heard Richard Noble OBE speak about his iconic project to break the 1000 mph landspeed barrier. His passion and unwavering positive belief inspired us to find out more.
His mission is audacious “To confront and overcome the impossible using science, technology, engineering and mathematics. To motivate the next generation to deal with Global 21st Century challenges”. When you break that down the alignment with Potential2Achieve’s philosophy is awesome. It is easy to make the links to our values.

The goal is mind-blowingly massive. The current landspeed record stands at 763 mph, the plan is not to just break the record and within that pass the 1000 mph barrier, but to change the mindset that something cannot be done. This is about sweeping away limiting beliefs, constraints and nay-sayers, but this is not foolish thinking. Supporting the mission is scientific probability which with time and investment will become fact. Achievement of the goal is not a dream it is a plan.
Behind the mission there is an altruistic and meaningful legacy under construction. This will change the process of how schools teach engineering going forward. It will inspire kids to discover, share in groundbreaking new ideas, make them hungry to research and ultimately to enjoy learning – lifelong skills much needed by businesses.

When the BLOODHOUND SSC runs and breaks that 1000 mph target. It will do so with www.potential2achieve.co.uk as one of the many names on its tail fin. Find out more about this amazing project here and let us know your thoughts.