BEACHs, The Primes by Chris McGoff

Prime 7 – Commitment and Attachment

Continuing my review of the Primes by Chris McGoff I found myself this week looking at number 7 – Commitment versus Attachment – which has a subtitle “Success is a state of being.” I like the basic premise that if we attach ourselves to a result and we don’t achieve it that we run the risk of having an emotional response to the “failure”. If we attach to the outcome then we let them determine our state. For McGoff, Commitment has more freedom in it. If you are committed to a way of being you can be that way no matter the results. I get that. Hold your plans and goals lightly and if you fall short remember the purpose and that YOU are not a failure. Your results and your way of being ought not to be attached. Sometimes I do think that creating a clear vision and committing to it, declaring it and acting boldly to make it real requires some emotional attachment. It is often that emotional energy that makes the difference between setting a goal and achieving it. I think it is important to attach yourself to a goal or a cause that you truly believe in. Make it personal sometimes and work as hard as you can to achieve success. I think really what McGoff is warning us about in this prime is that we think about SUCCESS a little deeper and make sure the measure of results does not necessarily equal success. I am successful when I give it my all … Shoot for the moon and land among the stars…. And that’s okay. What state of being is success to you? That will so depend on your BEACH. BEACHs give us our perspective on the world and I believe they can be seen in our state of mind. Identifying someone’s BEACH is easier when they are in a state…. no matter what the state is. They may be attached or committed to outcomes and results and that is easier to see at a point where it is clear that the result is not the expected one. You can learn a lot about WHAT someone is committed to when you can watch them fail (what ever that means). Success and failure are both states of being and in my mind are defined nine different ways. Being committed to outcomes keeps you working toward them and allows you to keep your perspective in the McGoff definition. Being attached to the outcome might cause us to lose the perspective and behave in ways inconsistent with our REAL selves.

I say be mindful of what results you commit to and what you attach to. Making the distinction gives you the freedom to choose.

Ways to know yourself

So I did an Internet search for profound coaching questions and found a website for Nadine Love in Queensland Australia with some very interesting stuff on it. There was a blog on Neale Donald Walsch, one of my favorite writers. It seems that Nadine and I have more in common than a last name. I am waiting to hear from her about the origins of her LOVE. Mine of course is Scottish, an anglicized version of MacKinnon (my beloved son).

I didn’t find any profound questions from Nadine on the site to use in coaching sessions. She is a mentor for coaches and talks more about growing a coaching enterprise than about the practice itself. It appears that she uses some profound coaching techniques to help people become successful at coaching which is cool.

The profound questions were in the NDW article. He suggests that you ask yourself these question three times a day for 60 days.

Who am I?
Where am I?
Why am I who I am?
What do I intend to do about it?

I would add… What else could I be doing? Where else could I be? Before the last one, to get the creativity going.

Three times a day … At 8am, 12 noon and 8pm. For 60 days. How would that change your thinking?

Prime 22 of 32 – Levels of Perspective

I like this McGoff Prime because it adds a multidimensional aspect to all of our thinking. If you were to take the BEACH perspectives and add this dimension you will have layers of perspective that peek back to the sustainable answer to the questions of life the universe and everything. The levels begin closest to the ground with a magnifying glass. What do we see when we magnify a situations? Then it moves to the naked eye perspective. then we look at the situation from a helicopter and finally from a satellite. think of any situation you are currently dealing with . Can you SEE how telescoping your perspective in this way can give you information that would be important . The quality of your decisions can be impacted by a narrow perspective. Use this prime to remind yourself to step out of the normal way of seeing things to improve your line of sight.

Primes again… Leadership spectrum

There are multiple styles, types and approaches to leadership. McGoff says that great leaders master many. I like that idea. I say that each of the BEACHs is an approach to leadership that is appropriate in a given circumstance. And I believe that the best kind of decision making uses all of the perspectives represented in the BEACH circle. ( perfection, connection, success, differentiation, detachment, security, excitement, power and peace).

McGoff has a spectrum from command and control to consensus. He puts three kinds of situations on a continuum. Closer to Command and control he puts Reacting. In the middle he puts Planning and towards consensus he puts Visioning.

Leadership is situational and the better prepared you are with tools for the variety of situations you will face as a leader the more successful you can be. Mary Parker Follett talked about it in the 1920s and 30s. It is an idea that has passed the test of time.

How do you make decisions and provide leadership for your team? What strengths do you bring and what strengths do your team members bring to the decision making table? Are all of the BEACHs covered when important decisions are being made? What I know for sure is that decision that do consider the circle perspectives are sustainable… and that is important.

Consensus- Prime 8

Today’s Prime is number 8 – Consensus.

Basically Chris Mc Goff’s Prime on consensus says that people don’t need to agree on everything. It is not important that everyone support every initiative. It is however important the they feel the process was fair and that their input or concerns were heard. When Carol and I used to teach at the U of L we taught a five-finger consensus model. If you made a fist then it was a no go and a ONE fist in a group, no matter what size meant that the project or idea had failed. A one finger vote meant you still had reservations. A two finger vote said you were not violently opposed but not willing to support yet. Three fingers meant you were okay with it. Four meant you might even help with the project and five meant you were all in. this kind of system was very effective in having people make important decisions TOGETHER. Not everyone is a five-finger voter but if you can agree that if everyone gets to three through open dialogue and addressing the concerns that would keep them from getting to three then you have something with enough support to move forward. Clear definitions about what each vote means are crucial and time to deal with resistance is also crucial.

Once we moved to stop lights – one red light shut down the project. One yellow meant more discussion and Greens where a Go sign. The key to this idea of consensus and what makes it consensual is that “the process was explicit, rational and fair” according to Mc Goff. Using this system people feel as if their input is heard and that they are treated well in the process and so they can live with the outcome and are committed to supporting the outcomes with their stated reservations. Consensus does not mean everyone agrees with everything but the process allows for the reservations to be put on the table and examined BEFORE the project goes forward so that the project begins in an informed manner. When there is no consensus building at the beginning of a project then the reservations come up “out of the blue” and people are surprised and they could jeopardize the project. So the process of building consensus is important AND you can use the PULSE Frame to do it.

Why I do what I do

What else could I be doing? That is a question I often ask myself and one that I would encourage all of you to consider as you work your way through the lazy days of summer.

I could be doing many other things I suppose, but what I enjoy most is working with people, giving them a new perspective on old issues and moving them to a different future than they may have had if I had not asked them to consider some tough questions about themselves and their situation. I am a question asker and I like that role.

The question today is related to Chris McGoff’s “the Primes”. Prime 10 is called Culture. It states that every group divides the behaviours it will tolerate from those it will not. So true. Looking at culture this way makes the distinctions from one culture to another quite evident and easier to identify. This idea will definitely help me as I continue to identify the cultures of the BEACHs. I suspect it will help you too if you think about where you work or live and what is and is not acceptable.

In your personal culture this question becomes important. What will you tolerate and what will you not tolerate.? I think for many the line moves as our own sense of what is right and wrong, what is ethical or not and what is acceptable to each of use is tested daily. Our world, our environment and our limits for what we can tolerate and what we won’t define us and help us to understand why we do what we do.

What defines the limits of your personal culture, your group cultures, your family culture and where do you begin to feel uncomfortable? Even more interesting and important to me is how does your “toleration” line shift? What can happen to move something from tolerable to not, thus shifting your culture? I would like to know more about that.

Things that make you go “Hmmmm….”

Nurse Nancy

For the last two days I have been helping my husband as he recovers from minor surgery. ( if there is such a thing). It is interesting how your instincts take over when you are asked to look after someone else. Your experience with related situations all comes back and you go into nurse mode. It is kind of like riding a bike. I found myself just KNOWING what to do.

I am no stranger to pain myself and know the worst thing that others do for me is try to help me move from one position to another. So I hover and wait to catch or assist but only when called upon. No one can know what the patient is experiencing until a request is made.

It is the same in conversations. Especially in mediation , people are in pain. it is so important to hover rather than to assist at first and then to assist only when the request is made. As mediators we often try to HEAL them rather than let them find the position that is most comfortable for them to rest while they heal themselves. You are there to set the structure and guide the process but any pushing or prodding is likely to inflict more pain than it relieves.

Each situation we encounter has a lesson…. learn it.

BEACHs – Sociology for the Workplace

This is the new titile for my new book. What do you think? It says it all. The book reveals how we can use an understanding of each individuals ‘Culture’ to move through the relationships and create an efficient and effective gathering place where needs are met.

So much has been written about psychology in the work place but this is a different twist. It is about perspectives and how they change and how that change can be predictable. Everyone KNOWS that at some level. You hear phrases like “Here we go again!!” in workplaces where people have not taken the time to understand what the impact of behaviours can be. We don’t study behaviour in patterns in the workplace … at least not yet. I am hoping the book will give people tools for doing just that.

The value propostion for the book is that it allows you to examine your workplace, family, organization and identify the recurring themes and patterns. Further to that it gives you information that you can use to adjust the patterns to create effectiveness and efficiency, if that is your desired outcome, or to create innovation and deeper levels of thinking, if that is your desired outcome. In fact you will be able to identify the existing pattern, the pattern from the past, the desired pattern and ways to get there.

Beliefs, Expectations, Assumptions, Concerns and Hopes.

Category : BEACHs