How’s things? I hope you’re having a fun week 😃
I want you to be happy.
My focus is leadership, design, and innovation for happier communities. It’s important to me that you enjoy the journey of solving problems that matter, and stay healthy and well… ideally feeling even healthier as you do work that gives you meaning and fulfilment.
When I’m working with people – and through my book Solve Problems That Matter – my ambition is they feel that I’m with them and working alongside them. Cheering them on, but also helping challenge them, to test thinking, and iterate – to succeed sooner.
When I wrote Solve Problems That Matter in 2021, I started with mindset. It’s chapter one. Why? Research shows we’re 30% more effective and productive when we’re positive.
I was lucky to learn the power of the mind and how we think very early in life. Over the years these lessons have been reinforced, and I’ve learnt a lot more about the neuroscience and psychology of how our brain and mind work.
“When we are happy – when our mindset and mood are positive – we are smarter, more motivated, and thus more successful. Happiness is the center, and success revolves around it.”
Shawn Achor, The Happiness Advantage
You might be thinking, of course I want to be happy – everyone does but it’s not that easy.
I think of happiness as “being well and doing well”, it takes action, and it’s something we create for ourselves. This is consistent with Shawn Achor’s happiness research, which led him to the conclusion that “happiness is not just a mood – it’s a work ethic.”
The great news is this means we can build some basic habits into our workflow to help create our own happiness. There are simple, practical things we can do to literally change our brain chemistry to increase our feeling of positivity – which leads to being more successful.
The purpose of starting with mindset and happiness habits is to create the foundations to look after our personal wellbeing while making a positive impact – so we stay healthy and positive without getting overwhelmed and burnt out.
Read my full post where I go into more detail on mindset and share some practical, quick, and easy things you can do to build happiness habits.
Solve Problems That Matter
My book Solve Problems That Matter, is a playbook with actions and worksheets to help you take a human-centred design and living systems approach to design, build, and launch your idea.
Ideas that customers love, make money, and do great things for people and our planet… all while increasing wellbeing.
How would you describe your role as a leader?
This is one of the questions I ask in the leadership research I’m doing. There are some common themes emerging. Here are some of the responses:
“Making people feel heard but helping carve a path in uncertainty.” – Financial Services Company Design Leader (Australia)
“I think it is about helping structure and support the team to do their best work and find their purpose.” – Tech Company Design Leader (USA)
“Uniting the group to achieve our goals through shared purpose. Igniting the passion in the shared purpose. Facilitating the best use of the varied skill set to achieve the end results. Bringing everyone along on the journey.” – Health, Safety & Wellbeing Company Leader (Australia)
“Having the self-awareness to understand the people I lead as individuals, helping them grow and become the best versions of themselves. It’s also being decisive, values led and driving benefit to the business I work for. It’s transparency, authenticity and a deeply communicative and learning based.” – Energy Company Innovation & Sustainability Leader (NZ)
“My focus is on serving & empowering my team members, prioritising their growth and well-being. I foster collaboration and empowerment, listening attentively and supporting others to achieve their best. By nurturing a culture of mutual respect and development, I aim to drive collective success.” – Medical Company Leader (Singapore)
“Inclusive, empathetic, empowering others and mentoring.” – Government Infrastructure & Services Design Leader (Australia)
There’s been a great response to this research. A huge thanks to the more than 80 people who’ve already shared their experience and insights.
What resonates for you? I’d love to hear how you describe your role as a leader…
Get involved!
I’m curious to learn more about how you’re adapting to meet the rapidly increasing expectations of your teams, customers, investors, and regulators. I’ll present the findings from my research in a report. It might even evolve into my next book.
Join the waitlist for the report now to be the first to get it. When you join the waitlist, you’re also invited to complete the survey that takes ~5 minutes, and you can express interest in being interviewed.
Ideas
A blog post/podcast and an event for you…
Impact Boom Podcast Episode 292… 2021 Repost
Thanks to Impact Boom for reposting our conversation in episode 292 last week… I had a listen to see what we chatted about three years ago. I think it mostly still stacks up 😄
In the chat, I share a bit about how I’ve approached designing, leading, and delivering strategic change over the past 30+ years… in financial services and in startups and social enterprises.
SydDT #103/Design Connection #2: Operationalising Great Work Cultures with Dan Szuc
For our 12 September Sydney Design Thinking meetup, we’re lucky to have Dan Szuc from Make Meaningful Work visiting from Hong Kong to introduce CultureOps™ – a methodology that transforms organisational culture from an abstract concept into a tangible, actionable strategy.
Come join us for some fun conversations with interesting people in and around the design community. New members are welcome! Grab your ticket now…
It’s also not too late to get in on SydDT #102: Get Seen & Get Your Best Ideas Built, With Skills You Already Have with Tarra van Amerongen from Atlassian on 8 August.
If you miss out you can always watch the recording. We’ve got a bunch on Youtube…
Brisbane Visit
I’ll be in Brisbane next week (30 July-2 August) and I’ve got some gaps in my calendar. If you’re around and keen to catch up, reply to this email and let’s sort something out 😃
Let’s Collaborate
At Dynamic4, we specialise in coaching, training, and working alongside leaders to solve problems that matter. With 30+ years in financial services, this is one of my happy places.
A key way we do this is by designing and delivering project-based leadership programs that use a learning through doing approach – with coaching – to help leaders adapt to increasing expectations and complexity.
We do this by bringing together design thinking, regenerative innovation, wellbeing, and purpose into an integrated practice.
These sessions build personal, team, and organisational capability to solve problems that matter with more:
❤️ Clarity on your purpose, goals, and approach to navigate complexity and make progress
🎯 Momentum to achieve your goals by building the workflows, rhythms, and habits for success
🌿 Confidence to move forward with more certainty and less risk while increasing your wellbeing
Keen to chat about how we can collaborate to solve problems that matter? Book a free 15-minute discovery call.
Have fun!
Ben
