This was a quote from a client, Shaun, when we were chatting about a 360 appraisal.  He is a Formula 1 fan – (pretty serious – went to the Singapore Grand Prix on his honeymoon!)

The quote was from a TV commentary on the race were Lewis Hamilton won this years championship…but as with a lot of sport, the metaphor helps us in other business settings than formula one’s rarefied atmosphere…

1. “If you always do what you have always done, you will always get what you have always got”.  F! always pushes the boundaries.  If you don’t fail sometimes though, you aren’t going to win…simple.
2. “There are 3 types of organisation:  Those who make things happen: Those who watch what happens; Those who wonder what happened.”  Would the cars go as fast and as efficiently if F1 wasn’t in group 1 here?  Would we have diesel turbo’s and low emissions without their research?  Would the UK be further behind the technology curve if 95% of F1 research wasn’t done in the UK?  Most organisations in my experience are in the middle group.  Top and bottom – maybe 5 % of organisations – the top ones thrive, the wonder what happened go out of business.  The fastest moving organisations tend to have loads of new ideas – but then pick on a few and push them remorselessly, and confidently.  You can’t do 20 things at once..but you can do 3…

A lot of the thinking about the quote “a triumph of ambition over adhesion” applies to individuals and to projects as well as to organisations as a whole.  Professor Rosabeth Moss Kanter (“The Change Masters”) said that projects often failed just as they were about to ‘work’.  The naysayers keep telling you ‘told you so – we tried it before…’.  And it is just at the time when the project team are too tired to fight back.  They lose their adhesion, and the project slips away…

And finally, just think of yourself – have you ever slid off the track because you didn’t think and plan carefully enough?  Or at least, made sure that as you ‘went for it’, you had systems in place to stop a complete breakdown?

I think metaphors are useful, and just help us sort the wheat from the chaff – especially if we are a bit stuck!

(Thanks for the idea, Shaun)

95 years old.  Test Pilot.  Just bought a sports car ‘and really loving it’.

Here’s Captain Eric “Winkle” Brown at the recording of Desert Island Discs – the 3000 edition (on i Player – here – Desert island Discs today )

You will be amazed at the content – and makes me feel rather inadequate and would prefer to think he is fibbing!!! You will never want to retire if you follow his philosophy…life is for living.

Some highlights – (Just the questions form Kirsty Young give you the flavour)

“So, what was it like being at the liberation of Belsen?”

“The 1936 Olympics must have been a sight”

“You carried out the first supersonic flight?”

“You still hold the record for the number of take offs and landings on aircraft carriers?”

“And you looped the loop through all three spans of the Forth Bridge?”

“Your current partner you said – she hasn’t hung her coat on a rattly hook has she? – as we say?”

There is more – so much more – and it is just lovely.  Big cup of tea and a few hon nobs – just stop work for 45 minutes and be truly inspired.  An absolute joy!

OK. Another brilliant health chat with Roy Lilley leading the post Paxman era interviewing. We all knew what questions he would be asking, and specifically about the 6 Cs, which was obvious to ask, and vital to be answered .  Jane is The Chief Nurse for NHS England .

Roy and Jane – taking questions

Roy knew his audience was very Nurse dominant…but it didn’t stop him being heavy! That’s what you pays for? Anyway, here are my (obviously personal) highlights.

• There was obvious and real passion from Jane. So, that’s what you would expects from ‘a nurse’? Not if you read the Mail or the Express! No one will write about the 99.7% of times when it goes right…it doesn’t sell.  She talked about her own personal (very) experiences of care and it shows in her attitude.
• We need to sort out some of the garbage that goes with the imbecility of having 96 nurse specialists in one trust, with 43 titles. One trust had simplified to two…and everyone agreed that was a logical progression (more of that later)
• Talk of a national nurse uniform kept rearing its head – because there had been a focus group with some of the audience there in the afternoon before our meeting. No idea of the outcome, but hey, I’m sure Roy will write about it in his e newsletter (not Blog…he’s move beyond that…he told us)
• Yet Jane did not bandage her Teddy as a young girl. She practiced on her long suffering younger brother….who is still suffering fear of the medical profession as a result!!! (I made that bit up)
• Much discussion about do we need caring to be a degree. Most nurses enjoy the confidence it seems to give in them from their colleagues as they a degree qualified.

Now, my opinions:

• HCA or old fashioned SEN &SRN…could that be a way forward, as long as we can make the HCA registered against a set of competencies? It is so difficult to ignore the 7 intelligences. Some people are born caring, but are not academic.  It is foolish to exclude them from nursing compassion.
• Lots of experienced nurses are de-registering. Find out why (maybe they are just knackered, as Roy implied…). If so sort out the staffing…and make every manager work 4 days a year(after training) as a ward auxiliary as a contractual requirement. and they don’t leave until the shift (12 hours if it is so) is over. And one of those 4 days has to be a night shift.
• And if they don’t, they forgo,their bonus
• We need a simple structure for specialist nurses that has career progression built into it. 3 levels. Nurse Practitioner, Clinical Nurse Specialist, Consultant Nurse.  Competency based. And Consultant paid as such.
• We can’t always measure everything. If the values that underpin the 6 C’s are good and real they will affect behaviours, which infects attitudes, which creates the right climate which will eventually change culture.
• Nurses do good. They enable people to live the life they want to live. Doctors are less important to health outcomes. They start the fix. Nurses make sure the fix sticks.

Loved it. Thanks all.

We don’t have enough emotion in business…but we do elsewhere?  Should we have more?  I think so…

We got up early, even though there was an extra hour to be had…clocks going back today.  We had seen the Poppies on the news when HM the Queen visited.

(have a look at the web site – the “making of” film is very moving…)

http://poppies.hrp.org.uk/

888 246 to commemorate all those who died in WW1.  Photos don’t do it justice

Close up – all different…

A sea of blood…

I found myself just quietly saying ‘thank you’ to all of them.

But this lone note got me…

If you can, go and visit.  The Last post is played daily at different times in the evening.  I fail to see how anyone could keep back tears.  We will remember them.

Remembered…we will…

OK – I had a lot of WILY (What I Learnt Yesterday) moments at this conference yesterday.  It’s full title was The Speak Out Summit, and Roy Lilley (editor nhsManagers.net) led, drove, chaired and generally corralled the whole thing.  The aim was simple, and therefore complex to do – ” Can we create best practice guidelines for handling feedback and encouraging Speaking Out?”

We had a lot of thought provocation. Dr Phil Hammond – ( why not NIGE instead of NICE – National Institute for Good Enough), and others like Gary Walker, Dr. David Drew – actual celebrity whistle blowers; legal aspects from Prof Christopher Newdick, Sir Robert Naylor who runs UCLH (about £1 billion turnover – this is not a little organisation – it is real business.) Nearly all of the speakers stayed to be part of the audience too – a testament to wanting to make things change, I feel.

Look, I’m going to do my thoughts and impressions from the great and good in further blog spots, but there were two absolutely pivotal, game changing moments in the day for me.

James Titcombe lost his son Joshua at Morecambe Bay hospital – needlessly.  He had to fight against the QC might of the authority (who I believe spent millions of our money defending the indefensible).  He is now a CQC adviser (The Care and Quality Commission – which may or may not be powerful nor focused enough…but that’s another story…).  “Joshua would have been a little boy of 5 now”.  I don’t need to say anymore.  I’d never met James.  I’d heard the story.  This is the reality, and I can’t see to type.  His fighting spirit, and Joshua’s legacy means a lot of lives have been saved since.

Then, a delegate from Mid Staffs.  Roy Lilley described it as ‘ ‘The Safest Hospital in Britain’.  I know what he means – the safest time to fly, statistically, is the week after a plane crash…  The chief executive seems to have had an amazingly galvanizing effect.  “I am so proud to work there.  We see Maggie all the time.  We all offer the best possible care to our patients”.  It was lovely to hear – heartfelt and totally real.  You can’t fake passion.

It is all about people.  And it helps if the vision is led by truly follow-able leaders.

I follow Roy Lilley’s blog (link to today’s blog here).  Roy is a leading commentator on the ills and positives of the world that is the NHS. And, as I often find, his blog today really hit me and made me want to expound it here.

De-icer – a little thing that meant a lot to me in February, just left for anyone to use at a company car park -it engaged me!

It was about “Somebody”. We want a change in attitude, he said – not like you are about to do the Tango – but positive stuff.  Three levels – Pleasant, Caring, Engaged.  Here is Roy’s description of what ‘engaged’ means to him:

“Engaged… this is really important.  Engaged people say; ‘This is not right and I won’t put up with it‘.  Engaged people say; ‘You know what, if we did it this way it would be better.’  Engaged people say; ‘If there is something not right I need to know, please tell me.‘  Engaged people say; ‘I always wondered why somebody didn’t do something – until I realised… I am somebody‘.  That’s engaged!”

Engagement was (and still is) a key theme of many a HR conference.  The Chartered Institute for Personnel and Development has had myriad half, one and even two day conferences on the subject.  It feels like a magic bullet that management are looking for.  Do you need two days when Roy has got to the essence so quickly?

This does remind me of a new marketing manager arriving in a company I worked for.  He appeared at a sales conference and 3 minutes into his first presentation said “…and I demand respect from  the sales team”.  You can’t, can you?  Little respect was shown at that point, and he realised he may have got the tone wrong because of the quite raucous laughter, and the fact that no-one would buy him a drink in the bar.

You can’t demand engagement.  You have to create the atmosphere for it to happen.  You have to respect people for the jobs they do and their input and thank them and give them the tools and the resource.  And you have to keep on doing that.  For ever.  On top of that, you need to protect your team from the crap that comes from above, from sideways and from below.

And then they will respect you, and you they.  You can have a united front against ‘them’ (there is always a them…).  You can fight together like you are extras in Les Miserables.  And you will all love it.

Let’s just do it, so we can all live happily ever after.

(You can see the food views in my sister blog, canmencook . So tasty, you can almost smell it!)

Nicki Davey had a lot of thanks to make as we continued to chomp away on the cakes as she introduced the Saltbox 5th Anniversary celebration.  It was held at The Salthouse in Nunney, Somerset .  As is Nicki’s style, we had all 5 senses used during the session.  I didn’t expect ‘taste’ to be represented, but had forgotten about the food!  Splendid smells wafted from the oil burners, and we were then entertained by Tom Butler-Bowden (click to see more).  He is quite famous for his “50” series – including titles such as 50 self-help classics, 50 Success classics and more…His approach can save you  a lot of time and a lot of reading!  These books would be an absolute boon for any student trying to pull together an essay!  But they just save anyone (especially us trainers) loads of time and money so in one book you get the essence of some of the classic works in an area without having to read like a Booker Prize judge.

Nicki with Tom in front of the collage

He was here though to talk about his other book – Never Too Late.  There is a 10 year theory – it takes that long for a new idea, a new business venture, a new way of working or whatever – to gestate and form and then to start it’s own life.  This was heartening to us 50 somethings, who may have felt that ‘if only’ idea was never going to come to fruition.  Hang on in there, is the message – but you need to start by thinking and working with something you are passionate about.  It helps you to stay the course.

More senses?  Hearing and listening!  And getting hot and bothered!  African Drumming – and singing, with Organic Rhythm.  Sharon Stone (another one…not that one!) kept us paced and in control.  It is amazing how much you can enjoy this, just by letting go and not worrying about making mistakes.  A lesson for work-life?

Nicki wanted people to add to her collage for the birthday celebration.  I added some pies with many fingers – she does have fingers in a lot of pies, and is a consummate net-worker.

Congratulations Nicki – here’s to the next 10 years (As Tom would tell you…)