NCS
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A Christmas Carol
If you read my post yesterday 98/100 Books read 2 to go you know I was reading Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. I finished our Company Christmas zoom call, then closed up the home office. I made a cup of tea and sat in front of the fire. Charles Dickens could have had no idea it… Read more
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98/100 Books Read, 2 to Go
I am 2 books short of 100 books read in 2020, I will read those last two books in my Christmas break. To realise this annual achievement I almost entirely removed all TV and watching movies. I set this task well before the Covid-19 pandemic was understood. To complete the 100th book I will be… Read more
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Your Attitude Determines Your Altitude
Have you ever heard the word ‘morale’ used when things are going well? No, me neither you only hear of morale when performance and results are slipping downwards. Think about your team, if you are an individual contributor then think about a team you were on once. If every member of that team had a… Read more
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TED Talks
Once in a while you discover a show which is more than you assumed. The irony of that assumption will be revealed when you watch the clip. I started watching Ted Lasso on Apple TV+ and thought it would be just a funny show to raise my spirits. It is certainly funny but what took… Read more
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Our Greatest Fear
Over my 25 years of working, I have worked with professionals from all walks of life. Many of them were hard working, a few were inspiring and demonstrated leadership. However, when I reached the VP level at Veeva I joined a group that displayed a leadership quality I had witnessed rarely but is in abundance… Read more
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Day One or One Day, You Decide
I have posted in my blog at Seastheday.blog 120 days in a row. I wanted to write regularly for years but just kept saying one day I will start. When you start things that are totally new for you there is a tendency to to feel like you cannot be effective without the full information… Read more
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No One Ever Got Dumber Sharing an Idea
I have noticed a selfishness of late, a reluctance to spend time talking about ideas. That is a shame, that is my lifeblood, it’s my passion, I can’t exist without discussion and discourse on ideas. Is it the lack of time, too busy, or you see your ideas as special sauce? I hope that is… Read more
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Be Curious Not Judgemental
The title of this post is a quote by Walt Whitman. I think it might be my most favourite quote and how I try and live my life. It is a lot easier to be mean than to be curious. So mean people, on top of being jerks, are also lazy and uninventive. Try and… Read more
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Go Offline If You Can
Before the covid changed the world. I used to love being in the air and unavailable to the world for half the day when travelling to the USA. I would write a letter, draw, write my thoughts down. Write slowly and plan, jot diagrams and concepts, all with a good old pen and paper. More… Read more
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The Dash in Between Is How You Are Remembered
I copied this down from a documentary I watched 12 years ago. I found it in an old notebook last night. It’s is inspiring and haunting at the same time. Enjoy! When you die, there’s going to be a tombstone. It’s going to have your name, it’s going to have the year you were born,… Read more
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7 Invisible Barriers to Success
I have had a good run of mentoring new Veeva employees this year and a theme started to form from their challenges. When we got onto the subject of what is holding them back from doing what they want to do, or making progress in their projects/accounts. A surprisingly regular list of what I call… Read more
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Autumn Walks in Winchester
I had an opportunity before the lockdown started to wander amongst the Veeva Orange-tipped trees and view the autumn mist from rolling hills where John Keats was inspired to write Ode to Autumn. My daughter Natalie is studying at Winchester University, and we used to go see her before Covid we were able to explore… Read more
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Our Bookish Family Christmas Tradition
Many years ago I started a Family tradition, which I learned about from an Icelandic friend. You see Icelandic people celebrate Christmas each year with a book exchange. This tradition is known as Jolabokaflod, which translates roughly to Christmas book flood. Jolabokaflod started during World War II, when paper was one of the few things not rationed in… Read more
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Presenting With Humour
I love watching anyone at the top of their game. Sir Ken Robinson delivered a barn storming Ted Talks years ago which I return to time and time again to be inspired If you get a moment watch him in this youtube clip notice how he uses humour to soften you and to help make… Read more
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You Are Not in Traffic, You Are Traffic
When I look at my schedule and it is full of meetings, other people are wasting my time! When I am queueing in a shop and I am in a hurry I am cursing the people in front of me When I come back from a holiday to a mountain of emails, how can these… Read more
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Looking for Motivation
I have started so many diaries, journals and blogs in 20 years. I struggled searching for regular writing motivation. This year that changed, I realised that motivation is an excuse. I no longer wait for motivation to arrive, I just sit down in a space and write. Most of what I write is awful, some… Read more
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Asking for Feedback
You don’t need to be Sherlock Holmes or the most emotionally aware person to know who your fans are, those people who will give you positive feedback, that think you are great – Your colleagues, family and friends are hardwired to say nice things about you. Are you as good as they might say you… Read more
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The Art of the Follow Up
I learned a lot from my colleagues in sales and wanted to apply that when I worked in sales a couple of years ago. It was the time in my life when I was meeting so many new people on a regular basis. I kept finding myself in need of a workflow. Needing a repeatable… Read more
