How to create a climate free of fear? How do you become competent for the future? How do you work in complexity? The last two weeks I was on the road a lot. The Brose Innovation Day Asia took place in Shanghai. I was in Düsseldorf for the nwing conference of the VDI. In Nuremberg I was on stage at 12min.me on my favorite topic Remote Work. There was no more time for packing treasures. But the waiting has come to an end. Here are the three nuggets of treasure 113.
Nugget 1 – How to create an anxiety-free climate?
Christoph Bauer I met him through the intrinsify network and was with him in my first Working Out Loud Circle. A climate of fear in companies has already caused several crises, including the Dieselgate. Christoph asks six questions that can be used to determine psychological safety in a company. I wanted to find out about it for my current company and took out the following question: Do you feel secure enough to criticize something?
I found that the question is not so easy to answer. I address criticism that concerns my immediate environment. What the worst thing that can happen? But there are also colleagues who do not want to or cannot openly address these issues. Then there are things that I do not criticise publicly. There are many reasons for this. Sometimes I would have to address someone I hardly know or do not know at all. Sometimes things are so deeply anchored in the corporate culture that you think twice about whether to tackle the topic. But then there are also topics where I simply do something different instead of criticizing. Maybe that’s a sign of psychological security. Does it come from the company or from myself? Not so easy to say.
But there’s an important take away from the article. Encourage more curiosity. Only in this way can we master an uncertain future. (4 min, text, German)
Nugget 2 – How to become future competent?
Tips on how to master the future are provided by the futurist Prof. Dr. Heiko von der Gracht. Using yoghurt and refrigerator as examples, he shows that the future is usually not a linear continuation of the present. Exactly this happens however usually in the enterprises. What will sales look like in the coming months and years? When will the project be finished? All this happens through linear updating of the past. This prevents you from taking advantage of surprises. Therefore:
Future is what you make of it.
What surprises have happened to you in the last few days? What have you done with it? Inspiration on how to use surprises and imperfections can also be found in my article Misfits. (5 min, text, english)
Treasure chest of opportunities
Nugget 3 – How to work with complexity?
The future is characterized by complexity. Chris Corrigan provides a list of 10 books with tips on how to work in complexity. I don’t have any of the books from the list. However, I can highly recommend the Liberating Structures. The methods are true power tools and I use them all the time. The week before last I used 1-2-4-All again at the Brownbag Lunch in Shanghai. Also this time it made sure that people exchange openly and energy is created in the room. A participant found assistance with a real estate purchase. A few participants exchange themselves in the future to the topic homework and school. Have you ever tried Liberating Structures? What is your favourite method? (2 min, text, English)