Oprah Winfrey, Confessor

January 15, 2013 By David Griesing 23 Comments

I wrote about Lance Armstrong in early October and later that same month for a couple of reasons that relate to the work we do.

When you make mistakes that affect your ability to continue working & your reputation, you need to “speak for yourself about what happened” if you hope to regain your productivity. First off, it’s looking in the mirror and owning your mistakes so that you have the chance to be trusted and have influence again.

Coming to this acceptance also involves seeking the counsel of wise people around you—if you’re fortunate enough to have them. It’s only after “the owning” and “the reflecting” that you tell those you’ve affected what you did, why you did it, what you’ve learned, and how you’re going to do things differently in the future.

Each step hard, but necessary.

While its taken 3 months (or at least as many years since the allegations against him started to build), on Thursday Armstrong is promising to come clean to Oprah Winfrey. In an intimate television kind of way, her backstory is joining with his. Afterwards, we’ll draw our own conclusions.

We care about all of this because we need role models in our work—people to show us how—and for many of us, Armstrong fit that bill. Disciplined. Motivated. Triumphing over hardship. We were fortified by his example.

We also care about this because we know that the moral training we have today often comes from such “teachable moments” (as the president once reminded us)—that is, as long as we take them.

So we’ve followed the arc of Lance’s story. It was hard to absorb the allegations about a doping conspiracy he masterminded, to see him fired as the spokesman for products we buy, and finally to watch him have to break ties with his LiveStrong foundation. We were saddened by his apparent betrayal and surprised by his retreat into silence. Was it embarrassment? Was it shame?

In recent weeks, there have been some odd, Armstrong-initiated pop-ups. A surreal picture of him reclining in his den below his victory jerseys with the remark “Back in Austin and just layin’ around.” Rumors that he was figuring out what he had to do to get back into the competitive sporting circuit, and how admissions he might make would impact the lawsuits & investigations still swirling around him.

The picture and its tag-line suggested denial. The rumors suggested the machinations of lawyers and media advisors instead of soul-seekers.

We’ll see.

Because what he’s looking for from Oprah is not merely a stage that’s big enough for him and his story, but also for a confessor who will help to change our perception of him. Facilitate our forgiveness. Lance Armstrong’s goes to Oprah’s mountaintop in order to be healed in our eyes.

When our turns come it won’t be about teams of advisors or media blitz, and maybe not even about a catch in the throat when you get to the hard parts. Because it’s not about orchestration. It’s just about telling the truth and being genuinely sorry.

Otherwise you shouldn’t bother.

Playfulness Can Help You Achieve Your Work Goals

August 22, 2012 By David Griesing Leave a Comment

Tenacity with a little playfulness thrown in can be a powerful combination when you’re looking for—and finally doing—the work of your life.

If you were armchair running, swimming, paddling and shooting your way through the Summer Olympics like I was, I think you’ll agree: they gave us a lot to chew on when it comes to tenacity and playfulness.

Take gymnastics, for example. Or platform and springboard diving if you prefer. What’s so excruciating about watching these competitions is how often tight plus nervous ends in a lost opportunity. On the other hand, all you have to do is recall gymnast Gabby Douglas’ all-around performance to appreciate what can happen when tenacity makes room for playfulness. As soon as Gabby’s smile said “I’m enjoying myself,” the rest was pure magic.

Gabrielle Douglas of the U.S. competes in the floor exercise during the women's individual all-around gymnastics final in London — GABBY DOUGLAS photo/Mike Blake Reuters

Sometimes playfulness is integral to the moment, as it was for Gabby and the purposeful individuals in my last post, The Power of Laughter at the Most Serious Times. Other times, playfulness follows the tenacity like a sigh of relief, and changes the whole meaning of the story.

As the Olympics rolled into their closing ceremony, the pageantry marked a triumphant end to what had been a long, hard year for London. You’ll recall the scenes exactly one year ago, when thousands of rioters smashed windows, looted stores and torched parts of the City. One of those looters burned down much of the 144-year old House of Reeves furniture store in the borough of Croydon. In the days and weeks that followed, the 5^th generation Reeves brothers and their 81-year old father came to embody Britain’s World War II motto “Keep Calm and Carry On,” as they struggled mightily to put their business back together.

While the media was busy debating whether the riots represented class struggle or opportunistic criminality, the community summoned up its better angels to coalesce around the Reeves family as they got back on their feet. The lifeline extended to the family included over 4000 photographs from young people, holding up statements of encouragement and denying the hooligans the last word.

When their new showrooms opened this week, Trevor and Graham Reeves sat on a sofa outside their store, playfully gesturing to their storefront, which they had wallpapered with all of those photographs. It did more than express their gratitude. It provided a moment of effervescence: the grace note after a very hard year.

HouseofReeves2 — TREVOR & GRAHAM REEVES Photo/zuma press

Having the tenacity to find and do work that expresses your values can be serious business.

When you can laugh at yourself and the odds you’re facing along the way, and celebrate what you achieve with playfulness, your path will be easier, the crowds pulling for you larger, and the story you’re writing far more impactful.

I am a Work in Progress

April 22, 2012 By David Griesing 2 Comments

How you introduce yourself has everything to do with how you see yourself.

I am a writer. A speaker. A company starter and a dispute resolver. But that’s not all that I am. How others see me, and even more importantly, how I see myself, is contained in the words I use to describe myself. These words should include all the things that you are, including what you’re working to become: the dynamic as well as the static parts of you.

All of us are works in progress, tadpoles becoming frogs.

That’s probably why it’s so limiting when people are summed up with adjectives that speak only to their former glories. Academy award nominated actress. Nobel prize-winning economist. President Clinton. What we hear is that you’ve already come and gone. Summed up, and no longer becoming.

Over-simplified packaging (even to honor) probably derives from our survival instincts. A stranger approaches: is she friend or foe? As we start learning more about her, we put her in one category or the other. Where is she in my pecking order, and where am I in hers? Today it’s no longer safety we’re most concerned about, but meeting the expectations we have for ourselves, and that others are busy imposing upon us.

What I’m talking about is scrambling those expectations in the ways that are best for you as soon as you start talking about yourself.

Doing so changes everything: the way you see your work, the way you think about your life. Because these are the words you are choosing to define yourself.

Social media has made tagging ourselves the very springboard for conversation. This wasn’t the case “in the olden days” where self-description was limited to more specific occasions (Resumes. A few lines in a yearbook. A short bio when someone was introducing you someplace).

Today, we are constantly introducing and branding ourselves. When there is truth in our marketing, these kinds of tags can move our expectations (and the expectations that others have about us) to the rich-with-promise places where they need to be.

I have a friend who describes himself as “the home inspector lawyer, professional speaker, and raconteur.” His promise is that he’ll help you with your home inspection problems, and that you’ll have fun while he’s doing it. Joe is many things, but first and foremost he’s an entertainer: happiest when he’s making you happy.

I am collaborating with a woman who describes herself as an “empire builder.” Whose empire, you might ask? The stated goal is that it’s mine, but (in truth) some of the best energy in our collaboration also comes from being a part of what Amy’s building for herself. And then there’s the software developer at a client’s company whose bio begins with “puzzle piecer.” When I read this, I see my fragmented jigsaw puzzle sprawling over a table and Jonathon’s getting a charge by helping me find that recalcitrant piece.

People like this who involve other people in what they’re doing—and with who they are—are influential people. There are even meters for tracking their influence (like Klout; PeerIndex; Appinions; and PeopleBrowsr, the creator of something called Kred). The endorsements of influential people are important precisely because there are all of us out here who want to be involved with them and learn from the choices they’re making.

Mark Schaefer, a Rutgers marketing professor, has put his finger on the way that influencers are creating buzz with their followers in social media today.

This is an entirely new marketing channel, and when’s the last time we had one of those? Done well, it can be enormously effective because you’re getting this advocacy [for whatever it is you’re offering] organically.

But organic marketing is really only part of it.

It’s not the reflected glory from past accomplishments that influential people are providing, but future promises. In the words they use, each of them is involving our expectations with theirs. Not by offering a static summary of who they are, but by opening a door that invites you into a shared experience you begin creating together: truly, a springboard into the future.

Think about defining yourself this way.

It’s more than just words, of course. But the right ones invite others into your work-in-progress—while putting your best foot forward.