The things that I am going to say in this post are nothing new. But still, it is extremely difficult to practice and to master. I am talking about asking for feedback and handling that feedback.

I try to make it a habit to ask people for feedback. This can be about any kind of situation. This can be from anyone ranging from a loose acquaintance to a very close friend. The insights that are there for you to capture are immense. In the end it is all about what is in the eye of the beholder and that what feedback is all about. What impression do you give to other people? When you have crossed the hurdle to ask someone for feedback then comes the even tougher task of accepting that feedback and acting upon it. Don’t start saying “No, that’s not correct  because…” or “No, but…”. Come on, just say “Thank you” and then just shut up. In what follows you should try to incorporate that advice in your daily behavior.

Another thing you will notice is that people really appreciate it when you ask them about feedback. Certainly you are willing to really listen to them and make a commitment to try to act on their advice. In a way feedback can become infectious when people are more then willing to cooperate what you.

Bottom line: Go ahead and ask for feedback

Why leadership development does not thrive in a big bureaucratic organization remains a point of discussion. But it is true that for instance in hospitals or the taxes agency the necessity for a leader is smaller. The better everything is structured and the more professional the environment, the smaller the chance for a leader to make a difference. In circumstances with urgency – disasters – leaders will stand up.

Bottom line: What will you do when disaster strikes?

Finding balance in life is a challenging task. Considering the alarming news about the number of burn-outs and stress related problems, it seems like it is a wide-spread issue. The fact that a lot of people are struggling with finding a good balance in their lives makes me wonder what you can do about it.

The number of publications, books and blog posts about this issue is staggering. The number of different types of advice rank up to the same height. All in all, there is one main cause for stress related problems. In my opinion people commit theirselves way to much. People barely can cope with the issues that come up everyday. Most people take on everything. Just a little bit more won’t do harm will it?

The fact that you commit yourself too much makes that everyday clutter fills your day every day. In the daily turmoil it is hard to think about why your are doing it all for in the end. Occupied by the short term you loose sight on the long term. The long term being: your physical health and your life goals. Yes, I believe that you do not only do harm to yourself physically (e.g. heart related problems). You also fail to ensure you are on the right track in your life.

How to solve this? In my opinion it is quite simple: JUST SAY NO! Say no to all the things that only suck the life out of you. A lot of people are afraid to say no when somebody ask them help or a favour. In fact, what do you think is better: doing a random job on fifty things or doing a really superb job on twenty things. A nice consequence is that in the end you get to do more of what you really like. Value that.

PS: Don’t mistake saying NO with letting good stuff pass by. In order to grow you need to take on new challenging projects. There is always a trade-off between pay-off and risk. In that way you really have to be YES-man.

Bottom line: say NO when it sucks the life out of you.

Last night I attended a seminar in Brussels. I could not find a parking spot nearby so I had to quite a walk. I was quite late when the seminar ended. During that time there was still a lot of activity in the city but I felt like the city was preparing itself for a quiet night. Considering the situation this was the perfect situation for the kind of thought that you also get when your are travelling by train.

Brussels is a city I am not that familiar with. I have to admit that in fact I am not that crazy about the city.  But that night suddenly the feeling hit me that everything around me was ultimately placed there by another person. At the same time I was amidst all the anonymity of a big city and sourrended by a maximum of human effort. Instead of the prevailing perception of a city being technological and without a spirit I perceived the city as being organic and with a soul. It is really strange to describe the feeling I had at that moment. I certainly put a smile on my face and it was the best moment of my day.  I hope to have the same experience with other cities.

Bottom line: let the town you live in surprise you.

In my opinion there is a reason for the things that happen around us. Let me explain in what sense. I don’t mean that everything is well thought over. There is not a big plan or rationale behind everything. Humans are emotional and irrational beings remember. I mean it rather like this.

For every consequence there has to be a cause. A hippopotamus does not end up high up in the lamppost alone. There needs to be support in order to do that. Let me give an example. Bush did not get elected as president just by handing in a candidature. Bush needed people to vote for him in order to get elected president. There was a need in society that

Bottom line: next time you see your imaginary hippopotamus in the lamppost think about how it ended up there.

Sometimes you just know that people try to fool you.  You are completely aware of the situation on hand and you have all the information but still the other person is openly saying something else. When that person is trying to defend his behaviour with this false information you have really caught him stealing.

How to react in that kind of situations? Well, it is a tough choice. You can choose to openly discuss it and break open his lies in public. This will make the person realize that you have got the edge on him and he will probably be more discrete in future situations. Another option is to choose not to give any hint. You let him go but you have come to know that you cannot trust him. In future situations, you will see his scams from far away.

As long as this person does not attack you in person the second option is viable. But in general I believe that openly reacting to his words is the best option. I believe that you should not tolerate behaviour like this towards yourself.

Bottom line: speak up!

It is hard to find a good balance between being a hard brainer and a soft brainer. Hard brainers tend to attribute everything to the hard-wiredness of the left brain hemisphere. Soft brainers are undoubted free flowing and artistic and rely on the right brain hemisphere.

When in left brain mode all your decisions are consciously made (at least you think that it is so). When in right brain mode you loosen up and you open yourself for new experiences. In a way right brain thinking is more holistic en purposefull. It is a way of thinking that people tend to deny.

After your next lunch. Take a comfortable seat and let your mind flow freely. Just when you do not expect it you probably will have found great new insights.

Bottom line: Gaze into the distance for one time

When I was a kid I always felt somewhere in between. When I was playing in one playground I did not really fit in because I was to much like those other kids playing in another neighbourhood. Then when I went playing in the other playground with those other kids I did not really fit in neither. Yes, because I was too much like the ones I mentioned before. I had really good friends in all the playgrounds I went and every time I turned up we all enjoyed the time together. So that is not the issue. I think the interest to search for something unknown and new was there. Those days I really did not think about it but it appears to me that I wanted to share the best of several “worlds” to my friends.

I was a member of two different scouts groups at the same time. That too gave rise to a lot of questions why I was into that other group. I guess I just wanted to enjoy the different ambiance in the groups. I tried lots of different sports (I stuck with athletics forever though) because I liked learning the techniques and the different kinds of activities.

During my years at university I really enjoyed getting a scientific education but at the same time I went to language courses during the evenings. I thought there is more than just left brain or right brain (not or but and). I had the luck to have the opportunity to go to study abroad for a longer period. I guess that really triggered my further decisions to gain international contacts. I got active in an international student organisation and got to know great people from all over Europe.

During my first professional experience I had the opportunity to develop a team. I am really humble in saying that I was a full-time learning experience. The urge to interact with people from other departments and to help the organisation grow did stick with me. I was the lighting match of an initiative that looks to the future of youngster in the organisation and the future of the organisation itself. The will to do a project abroad lingered though. Finally I got the opportunity I had worked for so hard. I am able to go on a mission in India and Middle East for at least a year. A year of pure entrepreneurship and personal challenges. I can say I am up to it even though I know I will encounter some humps along the road.

That is why I feel so good today. Really! So forgive me that I overused the “I” word in this post.

Bottom line: Just go for it!

There are those defining moment when you make yourself a deal: do this by then or else DIE. Those cutthroat promises put can put you in a nasty situation. They can cause you to feel like loosing grip on things. However those same promises make things happen and assure getting grip on things.

Bottom line: Make those cutthroat deals with yourself

We all set goals that we want to achieve and we do that the whole time. This ranges from small tasks that have to be done to big-hairy-audacious-goals (BHAG). What strikes me is that to complet a task, most of the time it is not the ultimate reward that stimulates you to give the best of yourself. For instance, the vision of yourself competing in a triathlon competition does not really help to get out of bed in the morning to run your miles. Indeed, in the long run you need this kind of future vision but in the short run other factors come in play. What really helps are achieving chopped up bits of your long-term goal. Goals like: complete an amount of files by that time, run that amount of miles by next week. With this notion we make the ultimate goal more achievable and more concrete. However, the goals that we set that way can cloud the ultimate goal that is behind it. If you set the goal of running 30 minutes and really stick to those 30 mins (not 29 not 31), it can get a bit ridiculous. In that way those goals appear to be mechanic.

Bottom line: We need those long-term BHAG’s, those pinky perfect goals far in the future. To achieve them we need short-term achievable goals to get the action going.

We all acknowledge that body language plays a big role in the way we communicate with other people. At moments we are very aware of our body language. However, we tend to make two kinds of mistakes. First, we do not consider the signals we are sending to the listeners. Second, we do not read or misinterpret the signals sent by others.

In my opinion, many times we are unaware of the body language we exhibit to other people. In our inability to make an abstraction of the current situation, we stick to a very narrow self-centered view of a situation. We only think about ourselves and our own opinion. This tends to be true most certainly in situations were you are deeply involved in the conversation. We are so busy in the heat of the battle that we are not conscious about how we act. This is a very unfortunate thing because it is exactly in those situations were good control of body language can make a huge impact on how the conversations evolves.

Another thing is that we miss out on the body language of other people. Again, when you have attention for the body language of another person you attain an awful lot of informal information. By not focusing to much on the words spoken but on the gestures and movements made, you gain a whole array of very valuable information. But there is warning point: put yourself in the shoes of the other person in order to get a correct perspective on his body language. Misinterpretation can be a very bad guide.

To conclude, body language is a very powerful aspect of daily conversations. First, be aware of the signals you send to other people. Second, pay attention to the body language of the other and make a good interpretation of it. By avoiding those two pitfalls you get access to conversations that are very richer.

When you give people the time and possibility to explain what is important to them, you can get very different reactions. In my view there are two distinct reactions.

A first group really grabs the opportunity because they have their own opinions that they want to share with other people. Behind that lies a positive mindset: they want to show their true face to the listener. The behavior they talk about is a real reflection of the behavior they really exhibit.

A second group also grabs the opportunity but this time there’s a different driver behind that behavior. They want to enhance the good appearance they have. I talk about appearance because there is no real truth behind their words. Sometimes they just talk to the mouth of the listener and other times they push themselves up in spite of other people.

The ability to differentiate between these two kinds of drivers is not easily learned. I realise that it is a skill you learn by trial-and-error. But in my opinion you really develop some kind of instinct for it, call it a gutt feeling.

This is a small excerpt from one of the best comedy series ever. The main topic of a Seinfeld episode really is … nothing.

I mean, it’s all about everyday life and just that made the show so great in my opinion.