A Follow-up

Virtual Book Club:

“Strong Ground”

by Dr. Brené Brown

Firstly, thank you to everyone who participated in insium’s Virtual Book Club: “Strong Ground,” by Brené Brown on November 12th. Everyone was willing to dig into the book and to share their learning and perspectives. I am grateful to all who showed up and dug in.

I placed everyone in Breakout rooms and had serious FOMO by not being in one myself. However, the sharing of those discussions by the participants has certainly got me thinking more deeply and fully. 

Feature Story

Our feature story today comes from a very special guest. She is someone who is incredibly courageous and inspirational. Her name is Eliana Saad.

Eliana is a 12-year-old entrepreneur and founder of La Forte, an activewear brand created to help women of all body types feel strong and confident. She was also the brain behind Smell of Hope, where she made candles and diffusers to raise money for children living with cancer. With the support of her sister Hannah and her parents, and through her passion and creativity, Eliana is showing that – even at a young age – you can make a big difference in the lives of others.

I am truly in awe of Eliana’s wisdom, her purpose & motivation, and what she has achieved, and I look forward to following her continued journey.  I am grateful for her sharing her story with all of us.  In her words, her story … 

courageously Receiving Feedback

insium’s Workplace Courage Questionnaire (wCQ) identified that 1 in 2 people will not give feedback; this finding was consistent amongst senior leaders, first line managers and team members.

You might be thinking, “this is not surprising”; “nothing new in this finding”. Fair enough. But, if your workplace has invested considerable time, effort and finances to build the skill of giving feedback, and you’re not getting a corresponding return on this investment, have you considered that this might be because we don’t put the same time, effort and finances into receiving feedback?

Leading Self & Others

In our newsletter today you will find 3 short pieces, each relating to both self-leadership and leading others:

1. The Comments Section … the cheap seats in The Arena (Dare To Lead)
2. Leadership: Glorious? A burden? Or both?
3. Stories of courage

You will find the insights and wisdom of others in each of these pieces, as well as reflection questions for your consideration – plus a final piece about something we’ve been working on recently: “My Courageous Self.”

The difference between knowing and doing is courage

In our newsletter today, you will find out what we’re doing, based on what we know. You’ll find:

• Two impactful courage-building programs:
  • What everyone is talking about, The courageous conversation that needs to be had …
  • My Courageous Self, a program that invites you to build your map of courage and chart your own future course of courage
• Stories of courage in which people have turned their knowing into doing 
• Books that we’re reading which provide strategies for doing; that is, strategies for increasing our knowledge and ability to do 

These are a few of my favourite things …

One of my most favourite things is to do is to encourage others to open doors in order to learn, to grow and to thrive. To enable this, in my practice as a facilitator and executive coach, I have a number of favourite exercises, quotes, tools and more—some of these, I invite participants to use; some are for my own use to ensure that I am the best version of myself in all I do.

A past courageous act in the future

Living in Moscow in the late 1990s I had to be courageous. I had to learn a new language, speak it and make myself understood. Since all of the signs were in Cyrillic, I had to learn a new alphabet to make sure I didn't get hopelessly lost on the Moscow Metro. I needed courage to maintain motivation working as a consultant during the Russian financial crisis and to trust the Russian translator when facilitating workshops.

Be the courage you wish to see in the world.

As you know, we are super-keen on building courage – building courage in our workplaces, in our homes, in our communities and in our world.  With recent local and world events, goodness knows we need more courage. 

So, in our newsletter today, you will find:

A few things to share with you; some may say “ to give” you...

 A Team Exercise: “I give …; I wish …”

This is a team exercise to strengthen connection, understanding and performance. Specifically, the aims of exercise are to:

Last year (2022) more than ever the world searched “can I change”...

 Happy new year!  I hope the start of 2023 has been good for you, your family, friends and communities, and for your colleagues and workplaces.