October 2009

This is about the tribal wisdom of the Dakota Indians, Modern Corporate wisdom and then ‘the world according to Jianele’ follows at the end, because I was reminded that no matter how creative and ‘reasonable’ our excuses seem, we sometimes have to make difficult decisions in order to succeed.

In a business environment where everyone wants to streamline their business, cut costs, reduce the headcount but still remain in business, I often find that those decisions – fiscally astute as they might be – backfire.

Yesterday I called the SABC about my TV license. (For my international readers: All South Africans are required by law to be in possession of a license in order to own a TV. This has to be paid annually in order to fund the public broadcaster. They are in dire financial straits due to mismanagement and have cancelled virtually all new programming placing many actors, producers and thousands of related jobs in jeopardy. They’re only broadcasting re-runs on all three their channels. Most, if not all, affluent people here watch satellite TV from a private supplier similar to cable for which we pay a monthly fee.)

I spoke with the lowest common denominator – a call centre agent. The conversation went something like this: (I might even call them again, record it and podcast it...)

I’ve done this with great effect in the past – both with small groups as part of Managment Training, but also at conferences with groups of a couple of hundred people!! The beauty of juggling lies in the fact that we’ve all marvelled at the skill of jugglers since we were little, but few of us have ever managed to acquire the skills.

Why Mind Management?

Every action begins with a thought – not one thing you’ve done has been without thought.  Therefore it stands to reason that, if you want to change your actions, you need to change your thinking. So let’s quickly explore a little bit of physiology to clarify the body-mind dynamic.