When was the last time that you had a really “deep” (meaningful) conversation with someone about anything ?
When was the last time that you really opened yourself up and shared some truthful (non sugar-coated) thoughts with another person ? On this note, when you last performed a GAP Analysis on your business, did you answer the questions/ prompts truthfully, or did you “blur the truth” in relation to certain questions/ prompts (e.g. when identifying what the weaknesses of your business are). If you you tended to “blur the truthfulness” of your answers then I suggest that you only kidded yourself, and the opportunity to improve your business operation will be diluted accordingly.
When did you last experience an alignment of your views with those of another person ?
When did you last challenge the status quo of: a commonly-held view/ how you manage yourself/ how a particular organisation operates/ etc ?
Increasingly, it is proving to be very difficult to hold such conversations with another person; so when the opportunity presents itself GRAB IT with both hands and go for it ! I find such experiences incredibly mentally stimulating, relieving and uplifting.
More than that, I see much evidence of many people preferring to “follow the rest of the sheep”, rather than form an opinion of their own through critical examination of the given issue. Result ? The discovery of innovative solutions to sometimes repetitive problems/ issues aren’t made; because “going with the flow” prevents this from occurring. And anyone who chooses to go “against the flow” is seen as being “radical”, “antagonistic” and even “rebellious”; and is often reprimanded for challenging the status quo despite their good intentions to realise an improved solution/ way of approaching a particular activity.
I have lived in New Zealand for all of my 50 years, apart from short trips abroad. During these 5 decades of time I have seen little evidence of a country that has “found its feet”. In all honesty, I think N.Z. is still trying to go from its knees to its feet. Why do I think this ?
a) We live in a society that promotes telling “white lies” over telling the truth, in order to avoid offending. i.e. PC Culture
b) We continue to step around core/ ingrained issues and thereby apply “halfhearted” solutions – which ultimately fail; rather than stare the given issue in the face and let the truth flow in order to fix the problem to the fullest extent possible.
c) The Kiwi ego is generally phenomenally over-sized; and contributes materially to the business failure rate. It seems that many Kiwi business owners either don’t know how and/ or don’t want to ask for help – and many more don’t even know that they need help – to survive in the commercial realm.
d) The right to speak freely without fear of reprisal is being called into question increasingly. And not just in relation to high profile political figureheads, but in respect of employees being willing to speak openly and honestly with their employer about aspects of their organisation that aren’t working well. Remember – step one of solving any problem in life is to “identify” what the problem is; so if employees are not prepared to honestly identify specific problems, how on earth can anyone move forward to help that organisation resolve its problems/ issues ?!
e) Most of N.Z. society is geared towards risk mitigation rather than “risk management”; and consequently children are growing-up without the ability to assess risk…any sort of risk.
f) The tall poppy mentality of many New Zealanders continues to contribute towards the restriction of the extent to which naturally talented Kiwis develop new innovative opportunities. In short, the rate at which N.Z. innovates, is slowing. Whereas, the rate at which other countries (e.g. Denmark, Holland, China) are innovating is increasing.
g) New Zealand has a tendency to want to “reinvent the wheel”, to find 100 % its own solutions; versus adapt proven solutions that have been developed by other countries. For example, why on earth doesn’t N.Z. use recycled plastics on its roads like other countries already do ?
Make sure that you keep thinking for yourself – and in doing so shape your world around you as best you can; because if you don’t then your entire world will be shaped for you.