who are you disapppointing?

One of my favorite poems is "The Guy in the Glass", it reminds me that the only person who will be disappointed in me, is myself. Not my parents, not my friends, not by my boss, not the JCI members, only myself. Of course - other people can be disappointed if I promise something then don't do it, or forget, but that's not the kind of disappointment I'm talking about here.

I'm talking about the more serious kind of disappointment, the am-I-fulfilling-my-expectations-to-life disappointment, the one that can lead to serious self-doubt and self-confidence issues.

One of the first things I say to members that want to get involved in JCI activities is to not disappoint themselves. In general, JCI members are ambitious young people, we see something we don't like and we fix it, we get ideas, we implement them, we go for our dreams, go-getters, sometimes even overachievers - you can call us a lot of things. And sometimes you can call us disappointed. Not in each other, but in ourselves.

Sometimes we think we can do everything, we'll spend an hour each and every morning working on JCI things, we'll get Richard Branson to come speak for us, we'll do everything, go to all meetings, travel...

And its a killer.

How, as a leader, do you deal with disappointment in a team? From an email saying "I'm sorry I didn't do what you expected", to someone who is so discouraged by their own efforts they don't even want to come to meetings any more? We've all been there - the project you don't even want to think about, the contact you should have emailed ages ago and now its too late, the note to yourself telling you to follow up on that lead...

So I do my best to not have to deal with it, telling my directors to not set themselves up for disappointment. I tell them that I will never be disappointed in them, in JCI we all participate as much as we can, but that they can be disappointed in themselves, and its a lot worse. It is better to give more than expected than less.

Yes - I am only disappointing myself, but is that really an "only"? Are we not the harshest judges of ourselves and our accomplishments?

I don't believe in living without expectations, I believe in following your dreams, being your best, but also keeping it all within reality. You should have a big hairy goal, an ambition you think is only 50% achievable, a dream to work towards and live up to. Just keep it --- you know ---- semi realistic. 

New Directors (2)

Last week we were looking for two new directors, and this week we got them! yay!

Anne is adding to her engagements in JCI London and coming on the board with a full directorship, Anne is already local TOYP coordinator and Deputy Business Director, and now also new International Director. Too much? Anne is very efficient and has a work capacity beyond most people, and I'm trusting her to keep me up to date if something changes. Also Anne is very ambitious on behalf of JCI and wants to do as much as she can for the organisation in the years she has left as a member (membership ends at 40), something we always like!

Second new director is new member Timmy from Sweden. New to JCI and new to London Timmy made a strong impression on us already from day one, and is also ambitious in using his role as Strategic Partnership Director to build networks and visibility in London both for JCI and himself. I've had a meeting with Timmy already and I'm excited for the new push.

Brands and partnerships

Today turned out to be a really long day, but very interesting!

Deputy Strategic Partnership Director Anna got in touch with Ben Leon from Bravo Lima, who met us for a drink and to talk about branding, clarity in branding, and partnerships. The meeting turned into two hours of passionate discussion about anything from entrepreneurship to the Israeli-Palestine conflict. Ben had lots of smart things to say about how JCI London can promote and profile itself, and lots of ideas for partners and partnerships. Both Anna and I had a lot of realizations during the discussion, and are both inspired for Monday's council meeting which will be themed on partnerships.

One outcome is that we need to be clearer about our message. JCI can be so many things to different people, and have so much to give, that when we want to communicate it all it does not enforce but dilute our message. Who our partners are and how we feature them also contributes to our message, or our brand, so that's something we should rethink. Finally Ben gave a range of suggestions to how we can add value to and contribute with the different partners. Lots of great ideas, lots to dig into, and lots to discuss on Monday!

After the meeting with Ben I met with Anne, and discussed the role of International Director, and how she can use JCI to promote her career. We talked about the opportunitie JCI gives to learn about and create contacts in the EU, our relations with the UN, how JCI UK/London profiles itself internationally, and just in general all the international opportunities with JCI London. And with at least 25 nationalities among our members that's not few!

Anne will present her ideas for the position at the council meeting, and hopes they will elect her as the new international director (but she might have competition...).

We're trying to do the council meetings this year less admin and bureaucracy, but more strategic; leave the directors to do (more or less) what they want with their areas, and use the monthly council meetings to decide where we want the organisation to go; what we want it to be; exchange experiences; contribute to each other through sharing synergies and ideas. Monday will be the third meeting..so its still a pretty new concept...we'll see how many shows up!

New Directors

This week has barely begun and I'm already on the hunt for two new directors. When we learned that two of our dear directors are leaving the council, Sarah (my deputy) and I talked about what our options are.

Martina is leaving her role as International Director because she is leaving London for Barcelona, while Tamas is leaving the role as Strategic Partnership Director because he wants to focus more on his job. Tamas and I have not had the best of communications, something we have both been aware of, and as the role is a new role taking upon itself things the President used to do earlier, I think that bad communication between the President and the Strategic Partnership Director, in addition to it being an entirely new role, made it a particularily difficult and time consuming role.

I have a council of almost 18 people, with 14 different nationalities, and I would be lying if I said that communication is not an issue. Its not normally been much of a problem though (at least not that I am aware..).Instead it is challenging and fun. I deal a lot with different styles of communication and cultures in my job, and what I learn in JCI I can use in my day job, and vice versa.

I have already several people showing interest for both director roles, so the option Sarah and I discussed if we did not get anyone interested does luckily not seem to be relevant. Instead we have a different challenge; how to select the new directors from all the interested applicants! Luckily there are lots of other great opportunities to get involved, so I hope I will not leave anyone hanging...