Impossible? Possibly not...

At earlier points in time, I have touched upon the fact that most of the time life is a matter of prioritisation, and I found it stated in a rather interesting way recently - the words are supposedly those of Muhammad Ali:

Impossible is not a fact. It's an opinion.

Because actually, that's the way things are.
In very few cases we are working with impossibilities - and then we are usually in a mathematical-physical context like perpetual motion, trisecting the angle or squaring the circle.
In the vast majority of situations, when talking about the impossible, instead, it is a question of priority - it may be possible, but it is so complicated or costly that we prioritize not to try to do it.
But still, in most cases, we have a choice - and when something is rejected as impossible, it is simply because it is decided (by more or less conscious decision) that it should not be prioritised.
That something is impossible is thus reduced to anyone's opinion - not a fact.
(Translated from Umuligt? Som oftest ikke..., originally published March 9th, 2016)

Room for differences

At a point in time, I came to read an article in the Dainish Railways passenger magazine Ud og Se from April 2012 about the Danish poet Søren Ulrik Thomsen.
He was quoted for the following, which I have also heard other people say, but never exactly as Søren Ulrik Thomsen does (in my feeble attempt of translation):

When I am annoyed with and very critical towards another person these days, I try to discipline myself and think of everything that is unique to him or her. The things that only this person can do, the things which I would miss if that person was no longer in the world. 

You can catch yourself thinking that there is a double-sidedness in this - that while thinking about what you would miss, you can seek some perverse pleasure by thinking this other human being dead. But apparently this is not what drives Søren Ulrik Thomsen. As he says in the following sentence: "It is a great poverty and folly not to be able to sense other people in all their diversity." Now, this is most certainly something we can learn from.(Translated from Rummelighed for forskellighed, originally published July 28th, 2012)

On the topic of weak weeks

When looking at things and how they change over a longer period of time, it is sometimes easier to notice change.
Not so long ago, it was nothing special if a month went by with no tralsation of posts into English on this blog.
Now I am at a point where it is difficult to interpret seven days without new posts as anything else than "a weak week", which I would so much like to do better than.
So therefore: No, seven days without posts is not an omen indicating that I am about to return to the frequency of translation of the past. It is actually simply a sign of this being "a weak week".
(Translated from Noget om svage uger)

On the topic of grass

Disney cartoons are generally known as entertainment for children, but for grown-ups who listen carefully, it's also possible to pick up gems. I found one at a time when I was listening in with with the younger generation watching Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers,.
We all know the expression that "the grass is greener on the other side of the fence" - an expression that I am not overly fond of - because I think we live in the best of all worlds, as we live in the only one - but with the Rescue Rangers I heard something that unites "the grass is greener" with my approach to the world. The gem was spoken by the wonderfully named Monterey Jack, and in all its simplicity, it goes like:

The grass is always greener when you remember to water it.

To stay within the metaphor: As I see it, I have only one lawn - but there is a world of difference between taking the lawn for granted as opposed to giving the lawn the care and attention it needs - and Monterey Jack's words should be an inspiration for all those who see their metaphorical grass fade while the neighbor's lawn flourishes.
Perhaps you should rather look at the neighbor's watering can ​​to become wiser?
(Translated from Noget om græs)

The battle against sleepless nights

I think most of us know the feeling of going to bed to (try to) sleep, with a head heavy from a mix of sadness, hopelessness and worries about something we've been working with during the day that we have not been able to bring to the point to which we would like to have it brought - just to wake up in the morning (after having finally fallen asleep far into the night) with a much more positive view of life. At least I, personally, have sometimes suffered quite a bit from it.

In fact, at one point, the feeling became so familiar that it allowed me to shake it off by calming myself with a simple "Do not worry about it - you know that you will wake up with a much lighter perspective in the morning". Although I know it's a strange meta argument, it has actually proven to be effective - and correct - in quite a large number of situations.

However, my dear friend from my Twitter tribe, Wendy Woolfork, mad eme understand that I ought to modify this large number of situations a bit. So I must underline that at least for me, it has proven to be effective. I am not able to say, that it is a silver bullet for anyone to use - and I recognize that there are worries with such an impact that they will not magically be gone at the break of dawn.

(Translated from Til kamp mod søvnløse nætter)

Alone with your thoughts

I have often thought about the difference between being alone and being lonely - but the other day I actually saw something that took me a little closer to what I think must be a suitable description of the difference.
It happened when I saw a sign on which someone wrote: "A customer should never be left alone with their own thought".
Of course, thinking solely business, there is a certain reason in saying so. However, it initially led my mind to the thought that we can all benefit from having someone near us to help us when we do not want to be alone with our thoughts.
And then it dawned om me: lonely is what I am when I am alone with my thoughts without wanting it to be so. And when I'm lonely, anyone with whom I can share my thoughts is a friend.
I only wish for anyone that they will always have good friends available when loneliness closes in. And I'll do what I can to be a good friend when people around me do not want to be alone with their thoughts - while at the same time respecting, when people actually want to be alone with their thoughts.
(Translated from Alene med sine tanker)

When towers lean a little

In a fascinating way, the people we meet can naturally be divided into circles: I may have a couple of hundreds of followers on Twitter, a part of whom engage in my tweets, some come so close that they actually go beyond Twitter and start reading here, and a few go so far as to actively react on what I have written.
Thus I was inspired to write this post by Bojosi Gamontle, who had come to the innermost of these circles, and after reading the post about the tower that did not lean at Osborg asked whether there is room in our daily lives though to say, "maybe the tower can lean a little today"?
Such a question is a bit too complex to respond to via Twitter - even after we have been given twice as many characters per tweet - but on the other hand it's too good a question not to be answered. And therefore it ended up as a post here instead.
Funny enough, it's a question that I have also debated (in a slightly different disguise, though) with a close colleague: should we be afraid to fail as a result of trying to do things in a new way? My good colleague thinks we should be afraid. If the things we create are released to the customers and malfunction, people could get physically hurt. Period. I am however of the opinion that there is a time to fail and a time to be careful: the things that are released to the customers must of course be okay - but on the way towards the finished, tested and functioning result we should allow ourselves to be as innovative as possible and fail as quickly as possible, otherwise we will never become smarter and better.
The same applies to the master builder of Osborg. I have no doubt that he had been in situations along his way, where the things he tried to build had crumbled to pieces in spectacular ways - that is what it takes to eventually be able to stand tall as a master builder. And in the same way, we must also allow ourselves to be imperfect, embrace our failures, admit to our vulnerability and be able to assess where it is necessary that we deliver our best. We, too, need to try things that fail in order to learn what works and what doesn't - and in the end we may in certain ways be like the builder who stood impassive when he was accused of having made mistakes, while we know very well that we have many other things to polish when we return to our studies. So yes, there are plenty of times when the tower may lean a little. We may even say that there are times when the tower by all means should lean - because otherwise, we have not challenged ourselves and have not escaped far enough from our comfort zone to build even higher towers of the future without fear of having them crash to the ground.
(Translated from Når tårne hælder en smule)

What's that about pings?

(Translated from: Hvad er der med det dér ping-pong?)
There must be readers who have not been around from the start and who do not quite get what the blog's title - and the title of the blog it's translated from, and the name of the Twitter profile - is really about.
It all started a long time ago - before blogging became publicly available, which was why the project had to be hosted on a "regular" homepage, which in turn decreased the release frequency significantly - as an attempt to create mutual inspiration (you could call it a kind of ping pong) - while at the same time being a place for me to record my thoughts that otherwise ended up noting on loose scraps of paper.
Since then, a lot has happened - I've begun to translate selected posts, and occasionally spread some of them on Twitter, but the purpose is still the same as originally: mutual inspiration. Comments are still more than welcome, and the amount of comments I get enables me to still be able to relate to all of them individually. The reader may feel free to take this as an invitation.

When culture eats breakfast

According to Mark Fields, who was heading up Ford Motor Co. in the Americas in 2006, Peter Drucker has once said that:

Culture eats strategy for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

And even if I have not really found any evidence that Drucker has used exactly the words in question, there is still something very true in this quote. Because you can have the best of strategies, devised the sharpest brains in a management team, often even with the help of external consultants - if you do not have a proper culture in the company, it does not matter.

As I have seen Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla like to be one of the hottest hotshots in corporate management these days, quoted:

Every person in your company is a vector. Your progress is determined by the sum of all vectors.

- and it expresses the same in a way for even nerds like me to be able to understand it.
Business culture is what it takes to make sure that all the vectors that a company consist of point in roughly the same direction. If the culture is sick, and the vectors point all over the place, then even the finest strategy is close to no good.
(Translated from Når kulturen spiser morgenmad)

Golden - and other - rules

It is usually a good general rule of thumb, rooted in the words of Christ - sometimes even called the Golden Rule - that we should do to other as as we wish them to do to ourselves - although George Bernard Shaw meant that "you should not do unto others as you would that they should do unto you, as their tastes may not be the same".
And you do not have to read many formative stories for kids to see that it may be excessive simplification - as soon as you have seen the rabbit treat the cat with carrots and in turn be invited to eat fish, you find that the Golden Rule can not stand alone by itself.

Image courtesy of pixabay / DasWortgewand

But then I recently encountered a quote by British literary theorist Terry Eagleton:

Genuine equality means not treating everyone the same, but attending equally to everyone's different needs.

- which could be considered to be an appropriate trade-off between Shaw and the Golden Rule.
Eagleton may be said to have a point here - the only problem is that it's so easy to use the Golden Rule. If you have to pay equal attention to the needs of other people, it requires that you actually understand the needs of others. But if we consider it carefully, then we quickly come to realize that it's worth the effort.
(Translated from Gyldne - og andre - regler)

On the topic of saying no

I used to be exceptionally bad at saying "no" to people, when they came to me for help - not least in the workplace. As a misunderstood attempt to be friendly, I would like to help anyone who contacted me with something that I could help them with.
And, as such, it was very good. Apart from the fact that I rarely had the resources to help all those who wanted help. Time used to run short.
And then suddenly it dawned on me: the fact that I cannot say "no", does not enable me to help everyone. It does not mean that I will not have to say "no" anyway. It just makes those who ask for help prioritize for me - after a first-come, first-served principle, resources are used, and when there are no more, the only possibility is to say "no, unfortunately". Or, what's even worse, return to some of those I have already promised to help and say that unfortunately, it cannot be done anyway. Hence, I basically reduce my own reliability.
So now I work with myself and do my best to get better, not saying "yes" to everything. In particular, if someone is better at helping than I - and that often happens - then less time is wasted. But also when there has to be room for something that's more important. Because I have learned that the only thing that happens when I cannot say no is that I exhibit unusually bad ability to prioritise.
(Translated from Noget om at sige nej, originally published October 19th, 2017)

More on the topic of chairs

Not long after I had written two posts: the one about t superbosses and the one about wishing to sit in the manager's chair I came with the idea to combine the two posts. Because it struck me: if you went to a job interview with one of Sydney Finkelstein's excellent managers with the point of view that in five years you would like to sit where the manager now sits; the hiring would most likely take it as given - why should she be interested in candidates who aren't ambitious? So I'm convinced that the superboss will take her candidate as far as possible and get as much as possible from the person in the process. The question mentions five years as a measure of "a long time", and much may have happened that could be of great value to the company before "long time" has passed.
Yes, it is more likely that the excellent leader calls on her employees to wish for the boss's chair, rather than to refrain from thinking so.
(Translated from Mere om siddepladser, originally published May 15th, 2016)

100...

This post is in a certain sense what we could call an anniversary - it's a blog entry number 100, which I translate into English.
It has been nineteen months since I started - at first I did not know how long it would last, I did not know how long I would have interesting posts to translate and I did not know if there would be anyone who would be interested in reading what I wrote.
But last month the English blog had six times as many page views as the Danish; it happens ever so often that I actually get the idea for a post out of something which is originally English; and therefore I have to think it back into Danish and then again into English, and I actually think that the process of having an English blog is rewarding. So there are really no good reasons why I shouldn't keep it up.
(Translated from 100...)

On the topic of help and delegation

In Rebecca Elvy's latest i3 Leadership Newsletter, she challenges us "to stop trying to do it all on your own and ask for help..."

The challenge of asking for help is an interesting one.

Let's forget that asking for help to a certain degree is a display of vulnerability - that you are not the superperson that you might desire to project the image of, because such a superperson would be able to do everything herself and still be able to fly around the world at the speed of light, all in a day's work. (The topic of vulnerability and why showing your weak spots might be a good idea has been discussed here earlier). And the vulnerability can easily be explained - there's a reason that you are the leader of a team; you simply have so much to do that you should not be able to do it yourself - or might not have all the relevant skills - hence the team.

Let's also forget that some people avoid delegation because knowledge is power - if a leader does not want to share necessary knowledge, she is not displaying leadership, not to be considered a leader and should never have been appointed in the first place.

And then I am happy that I did not even think about the point that Rebecca also mentions: the thought "that delegating or asking for help will ... not meet your exacting standards..." Because I take pride in empowering and trusting my team, it makes me happy that I did not even think that whoever I might delegate a task to might not be up to do it in a satisfactory way.

But Rebecca is still so absolutely right. From time to time I get into these situations where delegating seems a waste of time - because I would be able to do what I ask for in a fragment of the time, as I have tried it before, and know that simply the task of delegating it to a more inexperienced person would take time, because I would at least need to have a mentoring role in the process.
At these times, it is beneficial to at least consider: is this something that we for sure never need to do again. Because if there is a fragment of possibility that this could be a recurring task, then it must be remembered that next time the task occurs, the additional resources used on mentoring and building up experience will start paying back. And even if it is a one-off task, there is still a possibility to develop the delegate in the process, and it should be considered, if the time is not well spent on it.

Finally, the delegation is also a process of knowledge sharing - and if the knowledge is shared, the risk that a task cannot be handled the next time I am for some reason not around for it diminishes.

But in the heat of the moment, we tend to act rather than think. And if there's one thing your piece on asking for help has done, it has made me make a mental note: the next time, I am about to start on something that I might as well delegate, stop doing and start delegating. It's not necessarily an easy thing to do, but the above considerations show that it's an important one.

(Translated from Noget om hjælp og uddelegering)

#7ThingsIReadThisWeek

Occasionally - on very rare occasions - I am happy to observe that the distance between my ideas and my action is not always a marathon.
I have experienced a rare example of this kind of happiness this week, where I wrote on Monday how I could fantasize about creating a blog concerned with inspiring things I had read - and later today, I actually publish the first "real" post on #7ThingsIReadThisWeek.
The blog is in English - because I have to admit to myself that most inspirational things I read are written in English - but I cannot deny the possibility that from time to time there might be a link to something that's in Danish or otherwise non-English.
And the thought is - we'll see how long it lasts - that a post should be published every Sunday. So far, it seems to be going well; the post for today is ready for release. The coming Sundays will show if the initiative holds, or if I fail.
(Translated from #7ThingsIReadThisWeek)

On the topic of chairs

At one point I went to a lecture where the lecturer spoke of one of these usual recruitment interviews, where the interviewer asked the hopeful candidate the traditional question: "Where are you in five years?"
The applicant had the courage to answer "At that time I sit in your chair!"
From here, what happened further fades in to the mist - the story does not even tell whether the applicant got the job, but we can guess that the outcome to some extent had something to do with the interviewer's courage: if she was a little nervous and looked at the recruitment as part of a zero-zero game where the total amount of team cake is a constant, she would naturally feel somewhat threatened.
But if she was able to see the possibilities - and able to examine the applicant so well that she dared to trust that the person could contribute constructively to the progress - thereby ensuring growth and positive development - there are certainly perspectives in having such an employee.
Maybe there would even be room for promotion of the employee without the expense of the person hiring her - maybe because the hiring manager herself was destined for bigger things.
(Translated from Noget om siddepladser, originally published May 2nd, 2016)

On the topic of signs

Before the summer holidays, I had the pleasure of visiting the ARoS Museum of Modern Art in Aarhus, Denmark - and I have to admit that I share the museum's idea that it is not only a museum but also a mental fitness center. Just as, it is fair to say, many other excellent museums.
One of the biggest experiences I got was on the floor hosting the exhibition "No Man's An Island - The Satanic Verses", which presents works from the museum collections. And what made me particularly impressed was the Finnish artist Jani Leinonen's work, Beggars' Signs, which consists of framed signs, Leinonen has purchased from panhandlers in different cities.
I know that the museum in the accompanying text tells me that Leinonen hereby exposes "the world of art as a massive economic circuit" in a world, "where everything can be acquired for money: apparently even suffering people's cries for help."
Now I do not know how Leinonen has made his purchases - if I had been in his place, I would (because he could hardly bring all these people in a situation where they would be permanently without the need to beg) primarily have given a substantial payment for my contributors and have made sure that they would immediately have been able to produce a new sign. Thus I would just have been one of many who helped people who had fallen through the security net towards the bottom of society.
But I was most affected by a specific one of the signs displayed:

Excerpt from Jani Leinonen: Beggars’ Signs (2009-2015) ARoS Aarhus Kunstmuseum

Skiltet var angiveligt indkøbt i Los Angeles og bar teksten:

PLeaSe HeLP
Need Money For clothes And Haircut to Look For A Job.
Am willing to work Hard.
Ready to change My Life.
Need HeLP to stART
Thank you!

Now, I'm not rich enough to be able to afford a profound change in the lives of another human being - but this sign immediately gives me greater desire to make a difference to the one who made the sign. Not giving money - but by taking them out and organizing a haircut and some clothes and by checking if I had someone in my network that would be able to use that person in a job. And then, keep in touch and find out how things went. It is far from certain that the beggar would get a bright and happy life out of it - but the sign shows a willingness that gives the viewer a hope that a penny spent here will make a greater difference than a penny spent on one of the other panhandlers.
And as a final point: I do not agree with the accompanying text that "by purchasing material instead of producing it, Leinonen undermines the idea of ​​the artist as the creature genius". Because it is Leinonen who has got the idea - and first of all, it is precisely him who has been the creative soul. Yes, he bought the signs - but other artists also buy their raw materials and put them together so they become art, right?
I have since read an interview with Erlend Høyersten, director of the museum, in the Danish paper Kristeligt Dagblad, where he mentions this work as one of five especially suitable for mental fitness because "it's a collection of panhandlers' signs and in most religions it is seen as a virtue to help others". At least it was mental fitness to my mind. And maybe it's my protestant upbringing, which means that I feel like a greater virtue in helping those who show the greatest willingness to make an effort to help themselves in the future.
(Translated from Noget om at skilte med noget, originally published August 9th, 2017)

On the topic of being a wall

Man is, as it has been known for centuries, not an island; if John Donne had not found out, we would have seen it again and again. I am in no position to deny that Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein can have made their groundbreaking discoveries on their own; there are no stories about who was doctor Watson to the Sherlock Holmes of Thomas Edison, and Johann Sebastian Bach is not known as a participant in an artists' collective - but we who are of more average intelligence do best, when we have someone to bounce our ideas against.
Not because I am unable to get an idea every once in a while - but actually, I find one of the most interesting things for me to do is to act as a wall to the balls that people around me need to bounce to refine their ideas. Most likely, I would have been better as doctor Watson than I would have been as Sherlock Holmes.
(Translated from Noget om at være en mur, originally published May 9th, 2012)