Taking the scenic route

Beach at Port Erin, Isle of Man

Two weeks.  Fourteen days.  That’s how long I had without phone calls, meetings and email.  

Bliss.  

I seem to have a love-hate relationship with my inbox.  Email is a necessary part of my life, my business, but when you switch off, which I did, you discover that life does go on, and you can focus your energies on something else – like relationships.

I do find it is only when I leave home, leave Canada that is easy to close the email door behind me when I go.   When I stay here, it is much harder to switch off.  It is all too easy to sneak off and check the iPhone, but I highly recommend taking time to switch off and leave the electronics at home.

We had a wonderful time visiting family in the UK and reconnecting with old friends on the Isle of Man.  Those windy days on the island just blew the cobwebs out and nothing beats a walk along the beach surrounded by nature at its best.

I was struck by our different worlds when we drove home from Pearson Airport.  On the one hand on the island, it was sometimes a challenge to have two cars on the same road and the same time, because in reality there was only room for one.  While at Pearson there are multiple lanes, with cars going at a fast pace to reach their destination.

I guess in one situation, it truly is about the journey and the beautiful scenery to be enjoyed, while with the other, the pleasure (hopefully) is on reaching the destination.

As I look at my bulging inbox with over 1,400 emails, I kinda wish I could delay getting back on the fast track.  So learning from my vacation, I am taking the scenic route and taking some detours, before I rev up to go on the multi-lane highway.

Danger. Pay attention.

I know.  I said I wouldn’t write any more about the puppy, but you know he provides such great business/life lessons, that I couldn’t resist sharing this one.

He’s a handsome fellow, now a year old, completely trained and knows the rules. Because he’s been so good at sticking to his “territory” we’d taken to shooing him outside when he needed to go.  And in the cold weather, we were more than happy with this routine. He would go outside and bark when he wanted in.

All was well.  Until Tuesday.  When he decided to explore and visit our new cows, ten of them, and the bull.  He thought it would be fun and games as he played in their field, darting in between, getting them to chase him.  My heart was in my mouth as I watched him, thinking just one kick from the bull and it could be game over.  No matter how much we called him, he ignored us. He was having way too much fun, not realizing the danger he was in.  Eventually he came out.

But we are watching him like a hawk again.  Putting him on a leash so we can keep close tabs on him.

To me, it illustrates that no matter how much we trust people, and you think they know the rules of the game, you can’t just assume all is OK.  You have to keep your eye on the ball – be it staff, clients or competition.  Just because something appears all right, well, maybe it’s not.

Now, I am not suggesting we all get paranoid about schemes, plots and theft – more that we can’t afford to get complacent.  We can’t afford to ignore small signs, red flags that make you suspicious.  We can’t assume that others will behave the way we would.  Sadly not everyone works with integrity.  So listen to those nagging doubts, they may be telling you something.

As for Brodie – his little frolic in the field has cost him.  He needs to earn back our trust that he will stick within the boundaries of “his space.”  Until then, we’re watching. You could say, like a teenager caught breaking a curfew, he’s grounded. 

And I suspect, it is going to be a l-o-n-g summer. 

Made a mistake? Say sorry.

I hate to make mistakes.  But I am not perfect (I know, surprising news). But in some ways, it is what you do after you’ve goofed that is the true learning experience.

I remember totally blowing it with a sponsor and accidentally leaving her off a thank-you ad.  I was mortified. I couldn’t sleep and had this knot in my stomach.  How could that have happened?  Naturally I immediately apologized and rectified the situation, as much as I could and ran a second ad that thanked her company.  But the damage was done and for weeks, I was constantly berating myself for making the mistake in the first place. 

Saying you are sorry straight away and doing something to rectifiy or compensate someone goes a long way to making the mistake go away.  It is when, as the customer, that your concerns are ignored, or worse,  dismissed or ridiculed, that the problem escalates.  All any of us want is to have our feelings heard and validated, and even if you don’t agree, my advise is to listen, say sorry and take some action.

Now you can go overboard.  I always remember a story that one of our members would share about her days as a flight attendant, when she mistook a lacy sleeve to belong to a woman, and without really looking quickly asked “her” if she’d like a paper? 

You can imagine her horror when, on looking up, she discovered it was a rather famous skater.  She then proceeded at every turn to apologize, and kept up a stream of apologies for the whole flight.  Did this rectify the situation?  No.  In fact, she made it worse.  So her conclusion was that you say sorry, and move on. 

Making a mistake is a humbling experience, especially if there is an audience to witness what has happened.   No one likes to look foolish but people’s view of you can dramatically change depending on how you react.  When you work with integrity and respect, you can in fact turn a mistake into a redeeming situation, where observers note and admire how you handled a difficult situation.  Or you can totally blow it, hope it will just go away and in the end, make it worse.

Much of my reputation at Company of Women is tied up in the high quality speakers I bring in.  So you can imagine my horror when with a full house, we had a speaker who well… let’s just say she shouldn’t give up her day job, and perhaps seek counselling. 

I was horrified as the evening progressed and I also couldn’t get her to stop talking.  I had to physically go on stage and take the microphone from her.

Now we had a large number of women in the audience for whom this was their first experience with Company of Women.  So what did I do?  I sent out an email first thing the next morning, apologizing and assuring people that “normal service will resume” and offered a discount for a future event. That email earned me lots of brownie points and instead of losing participants, I went up in their estimation.

Mistakes happen.  Often when we have too much on our plate, get distracted or are just plain tired.  It is what you learn from them and what you do afterwards that can turn a bad situation into a positive one. And beating yourself up about it, leaves you stuck.  So learn, let go and move on.

In searching for my platform, I found myself again

These days everyone talks about having a platform.  What’s your platform?   I have to say I’ve been struggling with mine.

One friend suggested I think about what people most thank me for which did help narrow it down… a bit.  Usually I get thanked for the introductions I have helped people make, the connections established or just for what I offer at Company of Women and sometimes the support and encouragement I have given a would-be entrepreneur.

“Networking” was the conclusion at the end of this conversation, but you know, that just didn’t sit with me.  Partly because unfortunately networking still has a negative connotation and is frequently done badly.  Did I really want to be associated with this?  I don’t think so.

I needed to spend more time noodling that one.  Then I realized what I do, and what I have been doing all my career – is build community – be it mothers, teen mothers, abused women or entrepreneurs.  That’s my platform, community builder.

Or so I thought.  It is strange how the universe will provide the answers, if you are willing to listen and are alert to the messages.  In an interesting conversation with a woman from Atlanta, we started to talk about net-weaving, a word that really resonated with me.

In fact, when I first started Company of Women eleven years ago, I intentionally used tapestries in my business card, on the website and our promotional material.  I felt it symbolized what I wanted Company of Women to be – the intertwined threads making a beautiful fabric, representing how when we weave our threads together, we make a much stronger fabric.   Even our newsletter was called Tapestries, with the tagline of weaving wisdom and warmth into the lives of women…

Now I know some of you may be thinking P U L E E Z E – shoot me now, but you know what it worked back then and I still think it works now. Everyone wants to belong to something greater than themselves.

Now after a few years we got rid of the tapestries, albeit gradually, and probably not fast enough for my webmasters who I suspect thought it was, correction I was, over the top.

Reflecting back on all this, made me remember that just prior to starting Company of Women I was in California where I found and bought a pin and poem called the Weaver Woman. At the time I thought it was a good omen, given the journey I was about to embark on.

Despite our recent move, I was able to find it – no mean feat I tell you, but suddenly I feel I have come home. Isn’t it strange how we think we have moved on, evolved and yet in my case gone full circle back to who I was meant to be, and probably always have been, but I just didn’t know it. 

Here is the poem.  What do you think – does it resonate with you?

Weaver Woman

Wise weaver woman weaves, the fabric of life

A thread for each creature, a thread for each plant

A thread for the elements, that enliven the dance

A thread for spirit, a thread for sharing

A thread for balance, a thread for caring.

Cycles shape the pattern from death to rebirth

She is weaving a fabric of life for Earth

So precious – so fragile – so easily torn

So connected is all of life, all belong.

Let us help her to weave it, not tear it apart

With our choices, our voices, our actions, our heart.

Lela Florel

WE CAN DO IT - WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM OUR FRIENDS

Bringing a group of powerful, strong women together is always exciting. The fact that they all owned their business, were successful and leaders in their own right, made the meeting even more dynamic and you could feel the energy in the room.

On Thursday, the National Task Force on Women’s Business Growth held its fourth roundtable – this time in Toronto. Three roundtables had already taken place across Canada, and I suspect the conversations were similar.

While more and more women are starting their businesses, the growth of their ventures is slower to their male counterparts. Why is that? And more to the point, what can we do to change this situation? These were the topics under discussion at the roundtable.

We had sixty-four women in attendance, representing all types of businesses. Following a report on the latest research, a panel presentation from three successful entrepreneurs, the women were divided into groups to look at supplier diversity and procurement; access to capital; adoption of technology and training needs.

As the facilitators from each group reported back, you could see some common threads. First women needed to be more confident in their abilities to succeed and to actively seek out opportunities to grow their businesses, and it was identified that role models and mentors were needed who could show the way.

Another frequent observation was a lack of financial literacy which hindered growth. As a result, accessing capital became a scary prospect and one that women often chose not to pursue.

We actually had three groups of women from the IT sector which was gratifying to see as so often they are striving to get ahead in a male-dominated industry and they came up with all sorts of innovative strategies to keep us connected and supporting one another.

Different mechanisms and delivery options were considered in terms of training so as to fit into the busy schedule of women business owners and it was recognized that women business owners often seemed reluctant to invest in themselves.

And talking of time, we ran out of it. We’d been together for four hours and the meeting ended on the cusp of exploring solutions that could help and support women business owners. But this was just the beginning, and having the women all in one room to start the dialogue gave credibility to the need for change and the desire for it to happen.

Stay tuned.