This is a question that I have heard asked on many occasions in interviews for jobs, or of celebrities in TV interviews and many times I have listened to the answers without much reflection. There are always the perhaps more predictable responses – famous historic figures and others in the public eye, but the ones that carry most weight for me are the ones where people quote “real” people that they know – especially family members. Having said this, I rarely think much about this. Until now that is – I was just relaxing in my bath and my thoughts turned to recent conversations and the person in mind I started to remember interviewing him for a position in the company I worked for perhaps 10 years ago. I started to recall that I asked him this very question and his response needed no thought – it was his father who turned out to be a man of the church. So why am I blogging about this? The simple answer is that I have often reflected on people I admire and (sadly) for the first time I thought about my parents in this light….and I thought and thought, and you know what I AM absolutely proud and full of admiration for my parents. They brought my brother and I up incredibly successfully – we always had the essentials and were always loved and cared for. Both of my parents had to work to “make ends meet” and there were occasions when things were difficult, but they made sacrifices and made sure my brother and I always had what was needed. They are definitely my heroes, and you can be sure that I will tell them to their faces when I next see them 🙂
Category: Social
There’s a great motivational poster that deals with CHANGE. It says that a bend in the road is not the end of the road UNLESS you fail to make the turn! And boy are there some bends in the road just now! If you are a difference person and therefore change oriented, then all is well, but what about the poor sameness person who likes things pretty much the way they’ve always been? It can be tough, but I offer this for those facing change. It’s not what happens to us, but what you do about it…watch this inspiring video and you’ll see what I mean ...W Mitchell
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And does this change over time?
What I am driving at here is simply that I am sure we all perceive friendship slightly differently and based upon our personal expectations and experiences, may have cause at some time to reflect on this question.
Are those people that you thought were your friends STILL around when you most need them, or are they conspicuous by their absence in your life now you could do with some support and anchors?
I wonder what your experience has been :-)?
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Well it’s not often that I rant, but boy am I all riled. I have booked my car in for a service this week, and I can’t help getting a strong senbse that becasue the tightening economy and folks not investing much in new cars, that the main dealers are absolutely taking the p*%$ with servicing costs to make up the deficit. Are they prepared to negotiate – Hell no – “it’s fixed price servicing sir” is what I’m told. I’m between a rock and a hard place really because I took the car on a personal contract plan, so taking it for a service at the independent garage down the road could cost me (it might not, but can’t afford conversation about invalidating warranties) Grrrr I feel incensed 😦
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The new marketing phenomena is firmly established. From my space to facebook, and the more business focused linkedin and ecademy, all these “social networking/social media” portals appear to be thriving with many many people totally bemused by the new wave. The big question of course is how much time should be dedicated to using these sites and of course what is the real value. I hear much positive chatter about these sites and indeed am using them myself, but the value is far from obvious in the circles I work in. Perhaps there are some alternative views – always keen to hear
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The news every day does little to inspire risk taking for sure, but for many people I can see that it paralyses them completely, and instead of pursuing activities that will drive costs down, and improve efficiencies, they do absolutely nothing – I do find this curious, because it drives the opposite result to that which is REALLY desired – GROWTH and PROSPERITY.
Let’s all make sure we are part of the solution for driving this country into recovery and take some positive action today – reach out for help, and you will be surprised by the willing responses.
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Many of us were “gazing out of windows” at home yesterday feeling empowered by the snow….What empowered by the snow?
Many years ago, folks would have simply not been able to work at all in weather conditions like these because they could not GET TO WORK, and businesses would have lost thousands of hours of productivity and £££££s as a result. But like me, many folks are location independent, and work is no longer a place that you go to, you simply work wherever you are, and for many people this means a room at home. It could equally mean a quiet corner for an hour in Starbucks 
Flexible working offers a new paradigm to businesses around the globe – take presenteeism for example ( a phrase coined by the BBC I think), whereby people returning to work before they are properly recovered from sickness, infect other members at work – resulting in further lost productivity and more cost ££££££….Now the ability to work remotely allows folks, recovering from illness, but not actually too sick to work the ability to be productive without infecting their colleagues
Remote working – has it’s benefits and (I’m certain) it’s detractors too – what do you think – rather be in the garden building snowmen?
Graham Bunting -The Partner Catalyst 