Book Review

Business coach and author, Lynette Beer, believes we are all born for greatness and success, and in her book Rise Into Your Own Power, she provides her wealth of expertise and insights to show you how to be the person you are meant to be. Importantly, it is a guide that helps you to build great relationships in life and in business by starting with knowing yourself, your strengths and weaknesses, and learning how to be the best version of yourself.

Lynette Beer, author of the book, Rise Into Your Own Power, believes that we are born to be creators, explorers, leaders, thinkers, and to touch the lives of others. As women and as entrepreneurs, she believes we are born to be somebody, to leave our mark, and to change the world. In her book, Lynette shares how we can work to exceed the limits placed on us by others, to live a life of success, and to have a spirit of excellence. She believes we were born to be extraordinary and to live beyond our circumstances, rather than be defined by them, and her insights in her book show us how to achieve these goals. Just as route maps direct us to our destination, may this book encourage and guide you on the road to greatness and freedom, to be the person you are meant to be.

Author Quotes

More often than not, your greatest enemy stares you in the face every morning.

Learn to silence that deceitful inner voice that constantly tells you you’re not worthy or capable, and seize the power of choice to rise into success, right now, in this very moment.

Every day, you have the power to change your story.

About the author

Lynette Beer is a Business Coach, Author, and Specialist on how to fulfill your life’s purpose, unlock your potential, and build more meaningful and lasting relationships in business. As a global thought leader in the field of human behaviour, Lynette believes that in order to be content personally, and to be successful professionally, you must firstly have a healthy relationship with yourself, and secondly, have the ability to develop symbiotic relationships with others. And to accomplish the latter, requires a solid understanding of self and others. With this realization in mind, Lynette set out to demystify and simplify the dynamics of people. In the process, she discovered a proto-psychological theory formulated by ancient Greek philosophers that suggests that all people can be classified into four fundamental personality types. Based on this theory, she ideated the Four-Colour Temperament Model© that is simple enough for anyone to understand and easy to incorporate in daily life and work practices.

www.lynettebeer.co.za

by Lori Milner

When making progress on self-care goals, having a good intention is not enough. In my work as a coach and trainer, I know people genuinely have every good intention to show up on the calendar without guilt to make time for their self-care goals. They make promises to themselves, intending to honour them, but ultimately these agreements get broken. The excuses are coming from a good place — my boss needed something, I didn’t have enough time or my bed was too warm. I’ve realized that this lack of follow-through is not a character flaw nor a motivation problem. The real barrier is thinking too big.

If you associate exercise with needing 60 minutes of your time, then no wonder you never make progress. Thinking big is going to paralyze you. Instead, the answer is to think small. The secret to getting control over your life and working towards your dreams is making one tiny bit of progress every single day on the things that matter to you. In other words, how can you create micro wins?

Be specific.

The more specific you are about what ‘done’ and ‘doing’ looks like, the more likely you will make progress. Saying I want to be more mindful is too broad; it doesn’t clarify what specific action you must take. Instead, you can define ‘Done’ as staying calm when triggered by a stressful situation.

‘Doing’ means that every time I start a meeting, I will take ten deep breaths or every time I walk into my office, I will think of three things I am grateful for. Done could mean — I want to run a 5km race in 6 months. Doing is committing to a 20-minute walk three times per week. Shifting your focus to something that your mind perceives as a doable task will naturally increase positive energy, direction, and motivation.

Think in micro-choices.

We all make mistakes with our self-care goals. It’s human nature to give into instant gratification rather than stay focused on the long term goal. For example, when that cake comes out at the party, or you hit snooze because those extra ten minutes feel like they will change your entire day.

The good news is that one wrong choice does not equal permanent failure. It’s precisely that — one incorrect choice.

If you can see your day as a series of micro choices, you can make the next decision better. Drop all or nothing thinking — ‘oh well, I missed my walk today, so I may as well ditch the entire day and start again tomorrow.’

This thinking justifies a domino effect of poor choices like going for the doughnut or procrastinating on your tasks. Forgive yourself and move ahead with your day to ensure that the next choice aligns with your goals.

Put your choice under a microscope so you can prevent it from happening again. Maybe you had disrupted sleep, and the trigger was relying on food to give you an instant energy boost? The sooner you can identify the trigger, the sooner you can create sustainable change. Each good choice resulting in a positive action is a micro win. These wins stack up over time, which is how you make progress. It is not about one colossal decision but micro-choices throughout the day toward your goal.

Consistency is key.

The number one excuse for lack of progress on self-care goals is time.

If you can replace the mindset of needing more time with consistent action, you will no longer view time as a barrier. The beauty of consistency is that it compounds. I recently read the fifth book of Harry Potter with my daughter. The book is 800 pages, and it felt like we would never complete it. We started in December and completed it in three months, and we only read about 20 minutes per day except on weekends when we had more time to read. If you spend 15 minutes every day reading, meditating, doing yoga, studying, walking, painting, practicing a language or music — you name it — you will make progress. This is why thinking big can paralyze you from starting. You have convinced yourself that you need an hour to work on something, which will immediately deter you. When you think small and show up consistently, you will create daily micro wins and ultimately achieve your goal.

Trust the process.

Creating a micro win in isolation feels useless. One fifteen-minute session of writing or a five-minute meditation feels pointless. The key to making progress on your goals is to trust the process. There will always be a gap between creating micro wins and achieving your goal. If you start eating healthier, drinking more water or walking, there can be at least 3 to 6 weeks before you see the tangible result.

This interim period is a danger zone. You interpret the lack of tangible results as failure or that your effort is not worth it. If you can trust the process of creating daily wins and still persevere despite the results, you will eventually achieve your goal. Micro wins created consistently over time is what yields results.

The second part to trusting the process is you need to turn down the volume of the inner critic who constantly reminds you that you should be further than you are. Focus on creating daily wins and tune into your inner coach. Your inner critic is like a toddler; if you ignore the tantrum long enough, the child realizes it needs a new strategy. If you stop paying attention to the destructive self-talk, it will stay muted.

The reward is the journey, not the outcome.

It’s easy to get obsessed with the outcome because the end goal is what motivates you — being able to run 5km, get the promotion, buy the dream car or play a song on your guitar. When you finally achieve your goal, there is anti-climax and a feeling of ‘Is this all there is?’ Then you move the goalposts and start on the next goal. Perhaps a 10km or another degree. The MBA was all you ever wanted because you convinced yourself that when you achieve it, your happiness will skyrocket, and everything you have ever wanted will be achieved with a piece of paper. When you complete your MBA, it is not the paper you should be focusing on but who you have become along the way. Things that would have previously terrified you, you don’t think about anymore. Thinking small means focusing on the incremental wins along the way, not only the huge goal.

If you don’t find joy in the day-to-day journey, it may be the wrong journey. Of course, it’s challenging and not every part is sunshine and rainbows, but if you are on a sprint to the finish line, you may miss the scenery along the way.

Aim for progress, not perfection.

Change is difficult because you don’t want to experience discomfort in the process — the discomfort of feeling like a beginner and out of your depth.

When you can replace perfection with progress, you will start to appreciate each micro win and how it sets you up for success over time. Progress is what encourages you; this is the secret to motivation. When you pick up the guitar after a few weeks of practice, do the chords begin to make more sense than they did two weeks ago?

Author Niel Gaman said every writer has one million bad words in them. To get to the good stuff, you need first to purge those million words. I loved this analogy because it permitted me to be awful at the beginning of my writing career rather than feel despondent and give up. Instead of allowing my inner critic to use this opportunity to taunt me, I saw this as a process I needed to work through. When I think about my progress over the years, it is remarkable. What used to take me a week to write an article, I can complete in a few hours. It is being able to look back and appreciate where I was and where I have come.

Final thoughts.

When it comes to goal setting and creating a compelling future vision for your life, think big. When it comes to making these dreams a reality, think small. Focus on the incremental actions and daily micro wins that will lead you there.

We fail to recognize that the small decisions you and I make daily create our destinies. Every ‘overnight’ success took at least ten years to get there. It’s never one achievement that suddenly catapults them to success but consistent focus and deliberate daily action.

The purpose of the goal is to set the direction; the real win is growing into the person worthy of the goal.

Here’s to thinking small.

Warm wishes,

Lori

by Anja van Beek

 It is often said that culture is the competitive edge for any organisation. Culture is also referred to as the personality or character of the business. So it leaves us with the question: “Where does emotional intelligence (EQ) fit in?” 

When working with people in a workplace or any setting, for example, people respond differently. The “how” they respond to that specific situation or matter, is what sets the tone for what can be seen as the acceptable behaviour. This will then drive the culture of the business – which are the unwritten rules driving behaviours. The organisation, the culture, and ultimately the bottom-line will suffer when executives and team members act and respond in a less-than-emotionally-mature manner in the workplace.

EQ – a critical skill in the knowledge economy

The term emotional intelligence was coined in the 1990’s and popularised by psychologist and author Daniel Goleman in his book “Emotional intelligence: Why it can matter more than IQ”.  

EQ, in short, is to better recognise and manage emotions. It can provide insight into triggers and most importantly, it is the ability to not only recognize, name and understand the emotion but also to manage the impact of emotions on the behaviour in your life. It is also the ability to use this awareness to manage your behaviour, relationships and your interactions with others.

TalentSmart tested emotional intelligence alongside 33 other important workplace skills, and found that emotional intelligence is the strongest predictor of performance, explaining a full 58% of success in all types of jobs.

Therefore, emotional intelligence has an impact on all interactions among groups, friends, and family. When these encounters are founded on emotionally mature behaviours, better outcomes, improved performance, or greater team traditions can emerge, all of which contribute to the development of a stronger culture.

The 4 S’s of EQ

Daniel Goleman divides EQ into:

• Self-awareness – the competency to understand the impact of your emotions

• Self-regulation – the ability to manage your emotions in a healthy way

• Social awareness – to have empathy and awareness of others

• Social skills – to build strong relationships, inspire and motivate people

In the technology-driven world that we live in, workplaces must have the following main ingredients:

• Having a (strong) sense of belonging,

• Vulnerability to building a psychologically safe workplace and

• Having a shared purpose.

Humans are hard-wired for connection. We are also triggered by internal or external sources — some conscious and others subconscious, many times during the day. 

Self-leadership is therefore essential for the workplace of the future. Through our interactions and the development of any company’s culture, we all contribute to the development of these unwritten norms – and we should ensure it is positive. 

Leaders – how are you showing up for your teams?

Since you are the group’s most powerful individual, your teams will pay close attention to everything you say and do.

For team members to excel, be challenged, and feel like they have a purpose in their job, leaders must foster an environment and culture that allows them to bring their best self to the table. Leaders must constantly remember that the way you lead, the things you do and say, affect how others feel on the inside.

As we enter year three of the pandemic and confront global difficulties that force us to live in a state of uncertainty, empathy in the workplace is now taking on a new level of significance and necessity.

EQ becomes crucial. What do you say when a co-worker has missed a deadline three times in a row in the past week? What should you do if the team feels unmotivated because you decided to go back to the office full-time? Or when they are waiting for someone else to act rather than taking responsibility for improving a client’s situation. On the other hand, do you acknowledge the team’s modest gains and not just focus on the big stuff? 

One of my favourite quotes is Viktor Frankl’s words “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” This is sometimes easier said than done.

So, instead of reacting to a certain moment or heated argument, what should you do?

Take a pause. Never underestimate the impact of taking a few deep breaths to slow down your heartbeat and be able to evaluate what is happening and what will be the best way to respond to this situation.

Be aware of the 4 F’s. When you are trigged, you are in fight, flight, freeze or fawn state. A chemical reaction results in our neocortex (thriving, problem-solving part of the brain) to not functioning optimally. Instead of allowing an unconscious habit to drive your reaction, reactivate the neocortex and be mindful in choosing how you want to respond. To reactivate your neocortex, ask yourself a question (such as: What is the real issue for me? What might support a different explanation? What if this was someone else behaving in this way? What is my behaviour communicating? ) to notice what is really going on in the moment? 

Name the emotion. It is helpful to be able to name the emotion you are experiencing and consider what is the emotion trying to tell you. Instead of being angry, perhaps you are disappointed with how your idea wasn’t taken despite you being verbally told that your idea was the best idea?

Reframe your thinking. We often jump to a conclusion and easily take things personally. Reframe your thinking by considering what other possible reasons may be for the person to act the way they are behaving. A level of self-awareness is also hugely beneficial. For example: ‘What is my role in this scenario. How have my behaviour impacted the other person’s view – without being aware of it?’

Tactfully share what you are experiencing. Remember, an experience is made up of four elements – what am I observing, thinking, feeling and wanting.  When sharing your experience, a good start is to start with the “I”. For example, when the project’s team leader did not schedule sufficient time on the agenda: “I noticed that this is the third time that we didn’t have sufficient time allocated to the brainstorming topic. I feel disappointed that my idea wasn’t heard after the request to make the research a priority.  How can we ensure we have sufficient time allocated to this agenda-point moving forward?

Remain curious. Ask questions to truly understand the other person’s perspective.  Help me understand why do you want to achieve XYZ? What is the real issue for you? If you choose X what are you saying no to?   

The sweet spot for raising EQ awareness in teams

It is when…

• We all choose to respond in an emotionally intelligent way, and we care and connect with colleagues as humans, so that we can grow and contribute to the overall purpose of the business.

When the above is in place, we will create organisational cultures that make team members want to go to work in the mornings and WILLINGLY share their talents to help the business grow. Those are the businesses that reach the balance of profit and purpose and create a space where people can be successful. 

By Lionesses of Africa Operations Department

We have been looking back at the incredible Lionesses who have previously graced the cover of our Lioness Weekender Magazine recently, and amongst the many fascinating questions posed to these inspirational leaders by Melanie in their interviews, there is always one asking how they got the entrepreneurial bug. More often than not the answer includes the fact that one or both of their parents were an entrepreneur. This got us wondering – is there any correlation to this or was it just luck (some who enjoy the 9-5 stability and simply do not understand the drive of a late night entrepreneur struggling with cash flow and supply bottlenecks, might argue ‘bad luck’ of course), that creates the entrepreneurial drive.

Unsurprisingly to us (given the above sample and our knowledge of our >1.5 million membership) according to a paper ‘Why Do Entrepreneurial Parents Have Entrepreneurial Children?’ by Lindquist, Sol and Van Praag (here), it turns out that “The single strongest predicator of entrepreneurship is parental entrepreneurship. Having an entrepreneur for a parent increases the probability that own birth children become entrepreneurs by 60%.” – Good grief – as if we don’t have enough pressures already!

Any difference between nature or nurture? Do ‘own birth’ or ‘adoptive’ have any different effects? “Our…exercise with adopted children reveals that both biological and adoptive parents make significant contributions. [However] The effect of post-birth factors (i.e., the effect of adoptive parents) is approximately twice as large as the effect of pre-birth factors (i.e., the effect of biological parents).” So although genes have a lot to do with it, the real impact is through nurture, the impressions we subconsciously leave with our children as they grow up (again – such pressure!).

Perhaps this is because the kids move into the family firm?

The data available doesn’t agree – in fact “[I]nheritance can only explain a small fraction of this intergenerational association…In our data, only 2.2% of all entrepreneurs enter for the first time in the same industry as their parent and in the same year as their parent exits entrepreneurship. If we broaden this measure to include offspring that become an entrepreneur one year before or after their parent’s exit, then this number rises to 4.4%.” So, incredibly small, that surprised us, but looking again at the inspirational Lionesses interviewed by Melanie, none (that we can remember) were on the cover because they had been part of the ‘Lucky Gene Club’ as Warren Buffet calls inheritors of the family business, so their data agrees with ours.

What about having the bank of Mom and Pop on tap and with doors that open with a single glance from those ‘puppy eyes’? Surely rich parents would encourage a desire to start one’s own business, turn that hobby into a US$ printing machine? – Think again – “…in our analysis, neither parental income nor parental wealth explain the intergenerational transfer of entrepreneurship.” On our side we would suggest (although do not have the data) that the ATM of our parents has had a larger impact as we are a community that has been forced to bootstrap, where raising money from ‘Friends and Family’ are first, second and third in the queue (and there is ample data on that as across the globe female owned and run business have a minuscule amount of success with banks, VC and PE firms). However that is an impact on the business, not a reason…

There are other issues at play as well “Environmental factors include peer effects (Nanda and Sørensen 2010), and regional influences (Reynolds, Storey, and Westhead 1994). Several heritable traits, such as risk aversion (Cesarini et al. 2009a), extraversion (Bouchard and Loehlin 2001), and overconfidence (Cesarini et al. 2009b), [that all] relate to the choice for entrepreneurship”.

So where does that leave us?

Having to tread carefully with our kids, we would suggest!

Clearly we have a far greater influence on our children’s future role in life than we ever thought possible (gone are the days when we could order one to be a Doctor, one a Lawyer, one a…), this is subconscious influence. This creates a large responsibility and we would suggest that here is where our thoughts over ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) can guide.

If our children have a higher than normal chance of becoming an entrepreneur, then we have a responsibility through our actions, to show the way. Obviously just telling our kids to do ‘x’ will not have an impact (when has it ever!), this is subconscious nurture, it’s the actions, the kindness, the drive in our parents that we remember and what guides us years later, like a muscle memory in sports. Our parents didn’t just tell us, they lived it. We did a quick poll. “Always say good morning to Farmers, they’ve earned the respect”; “Let small business vans first, they are in more of a hurry than you”; “Pay small businesses first” (good one that one), were the quick memories that flowed from our team.

ESG sadly is coming under a bit of pressure these days with ‘Greenwashing’, ‘ESG-washing’ and so on. As companies are compelled by laws in the US, EU and elsewhere to report on such things, so the fees they pay to accountants increase. If one ignores the fact that we are never ones to worry about generalisations getting in the way of a good story [indeed – Ed.], this is perhaps why now more than ever the ‘G’ in ESG is so important. The Governance part – zero fraud, absolute refusal to play any part in corruption (which spreads through businesses and countries like a cancer), well conducted audits, and so on are so essential.

Live the Green in Environmental – really live it. At home split the plastics, the recyclables and ensure they get to the right place. Food waste and scraps – into the compost they go. Grow your own vegetables if you have space, if not – herbs (we have huge problems with our Coriander, plant in separate tubs otherwise when one ‘shoots’ they all go – clearly soul mates!).

And Social – our ability to live together peacefully and equally is first and foremost the essential factor in this part. We live this already in the way in which our inspirational membership treat their employees with kindness, empathy and fairness (fairness being such an essential leadership quality). Whenever we visit a Lioness’ company (these days more often via zoom sadly) and when we see instagram posts, there are the smiling and happy faces of the employees in the background – not because the Lioness is ‘soft’ on them, but because they are being treated with kindness, empathy and fairness within a safe and healthy environment. It is one of the main impacts recognised that businesswomen the world over also have a greater positive impact in their communities. When your kids have a ‘take your Daughter to work’, also take yours out into the community, they will see your happy and easy interaction with complete strangers and be inspired.

All of these ESG parts are not for the tick box, but actually good business. This is what we as Lionesses do well, but can also be subconsciously passed on to the next generation.

Finally, be positive and have high energy. That is not to say we paint everything rosy, we are realistic, but can still be positive.

As Melanie wrote in one of her recent GML Blogs (here)

“Yesterday, I had the pleasure of speaking to over 200 women entrepreneurs at one of our regular, inspirational webinars. I love these events, it’s like getting a big boost of adrenalin and can-do spirit, and supports my belief that if you put enough women entrepreneurs in a room, great things happen. As always, I was struck by the incredible positivity and high energy levels in the audience. It was wonderful to see and hear, and it got me thinking about the importance of having a positive mindset as entrepreneurs. As women shared their stories and experiences, what came across loud and clear was that if you are constantly looking for positive outcomes in life and business, you are more likely to achieve them. It’s that classic approach of choosing to look at life and business as a glass half full, not half empty. Yes, there will be challenges, and lots of them. Yes, there will be mistakes made, sometimes expensive ones, and it will feel like success is a long way away. But if we have a positive mindset, we look at every experience as a learning opportunity. We make the most of every situation we find ourselves in, and we work hard to get the best and most positive result from it. That’s a positive mindset, and it can be a real asset to us in business and in life.” 

Your children will thank you.

Stay safe.