It’s a story you don’t want to tell, a message you don’t want to deliver. Maybe you’re letting someone go, interacting with a disgruntled customer, or facing a board member who doesn’t agree with your strategy.

One of my clients, Eric, had to sever his relationship with his business partner. Luckily, they had set up the corporation with clear-cut options for buying one another out. But activating those clauses – and informing the partner of his intentions – gave Eric pause.

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When you’re delivering bad news, like Eric, keep these three things in mind:

1. Privacy Prevails.

If the conversation you need to have is a difficult one, or the stakes are high, the setup matters more than the pitch. Telling your story with your thumbs, or a keyboard, won’t cut it for this dialogue. For that face-to-face that feels like a face-off, consider your surroundings before you speak. Sometimes privacy is exactly what you need. And sometimes, having a difficult conversation in a public place can provide an element of safety, calm, and decorum. Consider your context carefully. If you’re in an office, shut the door – and make sure your conversation is private. If you’re in a public place, consider how your listener might take the news. Are you in the right environment for every reaction? That public place might help keep things from boiling over, or you may end up causing a scene at Starbucks. Consider the how – and the where – of what you have to say.  

2. Prepare for the Worst, But Don’t Expect It.

Do you always try to play out both sides of a conversation in your head, before it happens? Me too. In an attempt to control the unknown, we try to plan out all possible actions and reactions. While it can be useful to consider possible outcomes, being attached to those outcomes is a great way to drive yourself crazy. Consider the if/then scenarios, then ask yourself: “Would it be OK if he or she does… that? That one thing? That one thing that you think is going to be unacceptable?”

When you get OK with possible outcomes, you’re ready to explore the possibilities. Ultimately, no one can control the thoughts or actions of another person –especially if that person is an adult – yet we often try. Bruce Lee once said, “A goal is not always meant to be reached. It often serves simply as something to aim at.” Aim in the direction of that positive outcome. Shoot for the best. Keep in mind that the “movie in your mind” is usually much more dramatic than the action sequence that plays out in real life. Every movie has an audience – are you going to listen to their feedback? What kind of feedback are you hoping to receive? If you aren’t, or if you’ve already made your decision, saying things like “I’m sorry” or “I wish it didn’t have to be this way” is an invitation to an argument, a request for a reversal, or, at best, an unwelcome prompt for unwanted ongoing discussion.

3. Brace Yourself for Fallout.

When news is shared, especially if it’s bad news, people will react. If you cut off that reaction, or ignore it, it’s still there. Emotions will come into the conversation, which is why you wanted to do it over text in the first place. But those feelings of anger, betrayal, jealousy, disappointment, or disillusionment – they’re part of the journey. Knowing you can cope with whatever comes back at you is the key. Remember, you can’t fix feelings; don’t fall into the trap of trying to, especially at a tipping point like this. Once the bad news has been delivered, there’s an opportunity for clear action. Focus on discussing the desired next steps, whether that’s asking an employee to clear out his or her desk or sending documents to the lawyers. Take your time, give your listener time to process what’s happening, and remember the mantra: “If he or she does ________, I can handle it.”

When you’re prepared with an understanding of what might occur, and you detach from the need to fix feelings, you aren’t being insensitive – you’re being informed. And this insight can help you to take the first step toward that difficult conversation, and the outcomes that are on the other side.

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Questions on how to better manage human capital have topped leadership conversations around the world for a very long time. In an increasingly crazy world, the one word you should keep in mind as you start your planning for next year is simplicity. Here are seven emerging leadership trends for 2019.

1) Keep it simple

Over the past three years, the importance to move away from complex structures and simplify organizations has become clear. Not only it will help companies to be better equipped to face the challenges of the fast-paced markets, but it will also help employees to focus more on practical and rewarding tasks. For more insight on this topic, a great resource is the Deloitte Global Human Capital Trends report.

2) Redesign your management style

Paying extra attention to your performance management process is what will make your organization stand out in the next couple of years. It’s crucial to establish communication in which leaders outline what they expect from their employers regarding goals and ways to measure their completion to achieve this success. Indeed, a goal-oriented strategy gives employees clarity and a higher motivation to achieve their goals.

3) Invest in ‘human capital.’

The “Overwhelmed Employee” syndrome has been an enormous issue in companies stuck in an old generation, mid-level type management for years. In addition, the arrival of young workers thirsty for meaningful projects is a factor to take into account. Corporations need to invest more time in creating space for their employees to allow honest feedback from them (anonymous surveys are an option). It will also help staff to achieve success and help retain a workforce that  will feel supported and needed.

4) Do less, lead more

HR and managers have increasingly become process designers. Leadership and management problems are simple by nature and what we as leaders need to do is use trial and error methods in our managing style. We do this by letting our employees make more decisions and accepting that they might not get it right the first time. Our ability to do less and lead more will make us better leaders.

5) Forget about 9 to 5

The full-time employment model no longer makes sense. Research and studies have shown that long working hours make you less productive. Leaders, at any level, needs to revise their employment model to put individual performance at the core of their development – regardless of where it physically takes place or at what time.

Working on the go, at home or allowing flexible hours outside the traditional 9 to 5 office environment can work wonders with staff productivity. Acknowledging that employees have a personal life, and building work around it, can generate huge loyalty and more effective results if planned properly. This approach is an excellent way to respond to the needs of “purpose” and “meaning” that many young employees are seeking today.

6) Make technology work for you

Technology plays a massive part in our professional and personal lives, and that’s okay. What’s not ok is that we’ve gone head-over-heels in our relationships with our devices and tend to rely on them too much. It’s crucial that managers step up and learn how technology can re-enforce their technical expertise and leadership, but not at the expense of human capital. Some of these comprehensive leadership programs from Harvard Business School are great ways to learn how to control optimization and process flow, and a reminder that your smartphone can only do so much for you.

7) Just do it

Rethink your company hierarchy. Human capital learns best by doing what they inherently know, and not always by regurgitating what they learned at business school. The principle is simple: Encourage a single employee, to act like an atom – the smallest particle of an element, making them aware that they also contain the same properties of the larger molecule (leadership).

The reference to Nike in the subtitle might make you smile, but it summarizes things well: people learn by doing. Managers become great leaders by their ability to make the right call when faced with adversity and people become great employees (and ultimately great leaders) by their capacity to deliver exceptional results on a regular basis. Each person in a company is like an atom: their contribution helps to create a molecule, which in this example equals the company’s culture and success.

Former New York mayor and founder of global financial services company Bloomberg L.P., Michael Bloomberg shows that  no one sails through life without encountering some rough waters. The billionaire believes that if you love what you do, you’ll thrive on the inevitable challenges and have the stamina to achieve your full potential.

In college I had a straight C average. I think I was just lazy, or maybe I was just too busy chasing the girls. But then, first semester senior year, I figured that if I wanted to go to graduate school I’d better do something about my grades.

So for that one semester I took a double course load and got all A’s. I applied to business school and I got in, much to everybody’s amazement, particularly mine. Then I went right back to getting C’s for my last semester. 

After graduation, I thought I was going to serve in Vietnam. In those days everybody was going to Vietnam. But they wouldn’t take me at the last minute because I have flat feet. Why it bothered them, I don’t know. So I needed to find a job all of a sudden. I went to work on Wall Street only because a friend of mine said, “Call these two firms – Goldman Sachs & Co. and Salomon Brothers & Hutzler (as it was called back then) – and tell them you want to be a trader or a salesman.”

Fortunately for me, securities trading and sales were considered second-class occupations in those days, so I got interviews at both firms. At Goldman I was introduced to the managing partner like this: “Mr. Levy, this is Mike Bloomberg.” At Salomon Brothers I was introduced to some guy named Billy. We had a discussion, and afterward somebody came up to me and said, “What’d Billy Salomon have to say?” I had just been introduced to the managing partner on a first-name basis! I felt that Salomon Brothers was the place for me. To say I fit in there and loved what I was doing is an understatement. I reveled in it every minute of the day. But the thing is, fifteen years later, they fired me. 

I was fired around the time the company was sold. They assembled an executive committee of seven people that decided who stayed and who went. One of the committee members did not like me – my crime being that I had been the assistant to his nemesis – and he convinced everyone else to vote against me. He was later killed in a plane crash, and the other six members of the executive committee became paying customers of mine.

As somebody once said, “Living well is the best revenge.” 

I don’t remember being too pissed or feeling that bad about being fired. I think I have the same insecurities that everybody else has. The difference is that I don’t let them get in my way. There’s a great scene in the movie The Sting between Paul Newman’s and Robert Redford’s characters. They rob a bank and in the midst of doing this somebody points a gun at Newman. Afterward, Redford asks him if he was scared. Newman replies, “Right down to my boots.”

As long as you can admit things to yourself, you can deal with them and then move on. I don’t lie to myself, but I don’t harp on things and I never, ever look back. If your mind starts to wander to past events, the only advice I can give you is don’t go. Just stop it! Think about something else. If you divert your attention, your mind won’t immediately go back to the unpleasant occurrence, and when it eventually does, simply stop thinking about it again.

That’s how you quit smoking. You don’t have to stop for the rest of your life, just stop for five minutes. Five minutes from now you probably won’t want a cigarette. If you do, force yourself to stop for another five. Eventually, one of these fives will end in not wanting a cigarette. And then one day you’ll think, I’ve come so far  and I don’t want go back.

Had a place like Goldman Sachs called me after I was fired from Salomon and wanted to make me a partner, I would’ve done it. But nobody offered me a job. Thank God for that! I started my own company instead. I like that old Woody Allen quote: “Eighty percent of success is just showing up.” You create your own lot in life, and to be successful in business you’ve got to work hard. The more you work, the better you do. It’s that simple. Some people say, “I can’t go into work today.” I’ve never missed a day of work in my life! After I was fired from Salomon, I still had about two months left before I was actually going to leave the firm, but I still never missed a day. In fact, I made sure that I worked six days a week from as early in the morning until as late as I could. I was searching for new office space for myself during that period, but I called the broker and said I could only look on weekends because I didn’t want to take time off during the week. I didn’t want anyone to ever say that I didn’t work 110 percent. I had an ego problem with that.

Be the first one in and the last one out. If you are there early and stay late, you get a chance to talk to people who would not otherwise take your call. I built many relationships by being early. You can call the chairman of the board of almost any company early in the morning. If he’s a good chairman, he’s there. The secretary’s not, so he’ll actually answer the phone. The best time to strike is when gatekeepers aren’t there! When I started developing Bloomberg, I wanted feedback. So every morning I’d arrive at the deli across the street from Merrill Lynch’s headquarters at six a.m. and buy coffee (with and without milk) and tea (with and without milk), plus a few sugars on the side. I’d go up and roam the halls looking to see if there happened to be somebody sitting in their office alone reading a newspaper. I’d walk in and say, “Hi, I’m Mike Bloomberg. I bought you a cup of coffee. I’d just like to bend your ear.” Nobody is going to say, “Get outta here” if you just bought him or her a cup of coffee. When someone would occasionally say, “I don’t drink coffee,” I would say, “Well, then have a tea.”

Over the years, people have come to me and said, “You can’t do everything.” That is total bullshit. You certainly can do everything. The people who do some things can do more. If you need to get something tough done, give it to the most overworked person in your organization. There’s a reason why they’re overworked; they get things done. I have an employee named Patti Harris; she should be written about instead of me. She runs my foundation, she runs the city, she has a husband, they have a great marriage, she’s got a great family (the kids turned out spectacularly), they go on vacations, they ski, they scuba dive. If you go up to her with doubts that something can be accomplished because of this obstacle or that obstacle, she’ll look at you, smile, and say, “That’s nice, just do it,” and walk away.

My parents were my role models. My father was a bookkeeper for a little dairy company. He worked seven days a week until he checked himself into the hospital to die. At that point my mother knew that she would have to start driving. She went to the library, checked out a book on driving, took the car onto our little street, and taught herself how to drive. She got a friend to take her to the DMV, took the test, and got her license. That was it. She just did it. After running Bloomberg for twenty years, I decided it was time to do something different. Time to fire myself. I wanted to turn over the company to others without anyone thinking I was walking away from it. Well, public service is a good excuse, and it’s of great interest to me. People say that government can’t be made to work efficiently and truly serve the people. My response? “Bullshit!” Telling me something’s impossible is like waving a red flag in front of a bull. Might as well go for it. So that’s what I’m working toward now.

This is an excerpt from “Getting There: A Book of Mentors” by Gillian Zoe Segal. Find the book here.

Only 144,000 tons of gold have ever been extracted from the earth, 75 percent of it since 1910. There’s a good chance that the gold you wear on your fingers or around your neck was once involved in a war or conflict. One South African company is trying to change this.

Choosing a wedding band is one of life’s most significant experiences and reflects a deep personal commitment. Yet, have you ever questioned the social or ethical commitment of the company behind its making? Probably not. A new global awareness around conflict diamonds and responsibly-mined gold is seeing consumers take a closer look at the supply chain that leads to the impressive pieces on their ears, fingers and wrists. With dwindling natural resources on the planet, the temptation exists for many producers to extract materials at the expense of communities, workers and the environment.

A growing number of people and organizations are now calling for standards to be drawn up that ensure that human rights and are considered in the mining sector. Gold is already the primary source of income for armed groups in eastern Congo, much of which ends up in jewelry stores across the world. The link between gold and unlawful armed conflict and civil wars is well documented. Besides fuelling conflict, illegal gold extraction and dealing denies communities livelihoods and economic opportunities. In South Africa, Oro Africa recently launched the Absolute collection that has confronted this problem head-on.

Each wedding band is crafted from virgin gold, freshly extracted from the African earth, making each ring a pristine symbol of a brand new beginning. The trademarked product, called RandPure, consists of newly extracted gold ore; virgin metal of known provenance with a traceable source.

Inspired by the African philosophy of ubuntu – compassion, human dignity and respect for all – the woven bands reflect the continent-wide tradition of grass weaving and hair braiding.

Their manufacturing process is also independently monitored from start to finish and the gold is not contaminated with any scrap gold. The company has made a pledge to ethically source their raw materials and to develop communities in areas where the gold is found. “The collection is aimed at a new breed of consumer, who demonstrates a collective desire to protect the people and regions where our gold is sourced,” says Madrie Scott.

“It’s a logical next step for us, knowing how important responsibility is within a sector known for rogue traders,” she says. Oro Africa have collaborated with another local company, Rand Refinery, for this venture. This company has already refined over 50,000 tons of gold– almost one third of all the gold ever mined in the world. “The Absolute brand is currently the only gold brand that can claim with full confidence where their gold comes from,” says Scott.

“It provides an opportunity to make a responsible choice, with known provenance and a clear chain of custody from ore to store,” she says. A growing demand from consumers around the world is that information on the products they purchase is freely available and allows them a guilt-free experience.

So, before you declare your love for someone, ensure that what you put on their finger is not already tainted with the suffering of people in far-flung lands.

www.orodesign.co.za

While you may not be familiar with Louis Gagnon, he used to be senior vice president at job site Monster Worldwide, and then chief product officer and chief marketing officer for Amazon’s Audible unit, where he led a team that doubled revenue and KPI growth rates in less than 24 months.

Today, however, Louis is CEO and managing director of My Brain Solutions, which is building the first “Fitbit” for the brain – integrating neuroscience, mental health, and wellness best practices in ways that have never been done before.

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But the path that Louis took to his position as CEO at My Brain Solutions – founded in 2000 by neuroscientist Evian Gordon – was not a typical one. “Three years ago,” shares Louis, “I met an Indian guru, and through his teachings I went on a self-discovery journey in the mind, consciousness, and self.”

For thousands of years, humans have been curious about the workings of the human brain and the interactions of consciousness, self, and mind. The ancient Egyptians left behind texts detailing early neurosurgical practices, and Greek philosophers debated the role of the brain in thought and sensation (Aristotle thought that the heart was where thought was centered, with the brain serving as a cooling mechanism for the blood). Vedic texts – written several thousand years ago in India – explore the nature of consciousness.

While at Audible, Louis Gagnon was invited to a retreat with Indian spiritual leader Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, founder of The Art of Living and the International Association for Human Values. This retreat profoundly affected Louis. Led by Sri Sri, Louis experienced techniques of the ancient Vigyan Bhairav, a 5,000-year-old text describing techniques that open up meditative and expanded dimensions of consciousness.

Profoundly impacted by the experience of silence and transcendence, Louis brought this ancient knowledge to his team at Audible. “Our team was engaged, opened and excited to have the rare luxury to focus on themselves as individuals – individuals as a conduit and lever to ourselves as a team,” Louis shares. “We all felt deeply rejuvenated and at peace with each other. That, ultimately, built trust – the ultimate ingredient to teamwork.”  

The experience inspired a thought in Louis’s brain: “How can I take what is happening in my own mind and bring it into companies, at scale?”

The how was answered when he took the helm of My Brain Solutions with the goal of capturing a significant portion of the global wellness market. This market was estimated by the Global Wellness Institute to represent $3.7 trillion in revenue in 2015, with growth expected to exceed 17 percent through 2020. The fitness and mind-body category represents $542 billion in revenue, or approximately 15 percent of the total industry. Brain fitness is of particular interest to an increasing number of consumers, who hope to enhance the functioning of their brains while staving off memory loss. In fact, one recent study of older Americans revealed that memory loss is their number one fear – greater than terrorist attacks and being buried alive.

This continued growth in consumer interest around wellness and brain fitness provides Louis Gagnon and his company with a timely opportunity. Says Louis, “We are building the world’s first subscription-based digital brain fitness platform to allow individuals to assess and benchmark brain capacities and recommend personalized mind-body fitness programs.”

By combining the latest neuroscience discoveries with ancient Vedic wisdom, Louis and his team have delivered positive outcomes to a variety of well-established organizations, including Boeing, Kaiser Permanente, TEVA, and American Association of Retired Persons (AARP). As a result, Louis expects to double revenue this year while tripling the user base of the company’s MyBrainSolution product.

Says Louis, “We are providing a new way – based in ancient wisdom and emerging scientific discoveries – for anyone to boost their mental fitness.” And for an increasing number of consumers, this is exactly what the doctor ordered.

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