Hot Topic Friday: June 7

Friday Newsletter Personal leadership

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Happy Friday! Here are my June 7 Hot Topics and how they relate to advancing leadership or culture.

Hot Topic 1: Learning from a Drag Queen.

Source: The New York Times.

What It’s About: This is a raw and important story about the challenges we face being our true and authentic selves. The author, a gay man, married with a young son, experiences an event and becomes aware of a small inner wish that his son “would not be like me, that he would blend in and not suffer the way I did. My scar is rooted in anger and fear — and shame, the part I thought was gone but is still there.

Why It’s Important: A drag queen (a key subject throughout the story), gives the author simple and practical advice, “just listen to your son.” None of us should feel the need to hide who we really are. The author goes on to reflect: “There’s no guarantee what kind of person my boy will become, what his dreams will be, and I can’t expect his path to align with mine. I can’t protect him from prejudice. He will have scars. But I can choose not to pass my scar on to him.” Let’s work hard not to pass on our scars, and let’s learn more about being allies so none of us need to hide.

Hot Topic 2: The Connection Between Resilience and Inclusion

Source: Forbes

What It’s About: Forbes has published an important article about the connection between diversity, inclusion and resilience. The article notes we have this illusion where we mistake signifiers of surface differences, like skin color, language, religion, lack of religion, geography, etc. as true difference. However, the author points out that true difference doesn’t dwell in the surface stuff. It’s how we see, understand, and then choose to act in the world.

Why It’s Important: We need to progress our thinking and action to respect identity diversity, while we evolve to embrace comprehensive cognitive inclusion. This is sometimes counter-intuitive to an organization’s slavish commitment to alignment and harmony. What’s in the way, is the way. And the paradox is that cognitive diversity actually leads to more inclusion, hence more advanced harmony and adaptive resilience. Please read the full article. This way of working will become more strategically important and mainstream in the best institutions.

My Weekly Wine Recommendation (Thanks to Vivino):

The Investor Red Blend Napa Valley 2015.

[Picture and ratings provided by Vivino.]

And finally! Here’s Cecil’s Bleat of the Week!

Having a purpose statement doesn’t equal having a purpose.” – Aga Bajer

Bye for now!

– Lorne Rubis

Incase you Missed It:

Monday’s Lead In podcast.

Tuesday’s blog.

Wednesday’s Culture Cast podcast.

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