Dorrier Underwood

Forwarding the Action means empowering others to succinctly address the matter at hand so the next thing can happen. Fundamentally, forwarding the action often means knowing when to shut up. That is a “big ask” of the average human being! I was going over a Vision document with Gary and Nancy, so they could critique it, add to it, and help me take it to the next draft. When they suggested I take out a part or say it a different way, I reflexively began explaining why I did it that way to begin with. “Well, what I had been thinking was...” “I know, I just thought when I wrote this that...”          I forgot that the purpose of the conversation was not to uncover my motives for writing it the way I did. It was nearly impossible for me to simply shut up about that, and get clear on the new suggestion or addition. How much more useful to ask more about their suggestions than to defend what I had already writ...

In·i·ti·a·tive , noun the ability to assess and initiate things independently. the power or opportunity to act or take charge before others do. This week I got to distinguish initiative by observing its absence in myself. The strategy team had a retreat scheduled for Thursday, and I marked my calendar “be available,” because Nancy told me they might want to pull me in sometime during the day. On Tuesday, I had a call scheduled with Doug, but before and after, I was thinking mostly about the big dog client interviews I’d promised to summarize this week, and was starting to worry about how much (or little) of them I’d understand, and thinking that I should have started on them earlier. I had a few marketing and sales calls with people on the team, and between the reorganization of the supply closets and the email transition, working at home seemed like a smart choice. On Thursday morning, my phone rang at 9:00, just as I was settling in front of my computer to s...