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  • IVF
After months of waiting and nail-biting, our Lucky Number Ten embryo had their next round of photographs taken, aka, the 7 week scan.

This was a nail-biting moment for both my partner and I as we've been in this situation before and they've never gone particularly well. Historically, there's been long pauses, the sharp inhalations, the 'we'll book you in for another scan next week', previously. This time, we were told that everything is looking good and no cause for concern.

This means we have a grainy, black and white photo of a tiny 7 week old little person growing inside my wife. With a super-fast lighthouse of a heartbeat, our 1cm long foetus still has a yolk sac and foetal pole. But we have made a person and have even been given a due date. Quite a thing to hear on a grim Tuesday morning!

There's a long way to go still, but this is a major milestone along the IVF route and it's an incredible, humbling experience.

  •   Posted in: 
  • IVF
Of course, the time I don't take my phone with me, is of course the time the clinic call back. So when I find my better half, she's already talking to them about our results. On speakerphone. In a café. Which is of course amazing timing.

On average, the statistics for people in our age range is that there about 10 eggs are collected, of which 60-70% may be fertilised.

Our numbers are:
11eggs were harvested and after
19hours
8are fertilised.

Which is incredible.

It's like having had a year of trying for a baby condensed into a single month. It's the year of emotional highs and lows, concentrated into a fraction of the time. The intensity and rollercoaster of mood-swing cliff-edges is exhausting.

But it's a year of trying, and a year of energy.

Onwards to tomorrow, to see how our family of eggs are getting on.

Fingers-crossed.

During lockdown 2.0, I’ve been reminded of how time can just disappear when I don’t have a focus. So, I’ve bookmarked a lot of articles for later reading, registered with far-flung meetup groups and signed-up to receive dozens of newsletters. Some for hobbies. Some for work. Some that might be useful and some that will save me from 10 minutes of intense doomscrolling.

One such email landed arrived in Outlook titled New Ways of Working (NWOW) which gave a short sentence about a 5-week leadership course. Having read the book about leadership on a submarine, I loved the story, and the leadership concepts are all accounted for, but I struggled to relate: I don’t drive a nuclear submarine, I’m certainly not The Boss and most importantly no-one will die if the wrong email is sent. I do carry my fair share of battle-scars though, and I work with incredibly smart people doing difficult work so I’m somewhere between the two.

The way the NWOW email was worded, the course offered a chance to see how the theory could be transformed into a real-life calendar appointment in a 9 to 5 setting. Subsequently, the email was forwarded to The Actual Boss in the hope it started a conversation for any leader-type-people about how our organisation could benefit from an external nudge. Long-story short, I was somewhat surprised and pleased to join the first NWOW intake alongside two members of the BJSS Bristol Senior Leadership Team.

After five weeks of videos, podcasts, reading and communal Zoom-based class sessions, the sheer volume of consumption was incredible and marked a more intense study period than I’d completed in the last 10 years of my career.

I’d filled my notebook with comments, bullet points and ideas that came up as the group talked through their learnings from the previous weeks.

So, what have been my personal takeaways?

Bone Fide

Be authentic, all the time. At work and at home! If we are not sharing our own thoughts and feelings, decisions are taken based on assumptions both by me and by other people. By being genuine, trust is built and the team learns that honesty is more than okay, it’s expected, even if the words are sometimes difficult to hear.

Learn the tools

The internet has all the collaboration tools we could possibly hope for. The global pandemic has shown that we can work together apart, and that tools exist to allow sharing within and across teams. Some cost money. Some don’t. Some are great. Some are not. The curated list of tools from the course saved the trial and error (and a lot of time!) and I now have a go to list of bookmarks that each serve a specific purpose. From Zoom Breakout Rooms and Jamboards, there’s a tool to fit any intention.

Learn the principles

Collaboration is more than just apps. A meeting is not about talking, it’s about thinking, listening, and including. The most critical tool I learned about was a framework to support collaboration. In NWOW-speak, they’re called Liberating Structures and there are many formats to make meetings more interesting and positive for attendees. Some of these structures include mandated thinking time as part of the discussion. This proved to be a game-changer for me, since it gives the space for deep-thinking and helps to include more contemplative individuals in the conversation rather than only favouring those who thrive on reaction and gut-instincts.

We’re all just people

Teams are made of people and we’re unique, complex individuals. Having an ice-breaker at the start of a meeting shows that participants are invited (and expected) to contribute to the conversation that follows. A person-focussed question helps to level the playing-field for attendees since everyone is involved and hierarchies disappear with equal speaking time given to all. The side-benefit is that it also opens the door for non-business conversations to spawn. I personally like reflective check-in questions to help gauge energy levels for the meeting and to see if a separate conversation with someone might be necessary if they’re showing a change in energy or motivation.

Experiment and iterate

New Ways of Working doesn’t have a user-manual and becoming an expert takes time so trying things out is critical to have a successful long-term outcome. As new experiments are completed, if successful, things get better. If an experiment fails, that’s also okay. It means that the team has learned something new, and collectively we’re on the path for things to get better later. Failing is only bad, if we don’t adapt. The first time an unexpected experiment came good, I understood why the effort was worth it. Be brave and show people it’s okay to try.

Observation is not an emotion

Giving useful feedback is difficult, particularly if the recipient is not in a position to accept it. A simple technique of trying to separate the observation from the feeling it evoked has been useful to acknowledge the emotion, but to keep the focus on the actions. Useful not only for when giving feedback, but also when encountering other difficult situations or unexpected behaviours in the real world too. Taking a step back and separating the action from the feelings I felt, help to keep me focussed on the work rather than reacting to an emotion, which may not be helpful in the heat of the situation.

Feedback from others

Waiting for that one annual review to receive feedback means that we’re all missing useful insights for how we’re really performing. An annual review only 40 gives data points to help shape the direction of an entire career and is a very small number to provide the detail needed to genuinely improve. Receiving useful feedback is invaluable to help set a direction of change. Using the points of view of my peers and colleagues will stop me making assumptions about how my behaviours have been interpreted and where opportunities for improvements can be made. The best way of learning how the world sees you is to ask.

What’s stopping me from doing the best work of my life? Please, tell me.

Implicit Power

I’ve never seen myself as a Manager or what I considered to be a traditional Leader. However, it’s clear that not everyone has shared this opinion: colleagues have felt obliged to do things that I’ve asked and it was surprising to hear that some people have felt that they should do things. If nothing else, being more mindful of demonstrating power-with colleagues, rather than power-over is at the forefront of anything I now ask of others.
Side note: How did I find out about this mismatch of ‘power-over’ versus ‘power-with’ people? (Hint: Refer to above point).

What’s better than one brain? Ten of them.

New Ways of Working expects collective responsibility for the effectiveness of a team. Everyone must buy into it and everyone is expected to contribute. In the absence of ideas, I’d be the person to step-forward and offer a solution. The experiments from the course have shown me that a leader’s job is not to have all the answers, instead it’s to ask the questions and to give space to the people in the best position to provide answers. Stepping back is taking significant effort from me, more than stepping forward, but the result is better engagement in the team, and a sense of collective ownership that would otherwise be missing.

Not everyone gets it

There are a bunch of books about New Ways of Working, the one I’m reading now is called Corporate Rebels and the title is incredibly apt. NWOW is a rebellion against the traditional top-down structure, and not everyone gets it. That doesn’t mean that there’s no point in trying, it means that we continue to experiment. The evidence will speak for itself and there aren’t failures, just lessons learned.

What next?

I learned that New Ways of Working isn’t about someone having all the answers and telling people the best way. It’s about creating the space for the best way to emerge from the team and that success is obtained via introspection, experimentation, and co-operation.

As a result, I feel like in 2021, I have a ‘new’ job and its purpose is to create the space to allow success to happen.

Footnote: I am not associated with Mark Eddleston’s newNew Ways of Working coursefor 2021, but fully endorse its intent, approach and potential to change the way you look at work and the value you offer.

After this gushing article, I perhaps should ask for commission.