Patterns

We are constantly looking for patterns. Patterns to help predict the future; how to protect and enhance our health, our savings and our wellbeing. In business, our plans rely on second guessing the future based on patterns emerging now, and the patterns of the past. What if past and current patterns provide us with no light to illuminate the future path? Human wellbeing is predicated on the belief that we have some control over our destiny. In psychology and economics we employ, at great expense, wise people to give their expert views on what the future may hold. Once the future emerges, these predictions, budgets and forecasts are disguarded: Rarely do we forage in past predictions to analyse how wrong we were. We are animals that constantly look to the future. Historians weave stories together to connect the present to the past, but the truth is that the present emerges from the space that lies between events. Events that shape our world come out of the blue. A natural disaster, the timing of stock market crashes and people falling in love, emerge. The 10 biggest one day moves in the US stock market in the last 50 years account for over 50% of all the returns in that period.

Take a look at your own life and the complexity of it all. As I sit here in a cafe in Malta my thoughts turn to my family. I grew up in Wrexham, North Wales. We have a large family. I have three brothers and three sisters. On this day, 23rd September 2008 I am working in Malta, my dad is in Marbella, southern Spain, my mum is in Vancouver, one brother and a sister are in London, a sister in Edmonton, Canada, one in Sydney, one brother in the northwest of England and another in Wrexham. Accident and love lead us into the unknown. My chance meeting with my New Zealand partner twelve years ago led us to marriage and a period living in Australia to be closer to his family. My sister's visit to Australia to see us led to her falling in love with the place and on one of her subsequent visits to meeting and falling in love with her Canadian boyfriend. They then moved to Edmonton to be closer to his family, hence my mum's current vacation in British Columbia and Alberta. My partner's last minute decision, on a cold Spring night twelve years ago in West London, to return to the pub we had just met rather than catch the last bus home set off a chain events leading directly to my mum drinking a Chai Latte in Starbucks on Robson St in Vancouver.

Making a plan

Our lives are shaped by the unforeseen. None more so than in business. I spent years working at KPMG reviewing business plans and forecasts. Forming a view based on the balance of probabilities and the accuracy of the information provided. We performed sensitivity analysis against these forecasts and would identify, say the top 5 risk factors, likely to impact the future. For example, a jam manufacturer's important factors might include; the cost of strawberries, the potential loss of Tesco's as a customer and downtime costs if a key piece of machinery is made idle. We would rarely factor in events such as the destruction of the factory due to a freak catastrophic earthquake in the southwest of England or the death of 10,000 customers from a rare flesh eating virus. However, it's always the unexpected that blows our financial forecasts apart.

The asymmetry of human perception means that we have a tendency to attribute our success to our skills and our failures to external events causing us to have a strong belief that we are better than others at what we do for a living. Nasssim Nicholas Taleb reviewed journals investigating the difference between what we know and what we actually know. In a series of replicated studies, experts and lay people were asked to provide confidence limits surrounding an assertion. For example, "I am 98% confident that the population of Brazil is between 100 and 200 million". It turns out that on average the 2% error rate is more like 45%. We are 22 times more confident in our beliefs than we ought to be. The studies indicate that the more "expert" we are, the greater the average error rate. The more information we have the more a confirmation bias (looking for confirming evidence) and belief perseverance (stickiness of beliefs), creates the illusion of certainty.

So is the answer to make no plans? Probably not. Humans like creating the illusion of order and structure. It does not matter how far off plan we go, the important thing is that we attempt to measure the gap. We need plans to harness attention and focus of a group of people. A plan harnesses an organisation's values and tries to align these with those of the individuals the organisation is comprised of. Focused human energy is a powerful tool.

When it all goes wrong

Inevitably, the plan/budget/forecast falls apart. Increasingly scarce resources have already led to political, environmental and financial volatility in the 21st century. If plans went awry in the last 50 years of the 20th century what chance do they have in the new millennium?

Leaders have a responsibility to prepare themselves and their people for the inevitability of dynamic change. If change is impossible to predict, the only thing as individuals we can control, is our reaction to unpredictable events. We can prepare the mind to feel confident in uncertainty.

In calmer times

It may be useful to foster acceptance of the impermanent nature of reality; training the mind to enjoy the things of this moment without forming strong attachment to events out of our control. Focusing on the moment allows us to perceive change as it is happens, removing some of the shock factor. Being aware of the fluidity of our thoughts and how they impact our emotions allow us to remain calm in a crisis and experience change as it happens. Liberating our choices and allowing us to rise above primal responses.

In times of peace training can be undertaken to prepare the mind, body and spirit for tougher times. There is no better training than mindfulness and meditation to help create fluidity and adaptability in thinking patterns and to help foster kindness, compassion and acceptance. Adapting to change requires all these attributes.

Another useful strategy, to help build tenacity in the face of uncertainty, is to play to your strengths. This engenders hope and authenticity and provides you with the energy to help navigate unchartered waters. Identifying, expressing and celebrating core strengths, with likeminded people, brings focus and attention to what you do well. At times of crisis, having nurtured your core strengths, they can be deployed authentically and with ease. At these moments you feel this is your moment, your destiny, your reason for existence.

To learn more about meditation training for business leaders and strengths-based coaching contact me at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

www.breathe-london.com

"But in all my experience, I have never been in an accident...of any sort worth speaking about. I have seen but one vessel in distress in all my years at sea. I never saw a wreck and never have been wrecked nor was I ever in any predicament that threatened to end in disaster of any sort"

E.J Smith, 1907, Captain, RMS Titanic