Tag: Leadership

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Blue Print

obstacle course summary

Congratulations, you made it through the second part of creating a family blueprint. We hope you enjoyed the conversations and spending time doing so with the one you do life with. Did you find it interesting to learn about personality types, and figure out what the needs of your family are? How did you go putting your crisis management and stress management plan together?

What area did you find the most beneficial?

We would love to hear your feedback.

We found the who we are? section to be the most eye-opening. Even now, a few years after we decided to learn more about who we are, we are still learning more about each other’s personality. We have found ourselves talking often about this topic how our personality types clash and how they work together. We have been identifying more of our strengths and weaknesses – in order to learn how to compromise just a little more, in order to be more considerate and aware of each other. We must say, so far so good. We feel that we have grown closer together and have more knowledge and understanding of each other.

How do you feel since you’ve worked together on your obstacle course responses?

Did you use any of these conversation lead to big changes in your family?

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Victory

#homesofvictory

It always seems impossible until it is done

Nelson Mandela
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Victory

#homesofvictory

Those who follow the crowd usually get lost in it.

Rick Warren, author of The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here for?
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Blue Print

crisis management plan

To be honest crisis management is something that we don’t often come into contact with in a formal sense. From a business perspective, there is always one ticking over in the background and pending the type of business the frequency of its activation is determined. Applying this to home life, is more than a financial contingency plan which I find most common – the suggested saving of three months wages for the just in case – for more info read The Barefoot Investor for families by Scott Pape.  A crisis management plan is not so much a plan as a process that can be divided into three sections pre – crisis, crisis response and post crisis.

By building this into your family blueprint, as a family you will be prepared to an extent for a crisis, emergency or disaster. The idea behind having this type of plan, even briefly mapped out is to reduce the fear involved and enable the navigation of it to be the focus.

To lay it all out on the table crisis, disaster and emergency are defined as: 

A crisis is a time of intense difficulty or danger.

dictionary.com

An emergency is a serious, unexpected, and often dangerous situation requiring immediate action.

dictionary.com

A disaster is a sudden accident or a natural catastrophe that causes great damage or loss of life.

dictionary.com

As you can see, it is a sliding scale of impact on your family and community. None are ideal, but in life these types of situations are not an ‘if’ but ‘ when’ scenario. No one is immune from unkind situations. Here at Homes of Victory we are going to give you some framework to create a crisis management plan to enable you to navigate these seasons in life and hopefully feel more equipped.

Pre-crisis plan

First up, we have the pre-crisis plan. The following series of questions will assist you in creating a list of actions regarding the contents of your family a pre-crisis plan. We have included the basics of what we believe will contribute effectively to your family blueprint. You and your family may have other aspects to add to this part of the plan. 

Red Cross have a great online plan that lists everything you need to consider in an emergency or disaster type situation for example bushfires and floods.

When it comes to other life situations such as a crisis like an injury or illness with financial impacts there are other aspects to consider.

Documentation & medication information:

The Red Cross has a great plan for these details. This is a great template to use, for listing important documents and medication information.

Insurance:

  • Do you have an up to date will?
  • Is your superannuation up to date? Do you know how much insurance you have under your superannuation?
  • Are all of your insurance policies up to date – home, car etc… ?
  • Do you have all medicare and medical insurance up to date?

Financial:

  • Do you have a savings plan in place, in case of loss of employment or unexpected expenses?
  • Do you have other investments you could rely on?
  • Do you have plans for multiple income streams?

Education:

  • What tools are you going to use in your family life, to keep the crisis in perspective?
  • Is  there any education you need to invest in? e.g. first aid training, financial management, resilience, stress management etc…
  • Are you aware of each other’s personality types?  Keeping in mind we generally revert to this personality type under stress.
  • Look for ways to be able to talk to your children about particular situations. Check out your local library for books that explain the experience.
  • Do your children know how to phone emergency services? Relay their address?

Assistance:

  • Do you have family you could call on for help when needed? Who is it, and do you need to have a conversation about it?
  • Do you have a network of friends you could call on for help with the children.

By having a pre-crisis plan available to you and your family, it enables a level of organisation to be available for when life gets tricky.

Crisis Response

I feel this is one thing that is hard to define. For business it is all about making the crisis look minimal on the outside, while on the inside the business scrambles to mitigate the impact. From a family perspective this is far harder to do. I know for us, at time we do go quiet while dealing with issues that pop up in life, we take in a sense time out to deal, and then resurface. We are quite independent and over time have learnt to share what is happening in life and to accept support from friends and family. We tend to be the support rather than the supported. With all of that said, over time, we have also learnt to put measures in place, like what was discussed in the pre-crisis plan to enable us to navigate the obstacle as best we can. In the post – beware the layers, we share how we went through a hectic season of one crisis after another which brought us to our knees. One thing that pulled us through was our determination to continue to communicate, to continue building on the foundations of our relationship we had set, and deal the best with could with the layers of stress. These experiences have shown us how tough we are and we realised we are way stronger than we have ever given ourselves credit for. It also showed us, that in the end, we could be proud of how we managed it, as we did our best and that is all we can ask of ourselves. It wasn’t a fun experience, nor was it exciting. It was hard work, day in / day out – to stay afloat while staying grounded and keeping it all in perspective.

Take some time to think about situations that your family have faced. How did you pull through?

Were you proud of the way the crisis was handled?

What changes in your behaviour or thinking could you make to reduce the impact of it on your family?

Keep some space in your notebook, for the next crisis – take note of how you handled it and what improvements you’ve made. It does sound a little gloomy, but it is something to celebrate when you can see improvements on how you and your family deal with the not so nice situations in life.

Post crisis

When things settle down, and life carries on, it is important to look in retrospect at the situation or season and take some time to let the learnings sink in. When you are ready, take some time to look at:

What are your learnings?

How will what you’ve learnt equip you for the next crisis?

Who can you share your learnings with? Who will benefit from them?

What could you do to be more prepared next time?

We do acknowledge that we can never be prepared for everything in life but the more we learn as life goes on, the better we can deal with unexpected situations together.

Sometimes when you’re in a dark place you think you’ve been buried, but you’ve actually been planted. 

Christine Caine – co-founder of A21

This absolutely represents what I believe should happen through our experiences in life – even the dark places, we can learn and grow, and something good will come out of it. It may take time, but eventually we will see the good.  

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Victory

Learning to lead using freedom

We’ve just had a week away camping at the beach. We feel incredibly blessed as where we live Covid restrictions have lifted to the point where we could do this, as it is our absolute favourite thing to do.

Every time we camp on the drive home we chat about what improvement we could make to the set up and experience. Bit by bit we add to our camping gear to make camping that little bit more organised, enjoyable and easier.

The addition to this trip was a set of walkie talkies… our kids don’t have phones ( they’re 10,8 and 4) and our camping trips are screen free as much as possible. We take bikes and scooters and love to give our kids freedom to ride, play and meet other kids so these walkie talkies were perfect. They allowed them freedom with boundaries. We could relax knowing we could contact them.

Reflecting on this camping trip we realized our kids had learnt some valuable lessons by being given freedom. All of which contribute to their developing leadership skills.

  • Confidence: They could choose where they went knowing we could still keep them safe and were available if they needed us. The walkie talkies gave them the confidence to be apart and meet up again as they chose.
  • Communication: This section was three fold. 1) The kids were able to communicate with us, when they wanted , and thought through the process before contacting us. 2) They communicated with each other clearly and decisively – as they were having too much fun to spend too long talking. 3) Having a communication tool on hand made them feel safe – while having the freedom to explore together or alone. The fun part was the kids allocated every one a bird name as our ‘ code name’ for the walkie talkies. It added humour and fun to the conversations.
  • Decision making – they knew the boundaries of where we stayed and knew to stay within them. They did explore further – but communicated that to us first. We showed trust in their decisions and they in turn displayed communication and trust.

Without even knowing it, they spent the week learning a different dimension to their current leadership skills. The freedom we gave them – along with the trust, gave them the confidence to do what they wanted to and explore.

Likewise in the workplace- we too can give freedom to our staff – possibly not with walkie talkies on a camping trip, but freedom within their role – as we observe mentor – freedom for some – opens up so many possibilities and will get the creative thoughts flowing.

What ways can you build freedom into your family life?

What ways can you build freedome into your staff?

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Victory

# homesofvictory

Be the best you can be until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.

Maya Angelou

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Victory

Under the microscope: Resilience

Resilience is the talk of the town here at HOV this week. Considering the year we have had – personally, as a community, as a nation and globally, I am sure we can all relate to the quest for finding resilience and remaining resilient through prolonged seasons of stress, overwhelming situations and isolation. Resilience is not putting happy pants on and doing a dance then being ready to face the day with a plastered smile on your face, resilience is so much more than that. Resilience at times can be treated with contempt, as we wonder what next, in our stressful situations. Resilience, however, will offer us a look into the positive, could-be’s and may-be’s that negativity does not allow for. Resilience, in its finest form, is like wearing armour with our feet firmly planted, ready to do battle with the season we’re in.

We all have varying levels of resilience, at times we may feel we have bucket loads, other times, we wonder where we can find more… So, let’s take a closer look at resilience, and why it is necessary, important, and critical to our home life, workplace and community. 

Resilience is defined as:

1.    The power or ability to return to the original form, position, etc., after being bent, compressed, or stretched, elasticity.

2.    Ability to recover readily from illness, depression, adversity, or the like, buoyancy.

In your home, resilience is vital for several reasons as it enables us to develop ways to protect against experiences that could be overwhelming. Resilience helps us maintain balance in our lives during stressful periods and protects us to a degree from developing mental health difficulties and issues.

In the workplace, resilience is a key strategy to enable us to tackle stress, competitive job markets, workplace conflicts and address challenges and change. Learning to be resilient in the workplace is so important as we often identify work as the number one stressor in our lives.

In community, resilience becomes all about the recovery from adversity and how individuals / families contribute to that.In Australia over the past few years we’ve had our share of devastating fires and floods along with the rest of the world weathering coronavirus– it has been a mix of grief at the loss and devastation but also a joy to see how the communities affected rally together and inspire the recovery efforts.

So, how do we go about building resilience, staying resilient and teaching those around us how to be resilient? To answer this question, we need to look at the types of resilience and where our strengths and weaknesses lie. Once an awareness of our current capacity of resilience, we can then build on this foundation.

We all experience ebbs and flows of resilience pending the circumstances around us and its severity – we are a work in progress on this too. The idea behind building resilience and staying resilient is reducing the difference between the ebbs and flows.

Start to think about what impacts on your resilience? This will become a key factor when increasing your resilience and staying resilient through the long haul.

I know when my kids were little, lack of sleep played a huge role in how resilient I felt. I remember one night, making a sandwich for my eldest, my husband innocently asked what I was doing, and I burst into tears…. Not very resilient hey – the reality was I was living on four hours of sleep a night and his lovely well intended question pushed me to tears… it’s funny now, but when I look back, all I wanted was the strength to get through each day. Have you been there? Are you living this now?

Here at HOV we are not experts in this field, nor claim to be, what we are interested in doing is giving you some pointers to get you started and support and encourage you on the adventure of building resilience. 

Before we get into the how to build resilience, it is important to note that there are four different types of resilience we can build:

  1. Physical
  2. Mental
  3. Emotional and;
  4. Social

All four areas in our lives require some level of resilience, as we face major life problems, situational problems, daily problems and what we like to call micro stresses. The little annoyances that build up, or the ones we see when we are in a negative head-space.

Think for a moment and rate your level of resilience for each area?  Use a scale of 1 – 10. Where do you feel your strength areas? Where are your weaker areas?

If you are doing this with someone you are close to and feel comfortable – rate each other and talk about your answers. This is about growing and supporting each other.

Keep an eye out for the next post of under the microscope: resilience – in reality. In this post we will be looking at practical ways to increase your resilience and how to stay resilient.

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communication

communication plan 2

Fighting fair

How many of us, have had instant regret when words have been said during an argument that are either untrue of knowingly hurtful…. Who has been on the receiving end of these kind of words. Words are incredibly powerful.

…take ships as an example. Although they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot wants to go. Likewise the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark.

James 3:4-5 – NIV version

How do we then reign in the power of words and use them for good, even when it’s game on the disagreement races towards hostility?

Most workplaces have a code of conduct where expected behaviours are laid out and clear for all staff to uphold. Likewise, in your home it would benefit the family to have the expected behaviours when conflict arises to fall back on. In our home, we call it the rules of engagement. I am not by any means stating we are perfect or fight fair every time – we are human, but what we aim to do, is communicate in a way that is fair, that tries to get to the bottom of the issue without the emotional hurt and spray of angry words. Although the aim of this section is to finish off your communication plan, it may start to look like a code of conduct document – where what is acceptable and not acceptable behaviours and communication methods will be laid out.

Start adding to your list from the communication plan 1, types of behaviors you would like to see in your family when conflict arises.

How practical and easy do you feel it would be to demonstrate those behaviours in conflict?

The aim of this is not to feel like a failure if you set the bar too high. Start working towards your desired behaviours in baby steps – map out how you want to see your family conflict resolved from the fly on the wall perspective.

Finally, don’t be afraid to try different communication tools. As we often have the kids with us and tempers flare at times, we find we sometime argue over text… so no words are actually spoken, the kids are none the wiser and we tend to work it out faster. Once we work it out, we do talk about it and have a proper conversation to make sure we are on the same page.

Make it a goal, to try a new way to communicate when conflict arises – it may just work out better than you expect.

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Leadership

Leadership trait: Passion

Passion is contagious. Passion oozes out of you without you knowing. I was once offered a job, while I was talking about a project I was on, as I spoke with passion and that is what this company wanted in their management team. When we are passionate about our families, relationships, children, life we are living, whatever it is– we can’t help but let it ooze out. We can’t help but take others along for the ride. We can’t help but enable others to join us in our passion. Passion impacts everyone we come into contact with and leaves a lasting impression.

Question: What are you passionate about? What could you do to share it more with those around you?

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Victory

living the dream

In the rough and tumble of life, we found ourselves talking about what our 18 year old selves wanted to do, before the reality (ahem responsibility) of life took hold. The interesting thing was, although we had all of these dreams and goals at 18, some of which we have achieved, others that are still to come to fruition, we both agreed that if we didn’t have this, we would still want it. The ‘this’ was three kids tangled together sound asleep in our bed, toys, books, shoes, scattered over the floor, a ton of clean socks hiding behind a cushion on the couch and dirty dishes waiting to be done. We joked that even in the crazy, mess of home – we are still living the dream. The dream of having a family – although it looks far different in reality, the emotional rollercoaster, the lack of sleep, chicken nuggets, visiting of public toilets, the noise, the tears, the dramas, the fun, the laughter, the push me higher on the swing squeals, all of it – is really living the dream. When the drama reaches fever pitch or dinner time turns into a calamity, we try to smile and remind ourselves we are living the dream. By doing this, we actually change the mood – to a positive one – rather than respond to the drama with more drama.

What does ‘living the dream’ look like in your home? How close is your reality to your dream?

Is it something that you need to remind yourself of more often?

What changes could you make, to make living the dream, more of a reality?

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Victory

Tetris = next level resource allocation.

Working with resource allocation can be tricky, firstly working out the needs and wants, navigating the decision making process, communicating the final decisions and getting the team leaders on board to then be able to run with what they have.

During this season, creativity is entering into the most rigid of processes and encouraging ‘do more with less’ outcomes because of necessity. I have been pleasantly surprised by the significant changes, this season has almost forced upon workplaces and staff for that matter. Even though I have been personally impacted by reduced resourcing I am none the less impressed by the changes outworking during this season. The collaboration out of necessity, the shifting of mindsets,the ebbs and flows of decision making and project delivery methods. It is incredible to be apart of and also witness in the businesses around my city and the world.

In applying these creative methods to our home lives, it may be out of necessity due to reduced finances, or drastic changes in routine, it is interesting to note that out capacity seems to have adjusted and our mindsets have flexed also.

When allocating resources to projects and business as usual tasks I often visualise the game of Tetris. How should the resources fit to have the best outcomes. I must admit to needing some brain breaks lately to order my thoughts and have found myself playing Tetris. Somehow, while lining up the blocks, I am able to creatively work out the solution to the real life resourcing issue at hand. No longer, is it a game I played as a kid, competing to get the highest score, but now its gone to a whole new level of helping me work through resources allocation dilemmas.

What ways has this season forced you to be more creative?

Aside from the negative impacts of this season, what are some positive changes that have occurred?

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Victory

#homesofvictory

The reason we struggle with insecurity is because we compare our behind-the-scenes with everyone else’s highlight reel.

Steven Furtick
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Leadership

#homesofvictory

  Become the kind of leader that people would follow voluntarily; even if you had no title or position.

Brian Tracy
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Victory

#homesofvictory

When a flower doesn’t bloom , you fix the environment in which it grows not the flower.

Alexander Den Heijer
Categories
Blue Print communication

communication 2

In the digital day and age, communication seems easier and harder at the same time. Communication nonetheless is the number one most important thing in a relationship and family. How it occurs, when it occurs, where it occurs and the depth of it all impacts the foundations of the relationships and the building of a family. In the season of being a parent, communication can be hard. Sleep deprivation, forgetfulness, overwhelmed-ness – everything contributes to diminished communication. Your communication style may have changed, your capacity has changes so too has the needs behind communicating.

I know for us we often find in our busy that we remember to ask the other person something in the middle of the night when the other is asleep, or when they are in a meeting and we can’t talk. Then adding, when we do see each other face to face, the kids interrupt in a multitude of ways that we often forget what we were trying to say, ask or tell. Are you smiling yet, because it’s true?

I must admit at the moment, I am guilty of saying before the kids bedtime, after they go to bed, let’s hang and chat, I need to ask you about… I then proceed to fall asleep with one of the kids, and stumble into bed around midnight, remembering that we needed to talk about something. The conversation then happens in a rush before work the next morning sometimes even before caffeine. We all know that, that time of day is absolutely not productive. So to overcome these challenges, some self-inflicted of course we have started using a few communication tools and methods to help us.

1. yes / no text

As the main, social organiser/ child logistics queen in the family, I often need to ask my other half questions that have a simple yes / no answer. At the moment I am sending at least one text a week with a short list of yes/ no questions. He knows, to respond! Not because it’s a ‘ yes dear’ moment, but because he knows that I am running the logistics past him to make sure he is included and that it works for him too. At other times the yes/ no texts become an email, as I’ve waited so long and the list is too much for a text. This may or may not work in your situation, but it has taken the pressure off both of us when we are with the kids and working out the logistics of life. Since we’ve started doing this, I have been receiving yes / no texts too – I love it, as it keeps life humming along and we are both on the same page with what is happening with the kids and other things in life.

Would yes/no texts work in your family? What other tools could work to take the pressure off working out the logistics of life?

2. shared calendar

My husband introduced a shared digital calendar into our lives about a year ago. It was the best thing. If you don’t already have a shared calendar – you need one! It is our go to when we get asked to do something out of hours, rather than saying ‘I need to ask my wife’ – which sounds like he’s asking for permission, my husband checks the calendar and has autonomy over his decisions. Likewise, I am the same. Our simple parameter around the calendar is, whoever has it in first gets it. So if I plan a girls night on a particular date and add it to the calendar I go… if he forgets to put something in for that same date – he loses out and vice versa. It may sound a bit black and white but don’t worry we are kind and negotiate. We put that simple parameter around our calendar so we use it to its capacity so it benefits us the most. It is a communication tool, that we use to minimise issues in logistics and awareness. We got tired of saying to each other – I didn’t know you were going out/ but I already planned something –  all of those unavoidable conversations have now been avoided.

Research some apps that could contribute to enabling more communication in your relationship.

One additional app may make a huge difference.

3. screen time

I thought I would add in, screen time and parameters at this point. So much is being written about screens and their positive and negative effects on kids and adults. I was looking for some stats and quotes to add strength to what I am about to write, but the information online seemed overwhelming. All articles pointed to the same type of issue – more screen time = lower quality relationships. We know this to be true, just looking at our own lives. It is amazing how quickly addiction can take over. Not just for kids but adults alike. Who sits on the couch after the kids go to bed, watching TV, flicking through their phone, sitting with their loved one. It’s not spending time together, but rather just being in the same room.

Our kids are still young enough to not have their own device, but the time is coming soon when they will need to for school. In order to pre-empt the screen time dramas to come, we have started modelling screen savvy behaviours to them. We want them, when the time comes to be able to self-regulate their own screen use when the time comes. We need to set the example, and use our own devices in moderation in front of them. What they see is what they will do. In response to our kids behaviour and I know your family will be different and have other measures in place, we now have the following parameters in our home that include all members of the family:

  • No screens in bedrooms – this is hard for us as parents but we are trying to work according to this rule too – how easy is it to lie in bed scrolling through your phone at the end of the day…
  • 30 mins screen time on a school day and;
  • one hour on weekends ( this includes TV, computers, gaming devices, e-readers)
  • whole family time is in addition on weekends – this could be a movie night etc…
  • Parents don’t have a TV time limit. (Can you tell our kids are detailed.)

In addition to this, as parents we aim to put our phones out of sight from 4 – 8pm – if we are home. The only phone calls we answer are from family and text messages can wait. Although we are not perfect, we try. We know, what we are aiming for and that is quality relationships and those can only be built with communication at the forefront of our minds. Since implementing these parameters, our kids do communicate with us more, they read more, they play more, they even help around the house a bit more. Teamwork is gaining momentum as we have put this emphasis on communication and togetherness.

Think about how many times you’ve had a device in your hand, when someone else has been trying to talk to you? How do you feel when it is you trying to talk?