8/8/08 LPG Meeting on Habit 6: Synergize

It was a special LPG meeting. For the first time, we held it outside IBM which was befitting the first day of my IBM retirement--a new beginning for me.

We socialized, had pizza for lunch, then Hoa read to the group the heart-felt email from Gilma. Her words and her voice all the way from Brazil touched all of us deeply. We felt her presence.

Thanks to both LPG Core and LPG Extended members who made it such a special occasion for me. Thanks for giving me the Re-think diary and the Blanchard book, Live What You Love. I am grateful for being part of this wonderful group of people.

My retiring from IBM offers synergistic opportunity to bring the spirit of LPG to a wider circle. (Welcome Ji-Yun to LPG. You might just be our link to Mayo Clinic). LPG started four years ago in a conversation with a couple of IBM Asian Networking Group (ANG) officers. There was a feeling that ANG needed to encourage and enable leadership development of its members. And somewhat in jest, I mentioned I would like to do something for ANG that could grow into a future network outside IBM. That was a synergistic vision, though none of us really thought of it that way at the time. We just had the intention to pursue self-improvement, to practice effective habits, to learn from and support each other, to be open to new ideas and see what might come out of that.

In the nearly four years with LPG, I know I have changed for the better: more positive, responsible, self-determined, patient, open, intuitive and more deliberate in choosing how I would feel, believe, act and serve others. The result: one of the most remarkable personal experiences in my life. I learned from others and others learned from me. Together, our circle of influence grew mutually. It's not a zero-sum game in which some becoming more powerful at the expense of someone else having less power. That is the synergistic effect.

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Some points brought up at the meeting about Synergy:

1. When family members are so busy with their own priorities, how can they synergize?

Well, maybe it's all right each do their own thing. Not everything has to be synergized.

Or, maybe purposefully sit down once in a while with the intention to talk about the "mission statement" of the family. Have the family together do Habit 2: Begin With The End in Mind.

But, what if we can't break out from our own positions of "I am right, you are wrong" and cannot come to a process for agreement.

Have some trusted someone to facilitate the conversation (a counselor, a trusted friend).

2. Since synergy requires trusting relationship, how can you develop synergy when there is no relationship?

Take a page from the Open Source community, (Linux eg) establish a trusted cluster of members. Each cluster trusts another cluster. So, the whole can become a trusting community. In other words, you don't have to know or have to develop trust for everyone in a community hundreds or thousands strong, start with a trusted circle.

Establish relationship by personally making an effort to make an overture, a call eg, with the person on the other side. Tell them directly you want to improve your relationship with that person.

3. Synergy is about the willingness and commitment to seek a third circle (alternative)--one that is bigger than the sum of its parts. It is a process that requires a willingness to get out of your own circle (your ego, your assumptions) and seek to understand the other circle. Have faith in the process that can appear to be chaotic at times. Give the person a hug (your child for example) once in while just to show you care.

4. How do you value differences?

Be curious. How can you be curious? Be interested. What if there are things or people I am really not interested in? Well, maybe, but be open anyway. Don't conclude right the way that a topic or a person is not your cup of tea right the way. Be open.

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As I start my own new beginning of retirement, there are a number of opportunities for LPG to take. I am excited there is a real opporunity to take LPG to outside the blue wall. And we welcome to our group, a guest from the Mayo Clinic community, Ji-Yun. We hope as LPG evolves, she can help us shape it in a way meaningful to a constituency broader than IBM without losing its original core value.

Next meeting we will do Habit 7:

Habit 7 is Sharpening the Saw. It's a habit of continual renewal in four dimensions: physical, mental, social/emotional and spiritual.

Snergize and Synchronicity

I am at best only a casual student of psychology. Whatever knowledge I have comes from flipping pages of Psychology Today. Probably due to a faulty mailing list system, an unsubscribed copy of that magazien would arrive regularly at our house.

Carl Jung is one of the most frequently cited authorities in many of the articles. And I seem to remember that Covey in his 7 Habit book also mentions Jung.

I have always thought that Jung's synchronicity lines up with Habit 6: Synergize.

Both have the belief that life's seemingly chaotic events follow a pattern. Coincidents add up to produce synergistic results. One plus one sometimes does add up to four or more. The whole can be greater than the sum of its parts.

I have witnessed the working of synchronicity and synergy all this week.


Story 1: Close Encounter of the Liked Kind

Last Monday, Kay, Director of Rochester Diversity Council, meets with me to see if I would be interested in joining the DC board. Being passionate about diversity at IBM and now about to retire with more time on my hand, I told her I was interested and would gladly fill out an application form.

The next day, Tuesday morning, I fill out the application form and mail it to Kay. That was that, so I thought. But an hour later, at noon, Roger and I are at our Kiwanis Club West's weekly meeting. Lo and behold, I notice that on the agenda is a topic about diversity. And Kay is the featured speaker. Needless to say, Kay and I were both pleasantly surprised. What a coincidence! I told her if I had known she was going to be at the meeting I could have saved the postage stamp and just handed her my application.

Story 2: "Who are you again?"

Yesterday, after talking to my financial adviser who reassures me I am still good to go financially to retire, I wander into a "job fair" in the auditorium next to her office. I was not looking for anything in particular. I was just curious what was going on. Best Buy was there and a number of other companies too. As I browse around the room half-interested, I come to one of the last tables at the room, the woman behind the table calls out: "Al!" She looked familiar but I couldn't place her. "I am Abbey," she said. I am still puzzled. She went on: "You and I have been exchanging email the last couple of weeks." Then it clicks. I am standing in front of the table of RCTC. Abbey, whom I had met a couple of years ago when RCTC needed help to design a Chinese cultural course, have been emailing with me about the possibility of teaching that class. In our exchange she also became intrigued about LPG. What a coincidence!

Well, how will these two stories play out as far as Synergize goes remains to be seen. But I have a feeling that whatever it is the whole will be greater than the sum of its parts.

See this link for today's LPG meeting agenda.

Synergy Definition

I am jotting down some quotes from Covey that resonate with "diversity"--an effort which, up till now, I have tried to model mainly at IBM, and which with my retirement shortly I will do more in the Rochester community:

Synergy means that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

And,

The essence of synergy is to value differences--to respect them, to build on strengths, to compensate for weaknesses.

Habit 6: Synergize

As I count down my days to retire from IBM, the habit of synergize (Habit 6 of 7 Effective Habits) is something that I really want to practice. And it's already bearing fruits.

Through my work with Rochester Diversity Council, having just finished training as a prejudiced reduction workshop facilitator, I have a feeling that what I have done at IBM working to improve the company's diversity initiatives is going to blend in. These two work streams are synergistic and in fact will drive toward my vision of being a subject matter expert (SME) in globalization as a vocation in ACT 2 of my career.

I have an intention to play a role in the creation of an enlightened, holistic global civilization, which awakens to the "middle way" that blends the western scientific and efficient belief systems with the eastern traditions of mindfulness and natural harmony.

As I pay attention to Covey's Habit 6, I can see that synergistic results are happening. In addition to participating in diversity beyond the blue wall, because the work I did helping to support the Chinese Cultural Class at IBM, there is now an opportunity for me to participate, after I retire, to serve as one of the instructors for this course for Rochester and maybe beyond.

The multiplication effects of synergy is everywhere within yourself, family, workplace, neighborhood, the planet and the universe. Keep contributing to its natural growth, from an inner sense of good will, helps it become the New Earth,. Serve the world with good intentions. Sooner or later all things of good intentions will line up.

At least that is my belief.