Friday, March 23, 2012

Peer Pleasure

Last week I read an article in the Guardian weekly about a successful experiment at a home for people with mental problems. They had brought in other people with mental problems, those at different recovery stages, to help with caring. I couldn’t help but laugh. After all these years, the lunatics really had taken over the asylum.

Then I read more and thought more deeply. Of course, I concluded, this made so much sense. The root causes of people with disturbed minds are often psychological, things starting out with lack of self-esteem or other requirements for empathy. Despite all their training, it is very hard for care professionals to fully relate to such patients and to get through to them. Other people emerging from similar issues might have more ability to see into the heads of the sick, and explain coping strategies that might help, things that may have worked for them, things that could give hope. Hope may be all that is missing, hope given by someone credible yet not superior, someone who cannot be a threat or any sort of humiliation.

Isn’t that lovely? I wish them every success with the experiment, and hope that more spring from it. Of course care professionals do not lose their role, but it modifies. They have to work in the background, finding the right peer partners, gently suggesting approaches to those partners, being ready with follow up treatment such as a change in medication, and overseeing to ensure no harm comes from the process.

But the care professionals may not be comfortable with this. These different skills may not come easily to them. They may even feel a bit threatened by their subtle change in power and role.

I believe this is a microcosm of a very common opportunity. Sorry to keep bleating on about it, but in my part of Shell we tried something similar (though I’m not sure Shell leaders would be all that pleased about being compared with mental patients). In the Applied Leadership programme, we replaced training courses about leadership with discussion groups of leaders. Under the eye of a moderator, participants shared their issues and their solutions, building confidence and a menu of tried and trusted strategies. For many it worked well. For some it opened their brains for the first time to improving their leadership, something ego and fear and prevented before. Hearing that peers had similar problems was the catalyst to being able to share their own problems. Barriers were broken down, not for everyone, but for a larger group than would have secured value from classical training.

In essence, I believe this to be identical to the mental patient story. And it started me wondering what other examples might be out there, and what other fields might be improved with this approach.

Training teachers has changed a lot in the last fifty years. Classroom type sessions have been partly replaced by experienced based training, spending time in front of real live kids and finding ways to cope then to connect then to thrive. I remember when I was at school, there were some teachers who were no doubt very clever and technically well-trained, but who had no ability whatsoever to connect with their pupils. Some did not master control, others couldn’t find the right atmosphere or language, others simply could not see the problems from the point of view of the kids. I know this has improved, but I suspect that it go further. I am gratified to see that teachers are offered two or three days per term for training, but I wonder how much of that time is spent receiving technical training. My guess is that more often a dimple discussion with other teachers at the school would yield more dividends, if properly moderated. And the simplest and most cost effective way for any teacher to improve might be to invite a peer into his or her classroom a few times to observe, and to give the same favour back later. Does this happen? I have my doubts. What stops it? Well, ego and fear are two things – who would not initially be a little bit frightened letting a colleague into their empire? And I also suspect professional trainers by block this, subconsciously or not. The trade unions might not help much either.

Generally, any field where human communication is an important part of the skillset could benefit from a peer-based approach. One good bi-product of the much-maligned health service reforms might be the increased possibility for GP’s to give peer coaching to each other, though the same blockers are likely to persist as in teaching.

Another example is conducting and choir directing. True, technical skills are important, but, once again, my guess is that the best way to develop above a certain level is to observe and be observed by peers and to start an improvement dialogue as a result. Ego is especially big in this field, so don’t be surprised that in my experience few actually do this.

Gaining the benefits of peer coaching is one of the things enabled by the internet. Blogs and open query sites are perfect for peer coaching. People can share what works for them, or post issues holding them back, without much stigma. Virtual connections are fast, plentiful and relatively unchallenging. Many of us have got into the habit of surfing the web when we have a new problem to solve. We could probably do it more than we could, and apply the approach to things we think we have already mastered as well.

Two more example areas might be parenting or caring for the elderly. In both these cases, these are less often professions than skills people need to acquire as they go without training. A bit like line management really. I love to observe other parents and try to be open to their criticism of my own approach – within a couple is the easiest place to start of course. And I would love more clues for how to care for my ailing mother. So, I should start with the internet on that one.

I notice my daughter is a lot better and many of these life skills than I am. Building relationships is another one, my generation had no clue how to do that at all yet many kids these days avoid the pitfalls with grace. I expect peer coaching has a lot to do with it. Facebook and MSN may be derided by some of my generation, but my belief is that they are enabling a positive revolution in many empathy-based skills. Which only bodes well for a bright future. Perhaps in the future there will be many fewer people needing help mentally – and the treatment for those that still do will be more effective do to peer coaching.

Thursday, March 15, 2012

My Seven Wonders

I grow to love Intelligent Life, the Economist magazine published every two months. It is rather like the review section of a Sunday newspaper, but with the sharp attitude and writing style from the parent publication. Some features, like the wine review, just leave me cold, since they describe a world outside of my comprehension (how can a wine bottle of 400 dollars be good value?). It is also hard to make credible listing which are global and relevant: if six exhibitions are listed, then the chance that I might happen be in one of the cities might be 10%.

One regular feature is called Seven Wonders, in which some polyglot is asked to describe a special view, city, hotel, building, beach, journey and work of art. Often, I have not even heard of most of the nominations, and that can grate, inspiring not awe but a sort of jealousy. But each time I have read the feature I have been tempted to try it for my myself. So, this week I did. I have no expectation that it will inspire awe, and hope it will not inspire jealousy either. My hope is to inspire you to try the exercise for yourself, as I found it fun and pleasantly nostalgic.

For a view, there are many candidates in Scandinavia, and some cityscape views as well, for example the Staten Island ferry view in New York, but my choice is the Swiss alps from a plane. Business travel has many negatives, and frequent flying is certainly one of them, but I still love looking out of the window on a clear day, reflecting on the miracle of flight. I also love maps and fancy myself as a good navigator, so the puzzle of identifying locations beneath me is endlessly fascinating. Flying over any city I know is thus a joy, but, for its sheer splendour, mountain ranges are special. It is almost worth the cost and hassle of a day trip from Amsterdam to Milan and back for the beauty that are the alpine views from the window. One of the blessings of our generations.

I love cities, and love being what I now learn is called a flaneur, a sort of random wanderer in a city. Walking and public transport are my favourite ways to be a flaneur. Choosing any city over any other is difficult. London, Paris, New York, Barcelona, Lisboa, where to start? I suppose somewhere compact, where it is easy to walk, somewhere with a distinctive history and present, and where buildings and especially people have stylish diversity. So I go for Sevilla. It is stiflingly hot in summer, but otherwise the city is a jewel, its people proud, demonstrative, stylish and often out of doors. Boston or Cambridge might qualify as well.

I found hotel the hardest category, I think mainly because hotels for me mainly evoke the most sterile part of sterile business trips, judged only by the absence of the negative. As long as the room temperature is OK, the bed soft and without bugs, the hot water hot, the breakfast edible and the check-out efficient, I’m happy to move on. True, I’ve been to some beautiful locations (Holmenkollen in Oslo and the Danube front hotels of Budapest), historical places (the castle hotels near Stockholm or the Hunting Tower near Perth in Scotland), and quaint establishments, and I’ve had wonderful experiences in hotels as well, but something about the category does not work for me. So my choice is a sort of anti-choice. Formule One is a great business model, and revolutionised its category, so my choice is any Formule One. You can plan your journey, you know exactly what you will get, and your wallet will hardly be troubled. I’m old enough now to value a private toilet, but if Formule One hadn’t started the trend, imitators with private toilets would not have arrived.

For buildings, I am no expert in architecture, but I do love wandering into Churches. For me the delight of Rome is just to randomly walk, stopping at every Church I pass. But how to choose between them all, single one out? Then I also love many modern buildings, those that combine functionalism and simplicity with grace and uniqueness. I am not one to denigrate the town hall in The Hague. My choice is a museum, the Vasa in Stockholm. The building is the boat, reconstructed from a salvage operation fifty years ago, the same boat the sank half an hour into its maiden voyage four hundred years earlier. The boat itself is magnificent, and its museum combines that splendour with history, science and intrigue.

A beach for me is for walking. So it needs solitude, dramatic colours and dramatic sea, the chance to paddle and sand that is flat and hard enough to walk on, an alternative cliff top route for the return journey, and a vista facing either way. It also helps if the climate is seasonal but mainly sunny. So I choose Falesia beach in the Algarve, between val de Lobo and Albufeira. Just like Sevilla, avoid July and August, this time because of people as well as temperature. Otherwise the orange cliffs and exciting sea offer all the aids to reflection that one could ever want. Portstewart in Northern Ireland has all the same positive characteristics – but unfortunately it is usually raining.

Journey is a lovely category. One day I would love to walk to Santiago de Compostelo, but I haven’t had that pleasure yet. The South Downs way from Eastbourne is a wonderful journey and surprisingly accessible, dotted with good pubs. I could also choose something abstract like Holy Week. But I choose a rail journey, as I love travelling by rail almost as much as walking. The route from Oslo to Bergen is stately. At the top of the mountains it is possible to detour onto a funicular and boat trip on a peaceful fjord. But the best feature of the journey is its ability to offer three seasons in a single day, for example in September. Near Oslo you find Autumn colours and flavours, but it the mountains it is already bleak winter. Then in the maritime air towards Bergen you can capture the last of summer. Spring is a bit harder generally in Scandinavia, as it is always late and fleeting. Bergen is a wonderful destination if you are lucky enough to choose one of the sixty or so days in the year when it does not rain. A tourist tip for Norway is to go inland. The Hurtigruten up the coast is famous and has its charms, but the views cannot compare.

Last comes a work of art, and my appreciation is greatest for music. I could go for a Victoria or Monteverdi anthem, last year I sang a piece from the same era by Vivanco which was unforgettable in its drama, but in the end I choose Bach. This prolific composer could not write bad music, nor could he write music that stands still. Some Bach can be so somnolent as to be monotonous, but not the Magnificat. Twelve short movements, each with its own distinctive character, perfectly formed. Amazingly, Bach wrote much of his music for his local Church choir, and was constantly harangued to keep his music short. His remit for the Magnificat was not to go over thirty minutes, and this may explain why the very last movement rather runs out of steam. But in show business the maxim is always to leave the audience wanting more, and that certainly applies here.

So, that was fun, and I commend the exercise. One overall reflection is that most of my memory concerns less the object and more the human experience I associate with it. Don’t you find that when you look at your old photos the only ones you linger over are the ones of people? Well, I found the same with this. I suppose that is good, or we might all choose the same places.

The other reflection is how blessed I am compared with my parents, to live in an age where the world has become so much smaller and more accessible. Yet still almost all my choices are from the developed world and even from Europe. I guess my 22-year-old daughter would already be able to offer a more eclectic selection, and just think of the range of experience she might have when she reaches fifty one, or when her own kids reach fifty one.

Sunday, March 11, 2012

Take me to Jakarta?

A couple of weeks ago Ipsos published a happiness survey of 28 countries. Indonesia were run-away winners with 51% saying they were very happy, more than double the score for any European nation.

I love these surveys. I was encouraged when David Cameron started a campaign to understand and drive policy towards “gross national happiness” a couple of years ago and am disappointed that it seems to have led nowhere. Probably it has run into the problems of defining and measuring happiness, and also political blocks: who really wants to stake their re-election prospects on something so fickle as a poll?

The Ipsos survey interviewed people from the same 28 countries in 2007, so it is also possible to see trends. There are splits not just by nation, but also by age, gender, marital and work status. I looked at the raw data on the website, but haven’t yet found great surprises or insights from these other categories.

As the surveyors point out, a healthy dose of salt is necessary in drawing too many conclusions, even if we assume that the interviewers managed to find a large enough representative sample from each country. First, there is the language and culture dimension. The basic question can be translated into different languages, but the exact nuance is bound to differ. Anyone with one native language living in a second country knows that subtle changes in text radically change interpretation. Even if the intent of the question is more or less the same, the responses will still reflect culture. Perhaps in Indonesia, if a stranger comes up to you in the street and asking you how happy you are, it would be a monumental insult to them, to your family or to your God to respond anything but positively. For this reason, perhaps the trends over time give better indications than the national scores.

But this leads to another problem. I’m pretty sure that my response to the question would vary day by day, even hour by hour. True, we have an inner sense of contentment or otherwise that remains pretty solid for months or years. But my mood today is buffeted by so many ethereal factors as well. If the sun is shining, I always feel better. If I have slept well. If my football team has won its most recent match. If a friend paid me a compliment, or if I managed to make a friend happier myself. If I am free from a slight headache or backache or whatever ache. If the morning news or something I just read uplifted rather than depressed me. If my most recent family interactions have been happy ones.

Especially since I may respond quickly and without much thought to a random pollster catching me off guard, I have a feeling that my answer s might swing rather more wildly than they should. And while some of these effects are personal and might be expected to balance out in a large enough poll, others might effect a lot of people in the same direction, the weather, news and sport as examples.

Can a poll really mean anything in the midst of all that noise? My suggested answer would be: only if conducted quite frequently. One measurement in 2007 and another in 2011/12 seems to me to be rather like dismissing climate change because it was cool last week.

Still, let us for a minute cast all these quibbles aside and look at the poll results. Most countries at the top of the league in 2007 stayed there in 2012. Behind Indonesia were India, and then Mexico and Brazil, though Brazil dropped back in 2012. Turkey jumped from the bottom half of the table to fifth place. Then all the developed non-Europeans/non-Asians are in a cluster – US, Canada, Australia. South Africa, Argentina and Saudi Arabia are in the top half too. Then we have all the miserable Europeans. The Brits and Swedish are a bit ahead of most continentals, Italy and Spain (especially in 2012) a bit behind, and Hungary and Russia right at the bottom. China does no better than average, and Japan and South Korea do worse. For a table, look (among other places) at the February 25th Economist.

So, what does this all tell us, caveats notwithstanding? Money plainly doesn’t buy you happiness, at least as a nation. The best performers perhaps have simpler lifestyles, and a strong faith-based spirituality. I am sure that Elizabeth Gilbert, author of the excellent “Eat, Pray, Love” would not be surprised to find Indonesia and India at the top, and might attribute it in part to simplicity and spirituality.

While absolute economic development is not an indicator, some sense of progress perhaps is. Life for the leaders probably feels more blessed than a generation before. Turkey is plainly going forwards, and its results improved more than any other nation. Even Australia and the US might benefit from a sense of national youth. In Europe, by contrast, we are often led to believe that our best days are behind us. Perhaps distant former glories afflict the Chinese and Japanese as well?

What about dignity and justice? I argued before that these were stronger drivers of wellbeing than freedom or wealth. This theory is supported by Russia’s lowly position. In the case of Saudi Arabia, there may be multiple forces at work. There is also a case to say that material goodies only start to make us unhappy when we lack them but our neighbours don’t. That is one reason that, unless we are as enlightened as Liz Gilbert, we probably wouldn’t all make ourselves happier by moving to Indonesia.

All in all, the survey is fascinating and makes me beg for more. Surveys are so cheap to administer nowadays – why can’t this one cover 100 countries, with ten times as many people asked ten times as often? We might start to learn more about what truly makes people happy, and be able to do something about it, individually and collectively.

I think it would work. In the part of Shell I worked in, we started a regular staff survey, and used it to track things which were otherwise hard to measure. Questions like: “Does your division value for money for clients?”, or “Is X an innovative company?” are excellent for surveys, since trends in employee perceptions are probably the most reliable (and earliest) indicators of important business drivers. I was always fascinated by the results, and astonished at how consistently they anticipated real change. The work of Reichheld and Bain using customer and employee surveys to measure net promoter score uses a similar method, and I find it one of the most powerful tools available to companies.

Looking at why companies don’t do these things more often offers a clue why governments don’t either. At the time we used these internal surveys, my division was blessed with an enlightened leader. Even so, he was quite sensitive about the questions used, and not always objective in applying the results. His management team hated the surveys, seeing them as a threat. His bosses listened politely and allowed us to use survey scores to influence our self- assessment, but showed no appetite to copy us.

This was all about politics. How many leaders really want to display the truth? How many want to put their bonus in the hands of something so fickle as a survey?

It is the same with politicians, which is why I am cynical whether anything good will come from Cameron in the end. But, in the end, technology will defeat them. Online surveys already proliferate, and will become more pervasive, just like social media. It is not just Putin and Assad who in the long term will truly have to look their people in their eye.

I hope by that stage the Indonesians will still be as happy. But that is the great paradox of development. They probably won’t be, because that same technology might have taught them to value what they lack as well as what they have.