Genuine Curiosity

Author Dwayne Melancon is always on the lookout for new things to learn. An ecclectic collection of postings on personal productivity, travel, good books, gadgets, leadership & management, and many other things.

 

Connectors

This is one of those days when I can't help but think that everything happens for a reason.

One of the high points of my last visit to the UK was catching up with Adrian Trenholm, who I met through Rosa Say and her (our?) Ho‘ohana community.  Rosa is a "maven" in the truest spirit of "Tipping Point" and she has a habit of connecting people like me and Adrian.  And Adrian brought along his friend James from Redmonk,  who's an analyst in the industry I work in, and we delighted in sparring over a few bottles of nice wine.  Loved it.

As I listened to Keith Ferrazzi's "Never Eat Alone" on the drive home last night, I couldn't help but think how influential the "connectors" of the world have been on my life, and how I would like to develop my skills in this area.  One of the blocks I have to being a better connector is that I am naturally introverted, which means I gravitate toward analytical, internal thought more than outward communication and collaboration.

As I pondered how I could become more like the extroverts I admire, I stumbled across Steve Pavlina's excellent post on "How To Go From Introvert To Extrovert."  Wow - that was cool.

In my "everything happens for a reason", it feels like I'm being nudged toward changing my habits to act more like a connector.  Thanks, mavens.

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See the picture... BANG!

Last week, I returned from a week or so in the UK - I've been recovering and spending time with the family, hence the slow posting.  It was quite a busy week business-wise, but we managed to squeeze in a bit of fun.

As you may have noticed, from previous posts, I try to find patterns and models in life and see how and where I can apply them.  Since you often find what you're looking for, it's no surprise that I found a pattern within one of these activities.

One Saturday we engaged in clay pigeon shooting at the E.J. Churchill Shooting Ground.  My colleague Chris Morgan arranged the day and we were accompanied by a couple of business friends.

This was my first time shooting moving targets, and I learned a lot.  I had a great coach named Fred who helped me tremendously. 

In the beginning, Fred drilled me on the proper way to hold the gun for this type of shooting, and had me practice tracking across the shooting ground.Me_n_fred

In the next part of the lesson, I held the gun and Fred guided it along the path with the target, and said "Bang" in my ear when he wanted me to pull the trigger.  We did that several times for each target type and he instructed me to "See the picture" of what it looks like when the target is ready to be shot.  The hardest part of this instruction was for me to relax and let him guide the gun - when I tried to fight his guidance, I invariably missed.

Then, Fred turned me loose and had me move the gun and fire on my own.  When I "saw the picture" I pulled the trigger and began hitting my targets.

At the end of the 2-hour session, I'd hit 65% of my targets and had shot better than any of my 3 more experienced companions.

The lessons I took away from this:

  • It's easier to succeed if you can visualize what success looks like
  • It's easier to see what success looks like if you have a good coach to help you see it
  • You have to be willing to accept help, even when it feels uncomfortable
  • Technique and concentration can win out over experience
  • Listen to your coach

In short - listen to your mentors, visualize success, see the picture...BANG!

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LifeHack: Knowing whether you've got good airline seats

Gadget alert:  I use a web site called "Seat Guru" to see how good or bad my airline seats are before I fly.  As part of the itinerary I get from my travel agent, I can see what type of plane I'll be flying on, then I can look up my seat and see if it's a "problem seat" or not.

For example, later this week I'm flying to London on United Airlines.  I'm waiting for an upgrade to Business Class but since that's never guaranteed, I want to make sure my Coach seat is OK.  I fire up SeatGuru.com, select United Airlines from the navigation menu, select the Boeing 777-200 from the list, and I see a seat map of the plane.

SeatGuru color codes the seats.  The green ones are the ones you want, the red ones are the ones you don't, the yellow ones are the ones to watch out for. Hover over the seat on the diagram and you'll see a popup that tells you why it's colored that way.

On this next flight, my seat is 22H - not colored at all, so it's a "normal" Economy Plus seat.  Tomorrow, I'll call and see if I can get moved to a green one...

Oh - and did I mention SeatGuru is free?  Very sweet.

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