I live in a bizarro world.

I deliver strategic workshops to Executives using frameworks and tools I taught first year students at University over ten years ago. I work through my own systems and frameworks with junior, middle, and senior managers of all descriptions. It is the same stuff, but the context, language, and lens delivered through is tweaked for these various audiences.

Why would they listen to me?

Because I am their boss...? Because of the school I went to...? Because I am well groomed and have nice shoes...? Because I am charismatic?

What does a CFO of an education facility, a COO of a childcare business, a Sales Manager at a national utilities company, and a Manufacturing Department Head at an auto-motor company all have in common?

In the mid-naughties, I found myself somehow working as a floor manager in a high-end-big-box Salon Spa for Aveda (the American natural ingredients salon brand) in Covent Garden, London. It housed over 80 staff from more than 20 countries spanning three floors offering spa, salon, and education services. It was (and still is) a global centre of excellence.

It struck me in a workshop I was a participant in late last year.

As a presenter, I was going deeper into the importance of message, clarity of message, and finding ways to articulate this better in my speaking work. I filled notebooks with thinking, discussed my ideas one to one with colleagues, talked it out with instructors and practiced in front of the group. It was difficult, awkward, embarrassing and draining. But, then it popped.

It is contagious.

One person acts in a significant way. Another listens, joins and follows. Then another walks past and thinks, 'whats going on over there?' They check it out and get wrapped up in the vibe. Then before you know it a crowd forms and a movement has begun.

It is weird how the biggest contest in world cricket is the Ashes - a series played between Australia and England. This means if you are born in Jamaica or South Africa or India you will never play in this event. The Ashes simply represents history, and a deep rivalry more meaningful than a sporting contest the whole world of cricket pays attention to.

Julia Gutman is a young Australian artist. So young that last year she was the youngest ever Archibald Prize winner. Gutman creates collages from people's clothes. She says a person's clothes represents them and even the smell and feel can be the closest thing to representing a person. The clothes become her paint as she rips, sows, double-stitches and embroiders the textiles to make a work of art.

In my workshops I always strive to make people feel comfortable, relaxed, and familiar with the people around them. I run a few exercises to get people up and about talking with each other to warm them up before tackling the heavier content of any session.

Over recent years I have become an early riser. Up at five or five-thirty AM, a little exercise, breakfast and into work. A couple of weeks ago, I was eating my usual over-night oats as a part of my morning routine and my phone rang without me seeing it - a friend. 'Not to worry, I'll call them back later'. Then, a few whatsApp messages came through. Then, my phone lit up.

My little cousin, Nicola, is twenty-five and got back from a round-the-world trip late last year. We saw her on the weekend and it turns out she has got the bug and is planning try her hand at living and working in London for the next few years.

I went to the bank the other day. I had an appointment, yet I had to wait 20 minutes for someone to tell me there was no one around to see me. As I took a few deep breathes to deal with the anger rising inside, I noticed a message on the wall in large font:

Our Values

Integrity Collaboration Accountability Respect Excellence

If you have read Angela Duckworth's Grit, The Power of Passion and Perseverance, you would be familiar with her research around the idea of the grittiest kids being the most successful.

I didn't realise what I had done.

I walked off the course, cross-checked and signed my scorecard with my playing partner and asked, "right, who's got time for a beer?"

Its the weekend after the 'first day at school'.

We're in Sydney and decide to extend our stay to visit friends. They're youngest had survived his first day at school and they were gearing up for 'the first full week'…

Extinction is such a harsh word. According to the Oxford Dictionary it means: The irreversible condition of a species or other group of organisms of having no living representatives in the wild, which follows the death of the last surviving individual of that species or group.

I always loved the saying from Bill Shankly, the legendary Liverpool Football Club Manager in the 1950's and 60's, "Some people believe football is a matter of life and death. I am very disappointed with that attitude. I can assure you it is much, much more important than that.”

Know what side your bread is buttered on. Don't bite the hand that feeds you. There's no such thing as a free lunch. If they told you to jump off a bridge, would you?

It has been a year of 'snap back'. Back into offices, back to the grind, and back to 'growth-at-all-costs' as everyone scrambles to make up lost ground from two or so years of pain. Economies have been under pressure, job markets are gradually shifting away from the Great Resignation and flux is being felt in the 'hybrid era' of working.

The 90's for me was all about grunge music, basketball, baggy shorts and trousers, and long hair. For us school kids at the time it was also an era of trying, or should I say anti-trying.