In teams as in chorus: singing with joy even when we make mistakes
«N’ayez pas peur de vous tromper, soyez à fond, prenez du plaisir… même si on se trompe l’important c’est d’être à fond ! Le public pardonne aux gens sympas, pas à ceux qui restent là paralysés sur scène.» ‘Don’t be afraid of making mistakes, give it all you’ve got, have fun… even if you make […]
Unlocking Regeneration: when reconnecting to the context provides a key to work through an impasse
Last week I led a large international group of about fifty people, speaking different languages, all belonging to the same organisation but at different hierarchical levels, in a profound reflection on collective identity. The objective, which started from a need to regenerate meaning and belonging, was to experience a moment of reconnection together in order […]
Walking with systems: learning curve 2 – Grande Traversée des Alpes part I – 2022
On the strength of this first solo experience, I’m setting myself a new challenge: crossing the Alps from north to south. I plan to walk the GR5 from Lake Geneva to the Mediterranean ten days a year for three years. I’ve learnt a lot from the previous year: a short first stage with little climbing, […]
Walking with systems: learning experience 1
The most brilliant concepts can be very simple and yet difficult to assimilate. That’s how I felt when I discovered the systems approach and the work of Donnella Meadows. Powerful but complex. It took me a long time and a lot of miles to understand. Every summer since 2021, I’ve gone walking alone in the […]
The ‘left-wing manager syndrome’ or the denial of management
‘The worst bosses are the leftist bosses,’ said Arthur Brault-Moreau’s father. After a very difficult experience as a parliamentary assistant, he conducted a detailed investigation into what he calls ‘left-wing’ management. His book, ‘Le syndrome du patron de gauche, manuel d’anti-management’, tries to explain how apparently evolved bosses can practise toxic management for their subordinates. […]
Discerning in order to make a better choice
Today I had lunch with a friend, a company director, who complained that he had no choice but to accept a price cut imposed by one of his biggest customers. This will force him to outsource part of his business to low-cost countries. This is completely contrary to his values and to what he wants […]
What being Purpose-led really means
Over the past few years – and we should all be grateful for it! – there has been an ever stronger emphasis on becoming a Purpose-led organisation, and for leaders in those organisations to lead with/from purpose. Purpose: the new key to unlocking organisational performance? The rationale is simple: if you are clear […]
The link between risk aversion and the inner critic: self-sabotage in transformative decisions
Emma is an executive in a multinational company. She is 40 years old and her career path is built on a continuous series of successes, brilliant results, a very fast progression, until she was promoted to her last position, as marketing director of one of the company’s business units, a few months ago, crowning a […]
From I to We: enabling a group to clarify its collective intention
If you’ve read other of our blog posts, you’ll have picked up by now that here, at Nexus, we use the U process to design pretty much all of our interventions. So I’m not going to go into details about the process itself; my purpose here is to describe a methodology I’ve been using at […]
Decision-making process : Nexus’ iterative model
Decision-making is not an instantaneous event, something that occurs only at the actual moment that the decision is being made. Rather, it sits within a process that includes the build-up to the decision, the decision itself, and then the impact of the decision itself. That process can be extremely quick (minutes, or even seconds), or […]
