Family Treasures.

I am one of those lucky people who have had the blessing of enjoying their grandparents well into their thirties, and hopefully until later on still. 

Having grandparents around has formed many of my opinions and stances in life, has given me a different take on history, sacrifices, resilience and family relationships. Their wisdom, beliefs, sometimes a bit outdated but so real, their hard work, their memories.

Their hands. Hands that used to make their own food, wine, olive oil, tomato sauce, made their own clothes, built and repaired everything, from watches to cars to their own houses. Hands that to this day help my own children picking cherry tomatoes from their plants. Stories of home births, friendships, respect, family bonds, lands, money, passions, shootings, war cutting through their own memories.

The stories of my great grandma, grandmother of my mother, who woke up every morning at 5am and walked up and down hills, whose long grey hair were tied up in a perfect bun every morning, whose piercing blue eyes had seen and lived through so much. Those same blue eyes that a hundred and thirteen years later came back in my second son. Her husband had fought in the first and second world war, twice came back, last time deaf, his hearing lost to the deafening noise of flying airplanes. I had the luxury to hold her hands until I was twenty one. I have very clear memories of hot summer visits to her house, I used to open the door, call her name while running up the stairs, then sit with her, or help her make bread, her bed, water her plants. She always had money for her grandchildren, so we could buy ice cream, more like fifty ice creams truth be told. Jumping around her when she went to pick up her own salad in her field and let me go with her, the simple acts can be the greatest source of happiness for children. Her rabbits, feeding them with her gave me one of the happiest memories I still nurse. She was so calm and still, I loved being around her. Her name was Venera, that too I loved.

The downside of having great grandparents is of course seeing them going. The last summer she was with us I sat there with her holding her tired hands, she was 98, still independent and doing well, she was afraid she told me, she knew she had to go. 

I have never been able to see them and enjoy them as much as I would have wanted due to distances, I remember crying loud as a child at the end of every summer when the time came to say goodbye. We did everything possible to see them often and they came to visit often, but to me, it never felt enough. 

Clear memories of my grandfather on my father`s side come back too. He had so many stories of his youth, so much passion for his family and was so keen for us all cousins, children of his six children, to play together and stay together, keep in touch through life, he built something close to a family residence in order for us to be able to see each other as often as possible, mostly in the summer, gave houses to all his six children, land to all and gifted his family with land too out of fraternity and generosity. He raised his children with his wife with the strongest love and fraternity bonds that to this day I have ever witnessed in siblings. I remember my grandma's happiness and how she laughed when she put my baby brother in my old father's walker, it was an ancient model with no seat and my brother's chubby wobbly legs scrambled. He was not happy, she picked him up, laughed more, conforted him. I watched her being happy. I used to walk with her in her backyard, we picked berries, she showed me plants. I remember her smile and her insuline syringes. Sadly I was six when she went, too soon. The legacy behind however lives on. The four brothers and one sister of my father would do anything for each other. Their parents gave always the highest importance to family bonds. Grandpa was so in love with his wife, until well after she was gone, over ten years later, he spoke about how beautiful she was and how much he loved her. It was an early lesson of what I wished for in my own relationship. He had deep respect for his friends and his closest friend, the Count of his town, until the last year he lived he insisted on visiting the only daughter of his long gone friend, who by then was in her late 60ies and had no children, living mostly in London and returning to the family lands only once a year. He was there to visit her as he had promised his friend, her father, he would be there for her. 

At five years old I remember insisting on cutting a biscuit with a knife, for some reason I got away with trying and ended up slicing my finger. I remember to this day the warm touch of my grandma who held my bandaged finger till I fell asleep. Mums have no time for that, as a mum now, I know that well. But grandparents do. They infuse that patience and calm and love in children that no one else can match. The patience and care of my grandpa taking me to his lands to pick nuts and figs as a child, my little tantrums and their smiles. The little hand-made baskets I was given, the simple soothing things they would do for their grandchildren.

I feel sad in a way that due to the fact that many of us are having children later in life a whole generation will somehow miss out on being a young grandparent and the next generation will miss out on the invaluable treasure grandparents can be. Yes, we live longer, but no one is getting younger.

All of the above was possible thanks to the fact that my grandma married her ten years older husband at seventeen and had a baby, my mum, almost immediately, my own mother had me at twenty-five, and then off I went and only sat at thirty-two years old, seven months pregnant, in a birth class of first time mums where I was the youngest woman. 

The downside of my invaluable memories with my grandparents is seeing them aging and having had to say good bye once I had got to know them well. Seeing them dealing with the brutally miserable aging process. Losing their strength, losing some of their memories. A part of you goes, at the same time they live in you, but they are no longer there and every time the memory comes back, it stings.

Over the past few years I have done what I could to bridge distances. I have two grandparents left, and I treasure them. I have been flying my grandma over to visit us twice a year, visited whenever I could, face-timed, with my brother we massaged their tired shoulders, played cards, sat with them, asked them of their past. To bridge distances and my own guilt for not being closer this year I bought massage devices and sent massage therapists. Spent sleepless nights going through pictures of the past 90 years, together with my mother, to prepare the album of his entire life for my grandpa's 90th birthday. Fearing I would not make it as his health started to deteriorate 5 weeks before his big birthday. Some of his memories are gone. I was holding his hand on Easter Monday, relieved that despite the last few tough weeks he is doing better. His mind still works and memories are there but some are faltering. He recognises me, but asked me where do I live now. "Ah, I have a granddaughter who lived in England and now lives in Switzerland, works for a big company, my wife knows everything about her". Grandpa who is she I ask? Is it me you are talking about? "Ohhh yes of course it is you!". Somehow the memory doesn't overlap with the person at all times. Our minds are incredible places. Class 1927, he was the first boy in his town to complete higher education, helped me with mathematics homework during my long summer holidays, had a precise engineering job, could calculate faster than anyone I knew. Now memories are unclear. I pray he will recover most of his health but time is ticking and I cherish my own memories, grateful of the gems I have been given, wishing for my children and for the next generation to learn the same love and respect for our family treasures, for our past, for History.

M. 

Pressure and productivity

I am constantly amazed when I go into meetings and am the only person taking notes, and then converting these into actions on to-do lists. It’s how I get things done. If you don’t write things down, you will have forgotten them before you leave the room. We could never have achieved a tenth of what we’ve achieved without systematic lists and actions. R.Branson

These days on most days, I have two recurring words in mind to describe how I feel. Happy. Exhausted. Some evenings once the kids are in bed, the priority items on to do lists are ticked off, the house looks decent and everything is ready for the next day, we sit there and wonder how on earth were we able to achieve and get so much done in one day. Normally this feeling lasts 3 minutes, because some memory, normally from the working day, will hit and we will immediately think “Gosh I have so much work to do!”

 Only now, some memories of my childhood come back. I recall my mother in the evenings after work while my brother and I were still running around or demanding something, often saying “It never ends, days should have 48 hours”. I hear you now, mum, I do. Even with house help and childcare, even with our families often sharing the load, days are loaded and at the end of the day we are left with zero energy.

At the same time, we have never had more enthusiasm for all the projects we are running, at work and in our private life, energy to play like kids with our children, interest for more, better and new things. And, we realize every day, we have never in our life been more productive. If in the past I needed a week to recover from a nasty flu, in the past three years, since becoming a parent, I have had to learn to recover in no time and normally while looking after a demanding little person. We have learnt to cope with little sleep which means we have learnt to make a 10 minutes break a real battery charger.

There are pros and cons about life under pressure for sure, but one big advantage is productivity.

I have learnt, and many like me who are living the same adventure on the same lane, to maximize every minute of my day. I have long moved away from “Outlook slots”, not every meeting needs to take one hour or activity needs to last multiple of 15 minutes. At work I often set up meetings of 45 minutes if I can choose. I use any 10-15 minutes commute to listen to podcasts about topics I want to hear about. I have a list of people, TED talks, blogs, sites and online papers that I run through every day and plan for the week what to read or listen to.

Over Easter while in Germany my mother-in-law asked how I have been doing and how I am coping with the current pace and load, given I seem “relaxed” (perhaps she meant “aged”...?? I said I think am actually fairly relaxed indeed…and thinking back I probably can give three reasons for that, the children are a daily exercise for improving patience and prioritizing, I have now for 4 years practiced regularly shiatsu and meditation (and I cannot recommend both enough) and last year I had a big reality check when one of my closest childhood friends suddenly died of cancer at 35, leaving her husband and 18 months old behind.  Of course I also have days when I would like to climb the Himalaya or any hill nearby and just sit there in peace and silence…

While I plan, have multiple to do lists, use pockets of time to check items off or to relax. I also block hours, half days or days sometimes where I block the world out and exist only for family, or for myself, trying to keep it flexible when possible as I have learnt the hard way that viruses from nursery school have not yet heard of my to do lists…

About to do lists.

“Writer Kevin Kruse recently claimed that to-do lists are a ‘waste of time’. He suggested that they make people more stressed, and only 41 per cent of items on to-do lists are completed.

The crucial part of a to-do list is in the name – you need to actually DO the things on your list. The act of writing your tasks and thoughts down is useful in and of itself, as it helps to organise your thoughts and give you focus. However, if you then ignore your own advice and don’t follow up, the lists will lose most of their power. Quite often you will only do 50 per cent of things on to-do lists because, on reflection, only 50 per cent are worth doing. But by putting things on lists it will help clarify what’s worth doing and what’s worth dropping.” Read more about to do lists in this post. 

What is your experience for a balanced life? When have you been at your most productive? What has helped to make you a better person and to live well with yourself?

M.

Second to none

I had been living in Switzerland for about a week when I first heard the gut-wrenching term “secondo”.  Technically it refers to the children of the immigrants who moved to Switzerland in the 50ies and 60ies, who even if born here are not Swiss but “secondos”, ie, second generation immigrants.

Unlike in the US and in many countries in Europe, no “foreigner” who is born here is Swiss, they will be able to apply for passport and citizenship once they are 18, just like any foreigner who moves here later in life and can apply for citizenship after 12 years.  That means you have people in their 50ies who have lived here their whole life, native speakers, people who have nowhere else to call home, who actually are not Swiss citizens nor passport holders.  Some do have a passport. Many don`t and many refuse to get one because they disagree with the system. I have seen this only too often.

In practice, this term implies somehow “second best”. As if we are sitting in the center of the world here. So we have the “Swiss-Swiss” and the non Swiss, secondos, immigrants, expats & co.

Last time I had heard of a similar two-class society it was in secondary school on my history book when a certain movement born in Germany in the 30ies started to refer to a part of the “original” population as “Aryan race”. We know how far that concept went.

An episode of last week is a clear example of the status quo. We are planning the refurbishment of our house and have been talking to a few builders. One in particular, who introduces himself as a “secondo”, Italian origin - although when talking to him I have to suppress the urge to correct him - is worth mentioning.  At the end of the meeting for some reason we mention that one of my cousins is a great architect. She lives and works in Italy, is a university professor, has a master degree and various post university degrees, works for beautiful projects around the globe. His reaction: “oh, I have been looking for a secretary; you can tell her if she is interested.”

So perhaps I am wrong but is he thinking that because she is A- Italian (happily) living and having a very successful career in Italy as an architect and B – a woman, she would be interested in a job as the secretary of a builder in Switzerland (who with all due respect has never seen a university classroom)? Never mind that she is the actual expert. Incredible how some secondos bring wrong concepts forward.

Probably no need to comment further on this one.

There are hundreds of studies that show how key is for companies to have a diverse workforce, not just in terms of nationality, religion and the likes, but also in terms of diversity of thought, experience and mindset. Indicators point to clear economic benefits and better environment for companies that score high on the diversity front.

If this is true for companies, I am fairly sure it applies to societies and families too.

Let us do ourselves a favour and drop this daunting and nerve-wrecking “secondo” term.

I will tell my children that the fact that they live and breathe three cultures and are native speakers in three languages is a big asset, not a liability. They are Europeans, they are world citizens, they have an international family and background, they were born here because they come from educated parents who could have lived anywhere in the world and chose to live here mostly for logistics reasons after having travelled the world and lived in different countries. I will tell my kids to think hard before ever judging people based on the place of birth and on stereotypes.

I will tell them to travel the world, to live abroad, to ask and challenge the status quo, to ask why, always. To fear, if anything, ignorance, to fight prejudice and dangerous stereotypes.   

I will tell my kids to check out people's brains, not nationalities, places of birth or skin colour. 

M.

Don't expect to see a change if you don't make one

Increasingly we have seen media coverage on initiatives celebrating the strength of women, the resilience of mothers, the importance of time off for fathers and the importance of a healthy life balance to better perform, and to achieve an "integrated" work life equation. 

At last! We have come a long way from the previous generation, from the previous decade and actually, from 18 months ago, come to think of it. 2015 has been a very important year for topics related to diversity, gender equality and health versus productivity.

In 2015 HBR's ranking of CEOs has for the first time considered how companies score not only on the hard numbers, but also on "soft" facts (ESG performance) "In the past, our ranking was based exclusively on hard stock market numbers. We looked at total shareholder return, as well as the change in each company’s market capitalization. We liked the fact that the ranking was based solidly on data and not on reputation or anecdote. Yet it also felt incomplete, because it failed to account for the many aspects of leadership that go beyond mere market performance. And so this year we’ve tweaked things. We’ve added to the mix a measurement of each company’s environmental, social, and governance (ESG) performance."

We have seen many financial institutions jumping into the growing trend of socially responsible investing and best of all State Street launching a diversity gender balanced fund , which will track an index comprising companies that do a great job at advancing women through gender diversity on their boards of directors and in management in general. We have seen extensive research that shows that companies with gender-diverse leadership tend to outperform long-term companies that don’t so I am surprised these funds are only starting to emerge.

Bloomberg has set up a new team of journalists and analysts covering the topic diversity.

The ex Norway Prime Minister was interviewed and asked about the reasons behind the success of her country (beyond the obvious oil related wealth) as in the 80s Norway was nowhere close to where it is now, its economy weak and common people barely able to afford decent living. "Success comes from the fact that you see fathers pushing strollers at 3 pm on a working day" she said. "What has changed in these 30 years are family politics and work culture. Retaining talented women in the workforce, giving family benefits and allowing fathers to be fathers and workers without stigma. Shorter working days and flexible working, which results into creative and flexible thinking".

There is McKinsey research on how and why "Women matter" and the latest Mercer report "When women thrive businesses thrive" being presented at the WEF last week and discussed by the CEOs of Cisco, eBay, Marriot and the president of UBS Wealth Management, Jürg Zeltner: "One other thing we all found common ground on was retaining talented women. They leave the workforce after you’ve invested and trained them as many find that workplaces are not family-friendly. Our challenge is to keep them and make the workplace flexible and supportive of their needs and priorities."

So there is all the progress being made just cited above, the daily strong commitment of many of us to raise awareness on the challenges women face and to bring positive change in the world. All of it is still probably only a drop in the ocean but change is happening out there.

Out there.

Then there is me, and I know that like me many other women and working mothers at times have a similar behaviour.

Rewind of two weeks, Monday 11 January, 6am. My husband and I are getting ready for work, kids still – thankfully – asleep. My phone rings. Terror (not quite, but close...). Our current Monday babysitter's little child is sick so she won't be able to come today. And it is of course no problem, it happens. However, a well known feeling that I merrily refer to as "the cold –spine" starts taking over. We quickly and frantically go through our blackberries, our plan in these cases is to take half day off each to look after whichever child is at home, aim is to cancel the half day which would result in the lower damage for the rest of the week. We decide that I stay at home in the morning with our 9 months old baby, dialling in for a couple of meetings, and my husband stays at home in the afternoon, also dialling in when he needs. I let my boss know, who very nicely and empathically confirms it is no problem at all (she has been there too). I tell my colleagues and team. On we go with the plan. At 11 am my baby is happily playing on his mat babbling away while I dial in for an internal meeting. I dial in and immediately go on mute. I barely comment and step in only quickly for fear that someone might hear my baby gurgling cheerfully in the background. Why did I do that? Even if anyone heard the baby chuckle, so what? They all knew where I was and why. I am not that junior or young any more or shy or lacking self confidence. So why did I try and hide the fact that as a working mum this too can be part of my life and it is really no big deal, in fact, hat off really for pushing through and balancing it all??!

Fast-forward to 4pm. The above nearly forgotten and not even yet properly processed. I have now been in the office for a couple of hours and my husband at home for 2 hours and taken as well a (video) call. I call him asking how the afternoon is going. "Oh great actually! Baby M. was sitting on my lap during my call, they loved him and he behaved really well."

No need to comment, I think these two episodes speak for themselves. Perhaps I will add that I am proud of how my husband handled the situation and a little less proud of how I did not stand up to my ideals.

So here is my lesson learnt and a better version of myself has come out of it.

Change, real change, starts from us and from how we expect the world to view us. We all have a lot more responsibility and impact on driving change than we often think.

M.

Childcare and the privilege of pressure

This time it was all planned. This time we were going to have everything organized and taken care of.

This second time my return to work post maternity leave was going to be smooth. Considering we were about to start new jobs, it had to be. We had it all sorted. It took 10 months to plan. It lasted one day.

In Switzerland maternity leave allowance is normally three months. Yes a “generous” three months. In my company the allowance available is exceptionally up to six months. The average EU mother has and takes 12 months leave, considering countries like Germany where parental leave is up to 3 years, although most mothers take 10-12 months, countries like Italy and the UK where it`s normally 1 year and countries like Spain where it`s around 6 months.  And considering countries which are 100 years ahead like the Nordics where parental leave can be shared, fathers can take 3 months off without stigma, flexible working is a reality and not a career killer and results are not based on face time, childcare is available, high level and affordable for everyone. 

Per se Switzerland´s 3 – 6 months would not even be too extreme if the support network around parents and childcare arrangements were functioning well or in some cases existed at all. If mothers and fathers who decide to invest in their careers had it a tad easier, going back to work a few weeks after birth would be possible without major headaches. In a country where nursery schools are mainly private (unless you fall under a certain income threshold, and only about 10-15% of the population does, in that case you could apply for one of the few subsidized nursery places, well before you plan to get pregnant), where the 0 – 5 care is fully and only up to the parents, it is not a surprise that only 25% of the women return to work after the first child, and less after child number two. 

The childcare bill is on the high end, come June, when our second son will start nursery, we will have a monthly CHF 6000 bill only for two nursery schools, 7.30 to 6pm, and we are not in the most expensive school. No, it is not in line with average salaries, it is well above, this the reason why mothers in the workforce are so scarce in full time or executive roles. The same goes for the majority of the working parents we know, mostly affluent or above, and still. That does not include a possible nanny to help with late work days, sick days, school holidays (12 weeks a year for which you still pay school fees). Nannies cost between 20 and 40 CHF per hour and most importantly it is not easy to find a person to whom you leave for the whole day your children, your house and your car while you are gone. Of course there are some amazing people and professionals out there, and we were blessed until now, but what an adventure to find them?

We are lucky to be able to afford this so that we can both have the choice and continue with our careers. But it is little wonder that a strikingly high number of mothers list costs as reason number one for deciding to take care of their kids themselves and stay at home, in many cases giving up to her aspirations and careers. Reason two and three being the pressure from the employer, from society, and of course from themselves. Yes, society. It was a family doctor in his 40s who told me with a grave voice “Why are you doing this to your family? Can you not just stay at home.” when I asked for vitamins as I was feeling slightly exhausted the first few months after my return, the lack of sleep, the weekly nursery bugs of my first baby and the long work days were tough.

Switzerland is an amazing country and we chose to stay here in Zurich instead of London, Milan, Frankfurt for example, because of the many advantages it offers. But one thing that this country is missing is realizing the potential of the many amazing talents who because of the above we are losing daily. While it is a great country for having a family for example, it is very far from being a good country for working mothers and fathers. Here a good article with stats about this.

After our first son was born, I returned to work after 5 months for 3 days a week for a short period of time, before going back to full time, we had a part-time nursery school and were positive that things would just work out fine. They do for some families, they didn`t for us. This first particular school we had in order to “stay competitive” accepted sick children, in some cases highly infectious children – the normal standard of care states that when visibly sick children should be sent home. This meant that my son hardly ever went to school as he was sick every other day, we paid for the nursery school to keep the place and we paid for a nanny who helped when he was sick to go to the school that weekly made him sick. An interesting loop. Until we cancelled the school and got stung with 3 months "exit fee" anyway although my son had been there 20% of the time while he was still enrolled. So nanny and family stepped in until our little man and his immune system were able to cope with the daily bombardment of nursery school germs.

Aware of the above and of the fact that this time I was going back to work full time, a few months before baby 2 came we started looking for a full time nanny who could take care of him the whole day for the first 14 months of life, until he would start nursery school. We made our choice and our new nanny started a few weeks after our second little boy was born. I was keen to have her with us during my maternity leave so that we could all get used to each other. Things worked, she was doing a very good job, the kids liked her and I felt in good hands. The plan was waterproof, older child in nursery school full time, 5 months baby at home with the nanny and family a few days a month when and if needed.

I went back to work on October 1st. On October 2nd I almost choked on my coffee while reading a text from our nanny, who was off that week as my family was with the kids, who asked if we could meet for coffee the next day.

I just knew. I have to say I totally understand her reasons and there is nothing none of us could have probably done differently. She was about to go back to the corporate world as had been offered a great job by a very good company. What can one say? Is there a prize for worst timing?

What was I supposed to do with my job and my baby? Our place at the nursery school would not be available until June, that was only ...8 months to go. I was now back at work, to a new job too, and had very little time to interview or “try” nannies. Once again one of our blessings, family, and a friend whom I cannot consider anything else than family, came in. But how many parents can rely so quickly on their families really? We will find a new nanny of course, but could timing have been worse? Why do many parents have to cope with and live in a constant house of cards when it comes to childcare?

To make things easier, within the first week of me going back, our then 5 months old baby started to:

- Wake up between 4 and 8 times a night (he had been a superb sleeper since birth and until then)

- Refuse formula (which we had often been given as a little top up and were now trying to increase)

- Demand milk the whole night and refuse it during the day (while I was away)

Only who has been there knows what it means to survive on little, interrupted sleep for months on end and try and perform at work and be on top of your life. It is a type of exhaustion, effort and pressure that cannot be explained. Thankfully, like everything else, you get used to it. Almost.

Everything beyond kids and work becomes secondary unfortunately. A particularly gifted journalist like Carolyn Hax, was  able to explain why parents really have little time and what they can do about it (guess?). Here is a great read.

However, I have now known for some time, while stressful, pressure can be good. In fact, pressure can be a privilege.

One of my favourite entrepreneurs, Mr Branson just wrote an illuminating post:

"The other day someone asked me how I deal with pressure. Without thinking over my response, I said that pressure is a privilege – which really is a great way to think positively and proactively about any challenge. When we are faced with exciting scenarios and situations, dealing with the stress that they bring can lead us to be more alert, alive and attentive. It can help to improve our performance."

"You need to balance high-pressure periods with plenty of time for rest, reflection and recuperation, or else you won’t be able to switch off and get perspective. This is partly why work-life balance and spending time away from the office is so important," he says.

"And remember: When the stakes are higher, the rewards are greater — and the journey is more enjoyable."

M.

#workingparents

I have now been back to work for a month from my second maternity leave.  Well, I have never felt more energised and ready to do, work, be committed, pull pieces together, prioritize and be ready to throw enthusiasm into new and old projects, at home and at work.  

I now have one of those fitness trackers which tells me what my husband and I have known all along. We do not sleep enough, it is probably safe to say that we have not had in the past three years more than 3/4 straight hours of sleep.  And yet somehow we, as spouses, professionals and parents have never been more on top of our life. We have learnt to make friends with stress and exhaustion, find energy, make "miracles" happen, work full days then once home bath, feed the kids, play and put them to bed, maybe work some more or catch up with our private and social life, then carve a pumpkin (or a turnip for our first Räbeliechtli!). What is incredible is that like us, hundreds of colleagues and friends are running the same silent marathon.

Once again questions are asked. "Don't you work too much? Where do you find the time and the energy? Are your kids going to be OK with you not being there most of the day?" Typically these questions are asked to me (a "working mum").  

I will elaborate another time on the answers. What is clear to me is that as parents and as professionals, it is about having the choice, it is about doing in the best possible way whatever it is that we are good at, and it is about feeling satisfied with our lives.

A few weeks ago the genius #manwhohasitall hashtag hit a nerve with his (her?) twitter posts targeting the endless amount of advice given to working mothers "about "how to have it all" with 'all' meaning happy kid, successful careers, great hair, healthy diets, immaculate wardrobes, the perfect beach body, good girlfriends, a supportive husband and a pristine house. But what if we applied the same type of inane language we use when discussing women in the workplace to men?"

http://www.breakingnews.ie/discover/if-we-gave-fathers-the-same-nonsensical-advice-we-give-working-mothers-700862.html

No wonder the pressure is on for many women. Over and over in all the diversity conversations, events, studies I have heard of, the topic "self-confidence in women" has been indicated as one key trait to perform and stay on top of their lives, careers, etc. At some point early in life, we build a reserve for a life of self-confidence. Families, social surroundings and corporate life have a deep effect on the amount left by the time a woman can thrive in business and private life. This 60 million youtube views video from Procter & Gamble goes straight to the point. Enjoy. #likeagirl.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjJQBjWYDTs

M.

Learners and Doers

“Being happy doesn`t mean that everything is perfect. It means that you have decided to look beyond the imperfections” - Gerard Way

Despite what you will be reading in these first few paragraphs, this post has nothing to do with being a parent or raising children, not directly at least. But as mentioned a few times before here, given I find parenthood an educational and formative experience, some of my latest learnings come right from the fact that almost 2.5 years ago I became a mum (while staying everything else :).

As many who prepare for the birth of their first child, during my first pregnancy I invested way too much money and time in all sorts of books, pregnancy books, first months books, books about routines, sleep patterns, feeds, clothes. All sorts of experts, mostly childless, where lined up on my bedside table for months, all ready to share their…opinions, based on their, often little, experience.

Once we came back from the hospital with our little bundle of joy sleeping in his car seat, I realized that none of what I had read for months was based on the two things that in my opinion matter most when you become a parent: gut feelings and research based advice. I am now expecting my second baby and the only `baby` book I have gone back to over and over again in the past months and years is “Brain Rules for Baby” (J. Medina). This is because the whole book offers a wealth of knowledge and research based advice on how to raise happy children while being a happy parent who needs to also very much rely on his/her instincts and experience. The book goes beyond the mere babyhood and childhood years and gives great insights on many different aspects of the so called behavioural sciences.

As someone interested in the topic I researched a little bit beyond the book what could give me more knowledge on the topic, how can the principles of the book be applied to more fields, to different types of people. And mostly…what does behavioural science cover anyway?

I started asking myself the question: if I took a professional course in behavioural sciences, what would I learn and for what reasons, useful to whom, myself, my employer, my family? It turns out there is a huge offer out there when it comes to learning all about this discipline and its latest discoveries.

I ended up “choosing” an “Executive MSc Behavioural Science” at the London School of Economics (LSE). Here is what it offers:

“The Executive MSc Behavioural Science is offered jointly by LSE’s Departments of Social Policy and Management. The programme is delivered in a modular format and aims to provide a suite of high quality integrated courses for individuals seeking to advance their career in behavioural science while continuing to work.

The MSc Behavioural Science executive cohort will have a diverse academic background, such as – but not limited to – economics, geography and environmental studies, management, medicine, philosophy, political science and government, psychology, public policy, social policy, and sociology.

Executive students will have relevant work experience in the public, private or third sector, including businesses, charities, government, local authorities, and international organisations (such as the OECD, the European Commission and the World Health Organisation).

Many organisations now engage with the idea of applying behavioural insights to their organisational challenges. After all, these challenges ultimately require behaviour change of some kind. Further, many companies, charities and public bodies are recognising the power of ‘live testing’; testing their products and policies in real world environments. The motivation for this comes from increasing recognition of the limitations of traditional research methods, like market research and customer insight.”

It sounds promising and fairly impressive, especially given the increasing number of organizations looking into this. Also studies on the topic do seem to be of fairly high importance for pretty much everyone around us.

“Behavioral science is the systematic analysis and investigation of human and animal behaviour through controlled and naturalistic observation, and disciplined scientific experimentation. It attempts to accomplish legitimate, objective conclusions through rigorous formulations and observation. Examples of behavioural sciences include: psychology, psychobiology, criminology and cognitive science.” (Wikipedia)

While I would love to attend different courses and list a few more masters on my CV, I have very little time currently to enroll in any of the many interesting formative offers out there, so books, interviews, podcasts and reaching out to a few experts are the key activities that for now allow me to expand my knowledge and satisfy my curiosity.

Why would more knowledge on behavioural sciences be of interest to me personally? The answer to this allowed me to drill down and select the parts of this discipline that at this point in my life would be more beneficial. In short, behavioural sciences are directly linked to the way we (and our children, families, colleagues, etc) observe and perceive the world and in turn behave, learn and develop. Enough for me to decide it was worth to find out more.   

In the past two years I have read different books and listened to different experts on the topic, here is my current line-up of top three “luminaries” when it comes to this topic:

Dr. Carol S. Dweck, Ph.D., is one of the world's leading researchers in the field of motivation and is the Lewis and Virginia Eaton Professor of Psychology at Stanford University. Her research has focused on why people succeed and how to foster success.

Olivia Fox Cabane, a Harvard, Yale, Stanford, MIT and United Nations lecturer, executive coach to the leadership of Fortune 500 companies. From a base of thorough behavioural science, Cabane extracts the most practical tools for business, giving her clients techniques she originally developed for Harvard and MIT.

Alex Ikonn and UJ Ramdas, the creators of the Five Minute Journal.

I could add many names, books and lectures to this list, but I think the above names and their work sum up the key points I have learnt to carry with me daily.

One of Dr. Carol Dweck`s masterpieces is “Mindset”. I had already read about many experiments on children`s mindsets in Medina`s work, here I found a comprehensive research-based work on how the type of mindset you are born with could influence your life. 

As a young researcher Dweck was obsessed with understanding how people cope with failures, so she decided to study this by watching how students grapple with problems, specifically with easy first, then hard to solve puzzles. She expected the children to cope in different ways with difficulty, but was not prepared for what she saw. Confronted with hard puzzles, some of the children seemed to enjoy and be excited about the challenges they were facing. What was wrong with them? One either can cope with failure or can`t, so were these children onto something? They seemed to love failure! 

These children, many children, and many adults of course too know that human qualities, such as intellectual skills, can be cultivated through effort. And this is what these kids were doing, getting smarter. Dweck, on the other hand, thought that human qualities were carved in stone. Either you were born smart or you were not and if you failed it meant you weren’t.  So what are the consequences of thinking that your intelligence or personality is something you can develop, as opposed to something that is a fixed trait?

Robert Sternberg, the present-day "guru of intelligence", says that the major factor in whether people achieve expertise “is not some fixed prior ability, but purposeful engagement”. Or in other words, it is not always the people who start out the smartest who end up smartest. So what does this mean for us? For over 20 years Dweck`s research has shown that the view you adopt for yourself profoundly affects the way you lead your life. It can determine whether you become the person you want to be and whether you accomplish the things you value. But how can a simple belief have the power to transform your psychology and as a result, your life? We have seen a similar principle in the Placeboeffect, a  cognitive bias. 

Believing that your qualities are carved in stone – the fixed mindset – creates an urgency to prove yourself over and over. Our society values intelligence, personality and character, so you want to have these traits, and you want to have a healthy dose of these. But what if you fail, if you are not always accepted, if you don`t look and sound always as smart as you would like? Frustration kicks in at best.

There is another mindset, based on the belief that your basic qualities are things you can cultivate through your efforts: the growth mindset. People with this mindset believe that a person`s true potential is unknown, that it is impossible to foresee what can be accomplished with years of passion and training. Dweck`s research confirms that the willingness to take some risks and to put extra efforts into projects, to challenge yourself, come directly from the growth mindset, a mindset that can be learnt and achieved. The many self help book out there telling us what the “secrets” of many successful people are, do not give us a reading pattern, they are often scattered points (believe in yourself, enjoy life, etc) but they do make a whole different sense if you think of how (some) of these “successful” people might approach life and with which mindset.

Similarly, “The Charisma Myth: Master the Art of Personal Magnetism” (Olivia Fox Cabane) is another of my all time favourite books. Olivia Fox Cabane is an inspiring source for me for effective, frills free meditation and concentration techniques (a post on this soon, watch this space) and for her theories on charisma.

Can charisma be learnt?

“Charisma can be a huge asset if you're applying for a job, improving your relationships, or leading other people. The Charisma Myth shows you how to become more influential, more persuasive, and more inspiring. Soon you'll be able to move through a room and have people say: 'Wow, who's that?'"

Many believe that charisma is unchangeable, and now we know that this sounds like a fixed mindset approach, you either have it or you don't. But is that really the case?

Far from many of us (and far from me) the wish to move through a room raising constant attention. But from networking events, to gatherings, to meetings, to presentations, to family conversations, we want to come across and express ourselves in the best possible way and to show we can draw the right attention and discuss our reasons with a little influence, we want to have that amount of charisma that seems to work magic for some. This book shows us that this is too a skill we can learn, if of interest to us. We are born to learn.

“The Charisma Myth is a mix of fun stories, sound science, and practical tools. Cabane takes a hard-science approach to a heretofore mystical topic, covering what charisma actually is, how it is learned, what its side effects are, and how to handle them.” 

Finally a little gem I have found very useful over the past few months and that I would like to share with you, the Five Minute Journal.

What is it and why am I mentioning it here?

The Five Minute Journal was created by Alex Ikonn and UJ Ramdas and is based on the most recent researches on behavioural sciences. They designed a type of diary that helps to achieve concentration, have more productive days, and possibly, to feel happier. Before jumping to conclusions, it is suggested to try it out for at least 5 days.

The Five Minute Journal is available in both a paper version and an app (my personal choice). The diary is built on proven principles of positive psychology: priming your brain, cultivating gratitude, having a growth mindset.

Begin the day right: When you start the day on the right note, things automatically start to fall in place. (At least on most days?) 

Cultivate Gratitude: Gratitude is the opposite of depression and anxiety. It's the conscious experience of appreciation of the gifts in our lives and the results are tangible.

Introspection: Ending the day on the right note can be essential to a good night's sleep, eliminating negative thought loops and learning more about yourself.

It’s been proven that shifting your focus to the positives that many life events bring with them can dramatically improve your happiness, or the way you perceive it. The key is consistency. This journal has been created by combining the different elements of what is known as positive psychology: it might not work for you and if it does it might not work daily, but surely it is worth a try?

It is probably not a coincidence that, among many, Tim Ferriss, author of the “4 Hour week” (see post here), is a big supporter of this type of diary.

The key parts of this diary are the following:

1.   What would make today great?

2.   List 3 amazing things that happened today

3.   Weekly Challenges

4.   Gratefulness

5.   Affirmation

6.   How could you have made today better?

Of course not all parts need to be written daily. For “affirmation” I often ask myself, “where do I see myself in 1 year? In 3? In 5?” “What project should I invest time on next?, and so on.

Question nr 6 is particularly important for me: projecting our minds towards self-improvement, especially at the end of the day, is a powerful tool for our brains to elaborate the main facts of the day, visualize them, gain clarity and assess again what could have been done better or just differently. This is no pseudo-science, our brains are wired and obsessed with questions, they need to answer them, it is just a matter of feeding them the right questions and answers.

M.

Sources: “Mindset” by C.Dweck, “The Charisma Myth: Master the Art of Personal Magnetism” by Olivia Fox Cabane, “Five Minute Journal” by Alex Ikonn and UJ Ramdas.

Life stories for inspiration: Dame Stephanie Shirley

This week I am sharing the story of an extraordinary woman via her latest TED talk, Dame Stephanie Shirley. Hers is one of those special personal tales that made history on many levels.

Below some snapshots from her inspiring speech followed by a quick intro and her TED talk. Invest your next 10 minutes here and enjoy!

“In the 60s in England women could not work at the Stock Exchange, fly an airplane, drive a bus or open a bank account without their husbands` permission.”

“Who would have guessed that the programming of the black box of supersonic Concorde was done by a bunch of women from their homes.”

“You can always tell ambitious women by the shape of their heads, they are flat on top for being patted patronizingly.”

“The two secrets of success? Surround yourself with first class people and people you like and choose your partner carefully.”

In the austerity of post-World War II England, jobs were few, and opportunities for women to earn a wage were even fewer. So, on her dining room table, Stephanie Shirley founded the kind of company she'd like to work for -- one that posed challenging, rewarding tasks, built around flexible work rules that made it possible to have a real life. Her software company, Freelance Programmers made her one of the richest women in England (and one of the few to have earned her own money). Initially employing only women -- Shirley often bid for contracts as "Steve" to compete in the male-dominated industry -- the company was eventually valued at $3 billion, while 70 of the staff became millionaires when it floated on the stock market.

http://www.ted.com/speakers/dame_stephanie_steve_shirley

Expat life, culture clash and cognitive biases

I am an Expat. Not that I ever thought about it in these terms when 8 years ago I traded life in Milan for life in London and purchased that one-way ticket. It never occurred to me back then that leaving your country is a much bigger deal than one would think.

It has been an amazing experience and should I go back I would not change a thing, but the effects of moving abroad might impact you and your closest ones for ever. I had no real reason to leave, I had an interesting permanent job in a beautiful city, many great friends I had grown up with, a flat in a lively area and was enjoying life. But well, I wanted more, experience new places and life in another country for a start. The allure and spice of life abroad and the words of an ex boss who had relocated to London with his family years before, did it. During a lunch in a busy restaurant near Trafalgar square, 8 years ago, he asked me "If not now, when?". 6 months later I was boarding my plane.

It is safe to say that, like many, I became an expat (or just a “world citizen” as a friend would put it) by coincidence.

One of the things that surprise you at the beginning of your life abroad is how differently at times people do and perceive things: a different language structure helps to emphasize this too. I put this down to culture and country of origin the first few years, but 8 years and 3 countries later I can say that in my experience often culture and origin have very little to do with behaviours. Of course we all carry  traits that come straight from what we learnt as children and from where we grew up. But how much does that really influence the adult life of many educated, well travelled people? As I did not move abroad to bring my motherland with me, I have been determined to find out more.

Most importantly, as an Italian married to a German (also an ex Londoner), living in Switzerland and raising a trilingual/tri-cultural family, it has been imperative for my own survival and sanity to get to the bottom of things when it comes to personalities, backgrounds and unconscious biases.

I have had different occasions in the past few years that made me think about what makes people say and behave in a certain way. My typical Italian impulsiveness has long gone and has been replaced by a more open, curious attitude (ok, on most days!). I often take a quick step back and think "what made him/her say that?" Background, personality and where people are in life in that moment are some of the components I believe play a big role in people`s responses to life, rather than where they are from (too simple, too stereotyped), and most times, the real reason is one and only:  unconscious and cognitive biases, I am thinking of you!

So what are they, how do we deal with them and above all which ones do you recognize yourself in?

I am no expert but I have done quite a bit of reading recently on the topic; here is what I have found.

Wikipedia defines cognitive biases as “a pattern of deviation in judgment, whereby inferences about other people and situations may be drawn in an illogical fashion. Individuals create their own "subjective  social reality" from their perception of the input. An individual's construction of social reality, not the objective input, may dictate their behaviour in the social world. Thus, cognitive biases may sometimes lead to perceptual distortion, inaccurate judgment, illogical interpretation, or what is broadly called irrationality.”

So in short, cognitive biases represent the way our brain distorts reality. But why do we do it?  Our brains are daily bombarded by hundreds of thousands of sensorial inputs and in order to let warnings emerge (especially danger warnings) from the background noise, it has learnt over millennia to adopt some shortcuts.

Normally these are correct shortcuts which allow us to interpret reality quickly and efficiently, but some of these shortcuts lead us to dead-end roads, wrong conclusions on the world around us: these are called “cognitive biases”.

Here is a list of cognitive biases that we stumble upon more often. 

I have picked the ones I believe are more common. There is nothing we can really do to change them or change our perception either, but as always, acknowledging and being aware of how and why we perceive things in a certain way could make our life a lot easier.  

1. Affect heuristic

Our perception of reality is particularly influenced by what we most desire or what we are going through in that precise moment of our lives. 

This is also very true for the many challenges that expat life presents, we perceive realities in a new country also based on how we are feeling and we are giving more importance to in that moment.  

Once you choose to buy a new car, won`t you start seeing that model everywhere? 

2. Bandwagon bias

Our tendency to develop an idea based not so much on its actual reality but in relation to the number of people who share our same idea.

Or to put it differently, sometimes we like to follow without realizing we are doing it.

Especially as expats we will surround ourselves with people who are similar to us. Not necessarily people from the same country we come from, in fact, often the opposite I have come to realize. By sharing the same opinions we will often only reinforce our beliefs in it. This is where being open to confrontation and to constructive feedback from outside of our “circles” comes in handy. 

3. Confirmation bias

It is in our nature to give more relevance to those pieces of information only that can confirm our initial thesis.

It is apparently very easy to be in denial when it comes to this one bias…

4. Clustering illusion

One of the most powerful weapons our brain has is the capacity to spot "patterns" via which we get to quick conclusions (stereotypes, anyone?)

As expats for example, how many times have we been tempted to link behaviours or attitudes of people to their nationality? 

5. Hyperbolic discounting

The hyperbolic discounting is an attitude, the habit to choose immediate gratification over long term satisfaction.

This attitude is often present in 3 main areas of our lives:

• Food choices
• Savings/investments
• Career 

In an experiment of a few years ago scientists asked a group of people to choose a snack, fruit or chocolate, as their snack of the day and their snack in a week. 

As a future snack, 74% of the people chose the fruit. As the snack of the day 70% chose chocolate. Would they have chosen differently the following week if given the choice again? This shows we tend to overestimate our future abilities but the truth is that it is only by changing today`s attitudes that we can hope to be improved versions of ourselves in the future.

Similar experiments have been carried out by scientists on babies and children, the book “Brain Rules for Baby” (J. Medina) has quite a few interesting examples on this topic.

6. Negativity bias

We basically tend to give more importance to the negative aspects of our lives than to the positive ones.

A quick step back to re-evaluate a negative situation (a fight with your partner, a missed promotion, etc) and to regain perspective could only lead to a better life balance. Yep. Not easy to do on the bad days.

7. Placebo effect

This is one of the most famous cognitive bias and my favourite: it consists of trying to influence an event by convincing yourself that that particular event will at some point happen. I call it positive thinking and it does not sound too negative, does it?

8. Reactance

Simply put, the desire to do the opposite that others would like us to do.

It comes from the will to defend one`s freedom of choice. A suggestion could be to avoid to impose a single choice but to offer a range of options that, obviously, go in the desired direction.

Disclaimer: It applies to many situations in life of course. As the mother of a toddler I classify these biases as `tantrums`.

Yes, adults have them too, they are just called in many different ways…

9. Information bias    

Gathering information. Gathering yet more information. Then feeling absolutely stuck and undecided. This insecurity is caused by the information bias, the belief that the more information we have available, the better our choices will be.

Truth is, often the overload of information does not lead us to efficient solutions that work for us. You are the only one in the driver`s seat of your life.  

10. Galatea effect

This bias goes hand in hand with self-fulfilling prophecies. It occurs when a success (or a failure) of a person is influenced by his or her self-esteem.  

In other words, our successes are often determined by how much we believe in ourselves. Others and/or what we consider foreign cultures to our own have very little to do on this matter.

Conclusions

So which bias did you like best? Does any of these particularly influence your life? And your life as an expat or your opinions about the so called `culture clashes`? Which ones have caused you trouble? 

I have personally identified a few that over the years might have influenced my days and my decisions. I am observing them, recognizing them and learning to “manage” them when possible.

Are you ready to start your weekly “bias count”?!

M.  

Men, fathers, partners: can they have it all?

In the summer of 2013, while organizing an internal event on diversity, I had the privilege to meet one of the founders of Teilzeitmann (part-time for men), Andy Keel.

His project felt new and refreshing and started with a very simple question:  why can`t men make part-time work? Accordingly to research, more than 90% of the part-time requests from the male-work force are turned down. Thankfully times are changing and a few things are moving. Teilzeitkarriere.com for one advertises more than 14.000 flex/part time jobs and has more than 2 million views annually.

Andy stood on stage that day to tell us how it all began, how he had felt the pressure of work commitments clashing against family and life commitments, and how he decided to ask for part time to his company and after that decided to free-lance in his quest to achieve a better life balance, a deeper flexibility that would allow him to take care of his children.  His speech was inspiring and you could see it did touch a nerve for the men and women in the room. Why can`t a father maintain his status and responsibility at work and choose to work a few hours less to spend more time with his children? His advice has stayed with me since that summer, it was simple: whatever you decide to do in life, follow your guts and your passions and if you feel something is not right, do not conform and follow, stand up, speak, ask.

I interviewed again Andy a few weeks ago, while finalizing the "Own the way you live" project.

M. Andy, how did the project `Teilzeitmann` start?

A. I’ve founded Teilzeitmann because part time is not only a female topic… we need to start working as a family team where man and woman – both – are taking the responsibility to earn money and take care of the children at the same time. Teilzeitmann is working with different role models…. In order to show positive examples of how a more balanced division of responsibilities could work.

M.  Do you feel the attitude towards part-time and flexible work has changed in the past few years? Companies seem to have fairly flexible policies in place but the bottleneck they face seems to be on the one hand the final approval of line managers - some seem to be very traditionally attached to a `face time` culture, on the other, the fear of stigmas.

How do you think we can raise awareness on the need for a more flexible approach to work, tailored to the individual?

A. The bottleneck are clearly and without any doubt the middle and top management of companies. …as long as we behave and believe in these old fashioned views on hard working career – full time presence and kind of military behaviour, not much will change. But there are new positive examples out there … flexible working models and empowerment of staff are the two most important topics at the moment and we are contributing to raise awareness on them. 

Read more about Andy`s project and company here. 

Only this week, the press showcased two examples of men, both in leading positions, deciding to `lean out`.

“Earlier this summer, Matt Lauer asked Mary Barra, the CEO of GM, whether she could balance the demands of being a mom and being a CEO. The Atlantic asked similar questions of PepsiCo’s female CEO Indra Nooyi. As a male CEO, I have been asked what kind of car I drive and what type of music I like, but never how I balance the demands of being both a dad and a CEO.

I realized that the only way to balance fatherhood and my job was to step back from the role as head of my company" says Max Schireson, CEO, MONGODB INC. (Full story here).

And again this week: Google CFO retires with a candid memo about work/life balance.

“After nearly seven years as CFO, I will be retiring from Google to spend more time with my family."

“That's how Patrick Pichette, one of Google's highest-ranking executives, led his announcement on Tuesday that he'd be retiring from his role at the company. That line of reasoning has become something of a safe cliché among notable executives leaving their posts. But then Pichette did something unusual: He kept going, offering a candid explanation about the struggles of work/life balance at his level.” (Full story here )

So where do these two announcements leave us? From talks I have had in the past few years with men and women, friends and colleagues from different countries and different industries, parents and non parents, I have sensed the same message: we all want to strike a better life balance, at the same time we do not want our careers to suffer.

Recently the HR head of an international company, during an event on the benefits of flexible working, told his audience that 30 years ago, when he started his job he was told he had been chosen for a successful career, but if he wanted it, in short, he had to forget about his private life and family time, they needed 200% commitment from him. He went for it. “25 years later, my 28 year old  told me he was sorry but he could not cancel those few lined up dinners with friends to join me for dinner: `Why would I, you were never there for us when we asked`. He didn`t mean it probably that way as we have an amazing relationship, but that hurt more than I ever thought it could.”

As Mr. Pichette`s wife put it, "So when is it going to be time? Our time? My time?”  

M.