Simplify your Life: Mind De-Cluttering Tips

I think we have all been there. Looking at our desk at home, at work, at our personal space anywhere and thinking “Do I really need all this? It is getting a bit cluttered here…” Then looking at our diary and to do list and wondering: “What should I prioritize? What`s the most efficient way of tackling this?”

A life uncluttered by most of the things we fill our life with - tasks or things, would leave more space for what really matters. Many of us know that feeling of tidiness and control that comes after a good clean-up or declutter session, being it for physical spaces or situations. Decluttering spaces and parts of our life is a good exercise for body and mind.

"A life that isn’t constant busy-ness and rushing, but leaves time for thinking, creating, finding new successful paths for your business and for your private life, connecting with people we love or simply admire" is probably the aim of many of us.

Decluttering your diary, your home and work space does lead to a less cluttered mind. Many of the distractions and commitments we have pull on us in more ways than we realize. I will post what I have learnt and I am experiencing with regards to “physical decluttering” in my next blog post. 

For this week`s post, I have a question in mind:

How do I become more effective and avoid mind and life clutter?

I have attended a few interesting workshops on efficiency, focus and brain power in the past few years. I have been asked several times at work and in my private life how I manage to "squeeze" several key activities in a work day while dedicating time to nurturing and creating business relationships. 

I do not manage to be successful on the above every day of course. But when I do it is often because of a few key suggestions I have picked up along the way and made mine.

A few key principles I have found very useful have been mentioned by different speakers and similarly expressed by Stephen Covey, American educator, author and businessman, in his most popular book, “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People”. 

The “habits” or principles I like to keep in mind daily are the following:

• Habit 2: Begin with the end in mind. It means to begin each day, task, or project with a clear vision of your desired direction and destination.
• Habit 3: Put first things first
• Habit 4: Seek first to understand, then to be understood
• Habit 6: Synergize. This is the habit of “creative cooperation”. It is teamwork, open-mindedness, and the adventure of finding new solutions to old problems.

From Mind De-Cluttering to Focus and Productivity

How can I clean up and declutter my mind from too many commitments and activities? Again I have found very interesting what I have learnt in past workshops on focus, efficiency and time management.                

• Online distractions. There are a lot of amazing things we can do and find online. Learning from inspiring people, keeping up-to-date with the world news, keeping in touch with friends and family, but also wasting hours on social media, TV, games. As usual, we are in the driver`s seat of our lives so some self control and detached judgment of how we are using our time can help a lot. 
• Time for what is important and over-committing. One concept that has often lately come up for me is the rocks, pebbles and sand metaphor. If you put sand into a cup of water first, and then the pebbles and the rocks, you won’t get everything in.  But if you put the rocks in first, and then the pebbles and, lastly, the sand – the smaller items will fill in the gaps and you will be able to do all of them.  The same goes in life – start with the big priorities and then do the medium and then the smaller items. We have to make time for what’s important to us: time with our kids, time with our friends, partner, time for creating, time for exercise. The rest should be pushed aside to make time. It’s easy to fill up our lives because there are so many things that many do which sound amazing, holidays, sports, get-togethers, projects, etc. And they are often amazing experiences indeed, but by adding so many things to our lives, we are subtracting space. Often I get carried away and would love to do so much more, then remind myself of the rocks metaphor and try and stay “centered” on mine and my family`s priorities and choices, at least for some time. 
• It’s tempting to fill in every little minute of the day with productivity or distractions. Don’t. Leave some emptiness here and there: it turns out it is also a great different way of being productive.
• We often overemphasize productivity. Focus, priorities and effectiveness are more important. So is a nice walk home to reorganize thoughts. Even if catching that bus would have saved you 10 minutes. Do not always rush. It took me years to learn this, but I am getting there.
• Our attention and focus are our most valuable possession. Let`s give it as a gift to the people we love most and to the work that matters most. Distractions and downtime are also a good part of life, for me, they represent the sand of the quoted metaphor.

How many times have we written our to-do list for the day…and then got to the end of the day without having been able to cross off the list half of our to-do`s?

Leaving aside structured working days full of meetings, conversations, work lunches, phone calls, and so on, there are days in which we envisage full focus and productivity to get to the bottom of our to do lists. Then the end of the day comes and that list has probably even got longer.

Planning in detail our “less-structured” days can be a great habit, but not always is synonymous of daily productivity I have found. Why? Because there are too many variables in our days, new urgent priorities, a full inbox, a sick child, a traffic jam, a previous decision that impacts in the wrong way on our day, activities that end up being more time consuming than we had planned. So mostly, if we experience the above we end up our day with a feeling of frustration.

One trick that I have learnt for myself and that on most of my “unstructured” days works, is the “2 hours plan”. Two solid hours or two slots of an hour each during the day set apart for that to do list. Plan for these two hours and block them in your diary, ideally in the first part of the day. Plan also for some extra 30 minutes at the end of the day if you think you might need a backup plan. During these two hours try and respect every (realistic) activity you have planned, no room for distractions, emails, phone, procrastination, etc.

So what activities should be done in that time?

• Important but non urgent activities. Once done you will be able to spend time on the different “fire drills” of your day without feeling you still have all those important to do`s to cross off your list and enjoy that welcome and familiar “sense of control” for the rest of the day. 
• Long and complex activities (see rocks, pebbles, sand metaphor)
• Core activites, ie, all the main activities of your job. If you are working mostly on a project, leave all the admin aside and focus part of the two hours slot on this project.

I won`t lie, it is not easy to stick to any of these and be always disciplined, but it helps a lot to have all this in mind on the one hand, and to let things go every once in a while on the other hand. 

We are fully immersed in too often busy and imperfect lives, but we can learn (a lot) and keep becoming daily better and happier versions of ourselves.

M.

Source: S.Covey, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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.

Needed: Culture change!

Increasingly in the past few months, there has been a lot of rumour about the roles of working mothers (as in paid work) and fathers:  politicians, employers,  society, doctors, families themselves, all have an opinion on the topic of women choosing (or wishing to have the freedom to choose) to work while raising a family, and possibly even progressing in their career while doing it.

Now, as a working mother I think I can speak for many of us when I say that managing family and work is a daily difficult balancing act. It is just challenging to squeeze your working day down to the nursery/nanny/schoolhours, to maximize every hour, to have endless to do lists for work, home and everything in between and last but not least, to make everyone happy, including yourself. Of course there are practical things you can do to help you through the week, housekeepers and the likes do help but at the end of the day no one can replace any of your roles as parent, spouse and professional.

On the work front, often the above challenges are matched with employers who have very little understanding of the well being as a whole of the individual and who have yet to understand that for all employees of all ranks there is no one-fits-all format for their personal success, development and for their productivity. A happy individual, who also thanks to his/her employer is able to achieve a good work-life balance, will be way more committed and successful in his/her job than an employee who suffers from lack of empathy and little understanding or flexibility. A very good example is given by the latest flexible policies wanted by Richard Branson for his companies. And latest in time the announcement of Vodafone of last week.

On the society front, there are also things that could help. Longer nursery and school opening hours, being able to share parental leave with your partner, enabling fathers to work flexibly without stigma, subsidizing childcare costs, allowing for longer/better paid maternity leaves and removing the equation motherhood plus  flexible working  equals end of a woman`scareer. This has been the case for too long now and I believe that the time for women to speak up has come. 

By promoting and implementing flexible working models , measuring performance not by the hours but by results and allowing families to make free choices when it comes to childcare and career, we can enable and retain in their jobs  many talented women and men, who will be, in different ways, able to fulfil their potential and to have a more balanced life, this in turn will increase productivity and decrease sick leave absences at work and have a positive economical impact on our society.

What`s not to like about it?          

M.

I am a rocket scientist AND a mother

A few months agoI was lucky enough to be invited to the annual Tages Anzeiger event `Frauen – neue Leader, neue Arbeitswelt`.

The topics discussed were extremely interesting and so were the contributions of many of the speakers invited.  One of the speakers in particular gave the most meaningful speech, and her words still resonate with me.

Prof. Dr. Kathrin Altwegg, from the University of Bern, is a rocket scientist.  That day she stood up on stage and told us proudly how she was the mother of three, two (grown up now) children, and one special child: Rosina as she called her. Rosetta is an ESA spacecraft, and it was launched on 2 March 2004 on a rocket, its aim was to reach a comet on 6 August 2014, becoming the first spacecraft to orbit a comet. Prof. Altwegg was responsible for the launch and the `mother` of the spacecraft.

In 2004 she was also the mother of two young children who went to school and came home for lunch. She needed flexibility and time for her children, all three of them. So she asked for that, in the form of a part time work arrangement, she asked to be able to work every day from 8 to 12, with the same responsibilities, and to be able to be home with her kids in the afternoon. The industry said no to her request. The boss of her boss said no. But her boss said yes. Thanks to him, Prof. Altwegg was able to retain her team and responsibilities, manage her family, and to be in charge of the launch of Rosetta. She also proudly told us that her best ideas were conceived when she was not working. When her mind was not fully under pressure. When she could count on a good life balance.

So why do we think that a 12-16-18 hours work day should be the norm to better perform? Why so many working mothers are asked to choose career versus family? How much are our careers really in our hands and how much in the hands of our line managers? Are part time or flexible workers really performing less just because they spend less physical time in the office?  Should they deserve less than traditional full time colleagues? It does not seem the case.

Here is an interesting TED talk (in German) by Prof. Altwegg.

Let`s make our voices heard and let`s not be afraid to ask. Prof. Altwegg docet.

M.

Double-career couples

Next to my job I have now for nearly three years worked with the women business network of my company, where together with a colleague,  while both heavily pregnant, we created a subgroup to this internal network, called moms@work. Under this hat we have run themed events (see post on the last event) and created an internal blog (latest post). A few months ago we were approached by an amazing young colleague who shares with us our passion for making the equation work-life balance work: for all and especially, for us parents. I would love to share here her post on her master thesis about work life balance for double-career couples and her thoughts. Thank you S.P. for your contribution!

`First, full disclosure: I’m not a mum. Still, I find the work-life balance topic extremely important and some years ago, while writing my master’s thesis, I did a great deal of research on the topic.

I still remember the pleasant conversations (passionate talks!) I had with the people I interviewed. At the time, I realized work-life balance is a hot topic for many of us and I’m now going to share with you a little bit more about what came out of my empirical study.

Double career couples are a reality in our modern society, which often suffers from a lack of time due to the extra work and responsibilities, now a normal part of modern life. In the last decades, many factors have affected the nature of today’s families and the needs of workers, who must be highly organized and manage their life both at work and with the family and still be effective everywhere.

The work-life balance is a challenge and requires a kind of personal adjustment of life's roles, which finally allows having a similar positive engagement in both work and private life. Three factors are generally considered in the assessment of the balance: time, commitment and satisfaction.

The presence of young children seems to be the most critical aspect to manage.

The work-life balance appears to be a common problem for women, who often suffer from a sense of guilt about the children if they cannot take care of them full-time. The cooperation of the spouse in the household and with the family responsibilities has emerged as essential in double career couples where both partners are busy on many levels and perform different roles. Mutual help and a meticulous organization are the key success factors in the management of the multiple challenges.

Long working hours, a poor working environment, domestic responsibilities and work obligations are considered to be the major sources of conflict and bring about the feeling of lack of time, pressures between roles, and incompatible roles behaviours. The effects are felt at different levels, such as health, family relationships, and work context.  The conflict for these couples assumes a bidirectional perspective, even if work still seems to have a major influence on the family.

For double-career couples, the major difficulty is time management and therefor the most desired solutions are flexibility in work schedules or a part-time job. Depending on the type of the job, flex time is not always possible, but generally companies seem to be open to allowing employees to arrange their schedules to better accommodate their family duties. A part-time job is still considered almost only by women and high responsibility positions often do not accept a participation less than 100% (it seems incompatible; but is it really the case?).

Not all employment sectors offer the same benefits, so women and men with maternity or family situations should investigate about the company policy (maternity and paternity leave and the possibility to extend it) during the application process, including the availability of childcare.

In the interest of employees, but also employers, these balance practices are in place to ensure the proper functioning of the system by enhancing the effectiveness of satisfied workers.

Have you found your balance?`

We look forward to hearing your experiences!

M. & S.P.

Next World's Fair: Expo 2015, Milan

So what is an Expo? What can we expect from the next World Exhibition? A little bit of history first. On November 23, 2010, the event was officially announced by the International Exhibitions Bureau (BIE). The BIE General Assembly in Paris decided in favour of the Milanese candidature on March 31, 2008. The Expo Committee later chose that the event will be held under the theme Feeding the planet, energy for life.

Expo 2015 is the next scheduled Universal Exposition after Expo 2012, and will be hosted by Milan, Italy, between 1 May and 31 October 2015. This will be the second time Milan hosts the exposition, the first being the Milan International of 1906.

`The Expo will explore the theme "Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life" and is expected to attract over 20 million visitors to its 1.1 million square meters of exhibition area. Over the six-month period, Milan will become a global showcase where more than 140 participating countries will show the best of their technology that offers a concrete answer to a vital need: being able to guarantee healthy, safe and sufficient food for everyone, while respecting the Planet and its equilibrium.` Read more here. 

As I am planning to visit the Expo with my family, I tried to understand whether this is an event that children can also enjoy and learn from. Turns out the organizers did plan in great detail on this too, here is what I have found:

Expo & Children: TheChildren`s Park

The Children’s Park is designed as a forest, housing eight installations, each inspired by the theme. Sabina Cantarelli has curated the Children`s Park project and creation.

Sabina, can you give us three reasons to visit?

Three main reasons to visit the park are the setting, the games and the interaction. Firstly, Expo Milano 2015 aims to offer children a place where they can learn and have fun at the same time. Secondly, the Children’s Park is packed full of games and activities to get children actively involved. Lastly, it provides a wonderful opportunity to develop relationships through the installations, where they are encouraged to interact with others.

What is your vision of the future?

The concept of the Children’s Park is that only through the knowledge of others and the environment and by working together can we solve some of the major challenges that the planet is facing. It’s a powerful message delivered in a powerful setting. (Content by expo2015.org)

Milan – Zurich with SBB:  Milan is only 280 km away from Zurich and from 2017 SBB and Trenitalia will launch the new fast train that will cover that distance in 2 hours. Until then, direct trains run daily every two hours from Zurich HB and will get you to Stazione Centrale in just under 4 hours. A quick cab ride will take you to the city center. Here more details to plan your trip. 

Expo Prices: Two adults one child, open ticket 69 €, one adult open ticket 32€.

Most sought after pavilions: Rumour has it that a few pavilions, with their exhibitions and events, will be a once in a life time must attend: United Arab Emirates, China, Italy, France, Malaysia, Mexico, Monaco, UK, Switzerland, Czech Republic.

What to do in Milan:

Over the years many friends and colleagues have asked me what to do and where to go while visiting Milan. Here is a quick snapshot of what I would recommend doing in my home town (yes, including the shopping!). 

And here an interesting article (in Italian) with a list if 10 `secret` beauties in the city. 

Enjoy and don`t forget to share your experience!

Milano in pillole

Over the years many friends and colleagues have asked me what to do and where to go while visiting Milan. Here is a quick snapshot of what I would recommend doing in my hometown.

Hotels and flats in Milan:

I suggest to stay close to the Duomo - the Cathedral area (via Dante, Duomo, Cairoli, S.Babila, Sempione), it's the main central pedestrian area and every other central area you want to get to is close either with trams or metro or with a short cab ride. For hotels and short flat rentals, www.airbnb.com and booking.com are the best bets.

If you are up for a treat, I can recommend the Magna pars suites, Hotel Château Monfort or Armani hotel.

Shopping in Milan

For a good shopping centre I suggest "La Rinascente" (think Selfridges in London) it’s by Duomo, at the end of via Dante. This is also a shopping area, there are many high street chains and high-end boutiques around Galleria Vittorio Emanuele and San Babila. Don`t forget to go for a quick walk in Via Montenapoleone (THE shopping street :), think New Bond street in London, so the likes of Gucci, Armani, Ralph Lauren, and so on will be all there.

Other shopping areas are Corso Vercelli, where you will find shoe makers that have hand-made tailored leather shoes for over 100 years - many politicians and show business crowds can be seen shopping nearby, and Corso Magenta, a less historical but interesting area where to go for an afternoon shopping stroll.

As for outlets, there is a big one an hour drive from Milan, it’s called Serravalle outlet, if you like high end outlets, you will totally enjoy this Italian brands-packed one! :)

The Area of Sant’ Ambrogio is quite nice for a stroll and so is Navigli (the Canal area designed by Leonardo da Vinci , packed with little cute bars) and Brera, quite posh artistic area with many good restaurants, bars and tons of interesting artsy shops.

Pinacoteca di Brera is also a very nice art gallery. The other must-visit in Milan belongs to Leonardo da Vinci, the Last Supper (L'ultima cena), to visit this you will need to book online months before ...the queue can be painfully long.

Also don`t miss a quick hike up the Duomo (or cheat and get the elevator!) for breathtaking views and the Torre Branca, the high tower in the middle of Parco Sempione.

Drinks and Food in Milan

Milano is quite famous for its “aperitivo”, a Milanese version of the happy hour, that means that it’s plenty of fashion bars and lounge bars that offer mouth watering buffets, very good quality food mostly, free if you have drinks. Here are my favourite ones:

In the area of Corso Sempione, Arco della Pace area- 'my area' ;-) 

• Living  (best for aperitivo, especially if you can sit outside facing the park and the arch, and don`t miss the Sauvignon Blanc Specogna from Friuli, our favourite!)
• Deseo  (great for Sunday morning brunch)
• Milano (via Procaccini, 37, nice aperitivo big bar if the weather lets you down this is a good place) 
• Bar Bianco (in the middle of the park Sempione, open only in summer)
• 10 Corso Como (very nice bar for a quick drink while you are around the shops, Corso Como 10 is also a famous shop itself)

Don`t forget to go for an evening stroll to the Navigli area and choose a nice bar that inspires you.

Public transport can be pretty efficient and famous are the historic trans of Milan, don’t miss a chance to ride them. Taxis are the other obvious choice to move around, remember to memorise the cab number or code you are given on the phone. The companies I use are 0039 026969, 0039 02 8585 or 0039 024040. 

As for food, a few restaurants I can highly recommend:

• Salsamenteria Verdiana
• Papermoon
• La Torre di Pisa
• Pane e Acqua
• Shambala
• 4cento
• La Taverna dei Golosi
• Osteria Cavallini
• Officina 12
• Da Giacomo Arengario (breathtaking views of the Duomo)
• Cracco
• Savini

Don’t forget to check out the Brera area too, there are so many cute restaurants there. If you are around the Duomo area at lunchtime be adventurous and try a “panzerotto di Luini”. Luini started off as a bakery and now makes the best panzerotto (small calzone) in town, people queue there every day of the week.

For sushi in Milan try Nu, Trussardi or Finger.

If you are looking for a family friendly restaurant I suggest Pollicino but generally, except the very posh places, most restaurants will be happy to have children and offer children menus and highchairs, especially for lunch or early dinners. Just let them know before you reserve.

In general, for any tips on family friendly places in Milan, and activities, have a look on mumadvisor.

Are you into theater, operas, ballet? Then don`t miss a night at Teatro alla Scala, a world-renowned opera house right behind the Duomo. 

Last but not least, if you are visiting between May and October 2015, don`t miss out on Expo 2015, the next world`s fair!

Divertiti!  

Navigating Work and Life with Ambassador LeVine

On the 7th of January I had the honour to welcome the United States Ambassador to Switzerland and Liechtenstein, Suzi LeVine as a guest speaker to one of the internal company events I help organizing (one more hobby for me :)

I had the pleasure to meet her a few months ago at an external conference and was impressed by her frank, thought-provoking and extremely interesting experience as a working mother and at times a stay at home mum. 

We had the chance to discuss a few hot topics related to parenthood and career when we first met and I realized she would make an excellent inspirational speaker.

One key point that was covered during the event and I wish to highlight is the role that parenthood should have in our careers. Parenthood - and the skills coming from it, empathy, problem solving, efficiency, you name it - should be considered as career enhancer as opposed to an obstacle.

Amb Suzi LeVine is very active on social media, after the event shared her impressions her blog: 

"Navigating Work & Life - a discussion w/UBS Moms@Work"

On Wednesday, I had the incredible honor of being invited to present to and have a conversation with the UBS Moms@Work group – an affinity group started by 2 amazing women – Manuela Andaloro and Ladina Jenal – who, while pregnant, wanted to have a more focused conversation around navigating work and life.  They invited me to share my own journey, experiences, struggles, and learnings.  What was extra special was that I was able to also bring my husband, Eric, to participate in the discussion. Since I’ve been an Ambassador – he has really stepped up to be the primary one focusing on our kids and our household (in addition to having his own business!) so his perspective was really valuable.

Within the event, I was able to share some perspectives on self-defining success (you can see a version of my presentation here) and then did a sit down question session with Mara Harvey – the executive sponsor for UBS Moms @ Work.  After that, we opened it up to the very attentive audience.

I felt that the conversation was fascinating, engaging, and thought-provoking.  I was moved by the candor, compassion, and motivation of the women and men who attended. Several of the questions have really been rolling around in my mind – but one, in particular, really struck me:

One of the attendees asked me to share thoughts on how to deal with those times when parenting impacts working hours – especially if those around you might not understand that impact.  This grew into a discussion on how to set boundaries, manage your manager, and to set expectation among those around you in terms of your availability.  It then evolved into a conversation on setting priorities.  A bunch of us got into the action on answering that one.  My husband joined in, Mara had some great comments, and then other members of the audience chimed in with their wisdom.

Net net – the thoughts were:

• YOU are the one who trains those around you and sets your boundaries of availability.  If you respond to emails at all hours, accept meeting requests outside of business hours, and such – then people will expect to be able to reach you/leverage your skills at those times.  IF – instead – you share that “I am very available during these times/days and will give you my very best during those times, but otherwise – unless there’s an emergency – I am not available and am really focused on my family/activity” – and then stick to that commitment.  Then those around you will know when they can/can’t reach you.  Personally – the approach that I try (although I’m still working on this one) has been to get home at a reasonable hour from work, spend quality time with the kids, and then do a bit more work before finishing for the day.
• Rocks, pebbles, sand: Mara shared this concept with the group that I thought was so beautiful (I have since looked it up online and found that it is a well-known metaphor.  The funny thing is – I’ve been living it, but just didn’t know the phrase).  She shared this experience from earlier in her career:

Something urgent came up at work – so the manager held a meeting at 7pm to address it.  At that evening meeting, when they went to schedule the follow-up meeting, he suggested 7pm the next night so as not to affect the next business day.  She suggested that, if it’s so urgent, then it should be prioritized into the regular working day.  The manager hadn’t even considered that, but appreciated the feedback.

The answer continued with a focus on how to prioritize – and that’s when Mara shared the metaphor.  If you put sand into a cup of water first, and then the pebbles and the rocks, you won’t get everything in.  But if you put the rocks in first, and then the pebbles and, lastly, the sand – the smaller items will fill in the gaps and you will be able to do all of them.  The same goes in life – start with the big priorities and then do the medium and then the smaller items.

• Multi-tasking is a special skill that parents develop as a survival technique.  As a parent – we look at creative ways to multi-task and leverage our time.  For example – in my former job at Microsoft, I would stack up my conference calls on Fridays so that, in the afternoon, I could bake bread for our Friday evenings while doing the conference calls.  OR – if someone needed to meet with me and it didn’t require I wear a suit, I’d ask them to bring their sneakers and do a walk with me while we discussed whatever it was we needed to discuss.

And that was just 1 of the questions that came up!

It is clear that there’s a real dialogue and progress happening – within UBS – AND also in the greater Swiss working world – for women who have children to choose whether or not to work for pay (I recognize that being a Mom can be, in and of itself, work – so I try to avoid the term “working mom” as I feel that’s redundant).

From my own experience in the United States I know that, even from my first pregnancy in 2002, conditions in the United States have improved greatly to enable that choice.  As someone who has made both choices – to go back to paid employment and then, separately, to stay home with my kids, It will be exciting to see what we can continue to learn from each other and do together over the coming years!`

M.