New Leeson Life

If you work for me, or with me, you will be well versed in my love for a metaphor. Today for example, I pushed a 'welcome to the party' metaphor so far that, by the time I'd finished, the police had been called and people were outside sitting on the kerb feeling sorry for themselves. One of my favourites stems from a Polish saying "Not my Circus; not my monkeys". I love this, not because I like a slopy-shouldered sentiment. Quite the opposite; because the phrase begs the obvious question: "Whose monkeys are they then?". My team will often find themselves grilled by me on monkey ownership. "Who has this monkey?", "Do we have track of all our monkeys?", "Do you each know which are your monkeys?". Monkey ownership. Its a useful concept. One that organisations undergoing change, or that move at pace, or that have fluid structures often struggle with. I've worked in some organisations (usually German) that have monkey own

It was a simple Facebook comment that did it. One minute I was scrolling idly through my mum's page. The next I'm kneeling on the floor sobbing. The comment? "Mimi would have been so proud".  Mimi was what we called my beloved grandmother. (Because she felt that 'Gran' was too old and fuddy duddy, and because she'd got it into her head that Mimi was French for Grandmother and, by the time she'd been gently disabused of the notion, it had stuck. It suited her perfectly.). It'll be a year since she passed away on Tuesday.  The comment, made by one of her dearest friends, was in response to a video of me singing a big band song. It had been posted on Facebook and Instagram by my vocal coach, and shared by my mum. (I'll be 40 in 7 months and my mum is still doing that kind of shizzle - what can you do?). I was sobbing because it was a bittersweet compliment. It was a bittersweet compliment because Mimi never heard me sing. She never heard