New Leeson Life

I stumbled across this article in Harvard Business Review this morning  FINALLY! I thought, someone (other than Patrick Lencioni) is talking about trust as a precursor to just about every element of business success. And then I read on, and I pulled a face a bit like this... I mean, I applaud the research (even though it falls everso slightly into the category of “socio/psychological research into the stuff most of us know deep down to be true anyway”). It basically says that organisations with a high level of trust in their culture perform better. Simple right? Logical, non? After all Mr Lencioni has been telling us this for decades. Now the scientists agree. Excellent. Except... What the scientists basically measured was Ocytocin levels. And Ocytocin is the neurochemical of trust, true. But it’s also the neurochemical of connection, love, attachment and (whisper it) the stuff that courses through your veins after really good sex. We need more oxytocin in ...

This is the transcript of a talk I gave to Northampton School For Girls on International Women's Day. It was a 30 minute talk, so for that reason is longer than my usual posts! Before I began I asked each of them to write down the positive things that made them unique. Their core values, strengths, abilities, personality traits. (I also talked a bit about the business I work for. Because this is a personal blog I've taken that part out.) So. What am I going to talk to you about?  I was going to talk to you about International Women’s Day. I was going to talk about how today should have been my birthday, which would have made my feminist mother proud, except I came two days early instead. I could have talked about how that was a good metaphor for my impatience and the ways in which we can unwittingly confound our parents’ expectations. I was going to talk to you about all the things that my mother’s generation achieved for women, and all the things we still need t...