First published 1 March 2019 on Your Best Year Starts Here with Nigel Risner.
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The monkey hadn't started the clock, so this one began with a false start. The monkey being Nigel. It's the last of our zoo week, and after the elephants last time we're onto dolphins.
Everyone wants to swim with dolphins. Nigel says they're lovely until you let them down. They live in pods and look after everyone else first. They're the ones bringing in rich tea biscuits (fair trade, obviously) and cake for the office, or coming in early to get the heating going. They find it really hard to say no, so they end up helping everyone and their own work slips. Lions have no trouble saying no. Monkeys say yes and then don't do it.
I brought up the oxygen mask thing, putting your own on first. Nigel took it further. He's worked with lots of dentists and opticians, and the mum with an appointment will make sure the kid gets seen first.
Then the warning. Dolphins trust easily, but mess them about two or three times and they turn into sharks. They start circling and it's very hard to get the trust back. And they don't forget. Nigel says they'll swim 60 or 70 miles and know the route exactly.
His idea of a perfect zoo is lions picking up some compassion from the dolphins, dolphins getting a bit more single-minded, and the monkeys borrowing some structure from the elephants. We finished with the free PDF of his book, It's a Zoo Around Here, through bestyearstartshere.com. I said what a job he'd done this week. Being a monkey, he clapped himself.
My notes from this one
- The quiet ones who always say yes are often the most overloaded. Notice them.
- Dolphins need to put their own oxygen mask on first.
- Let a dolphin down two or three times and you've got a shark. The trust is very hard to win back.
- Think about who in your team you get on with and who you clash with. Opposites attract, and they can drive you mad.
Try running a company without dolphins, and you'll die within minutes.
Nigel Risner
You will find that opposites attract, but opposites can drive you mad.
Nigel Risner
