Kate Marshall

Columnist

Kate Marshall

Coach Speaker, Author, Facilitator

Regrets –I’ve Had a Few

I’ve recently been revisiting the work of Daniel Pink. His 2009 TED Talk on motivation was pivotal to the development of my work on leadership and the “how” of bringing people with you. His research asserted that the “if you do this task, then you get that reward” style of motivation really only works when that task is easy, routine and doesn’t involve innovative or independent thinking. Where you have more complex problems that require creativity and innovation, the real drivers of motivation are autonomy, mastery and purpose.

Autonomy. I heard a saying a few years ago: “adults hate being told what to do even more than children do”. It’s so true! I’m reminded of this so often while looking after my two-year-old granddaughter. Often when I try to help, her little voice asserts, “no, I do it”. We like to feel we have choices about how to direct our behaviour ourselves. The leader’s job is to create the environment where people are given direction, supported where needed but allowed to work out the “how”.

Mastery. Last edition I talked about the challenge of attracting and keeping great staff. Having a development plan and investing in your people will go a long way in keeping talented people in your team. A key role of a leader is to create other leaders, help others improve and demonstrate that you care that they do.

Purpose. As human beings we have a need to connect what we do to a greater purpose than just hitting a target or number. Help your people find their work purposeful and watch them and your organisation thrive.

Daniel Pink’s newest book, The Power of Regret: How Looking Backward Moves Us Forward, is worth a read. He believes the power of regret can shift us to live a better life. He researched thousands of people and categorises those many thousands of regrets into four core areas. 1. Foundation regrets: Typically these are things related to money (not saving enough), health (not exercising consistently or eating healthily) or not working hard enough (at work or school). 2. Boldness regrets: This is where people played safe: “I wish I had the courage to… ask someone on a date… speak up… start my own business”. As you may expect, his overall conclusion on this is what people most regret was not that they didn’t have the opportunity, but that they played safe. They didn’t take the chance.

3. Moral regrets: This was about doing the right thing. People held onto regrets from many years ago – times in their lives (even as children) when they stole sweets from a local corner shop, bullying or infidelity. I believe the majority of us are hard wired with an inner moral compass and when we are presented with choices, we should go inside and listen to that moral compass and have the courage to act on it. 4. Connection regrets: These were all about people. Regret over losing touch, not saying how much you care, hurtful comments, and sadly these regrets were often around parent and child relationships.

Once again Daniel Pink’s work has aligned with work that I passionately believe matters. We created a retreatstyle workshop called “What if: making bold decisions for a better life”.

The seed for this programme came from my colleague Ingrid who was working with a client who was stuck on a very important decision. The client kept saying “but what if… it doesn’t work… they walk away… it fails… I fail”. Ingrid gently encouraged the client to realise that they needed to make a decision, to step out of the fear, to stop the “what ifs” from turning into “if onlys”.

During the research for this programme, I came across the work of Bronnie Ware, an Australian palliative care nurse working with people of all ages in the final stages of their lives. She wrote a book called The Top Five Regrets of the Dying. These regrets are very much aligned with Pink’s work.

• “I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.” • “I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.” • “I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.” • “I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.” • “I wish that I had let myself be happier.”

My life’s work and indeed my purpose is to positively impact the lives of those I come in contact with. I work to encourage them to have the courage to step out of the fog of indecisive “what ifs” into the uncomfortable unknown. Like Pink, I have regrets, but I hope I’ve used them to forge a better path for myself and the leaders I work with by courageously walking out my purpose, with a few regrets that have shaped my choices for the better.