Hope is a Strategy

I was reflecting this morning on when I've felt out of place and my answer is most of the time! I don't see it as a bad thing, but there's loads of examples throughout my life, often including having hobbies that didn't seem to go together (or where not many people did both).

- I spent my 30s riding fast motorbikes and competing in dressage
- In the same week, I would go to rock nights at Maximes in Wigan and Renaissance club nights (progressive house and techno)
- I'm really happy to be on stage in front of any number of people and I don't like to be the centre of attention
- My top two Gallup® CliftonStrengths® - Relator® and WOO® - are generally regarded as opposites and don't often appear together
- I'm obsessed with academic research (how we know something to be true) and I believe that people are unique and that they are the expert in them
- I'm commercially focused and with a heart for social justice
- My deep expertise in Hope embraces how we need to be relentlessly positive and lean into the difficulties and realities.

My overall reflection; I sometimes feel like a mass of contradictions, which is very much a superpower and I wouldn't have it any other way!

(Photos of me on a bike on a racetrack and on a horse at a dressage competition)

The book is now available on Kindle and we've made it just 99p (99c in US) on launch day (8th December) to help get the book out there! Hope is the number one thing people say they want from leaders and this book helps leaders to meet that need.

Please consider buying this either for yourself or you can click 'buy as a gift' to buy either one copy or get redemption links for multiple copies (and maybe even share this post). Thank you!

To purchase on kindle: https://mybook.to/HopeIsAStrategy-eb

I often highlight passages from books and share the ones I find helpful but this is a new experience - sharing a highlight from my own book! It might sound like a real flex but every time I re-read it (e.g. as I worked through the copy-edits from the publisher last week), I'm findings things that I already know (because I wrote them!) but I need reminding of. Today it is about the importance of the amazing people I have around me who cheer me on and encourage me. I'm very very grateful for them.

We agree with Napoleon that "A leader is a dealer in hope". Well, they should be even though many get it wrong.

Optimism and Hope are related concepts; The words often get used interchangeably, but that's wrong. They are different things, and Shane Lopez does a great job of differentiating between them.