No Box Summer Camp

I'll bet you don't see a photo like this around your place of work much. This is what ignoring the box looks like.

During the week of July 21, the Amputee Coalition of America (ACA) held their summer youth camp at the Joy Outdoor Education Center, just north of Cincinnati. The campers were kids aged 10 – 16, who have been missing limbs since birth or because of cancer, accidents, or even gunshot wounds.

Besides the traditional camping activities, they had the opportunity to participate in a ropes course, a series of challenging activities, connected together by wires and ropes, A typical activity might be inching across a balance beam, or walking a shaky tightrope with a very loose rope as the only handhold. As tame as these may sound, they suddenly become much more challenging, if not terrifying, when they are 25 or so feet in the air. We have worked with countless adult groups who have to muster up some real courage to participate.

So here we have kids, some who are frightened by height and all who are missing a limb or two, doing the high ropes course.

Now wait a darn minute. A high ropes
course is hard enough for people with arms and hands and legs. This can’t be done by kids with amputations! But it can. And it was. Try this one on for size. One 13 year old got about half way through an activity, when – gasp – his artificial leg fell off, landing 30 feet below. With a No Box spirit, he matter-of-factly responded, "I’ll finish without the leg."

Adults who are stuck in a box can produce some truly whiny excuses to avoid a challenge like this. I don’t have enough upper body strength, my legs are too short, I am too overweight, blah, blah, blah. Think about the excuses some of these kids could have come up with. "Uh, I am wearing a leg prosthesis” or “I am missing a couple of arms.” But they didn’t.

Hooray for everyone, especially these kids, who prove that limits imposed by the box of conventional thinking can indeed be ignored. Don't let the box keep you from being great.

Learn more about ACA www.amputee-coalition.org or Camp Joy www.joec.org

To enjoy some video: http://www.local12.com/mediacenter/local.aspx?videoid=31120@video.wkrc.com

Steve

Unusual Interview

I recently came across this lead-in from an article on The Ledger.com.

When Andrew Morton interviewed to work at Comtrend, a high-tech equipment manufacturer, he didn't bring a resume. He brought a business plan.

The article went on to explain quite a bit about Morton, Comtrend and the direction they are headed (yes, he got the job). But it was the statement above that caught my eye.

Doesn’t conventional wisdom specify that you have a resume handy for an interview? But ignoring the box, Morton brought a business plan instead. Do you think that might have made him at least a bit more distinctive, from other candidates who might have been seeking the same position? Even if Morton was not exactly correct in his plan, what message did it send to Comtrend about his interest, willingness to prepare, and ability to apply some real thinking toward important business issues?

This reminds me of one of the problems in many organizations today. Too many managers at virtually every level, spend too much time preparing status or activity reports, and little or no time doing some real thinking about the direction or strategies the business should take. The status report is like the resume – “here is what I have already done.” Reviewing current status is important, but so is deep thinking about the future. So with all the focus on current activity, who is doing the strategic thinking work?

If you want to make yourself distinctive, try viewing your piece of the business as if you are the owner. Learn about it, think deeply about it, and do the hard work of figuring out how to best differentiate your organization’s value and capabilities in the external marketplace. Don’t settle for simply reviewing yesterday’s work. Develop and willingly offer your "business plan" of growth possibilities and strategies. It will benefit your business, and clearly shine the light internally on your own value and capabilities as well.