I Choose To Sing A Different Song

I ran into the excerpt from a new book by former spiritual adviser to President Barack Obama, Joshua DuBois. It quotes lyrics from a song by Nina Simone titled “Feeling Good”;

Birds flying high, you know how I feel

Sun in the sky, you know how I feel

Breeze drifting on by, you know how I feel

It’s a new dawn!

It’s a new day!

It’s a new life for me

And I’m feeling good.

—Nina Simone, “Feeling Good”

DuBois in making his point that no matter what is happening around us, we still have the choice on what to keep our focus on, also quotes Psalm 59 which narrates the Psalmist choices in the midst of crisis:

See how they lie in wait for me!

Fierce men conspire against me

for no offense or sin of mine, Lord. . . .

They return at evening,

snarling like dogs,

and prowl about the city.

They wander about for food

and howl if not satisfied.

I will sing of your strength,

in the morning I will sing of your love;

for you are my fortress,

my refuge in times of trouble.

You are my strength, I sing praise to you;

you, God, are my fortress.

—Psalm 59:3, 14-15, 16-17, (NIV)

Then DuBois concludes that “Nina Simone and David remind us of one unimpeachable fact: whatever situations we face, the lyrics we sing today are completely up to us. We can choose to shout above the din outside our window and sing louder than the ominous noise approaching our lives. We can worship God today. We can love today, even when it’s tough. We can take control of our song, our Psalm”.

What a great word of encouragement from Joshua DuBois. I know that when I am faced with crisis – I resort to my native instincts of how people dislike me for whatever reason. I focus on the negative circumstances instead of looking to the larger work the good Lord is doing my life. The truth is it is up to us not the circumstances. 

Writing about habits of effectiveness, the late Stephen R. Covey said that to live effectively, we must be products of our own decisions not our circumstances. When we allow our circumstances to determine our responses we become reactive to “weather, to someone who has it in for us”.

But when we decide that no matter what happens, we have the power to choose. I need to remind myself of this constantly. Like the psalmist David, I can sing of God’s goodness in the midst of the storm. I can reflect on the grace that enables us to live and deal with life. I can remember that my story is only just unfolding and truly;

“What no eye has seen, nor ear heard,
    nor the heart of man imagined,
what God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Cor 2:9).

In a world of the whirlwind, it is easy to forget that the choice is ours - that the remote control of our lives lies in our hands. It is truly up to us to focus on that which brings peace. So I can dedicate my day to this fact and with help of God, live a life that reflects this undeniable fact.

And as John Steinbeck wrote in “East of Eden”, “And this I believe: that the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world. And this I would fight for: the freedom of the mind to take any direction it wishes, undirected”.

Why We Do What We Do

As we match towards 2014, it is important to remind ourselves about why we do what we do as business. Why do customers continue to rely on our content, delivery capability and follow-up. Why do we continue to get referrals and why do people who attend our workshops give us 9 or 10 in our post workshop assessments.

To be sure, our plan is to run a profitable business, with solid margins and great pipeline of future business. But as I reflect, what keeps Julia Nansubuga  - a 6-7 month pregnant woman running through the parking lot of Uganda Revenue Authority to deliver a proposal ahead of time, is not the profitability of the business or the prospects of future options. And as the ex-Google Uganda employee opined “this is great and I know I am in the right place”.

That “right place” is right because of our mission. As FranklinCovey Executive Vice President, Sean Covey put it in his December memo to owners, “In the end, we do what we do because we care about our mission.  We are a mission driven business, not a business with a mission. Why are we in business?  Because we believe we can help individuals, teams, and organizations achieve their potential through applying universal principles of effectiveness.  This is why I, personally, belong to this organization versus any other, because I believe we have a unique stewardship to fulfill that no other organization on the earth can fulfill.  Our purpose is to unleash human potential and no one knows better how to do this than we do.  We understand the whole person.  We understand that culture (the quality of the relationships that exists within an organization) is the ultimate competitive advantage and eats strategies for breakfast”

And it is the unique stewardship to understand every client through a rigorous process of determining client requirements and collaborating to deliver a solution that exactly meets their needs, that sets us apart. It is this culture that we must work to improve in coming years ahead. We must look to every client engagement driven by our values of excellence, service, compassion and the integrity to deliver on our commitments. While ensuring that the quality of relationships in our side our team is driven by an intent and intense desire to make ourselves better people, our team a model for executing on our highest priorities and enable our customers to achieve.

While customers have told us that we have a 9 or 10 in content, delivery and follow-up, we must look inward to consistently deliver the same numbers for the way we relate as a team. Holding one another accountable and volunteering support where needed. No one has the exclusive reserve to knowledge or performance but as we value our differences, we will live out the principle that says together, we create a better and higher way. Indeed we must work on our relationships and way of doing things – our culture. It is this cultures not our wildly important goals or lead measures that will make the difference. It is our culture that will drive the 9s and 10s.

As Thomas Carlyle put it, “Culture is the process by which a person becomes all that they were created capable of being”.  When we give our best to one another in service to the client and ourselves, we become our best and become what we were ultimately created to be.

On becoming African

It took my family and I almost two hours to get to the airport at Entebbe on Saturday. Traffic crawled along and we thought there was an accident on the way. But we crawled along until we go to Entebbe, no accident, just lost of cars and trucks on the road. We arrived at the entrance and we were told that our favorite airline gate was closed.

We pleaded with airport security and airline representative but we were told that we were late - gate closed an hour ago. So we called our travel agent who insisted that we could still board because aour seats were "available". She said "you be an African and put something in that man's hands". The "that man" was the supposed supervisor. I said "put something in his hands?", "yes!" was the response. So we ended up staying the night in Entebbe for the next flight where we did not have to "put something in that man's hands" and where I did not have to prove the authenticity of my Africaness.

Be an African? it got me thinking about the numerous negative associations with Africa. "This is Africa or TIA" is used to connote all the unthinkable behaviours we put up with. For example, only in Africa will a fake translator find his way to translate for world leaders on a day that we were celebrating the life of the great Nelson Mandela. Only in Africa, will $50 billion go "missing" as alleged in the newswires about the Nigerian National Petroluem Corporation (NNPC). And yes only in Africa will you have to "put something in that man's hands" in order to board a flight with four children to go on holidays after the checking had allegely closed.

But one can get carried away that all of Africa is like this or that some how Africans like mediocrity. The temptation to think that is real but we are reminded by J.S. Mills that the "worth of a state in the long run is the worth of the individuals comprising it". It is the individuals, it is not Africa. Samuel Smiles wrote in 1904 that "National progress is the sum of individual industry, energy and uprightness as national decay is of individual idleness, selffishness and vice". It is not because we have poor national leadership that people decide to take bribes. People make the choice to take bribes as people make the choice to deliver poor customer service or throw empty bottles of water from thier cars.

It will be too easy to blame the greed of one airline supervisor on the continent but the root of this type of behavior is located in the personal decision and choice of that supervisor. To ask for bribes to do your job has nothing to do with Africa. It was an individual choice. So we waited the extra day and took the flight complete with upgrades for my wife and I by another supervisor on duty who noticed that we did not board the previous day. Not to mention the wonderful time we spent with Simon R. from the Center of Creative Leadership (CCL).

And it is this type of simple acts by the second supervisor on the second day that gives hope and reminds us of what Samuel Smiles wrote so many years ago "The greatest results in life are usually attained by simple means and the exercise of ordinary qualities. The common life of every day, with its cares, necessities and duties, affords ample opportunity for acquiring experience of teh best kind; and it is most beaten paths provide the true worker with abundant scope for effort and room for self improvement. The road to human welfarelies along the old highway of steadfast well doing; and they who are most persistent and work in the truest spirit will usually be the most successful".

Merry Christmas!
 

We Can Change

A client of mine asked a question a few days ago, after a few hours of our second requirements gathering session, “what is your success rate, I mean do you have sure fire way to change human beings..”. This client was expressing a feeling most have when it comes to investing in themselves or their staff. “Will I really change?”, “Can old dogs learn new tricks?” others might ask. You at the bottom of these questions are long held beliefs that it is difficult to quantify investments in training, especially in programs or processes that involve change in human behavior.But the good news is that old Dogs can learn new tricks and it takes about 28 days to begin to see evidence that adults have learning new behaviors. 

The process as Samuel Smiles reminds is in forming new ways of doing things and overcoming the old ways that maybe working against us. The quotation now made famous by the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People program, Samuel Smiles says the following:

“Sow a thought, reap an Action
Sow an Action, reap a Habit
Sow a Habit, reap a Character
Sow a Character, reap a Destiny”                  

The process of changing your behavior begins in your thought; it begins in your head. Charles Duhigg in his New Times bestseller, noted that the process for habit formation is a three-step loop. First there is cue, a trigger that tells your brain to go into automatic mode and which habit to use. Then there is the routine, which can be physical or mental or emotional. Finally, there is the reward, which helps your brain figure out if this particular loop is worth remembering for the future. Overtime this loop becomes more and more automatic and a habit is born. By same token Charles Duhigg reminds us, we learn to create new neurological routines that overpower those behaviors – if we take control of the habit loop-we can force bad tendencies unto the background. And begin create new tendencies, patterns and form new positive behaviors. 

So to the question posed by my client earlier, the answer, is yes adults can decide to change and through practice form powerful positive habits. But doing this requires that we understand the power we have to create outcomes in life and not surrender to circumstances. John Maxwell wrote that “When we surrender to our circumstances we have good days and bad days. We are at the mercy of what happens to us. When we surrender to a cause or purpose, we have good days wherever we go: the purpose never dies”. And how do we begin to change our behavior? How do we take concrete steps to change?. I go back to another client who indicated that exercise of identifying all his roles in life and deliberately creating a personal mission statement to serve as a powerful guide to living out his purpose in life was a great help. 

As a matter of fact, the process begins with a firm realization by people to take charge of the remote control of their lives – your life is the most important project there is and you can delegate the project management responsibility to somebody else. What kind of life one lives is directly correlated to the choices one makes. So before you start blaming your ethnic origin, geographic location of your birth or who you are married to, remember that you have that remote control of life in your hands. You can decide today to begin to make meaningful choices or spend most of the day watching Nigerian movies on Africa Magic or watching your favorite premiership soccer side. It is up to you. And there are people who are deciding to live meaningful lives regardless of their objective conditions. 

Take the youth from Paraguay who are made musical instruments from Landfills around their homes and joined a project to form what is today a global sensation called the Landfill Harmonic. Or Uganda’s own queen of Katwe, a 14 year old who got out of poverty by learning to play Chess in local community program. Today Fiona Mutesi has won at least two international Chess championships, a book titled the Queen of Katwe is out about Fiona and a full length movie from Disney is on the way.

From Entebbe to Dar

                                                                                                                               I spent about 12 hours today flying from Entebbe, Uganda to Dar Es Salaam. What started out as a simple process to catch a flight turned out to be quite exhausting. I arrived at the Entebbe Airport at about 6:45 am in morning for a 9:45 am departure. You see I prefer to arrive early than to be caught in traffic or security jam. “Which flight?” is the usual good morning, “Air Uganda, to Dar” was my tired response. “Not yet, go and seat over there”, the “over there” was the coffee shop next to the departure lounge.

I stayed there till almost an hour later – then I remembered that I had the phone number to the duty manager so I called. “I am so sorry” was his immediate response, “I will come over right away”. And he informed me that the flight was rescheduled from 9:40 to 13:00 hours and that Air Uganda will take of me by offering access to the business class lounge (Karibuni Lounge).  The “I am coming right away”, I was promised earlier took another 30 minutes and no one showed up. So I went to the departure lounge where I was greeted with several “I am so sorrys”.

When it came to giving me the Karibuni Lounge coupon that proved to be another matter. The check-in attendant wanted me to clarify if I knew of the rescheduled flight earlier. It sounded like those who got the notice were not entitled to the business class lounge. So I promptly responded in my best “stimuli-pause-response” mode. But I guess I was not very successful doing that because I overhead the supervisor to the attendant say “don’t worry, he is a Nigerian!”.

On check-in, I had 12Kg over weight and charged $60 but at an exchange rate to the dollar of almost 260K UGX. I tried to complain but was too tired to continue so I said “please keep the change” – I gave 170K UGX. I finally made it to Karibuni Lounge where I was attended to my a lovely hostess who not only made me a chicken sandwich for lunch but asked “what will like to drink?”.

Later the Duty Station Manager came and continued with the “I am so sorry” except this time he apologized for the staff who gave overcharged me 11,000 UGX on the excess luggage. I thanked him for his follow through. You see, I could tell that the Duty Manager was doing all he could to ensure that I felt comfortable. But comfort was the last thing on mind after 6 hours of waiting.

But the experience at Entebbe was mild compared to what awaited me in Dar es Salaam. We arrived at about 3:00 pm or so and it took a full 2 hours plus to get a visa issued. We arrived behind Emirates Airlines and what a wait. First the Immigration officer was kind enough to point out to me that I had already had a multiple entry visitor’s visa. But she was quick to announce that I needed another type of visa called CTA. According to the Tanzanian Immigration website, Applicants who intend to travel to Tanzania for business purposes will be issued a Visitor's Pass, which has words "CARRYING ON TEMPORARY ASSIGNMENT (CTA)". This pass will be issued on arrival at the entry point and is valid for 2 months only, from the date of issue. For obtaining a visitor's pass, fee of US$200, Company's Recommendation Letter or an Invitation Letter and 2 photos should be submitted during the application. However, before traveling they are requested to obtain a Travel visa from the Tanzania Missions abroad. I was lucky the immigration officer did not demand the all the other collaterals, just the money.

So after paying $200 dollars, the immigration officer left with my passport and I waited for almost 2 hours for the CTA to be issued. I wandered, used the bathrooms, sat, stood and hoped for providence to release my passport. I thought about all the positive things I could do with my time and practiced once again the power I had between stimulus and response. It was tough but I kept reminding myself to focus on the good of this situation. Occasionally, I will wander to the window and ask the immigration officer about “is passport almost done?”, and I got “no this is manual, it takes time”.

I eventually got the visa and I left for the hotel reflecting ho what one could do with the various opportunities I encountered. At the risk of sounding like the master of the obvious, Air Uganda could use a simple SMS enabled system which will notify customers directly – not emails – about flight rescheduling or cancellations. To quote William Pike, the former Managing Director of Uganda’s New Vision, “we know there will be mistakes in service delivery, but please communicate”. Rather the several “I am sorrys”, keep your commitment to provide support to passengers during long delays instead prolonging the pain by not keeping you word. Let your “I am coming” truly mean you are on the way.

As for the two hours at the Airport in Dar to get a visa or permit, the folks there can decide to change that by making specific choices about providing a welcoming service and making the visa application process as painless as possible. First up, can notify customers at point of departure about these rules by the airlines and offering a web enabled system for getting this done. It would have been by far better to deal with this online instead of the frustration at the airport in Dar.

Delivery of public service does not have to be painful – and the folks at the Rwanda Development Board have proved this. It took less than 2 hours to get my company registered in Kigali complete with a Tax Identification Number (TIN) and Value Added Tax (VAT) numbers. All delivered sternly but with delightful outcomes. And I know all countries can offer the same level of service if we decide to make the appropriate choices.

Of Hard-work, Trust and Output per Worker

The Saturday October 26th 2013 New Vision newspaper cared a double spread titled "Lazy, thieving Ugandans give jobs to Foreigners", of course that was enough to interrupt my breakfast of fruit salad with honey, yogurt and nuts at Javas Cafe. Javas Cafe is probably an appropriate place to read this headline because it has a staff that is representative of both local and foreign workers who do a great job of providing predictable service and consequently lots of repeat customers.

So I paused to read more. Quoting the former Executive Director of the Uganda Investment Authority, Dr. Maggie Kigozi, Some Ugandan employers take on foreign workers because Ugandans lack skills and are not trustworthy, "We lack experience because our companies are still young. When Uganda was embroiled in chaos in the 1970s, Kenya was peaceful and growing her skills in the hotel and banking sectors. That could be the reason why they have good managers,". The other "undoing", according to the New Vision piece is lack of trustworthiness. That is the reason why positions like accounting and finance managers, which require high levels of integrity, are occupied by more foreigners than Ugandans.

Now, the part about "lack of trustworthiness and laziness" caught my attention for a number of reasons. First it plays into the dominant perception that I ran into when I arrived in Kampala about 7 years ago - that folks here don't want to work and will steal from you at moment's notice. Secondly, it seems to suggest that people were created or have learned the behaviors of been untrustworthy and theft to the detriment of their productivity. And thirdly, the blanket sentence past of "Ugandans" is quite unfortunate.

Of course the obvious question is whether laziness and theft are the two most important variables when discussing output per worker by country. And here we are lucky to have the works of Robert E. Hall and Charles I. Jones, both from Stanford University who in a paper published over 15 years ago found that that differences in capital accumulation, productivity, and therefore output per worker are fundamentally related to difference in social infrastructure across countries. By social infrastructure, "we mean the institutions and government policies that determine the economic environment within which individuals accumulate skills, and accumulate capital and produce output. A social infrastructure favorable to high levels of output per worker provides an environment that supports productive activities and encourages capital accumulation, skill acquisition, invention, and technology transfer".

So while the New Vision quoted a recent report that put Uganda's productivity below that of other East African countries, we left out a crucial contributing factor to why it takes eight Ugandans to do the job of one Kenya or four Ugandans to do the job of one Tanzanian. In addition to the issues of social infrastructure - and we can spend some other time on this - there is the mindset that perpetuates the continued stereotype.  As we are reminded we are what we feel about what we think and what we think to quote Samuel Smiles will ultimately determine our destiny.

Having worked in the region for 8 years there is enough evidence to fall into the temptation of this type of "Ugandans are lazy" thought process but I choose to remember the hard work and dedication of Pius Otela, Harriet Ofumbi and Joyce Bakire - all Ugandans who gave 110% everyday we worked together at the local national telecom company. It is by far better to discuss ways to address the intractable issues impacting our peoples ability to compete favorably - issues of mindset, skill sets and tools rather than recycle the old narratives.

Customer Experiences That Matter

During my recent trip to Kigali, Rwanda where I facilitated a public workshop on the 7 Habits of Highly Successful People - Associates program - I ran into a Chef at hotel where we stayed. With one hand in the pocket while he prepared my omelette with other hand. What an image, first I thought this guy must be quite serious or just having a bad morning. So I asked "you a very serious Chef" I said and without thinking much the Chef responded "all the time".

Wow, I thought, a serious Chef with one hand in his trouser pocket claiming to be serious "all the time". I almost dismissed it as another one of those hotel experiences that fits between a hotel room with no AC or fan and a Waiter who told me drinks like "Stoney" and "Krest" bitter lemon are Ugandan drinks!. But I thought a little more about it. Chefs like this one or employees who by their attitude make customer experiences unpleasant are the very reason businesses lose customers and eventually go under.

You see providing remarkable customer experiences are not a nice to have but a matter that could make the difference between having loyal and lukewarm customers. Loyal customers, according to a global research from Franklin Covey, are an extension of your marketing department. Loyal customers - those who are more likely to enthusiastically refer you to a friend or colleague. These customers will also go out of their way to do the following four things, according to the study:
1. They purchase more in each visit
2. They come back and purchase more often
3. They refer to their friends
4. They devote time to give their feedback

The same study noted that loyalty leaders grow 2.6 times more than their competitors' average. But it appears these facts are either not known or some of our hotels, restaurants or other establishments don't care very much. Because if we care a little more about our we design experiences we will notice and give our energies to what customers care about.

Customers care about how they are treated, especially in the morning - when we are just starting our day - no one wants to see a Chef with one hand in his trousers frying eggs. The courtesy greeting of day and polite delivery of the order will go a long way to build a remarkable experience.

Experiences To Remember

There are little things that make the experience to a hotel, shop or restaurant memorable, at least for me. Take my visit to the Spa at the Park Hyatt in Macka Istanbul for example. I found a notice - see picture - which listed 14 items that are available upon request!. Now I had to re-read the list a couple of times to be sure. Everything from toothpaste to shaving kits. 

Very thoughtful of the hotel. I contrasted this with my local gym back home where to get a polythene bag to put your wet clothes will incur the ire of the attendant. Toothpaste? "no, that is for hotel guests only" is the polite but never-you-ask-again response that you get. So you can imagine my joy when I saw this sign.

Which also got me thinking. On arrival, the guest relations manager came out to welcome my wife and I. She made the point of mentioning our long history with the Hyatt properties and welcomed us back. As a gold passport member of Hyatt, we got upgraded on the spot. What a way to begin our visit to Istanbul. 

And for this, Park Hyatt - Macka, Istanbul makes it to my list of experiences to remember. Just like the Dorchester Hotel in London - where on entry at least 3 attendants vie for your attention, "how may I help you?" quickly followed the greeting of the day. What a great idea. Usually, you walk to hotels and you have to weave your way through metal detectors and unfriendly security personnel. Not at the Dorchester, where you truly feel welcomed. It is the little things. No billboards proclaiming we are a "5 Star Hotel" just the basic welcome and warmth of a passionate front office staff.

Edo College at 30

I had the pleasure of attending the 30 year anniversary of my high school Edo College Benin-City. The function was held at the Holiday Inn in Brent Cross London where most of our friends from the Class of 1983 gathered to celebrate and give thanks. What an evening, from the smartly dressed black ties to the beautiful wives, it was a great evening to remember.

I met folks I had not seen in 30 years, Jerry B and his lovely wife reminded us that couples can still dance like it was "1983!. Solomon Osagie - sorry Dr. Solomon Osagie gave a rousing speech which recollected the history and achievements of Edo College. But Solomon saved his best lines of the night for the unfortunate ICC (Bishop Kelly College) alumni who showed up to lend support. Bishop Kelly College (ICC) was a neighboring school on the same road in Benin-City. Gideon, Omodon (now Gideon Chukwualim) was still his subdued self, intellect and dance steps still intact. Emma Ikhifa (although graduated a year or so later) was there and displayed some of his dance floor moves, while reminding us that "I nor want dance today oh". There was Enina Akpata (Akparex) and his brother Uwa who looked great after these many years. And Kenneth Okogie was his bubbly self shepherding his lovely wife from table to table by carrying the long flowing gown.

We also took time during the evening to remember those members of our set who had departed like Osasikemwen Oviasu - Sike, as he was fondly remembered past away in London about a decade or so. Solomon read out a list of the names, this was a sobering part of the evening.

All in all, it was a great evening, kudos to the organizers who did a great job..well done guys!.

African Time

African Time

During our wedding over 15 years ago, my late father-in-law walked in through the side door into waiting room where the wedding party was awaiting to be ushered into the main reception hall. Without much hesitation and as if to respond to the anxiety inside me that we were over one hour late – “Africans have time, white people have watches”. While this did not offer much consolation, I reflected a bit on the thought that we did not have to be anxious because “we have time”.

I almost forgot about this thought from my father-in-law, until a couple of days ago during a dinner with two American friends. One them – Benjamin made the point that his experiences in Uganda in the last 5 years or so has thought that Ugandans and consequently Africans invest “more time into relationships” than make commitments to be “on time”. So Benjamin will have us believe that rather than keep our commitments to an appointment, we kept our commitments to relationships.

Well, my immediate thought was that this was another justification to the some of the bad habits that some of us have developed. People will commit to a meeting and conveniently show up late with all sorts of excuses – “well you know, it rained...”, “the jam (as in traffic jam) was heavy,” and of course “it’s African time”. The truth is that it is neither African time nor bad weather; it is people showing up late.

My experience – from Kigali to Cape Town – is that you run into folks who do not intend to keep their appointments. I have had account managers who will sit at their desks 15 minutes to their appointments and act very surprised when reminded of their meeting commitment at the top of the hour. 

So what is African time?  Why are we so casual to keeping time? Why is “African time” the only time that is inconsistent with keeping our commitments?. According to Wikipedia “African time (or Africa time) is the perceived cultural tendency, in most parts of Africa, toward a more relaxed attitude to time. This is sometimes used in a pejorative sense, about tardiness in appointments, meetings and events.^[1] This also includes the more leisurely, relaxed, and less rigorously-scheduled lifestyle found in African countries, especially as opposed to the more clock-bound pace of daily life in Western countries.^[2] As such it is similar to time orientations in some other non-Western culture regions”. Others say “The appearance of a simple lack of punctuality or a lax attitude about time in Africa, may instead reflect a different approach and method in managing tasks, events, and interactions. African cultures are often described as "polychronic,"^[3][4] which means people tend to manage more than one thing at a time rather than in a strict sequence. Personal interactions and relationships are also managed in this way, such that it is not uncommon to have more than one simultaneous conversation.^[5] An African "emotional time consciousness" has been suggested which contrasts with Western "mechanical time consciousness".^[6]

I believe somewhere in the positions above is that real truth and that is to there is no such thing as African time. If anything, “African time” falls in the same waste basket of all the excuses we give for why service delivery is at a standstill. My barber who we made an appointment with us in Kampala not so recently, showed up a full hour late and of course reminded my 3 kids and I about the morning drizzle as his excuse. My 11 year old promptly reminded us that that was the same thing a very high ranking government official did during a visit to their school. And because the official was very senior, no phones or newspapers were allowed. My son and the rest of the school were kept waiting for over two hours. But in that case, the senior government official did not give any explanations. People in attendance were telepathically informed that it was “African Time”.

And as African Literary prize winner, Victor Dlamini reminds us “There is truly nothing more annoying that to receive an invitation to an up-market event and, when you arrive at the venue, there is hardly anyone there, not even the host. Invariably, if you bother to call them to find out why they are late, they tell you that they are around the corner, or the perennial favorite, they are five minutes away. Of course, that always turns out to be untrue and you end up waiting and wondering why they did not just choose a time they could manage”

However, the good news is that we can change. We can decide as individuals to take responsibility for our actions. We can decide to be on time regardless of the weather or geographic location you find yourself. After all, as we are often reminded, “we are a product of our choices and not our circumstances” – this is true for us as it is for those who make commitments and keep them.

Francis Egbuson

Kampala, Uganda

2007

TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR LIFE WITH 5 CHOICES

We just arrived from Kigali, Rwanda where we hosted Franklin Covey global productivity practice leader Kory Kogon. Morning event with the Rwanda Private Sector Federation was awesome. We had about 90 plus guests for the morning event. Attendees were drawn from key private sector organizations and they came early to listen to Kory Kogon. Kory delivered the core thesis of the 5 Choices - that with today's paradox of instant access to data and poor decision making, the 5 choices provide the mindset, skill set and tool set to provide focused attention, improved decision making and greater physical and mental energy at the end of the day.

The 5 Choices to Extraordinary Productivity are:
Choice 1 : Act on the important, don't react to the urgent
In today’s world, people are drowning in email, overwhelmed with demands, and trying to do more with less. 5 Choices participants explore how to filter vitally important priorities from distractions so they can make a real contribution.

Choice 2: Go for Extraordinary, don't settle for ordinary
Everyone wants to make a difference, but competing priorities often prevent them from achieving extraordinary results. People who practice 5 Choices learn to structure their roles in terms of extraordinary results to achieve high-priority goals

Choice 3: Schedule the big rocks, don't sort gravel
The crushing increase in workday pressures can make people feel helpless and out of control. 5 Choices participants learn the planning systems that lead to extraordinary outcomes

Choice 4: Rule your technology, don't allow your technology to rule you
An electronic avalanche of email, texts, and social-media alerts seriously threaten productivity as never before. 5 Choices process teaches people how to optimize platforms like Microsoft Outlook to boost your productivity

Choice 5: Fuel your fire, don't burn out
Today’s exhausting, high-pressure work environment burns people out at an alarming rate. Participants benefit from the latest neuroscience around the Five Energy Drivers to consistently recharge mental and physical energy. The five energy drivers are Move, Eat, Sleep, Relax and Connect.

Kory delivered with brilliance, wit and great empathy. In addition, there was a press conference at the end where Kory, PSF CEO and yours truly took questions about 5 Choices and the CEMM/PSF partnership. The event which was organized by CEMM Group -sole licensee for Franklin Covey in Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi and Private Sector Federation of Rwanda, was sponsored by Kigali Serena Hotels, Rwandair, and NFT Consult.

Franklin Covey is a New York stock exchange listed company listed company with headquarters in Salt Lake City, USA. Franklin Covey was co-founded by the late Dr. Stephen Covey, acclaimed author of the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, which has sold over 20 million copies. Franklin Covey is a performance improvement company with operations in 146 countries.

Kory Kogon in Kigali July 11th 2013

Kory speaking on the 5 Choices - Feb 15 2013 in Uganda 

Having just concluded a 5 Choices To Extraordinary Productivity workshop with Kampala Serena Hotel, it is great to be heading to Kigali on Wednesday to see Kory Kogon. Kory Kogon is the global productivity practice leader for FranklinCovey and she will be speaking at a breakfast event at Mille Colline Hotel on Thursday July 11th at 8:00 am. Kory is really the author and chief evangelist of 5 Choices.

This invite only event is been organized by our firm CEMM -www.cemmgroup.com- and the Private Sector Federation of Rwanda -www.psf.org.rw-. Now for the uninitiated, 5 Choices is designed to ensure that we focus on our highest priorities that enable us leave a contribution in our selected roles in life. With 5 Choices you can act on and schedule the big "rocks" (major priorities) with clear attention, focused decision while increasing your energy levels. In a world of big data, alerts, pings and multiple decisions to make, 5 Choices is a welcome relief. Complete with award wining videos and hands-on exercises, this workshop, to quote one delegate at the Serena Hotel workshop "is truly extraordinary".

And it is this extraordinary experience that we will be heading to Kigali to get from the Chief evangelist herself. 

Please visit www.the5choices.com for details.