Horizon Point Consulting

Author: Mary Ila Ward

Mom, I’m Bored
“Mom, I’m bored,” said one kid from the backseat after we told them NO MORE DEVICES on a road trip to kick off the summer.

You see, devices for them create the stimulation that makes them, well, crazy.

So after allowing them on the first leg of the trip without any constraints, we put a cease and desist order out on all devices and prayed we wouldn’t all kill each other over the course of the next hundreds of miles.

Our trip began with a desire for our kids to see all 50 states before our oldest leaves for college in six years. With this in mind, I had the grand idea to create books where they could write and draw about what they wanted to see, what they did see, and what they liked and didn’t like about each place we visited throughout the years.

With devices in hand, these books sat empty.

After the electronics were taken away and after a few “I’m bored” whines came from the backseat, the books came out.

And what was inside them was nothing short of creativity on full display.

Our oldest is into shoes now and he started drawing them.

Our middle created fun facts and drawings about each state we visited, and then created drawings where she narrated the story line she had also created about the images. Apparently, limes can be our friends.

Our youngest drew what only he knew them to be, but then told us, “This one is a flower, this one is a roller coaster. Mommy, can you draw me an alligator?”

And so I got in on the creative process and drew just that.

As we’ve focused on creating space all year at Horizon Point, the point that space is absolutely needed to innovate and create has been a key theme.

But first, before we can have the space to create and innovate, we probably need to create some space to be bored.

In fact, research supports just this. Boredom is the spark that creates the flame.

To facilitate some boredom that leads to your mind seeking something that leads it to create and innovate perhaps we all should:
1. Don’t Look Down. Put a cease and desist order on your devices. All of them.
2. Get away. Get somewhere you aren’t normally. See the novel. Take a road trip.
3. Look Up. Pay attention to your surroundings.
4. Capture. Have something that can capture your creativity once you get bored, like our kids “diaries” as the little one calls his.
5. Collaborate. Maybe you might be drawn to draw a little something out of the norm like my alligator.
Turns out boredom also may help get the crazies out. It’s good for our mental health too. Our kids were much less on edge once we swapped the devices for the space to create.

How comfortable are you with being bored?

More on this topic:

The Creative Benefits of Boredom from HBR
June 6, 2023
6 Tips to Help You Unplug for Your Vacation
With 4^th of July being the unspoken week of summer vacations, it’s time to consider- does anyone every really truly go on vacation now days? By a true vacation I mean no work is done. None. No emails, no voicemails, no finishing up a project, starting a project or even thinking (and therefore procrastinating) on a project.

In a world of constant connectedness, I’d venture to guess most people don’t actually unplug completely from their work. According this article, more than half of Americans plan to work while on vacation.

But if you are headed on vacation or on vacation now (wait, does reading this count post as “working”?) here are some tips for unplugging while on there:
1. Get your stuff done before you leave. Practice productivity before going which will eliminate the need to work while away.
2. Schedule time when you get back to catch-up. Block your calendar for a day or two after you return with no meetings or scheduled activities to eliminate the pressure of having to get through 987 emails when you return with no time to do it. Post-vacation laundry can be a beast. Don’t forget to schedule time to catch up on the household items that need to be attended to as well after returning from vacation.
3. Eliminate the temptation to check in with work. Don’t take your computer with you, go where there is no internet connection (is there such a place now?) and if you have a phone dedicated just to work, leave it at home.
4. Set clear expectations with colleagues/clients before departing. Tell them how long you’ll be away and establish that you will not be checking in via email, phone or text. Ask that they respect your vacation time and reciprocate by respecting theirs. Set up automated out of the office responses with a date of when you will be able to get back in touch. Date it at least one day after you return.
5. Take for pleasure reading with you and schedule for pleasure activities. Take that novel you’ve been dying to read (or movie you’ve been waiting to watch) or that cooking magazine you’ve been trying to look at for the past three months and haven’t ever gotten to. Book the massage you’ve been wanting. By taking time for pleasure reading and scheduling for pleasure activities, you’ll eliminate the desire to turn to business reading and/or checking emails. You simply won’t have the time or desire to do it when you are enjoying something else.
6. Realize that vacations are more often than not a time connect and build relationships with those closest to you. Most of us don’t take our vacations solo. If you are venturing out on a vacation this week, more than likely family member(s) or close friend(s) will be with you. Vacations are a time to rejuvenate as individuals, but also a time to rejuvenate the relationships that mean the most to us but may have been neglected somewhat by competing work demands. You’re on vacation, so don’t let work get in the way of relationships (you shouldn’t ever let this happen, but that that’s a topic for another day). Don’t let your spouse or your kids define the time away by the number of hours mom or dad spent checking email.
How are you unplugging on your vacation? Tell us how you do it and we’ll reward you with a $50 Starbucks gift card to help you unplug (or replug) more! We’ll pick a winner on Tuesday, July 8th.

Some of the ways I’ll be unplugging while taking a little 4^th of July sabbatical:
May 30, 2023
4 Workplace Innovations on Repeat
Earlier this week, I had the opportunity to serve on a panel discussing workforce and skills challenges created by the automotive industry’s shift to electric vehicles (EVs).

I’m no expert on EVs. I’m no expert on cars.

But I drive one. And it broke down at the end of last week.

I got off the interstate from a work trip, headed into my hometown on a highway connecting the interstate to my neighborhood. When I went to accelerate on the highway, the RPMs jumped way up, and it did not want to shift gears for me to accelerate effectively. Luckily, I got home going about 10 miles per hour, not trying to force the car to shift into second gear.

We had it towed to the dealership where I was told that the issue was “probably the transmission.” I was then told it would take two weeks to get a technician to diagnose it. Then, if it was the transmission, it would be about two months before they could get to it.

I took a deep breath (I’m in my car A LOT, I’m not quite sure how to go without a car for a day, much less two months) and asked, “So is the challenge you all are dealing with because you don’t have enough labor?”

He breathed a sigh of relief- I think he was afraid I was going to bless him out- and proceeded to tell me in great detail about all the labor challenges they have. Namely, that they had the only transmission guy in our county and that it takes two to three years to train someone effectively to fix transmissions. He also told me there were 40 cars in front of mine if it was, in fact, the transmission that needed to be replaced.

We have a workforce shortage with the current labor skills needed to make and fix cars. If we can’t handle the current challenges, how can we expect to handle future ones? The good news is EVs don’t have multi drive transmissions, I have learned :). Do we have people trained to work or gearboxes (my understanding of what replaces a transmission)? I doubt it.

This is not just a phenomenon in the automotive industry, it is in almost all of them. As we innovate products, services, and technology exponentially, we’ve also got to continuously innovate our workplaces through people practices. And, unfortunately, we are lagging behind here, thinking that what worked yesterday will work today. It won’t. The labor force is telling this loud and clear.

We also need to capitalize on the opportunities brought about by innovation that can help us rethink the workplace and how work gets done and in what types of cultures it can succeed.

I think we could all take a good look back at the automotive industry and how Henry Food transformed it approximately 100 years ago to help pose us well for the next 100 years:
1. Early Exposure Matters: Henry Ford showed that early exposure to a variety of skills and work opportunities need to be widespread and that skills in one industry are readily transferable to another. For example, Ford grew up on a farm. He taught himself to fix watches and this helped him learn basic mechanical skills. These skills, no doubt, helped him in creating “horseless carriages.”
2. Learning by Trial and Error: This tinkering also shows that Ford learned by trial and error. By doing. Failing. Trying again, and again, until it worked.
We need to be applying these truths in our homes and schools. Exposing kids at an early age to a variety of domains and subjects and ways of thinking and giving them tools to “tinker” with is necessary for them to learn by trial and error. I would also postulate that time to be “bored” fosters this tinkering too. When kids are over scheduled, they don’t “play” and therefore they don’t “tinker.”
1. Compensation Matters: Ford’s company was plagued by very high turnover rates. According to The Henry Ford Foundation, “Turnover was so high that the company had to hire 53,000 people a year to keep 14,000 jobs filled. Henry responded with his boldest innovation ever—in January 1914 he virtually doubled wages to $5 per day.” Ford realized that he needed to pay people a premium for the repetitive work they were doing, and that doing this would help lower costs, not raise them. He also was very clear that the people he employed needed to be able to afford what they were producing.
2. People don’t want to work all day, every day. They are more productive when they don’t. Ford is largely credited with the creation of the 40-hour workweek (although union pressure may have led him there). He changed the workweek from six days to five without changing compensation. We are now in a world largely talking about the value gains in a four-day workweek. As innovations increase productivity, should people be able to take advantage of these gains to work less with the same pay? Or should we at least provide people with autonomy to decide how to do the work in order to produce the results that are needed? I think these are discussions of merit.
Innovating is not just about creating something from scratch. It also includes recycling the old to create the new.

How will you innovate your workplace through old lessons learned?
April 27, 2023
What Kind of Intelligent Are You?
Did you like school growing up? Were you one of the “smart” kids or did you just get by? Were you bored in the classroom or excited to be there?

How about at work? Are you one of the “smart” ones?

When you are training or in a learning setting on the job, do you pick up on concepts quickly or do you find yourself being one of the “slow” ones? Does the learning engage your attention or leave you questioning why you are doing what you are doing?

Whatever category you fall into, I’d challenge you-and maybe more importantly, those teaching and leading- to think about the source of the ease or difficulty. This may have more to do with how things are being taught and whether they cater to specific types of intelligences rather than whether or not people are “smart”.

And in most formal learning environments, we tend to only cater to two of the nine intelligences postulated by Harvard Professor Howard Gardner- linguistic intelligence and logical-mathematical intelligence. Gardner says of these intelligences, they are “particularly important for learning in the kinds of schools that we have today- ones that feature listening to lectures, reading, writing, and calculating- and they are crucial on those tests that purport to assess human intellect and cognitive potential.”

But Gardner says we get it all wrong if we stop here. Other intelligences that Gardner suggests from his research are:

“Noncanonical” Intelligences:
- Musical Intelligence: “Facility in the perception and production of music.”
- Spatial Intelligence: “The capacity to form spatial representations or images in one’s mind, and to operate upon them variously.”
- Bodily-Kinesthetic Intelligence: “The capacity to solve problems or create products using your whole body, or parts of your body like your hand or your mouth.”
- Naturalist Intelligence: “Entails the capacities to make consequential discriminations in the natural world.”
Personal Intelligences: “Knowing Human Beings”
- Knowing Oneself: Self-Awareness
- Knowing Others
Existential Intelligence: “Religious” or “Spiritual” intelligence

I’d venture to guess that as you read this list, there are one or more where you feel like you excel. Is it recognized in your workplace? Does learning content cater to your style?

If you are a leader or trainer/facilitator, I’d encourage you to examine your learning opportunities at work to see if you are reaching everyone in your audience with their particular intelligence so you can capitalize on all people’s “smarts”.

Some ideas for doing so:
- Incorporate games and puzzles
- Incorporate music
- Incorporate outdoor activity and/or break up content where breaks in learning require participants to move around and go outside if possible
- Provide things to “fidget” with
- Get people to draw in order to convey thoughts and learning- to visualize concepts
- Have people interact with others regularly- through questions, role play, case studies, etc.
- Provide questions for self-reflection and thought and the time to do this
- Get people to teach what they have learned to others- creating and incorporating their own ideas for conveying concepts
- Give tools for people to practice and apply learning on the job and record and report their findings in the format or mode they prefer
When we begin to realize that all people are “smart”, we can then use that information to make sure we are incorporating a variety of ways to make sure our workplaces allow for the expression of each individual’s unique talents and contributions.

What kind of intelligent are you?
April 25, 2023
3 Steps for Leading through Pressure & Change
Coal can’t be transformed into a diamond and a pearl can’t become a pearl without pressure and change. We know that beauty is created through times of pressure and change. For leaders, it is often where the most growth and learning takes place. However, more often than not, it is less than enjoyable. It is stressful. It is hard. And this can keep us from learning and growing amidst the difficulty if we don’t know how to effectively handle it.

And if we are honest, in the world of leading and living today, when is there ever time that is not seeped with some level of pressure and change? So how do we navigate it? How do we see beauty in both the process and the outcomes and navigate the stress and difficulty with a sense of purpose and energy?

A book and a podcast I’ve engaged with recently, have helped provide some key insights into this:

1. Know your default. If you’ve heard us say at once at Horizon Point, you’ve heard it a million times: strong leadership is always built with a strong foundation of self-awareness. When it comes to pressure and changing situations, is it your default to turn inward or outward? Do you tend to focus on what you need and keep it in, or do you focus on whatever everyone else needs trying to please people to respond? Knowing your natural inclination will be the first step in helping you better navigate the pressure and change.

2. Question yourself and the situation. In the Making It Work Podcast Episode 59- Staying Composed Under Pressure, Dr. Rob McKenna encourages asking these (among other) questions of yourself:
- Why are you leading this situation? Another way to ask this is, “Why are you here for these people?” According to the research by Dr. McKenna, a sense of purpose was the number one indicator of ability to successfully lead under pressure. If you know your purpose, you are able to appreciate the stakes that make a difference.
- If this goes well, what is the positive potential that will open up? The second best indicator of leading well under pressure was the leader’s ability to focus on the potential. It’s not optimism or pessimism, it’s “I have a half full glass full of water, what could I do with that?” It causes centering for the leader. The research showed that it helped moderate success especially in leaders who tend to take things personally. And their research showed that most leaders do take things personally.
What is your PURPOSE and what is the POTENTIAL? You will most likely have to return to these questions and the answers to them often, especially in extreme times of pressure and change.

3. Share the story. In Changing Minds by Howard Gardner, a theme around changing minds- especially in what the author defines as a heterogeneous group- is the leader’s ability to 1) be who they say they are or “practice what they preach” and 2) narrate, or put into story form, purpose and potential. This then translates to purpose and potential for others. And purpose and potential combined lead to action.

When we know ourselves, ground ourselves in purpose and potential and then share this through authentic stories, we are better able to lead ourselves and others through challenging times of pressure and change.

What helps you to lead well in pressure and change?
March 28, 2023