¡FELIZ DOMINGO DE PENTECOSTÉS!

The following information is used for educational purposes only.

   ¡FELIZ DOMINGO DE PENTECOSTÉS!


PIEDAD Y PACIENCIA

ENSEÑANZA Y ENTEREZA

NEGACIÓN Y NOSTALGIA

TEMPLANZA Y TERNURA

ENTENDIMIENTO Y EMOCIÓN

CARIDAD Y CUIDADOS

OBSTÁCULOS Y OSCURIDAD

SENTIMIENTOS Y SENSACIONES

TEMOR DE DIOS Y TRANQUILIDAD

ESPERANZA Y EMPATÍA

SABIDURÍA  Y SINCERIDAD

En los tiempos tan difíciles, extensos, y angustiantes que estamos

transitando es cuando más debemos poner a prueba toda esa 

batería de recursos espirituales, emocionales, y escondidos en 

alguna parte de nuestro ser, para generar las fuerzas y energías 

que necesitamos para atravesar este camino de tormentas, de 

desierto, huracanes, y tsunamis en que se ha convertido nuestra 

vida debido a ese monstruo invisible y traicionero, con una 

capacidad de daño incalculable, inconmensurable, de efectos 

ciertamente devastadores en todos los aspectos de nuestra 

existencia  humana.

Por ello, hoy en el Día de Pentecostés con la llegada del Espíritu 

Santo,recurramos más que nunca al fondo de nuestra alma, a lo 

más profundo e infinito de nuestro ser para buscar ese abrazo, 

consuelo y fortaleza-entre otros de los hermosos y maravillosos 

dones- que el Espíritu Santo nos regala tan gentilmente.

Vayamos a él, con una oración, en silencio, pero con profunda 

convicción que su dulce poder nos llegue para brindarnos esa Paz, 

Amor, y Esperanza que tanto nos hacen falta en estos momentos de 

gran desasosiego.

¡Qué así sea!

¡Gracias Espíritu Santo por no abandonarnos cuando la 

desesperación y las lágrimas parecen  ahogarnos y quitarnos 

hasta el último aliento!C.M.

Fuente: Imágenes de Google Images.Acróstico y palabras de Clara Moras.

LIFESTYLE | ARTE Y CULTURA-Yo te digo todo va a estar bien, por Nicolás Artusi

The following information is used for educational purposes only.



LIFESTYLE | ARTE Y CULTURA

Yo te digo todo va a estar bien

Nicolás Artusi

23 de Mayo de 2020

"Todo va a estar bien", dice Kevin Bacon, mientras mira fijo a cámara y, sea por lo indiscutible de su calidad como actor o por sugestión pura, uno respira más aliviado. "Todo va a estar bien", dice Angelina Jolie; "todo va a estar bien", dice John Cusack; y hasta el mismísimo Barack Obama se cuela en el reparto de estrellas con un parlamento invariable: "Todo va a estar bien". Es la inspiradora obra del artista californiano Allan McCollum: con el título Everything Will Be O.K. , una cinta sin fin de mil doscientas escenas de series o películas, desde Lost hasta El irlandés , donde los actores dicen la misma frase. Parece una idea muy simple (lo es), pero el efecto de acumulación termina convenciendo al pesimista de que, sí, todo va a estar bien: en una época plagada de malas noticias, es un manifiesto a favor del optimismo.

A los 75 años, McCollum es uno de los popes del arte conceptual estadounidense: solo hay que escribir su nombre en Google junto con la frase everything will be o.k. para acceder a la obra que se anuncia como "una colección continua de capturas de pantalla con subtítulos tranquilizantes" . Sobre un fondo negro desfilan las escenas donde la frase se les dice a niños con terrores nocturnos o a víctimas de episodios sobrenaturales: la repetición delata la falta de originalidad de los guionistas o cómo la producción audiovisual no es distinta a las otras industrias que fabrican artículos en serie. Si McCollum lleva medio siglo experimentando con las tensiones entre los objetos únicos y las cosas que surgen de una línea de montaje, acá pega una frase junto a otra y en las variaciones mínimas ("vas a estar bien" o "todo irá bien", a veces se dice) remarca las fallas inevitables de la producción fabril: cada vez que se adulteran las palabras, el resultado final tiene la marca de lo fallido, como el ojo mal pintado de una muñeca de plástico que salió virola. A continuación, "todo va a estar bien" repite otro actor y el planeta regresa a su órbita: aun en la ironía, es un desafío a la persistencia de la negatividad.

¿Todo va a estar bien? Espero que sí. Un viejo chiste dice que "un pesimista es un optimista mejor informado", y en general se cree que el optimista tiene algo de tonto y el pesimista, mucho de cínico. Soy de los que piensan que el mundo siempre está mejorando y que de esta crisis vamos a salir mejores (o, por lo menos: no peores). Llámeme ingenuo o directamente idiota, si quiere: en esas noches en que la incertidumbre congela el alma, si Tom Hanks me mira fijo y me dice que todo va a estar bien, yo duermo sin frazada.

Listamanía

Cinco obras de Allan McCollum, un pope del arte conceptual

*The Shapes Project. Un proyecto de ambición universal: una colección de siluetas dibujadas con formas únicas. una por cada habitante del planeta.

*Your Fate. En español, tu destino: un sistema de adivinación con fichas que representan la salud, el dinero o el amor, como un tarot para el siglo XXI.

*The Visible Markers Project. Una colección de objetos de formas y colores múltiples grabados con la palabra thanks para que la gente pueda expresar su gratitud.

*Each and Every One of You. Un desafío a la idea de originalidad en una gigantesca instalación donde aparecen enmarcados los 1200 nombres más comunes en EE.UU.

*Everything Will Be O.K. En Internet, una sucesión sin pausa de escenas de series o películas donde los personajes dicen la misma frase: "Todo va a estar bien". (:http://allanmccollum.net/1/everythingsok/ok/ok006.html)


Fuente:https://www.lanacion.com.ar/lifestyle/yo-te-digo-todo-va-estar-bien-nid2367989

R322-S106-TED TALKS-Carol Dweck: "The Power of Believing That You Can Improve"

The following information is used for educational purposes only.


TEDxNorrkoping | November 2014


Carol Dweck: "The Power of Believing That You Can Improve"


Carol Dweck researches “growth mindset” — the idea that we can grow our brain's capacity to learn and to solve problems. In this talk, she describes two ways to think about a problem that’s slightly too hard for you to solve. Are you not smart enough to solve it … or have you just not solved it yet? A great introduction to this influential field.


ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Carol Dweck · Psychologist
Carol Dweck is a pioneering researcher in the field of motivation, why people succeed (or don't) and how to foster success.

Transcript:


The power of yet.

I heard about a high school in Chicago where students had to pass a certain number of courses to graduate, and if they didn't pass a course, they got the grade "Not Yet." And I thought that was fantastic, because if you get a failing grade, you think, I'm nothing, I'm nowhere. But if you get the grade "Not Yet", you understand that you're on a learning curve. It gives you a path into the future.

"Not Yet" also gave me insight into a critical event early in my career, a real turning point. I wanted to see how children coped with challenge and difficulty, so I gave 10-year-olds problems that were slightly too hard for them. Some of them reacted in a shockingly positive way. They said things like, "I love a challenge," or, "You know, I was hoping this would be informative." They understood that their abilities could be developed. They had what I call a growth mindset. But other students felt it was tragic, 
catastrophic. From their more fixed mindset perspective, their intelligence had been up for judgment, and they failed. 

Instead of luxuriating in the power of yet, they were gripped in the tyranny of now.

So what do they do next? I'll tell you what they do next. In one study, they told us they would probably cheat the next time instead of studying more if they failed a test. In another study, after a failure, they looked for someone who did worse than they did so they could feel really good about themselves. And in study after study, they have run from difficulty. Scientists measured the electrical activity from the brain as students confronted an error.

 On the left, you see the fixed-mindset students. There's hardly any activity. They run from the error. They don't engage with it. But on the right, you have the students with the growth mindset, the idea that abilities can be developed. They engage deeply. Their brain is on fire with yet. They engage deeply. They process the error. They learn from it and they correct it.

How are we raising our children? Are we raising them for now instead of yet? Are we raising kids who are obsessed with getting As? Are we raising kids who don't know how to dream big dreams? Their biggest goal is getting the next A, or the next test score? And are they carrying this need for constant validation with them into their future lives? Maybe, because employers are coming to me and saying, "We have already raised a generation of young workers who can't get through the day without an award."

So what can we do? How can we build that bridge to yet?
Here are some things we can do. First of all, we can praise wisely, not praising intelligence or talent. That has failed. Don't do that anymore. But praising the process that kids engage in, their effort, their strategies, their focus, their perseverance, their improvement. This process praise creates kids who are hardy and resilient.

There are other ways to reward yet. We recently teamed up with game scientists from the University of Washington to create a new online math game that rewarded yet. In this game, students were rewarded for effort, strategy and progress. The usual math game rewards you for getting answers right, right now, but this game rewarded process. And we got more effort, more strategies, more engagement over longer periods of time, and more perseverance when they hit really, really hard problems.

Just the words "yet" or "not yet," we're finding, give kids greater confidence, give them a path into the future that creates greater persistence. And we can actually change students' mindsets. In one study, we taught them that every time they push out of their comfort zone to learn something new and difficult, the neurons in their brain can form new, stronger connections, and over time, they can get smarter.

Look what happened: In this study, students who were not taught this growth mindset continued to show declining grades over this difficult school transition, but those who were taught this lesson showed a sharp rebound in their grades. We have shown this now, this kind of improvement, with thousands and thousands of kids, especially struggling students.

So let's talk about equality. In our country, there are groups of students who chronically underperform, for example, children in inner cities, or children on Native American reservations. And they've done so poorly for so long that many people think it's inevitable. But when educators create growth mindset classrooms steeped in yet, equality happens. And here are just a few examples. In one year, a kindergarten class in Harlem, New York scored in the 95th percentile on the national achievement test. 

Many of those kids could not hold a pencil when they arrived at school. In one year, fourth-grade students in the South Bronx, way behind, became the number one fourth-grade class in the state of New York on the state math test. In a year, to a year and a half, Native American students in a school on a reservation went from the bottom of their district to the top, and that district included affluent sections of Seattle. So the Native kids outdid the Microsoft kids.

This happened because the meaning of effort and difficulty were transformed. Before, effort and difficulty made them feel dumb, made them feel like giving up, but now, effort and difficulty, that's when their neurons are making new connections, stronger connections. That's when they're getting smarter.

I received a letter recently from a 13-year-old boy. He said, "Dear Professor Dweck, I appreciate that your writing is based on solid scientific research, and that's why I decided to put it into practice. I put more effort into my schoolwork, into my relationship with my family, and into my relationship with kids at school, and I experienced great improvement in all of those areas. I now realize I've wasted most of my life."

Let's not waste any more lives, because once we know that abilities are capable of such growth, it becomes a basic human right for children, all children, to live in places that create that growth, to live in places filled with "yet".Thank you.


Source:www.ted.com

Debate-Cómo será la vida urbana en la pos-pandemia, por Lucía Bellocchio

The following information is used for educational purposes only.


Debate

Cómo será la vida urbana en la pos-pandemia

Estación Constitución, Buenos Aires en cuarentena. Foto Guillermo Rodríguez Adami

Lucía Bellocchio

25/05/2020


La historia nos revela que las pandemias dejan sus huellas en las ciudades. Así lo ha hecho la peste de Atenas de 430 a.C. que provocó cambios en las leyes e identidad de la ciudad, la peste negra en la Edad Media que transformó el equilibrio del poder de clase en las sociedades europeas, y el ébola en la África subsahariana que fomentó la creciente interconexión de las ciudades hiperglobalizadas de hoy.

El COVID-19 se suma a ellas y, sin dudas, dejará su huella en nuestras urbes, pues luego de que la OMS la declarara como una pandemia, el mundo comenzó a enfrentar una emergencia sanitaria sin precedentes y, a partir de entonces, los gobiernos comenzaron a tomar medidas con la finalidad de mitigar la propagación del virus, tales como cuarentena, distanciamiento social, modalidades de trabajo remoto, utilización de tecnologías, entre otras.

Con ello, se advierten nuevos modelos de conducta y hábitos en diversas áreas del estado y cabe preguntarnos cuáles de las medidas que trajo la pandemia vinieron para quedarse y cómo las ciudades -y gobiernos- se preparan para la vuelta a la nueva normalidad.

Por un lado, advertimos a nivel global que una de las herramientas para dar respuesta a la pandemia fueron las tecnologías. Indistintamente, desarrollos públicos y privados han surgido para enfrentar el virus, pudiendo mencionarse apps de autotesteo y rastreo de contactos, drones de monitoreo y desinfección, cámaras térmicas que miden la fiebre de transeúntes, robots de seguridad policial, inteligencia artificial y big data capaces de predecir el avance de la enfermedad, entre otras.

Así, los ecosistemas tecnológicos nos demuestran su potencial para recopilar datos de tráfico, ruido, calidad del aire y consumo de energía, para tomar decisiones mejoradas y sostenibles. Factiblemente, luego del aislamiento social, estos tipos de soluciones seguirán estando presentes en sitios con aglomeraciones de personas como centros comerciales y lugares de trabajo.

Es decir, la pandemia nos habrá dejado una intensificación de la infraestructura digital en nuestras ciudades.

Por otro lado, será necesario que los gobiernos tomen medidas para asegurar una pacífica y segura vuelta a la normalidad, y la consecuente reorganización de las ciudades. Ejemplo de ello es Barcelona, que ya cuenta con un plan de acción de movilidad urbana para adaptarse a la salida progresiva del confinamiento. Dicho plan contempla el cierre de áreas al tráfico, actuaciones de mejora del servicio de autobuses y la ampliación del carril de bicicletas y zonas peatonales.

Asimismo, las medidas que los estados tomen de aquí en adelante deberán enfocarse en que el derecho a la salud sea garantizado sin discriminación alguna y, en particular, para aquellos grupos afectados de forma desproporcionada. En relación a ello, en su Declaración 1/20 del 9 de abril de 2020 la Corte Interamericana de Derechos Humanos incluyó como grupo vulnerable a la población de zonas precarias (como villas y barrios afectados por la pobreza y el hacinamiento) y personas en situación de calle. Inexorablemente, surge como desafío para los gobiernos alcanzar la protección de dichos asentamientos velando no sólo por el cumplimiento de protocolos necesarios para la prevención del virus, sino también asegurando un eficaz y eficiente cuidado de las personas que allí habitan.

Planificación y tecnologías, dos aspectos relevantes al hablar de smart cities, cobran hoy especial importancia en la transición hacia la salida de las medidas de confinamiento social.

Resta esperar para ver cuál será la huella pos-pandemia en las ciudades, qué tecnologías continuarán en uso o cómo se readaptarán, qué medidas serán tomadas para reordenar la dinámica de la vida cotidiana y qué aprendizajes tomarán las ciudades, los gobiernos y ciudadanos para prepararnos mejor para futuras crisis.

Quizás, un indicador de inteligencia de nuestras ciudades pase a ser la readaptación a esta nueva normalidad, pues el futuro podrá traer una disrupción en la vida cotidiana caracterizada por más tecnología y un diseño urbano que reivindique el espacio para permitir el distanciamiento social. Con ello, parece que el pos-pandemia nos trae una nueva era urbana.

Lucía Bellocchio es Directora de la Diplomatura en Smart Cities de la Escuela de Política, Gobierno y Relaciones Internacionales de la Universidad Austral

¡Excelente artículo, dear Lucía! C.M.





Fuente:https://www.clarin.com/opinion/vida-urbana-pos-pandemia_0_tnpJBOwm5.html

R322-S106-TED TALKS-Stacey Abrams: 3 questions to ask yourself about everything you do

The following information is used for educational purposes only.

TEDWomen 2018 | November 2018

Stacey Abrams: 3 questions to ask yourself about everything you do


How you respond after setbacks is what defines your character. Stacey Abrams was the first black woman in the history of the United States to be nominated by a major party for governor -- she lost that hotly contested race, but as she says: the only choice is to move forward. In an electrifying talk, she shares the lessons she learned from her campaign for governor of Georgia, some advice on how to change the world -- and a few hints at her next steps. "Be aggressive about your ambition," Abrams says.


ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Stacey Abrams · Politician
Former Georgia House Democratic Leader Stacey Abrams made history in 2018 when she earned the Democratic nomination for governor of Georgia.

Transcript:

When I was in high school at the age of 17 -- I graduated from high school in Decatur, Georgia, as valedictorian of my high school -- I was very proud of myself. I was from a low-income community, I had grown up in Mississippi, we'd moved from Mississippi to Georgia so my parents could pursue their degrees as United Methodist ministers. We were poor, but they didn't think we were poor enough, so they were going for permanent poverty.
And so, while they studied at Emory, I studied at Avondale, and I became valedictorian. Well, one of the joys of being valedictorian in the state of Georgia is that you get invited to meet the governor of Georgia. I was mildly interested in meeting him. It was kind of cool. I was more intrigued by the fact that he lived in a mansion, because I watched a lot of "General Hospital" and "Dynasty" as a child.

And so I got up that morning, ready to go to visit the governor. My mom and my dad, who were also invited, got up, and we went outside. But we didn't get in our car. And in the south, a car is a necessary thing. We don't have a lot of public transit, there aren't a lot of options. But if you're lucky enough to live in a community where you don't have a car, the only option is public transit. And that's what we had to take. And so we got on the bus. And we took the bus from Decatur all the way to Buckhead, where the Governor's Mansion sat on this really beautiful acreage of land, with these long black gates that ran the length of the property.

We get to the Governor's Mansion, we pull the little lever that lets them know this is our stop, we get off the bus, my mom, my dad and I, we walk across the street. We walk up the driveway, because there are cars coming up, cars bringing in students from all across the state of Georgia. So we're walking along the side. And as we walk single file along the side, my mom and dad sandwiching me to make sure I don't get hit by one of the cars bringing in the other valedictorians, we approach the guard gate.

When we get to the guard gate, the guard comes out. He looks at me, and he looks at my parents, and he says, "You don't belong here, this is a private event." My dad says, "No, this is my daughter, Stacey. She's one of the valedictorians." But the guard doesn't look at the checklist that's in his hands. He doesn't ask my mom for the invitation that's at the bottom of her very voluminous purse. Instead, he looks over our shoulder at the bus, because in his mind, the bus is telling him a story about who should be there. And the fact that we were too poor to have our own car -- that was a story he told himself. And he may have seen something in my skin color, he may have seen something in my attire; I don't know what went through his mind. But his conclusion was to look at me again, and with a look of disdain, say, "I told you, this is a private event.

 You don't belong here." Now, my parents were studying to become United Methodist ministers, but they were not pastors yet.
And so they proceeded to engage this gentleman in a very robust discussion of his decision-making skills.
My father may have mentioned that he was going to spend eternity in a very fiery place if he didn't find my name on that checklist. And indeed, the man checks the checklist eventually, and he found my name, and he let us inside. But I don't remember meeting the governor of Georgia. I don't recall meeting my fellow valedictorians from 180 school districts. The only clear memory I have of that day was a man standing in front of the most powerful place in Georgia, looking at me and telling me I don't belong.
And so I decided, 20-some-odd years later, to be the person who got to open the gates.

Unfortunately, you may have read the rest of the story. It didn't quite work out that way. And now I'm tasked with figuring out: How do I move forward? Because, you see, I didn't just want to open the gates for young black women who had been underestimated and told they don't belong. I wanted to open those gates for Latinas and for Asian Americans. I wanted to open those gates for the undocumented and the documented. I wanted to open those gates as an ally of the LGBTQ community. I wanted to open those gates for the families that have to call themselves the victims of gun violence. I wanted to open those gates wide for everyone in Georgia, because that is our state, and this is our nation, and we all belong here.

But what I recognized is that the first try wasn't enough. And my question became: How do I move forward? How do I get beyond the bitterness and the sadness and the lethargy and watching an inordinate amount of television as I eat ice cream?
What do I do next? And I'm going to do what I've always done. I'm going to move forward, because going backwards isn't an option and standing still is not enough.

You see, I began my race for governor by analyzing who I was and what I wanted to be. And there are three questions I ask myself about everything I do, whether it's running for office or starting a business; when I decided to start the New Georgia Project to register people to vote; or when I started the latest action, Fair Fight Georgia. No matter what I do, I ask myself three questions: What do I want? Why do I want it? And how do I get it? And in this case, I know what I want. I want change. That is what I want. But the question is: What change do I want to see?

And I know that the questions I have to ask myself are: One, am I honest about the scope of my ambition? Because it's easy to figure out that once you didn't get what you wanted, then maybe you should have set your sights a little lower, but I'm here to tell you to be aggressive about your ambition. Do not allow setbacks to set you back.

Number two, let yourself understand your mistakes. But also understand their mistakes, because, as women in particular, we're taught that if something doesn't work out, it's probably our fault. And usually, there is something we could do better, but we've been told not to investigate too much what the other side could have done. And this isn't partisan -- it's people. We're too often told that our mistakes are ours alone, but victory is a shared benefit. And so what I tell you to do is understand your mistakes, but understand the mistakes of others. And be clearheaded about it. And be honest with yourself and honest with those who support you.

But once you know what you want, understand why you want it. And even though it feels good, revenge is not a good reason.
Instead, make sure you want it because there's something not that you should do, but something you must do. It has to be something that doesn't allow you to sleep at night unless you're dreaming about it; something that wakes you up in the morning and gets you excited about it; or something that makes you so angry, you know you have to do something about it. But know why you're doing it. And know why it must be done.

You've listened to women from across this world talk about why things have to happen. But figure out what the "why" is for you, because jumping from the "what" to the "do" is meaningless if you don't know why. Because when it gets hard, when it gets tough, when your friends walk away from you, when your supporters forget you, when you don't win your first race -- if you don't know why, you can't try again.
So, first know what you want. Second, know why you want it, but third, know how you're going to get it done. I faced a few obstacles in this race.

Just a few. But in the pursuit, I became the first black woman to ever become the nominee for governor in the history of the United States of America for a major party.
But more importantly, in this process, we turned out 1.2 million African American voters in Georgia. That is more voters than voted on the Democratic side of the ticket in 2014.
Our campaign tripled the number of Latinos who believed their voices mattered in the state of Georgia. We tripled the number of Asian Americans who stood up and said, "This is our state, too." Those are successes that tell me how I can get it done. But they also let me understand the obstacles aren't insurmountable. They're just a little high.

But I also understand that there are three things that always hold us hostage. The first is finances. Now, you may have heard, I'm in a little bit of debt. If you didn't hear about it, you did not go outside.
And finances are something that holds us back so often, our dreams are bounded by how much we have in resources. But we hear again and again the stories of those who overcome those resource challenges. But you can't overcome something you don't talk about. And that's why I didn't allow them to debt-shame me in my campaign. I didn't allow anyone to tell me that my lack of opportunity was a reason to disqualify me from running. And believe me, people tried to tell me I shouldn't run. Friends told me not to run. Allies told me not to run. "USA Today" mentioned maybe I shouldn't run.

But no matter who it was, I understood that finances are often a reason we don't let ourselves dream. I can't say that you will always overcome those obstacles, but I will tell you, you will be damned if you do not try.
The second is fear. And fear is real. It is paralyzing. It is terrifying. But it can also be energizing, because once you know what you're afraid of, you can figure out how to get around it.
And the third is fatigue. Sometimes you just get tired of trying. You get tired of reading about processes and politics and the things that stop you from getting where you want to be. Sometimes, fatigue means that we accept position instead of power. We let someone give us a title as a consolation prize, rather than realizing we know what we want and we're going to get it, even if we're tired. That's why God created naps.

But we also learn in those moments that fatigue is an opportunity to evaluate how much we want it. Because if you are beaten down, if you have worked as hard as you can, if you have done everything you said you should, and it still doesn't work out, fatigue can sap you of your energy. But that's why you go back to the "why" of it.
Because I know we have to have women who speak for the voiceless. I know we have to have people of good conscience who stand up against oppression. I know we have to have people who understand that social justice belongs to us all. And that wakes me up every morning, and that makes me fight even harder. Because I am moving forward, knowing what is in my past. I know the obstacles they have for me. I know what they're going to do, and I'm fairly certain they're energizing and creating new obstacles now. But they've got four years to figure it out. Maybe two.

But here's my point: I know what I want, and that is justice. I know why I want it, because poverty is immoral, and it is a stain on our nation. And I know how I'm going to get it: by moving forward every single day. Thank you so much.

Source:www.ted.com

Debate: ¿Cómo será la nueva normalidad?, por Marita Carballo

The following information is used for educational purposes only.


Debate

¿Cómo será la nueva normalidad?

Ilustración: Daniel Roldán


Marita Carballo


13/05/2020

Es fundamental conocer los valores culturales y sus cambios en el tiempo porque las creencias juegan un rol central en el desarrollo político, social y económico.

Estudios de prestigiosos académicos del World Values Survey como Ronald Inglehart señalan que en la segunda mitad del siglo XX una gran parte de la generación de post guerra creció dando por sentada la supervivencia. Esta seguridad física y económica con eficientes estados de bienestar condujo a cambios culturales intergeneracionales generalizados. con visiones del mundo mutando de valores materialistas a post materialistas.

Así surgieron movimientos con alto apoyo a la paz, la protección del medio ambiente, los derechos humanos, la democratización y la igualdad de género, y se introdujeron con fuerza cuestiones no económicas en la agenda, eclipsando las clásicas de derecha e izquierda.

Pero esta aparición de cambios marcados provocó una reacción entre grupos que se vieron amenazados por la erosión de sus creencias y en los últimos años detectamos un backlash (reacción) cultural hacia valores más conservadores y de subsistencia.

Los mismos se vieron reforzados por una creciente desigualdad en la distribución de la riqueza que se concentró marcadamente en un porcentaje muy chico de personas y donde los sectores bajos y medio bajos experimentaron un deterioro en su posición relativa.

Altos niveles de inseguridad existencial conducen al autoritarismo, el nacionalismo, la xenofobia y el rechazo de nuevas normas culturales. Las personas que resisten y están en contra de este cambio cultural hacia valores que enfatizan la autoexpresión, individualismo y post materialismo tienden a apoyar líderes y partidos que defienden valores culturales que suelen poner el acento en llamamientos nacionalistas. Buscan líderes carismáticos y desconfían del establishment. Esta situación junto con la creciente desigualdad ha incrementado el apoyo a candidatos políticos como Marine Le Pen en Francia, Donald Trump en Estados Unidos, Salvini en Italia o Bolsonaro en Brasil.

A pesar del deseo de libertad y autonomía, cuando la supervivencia está en riesgo, esas aspiraciones se pueden ver subordinadas a la subsistencia y necesidad de orden y a la inversa cuando se dan las condiciones de seguridad estas conducen a una mayor tolerancia de los grupos externos, la apertura a nuevas ideas y normas sociales más igualitarias.

Nos encontramos en una situación de difícil previsibilidad hacia futuro y es importante estar abiertos y no ajustarnos a paradigmas que limiten nuestra visión y comprensión de los procesos sociales para poder orientar la toma de decisiones.

Sabemos que los valores morales de las personas se forman hasta alrededor de los 25años y estos tienden a ser bastante estables durante la vida. En circunstancias normales los cambios suelen ocurrir a través del reemplazo generacional y es un proceso lento. Pero estamos frente a la mayor crisis a escala mundial desde la Segunda Guerra Mundial y cabe preguntarnos cómo se comportan los valores de la gente en estos tiempos.

La pregunta es ¿cambiarán los valores a partir de la pandemia? Y si fuera así, ¿en qué dirección y cuán duraderos serán estos cambios? ¿O se volverá a lo que llamamos normalidad pre-coronavirus? No son respuestas fáciles y no hay estudios empíricos de epidemias anteriores que nos sirvan de referencia.

Investigaciones que realizamos en Gallup International y Voices sobre la pandemia indican que, a nivel global, las opiniones están divididas con 46% que piensa que habrá un cambio importante, 41% que el mundo volverá ser como era antes de la crisis y 13% que no sabe. En Argentina los resultados están en línea con el pensamiento global y en países como Alemania, Austria y Suiza la mayoría piensa que se volverá a una situación similar a la pre pandemia.

Al indagar en mayor profundidad en nuestro país acerca de los posibles cambios, vemos que no se prevén modificaciones sustantivas en la socialización. Se considera que podrán demorar un poco las reuniones sociales pero que volverán. La socialización es lo que más se extraña. Los vínculos a través de la tecnología ayudan, pero no reemplazan la relación cara a cara.

Quedaran de la pandemia las experiencias del teletrabajo y los avances en habilidades tecnológicas a los que se vio forzada gran parte de la población. Habrá mayor desarrollo del trabajo a distancia y del e-commerce.

También vinieron para quedarse cuidados preventivos de la salud como lavado frecuente de manos, no tocarse la cara, no estornudar sobre el otro, etc. Hay una revalorización de todo lo que implica el sector salud y reclamo de mayor inversión e investigación científica. Se fortalecerá en la agenda el problema de la desigualdad social que se vio muy expuesta en sus carencias y la falta de infraestructura para responder a necesidades básicas.

También, la enorme fragilidad de las pymes y de nuestra economía. Altísima preocupación, incertidumbre y angustia por la economía personal, familiar y del país que trasciende la coyuntura. Se visualiza un escenario de muy alto desempleo, cierre de empresas, quiebras, recesión. La planificación a futuro se ve dificultada por los problemas económicos y hay mucho miedo a quedar fuera del sistema.

El futuro es incierto y solo el tiempo y las nuevas investigaciones nos permitirán ver y explicar mejor. Pero hoy mi lectura es que la gente quiere volver a su vida normal y que si bien habrá cambios no se prevén sustantivos en la forma de vida. Hay nuevos aprendizajes, pero sin cambios profundos de valores y mucho temor por las urgencias económicas que se ven venir. Esperemos que en la esfera política tanto nacional como globalmente el miedo y la inseguridad no nos coarten la libertad y la consolidación de la democracia.

Marita Carballo es socióloga. Presidente de Voices! – Vicepresidente Comité Científico de la Encuesta Mundial de Valores



Fuente:https://www.clarin.com/opinion/-nueva-normalidad-_0_7Q9gaPGWh.html

TED-Ed-Elizabeth Waters:The left brain vs right brain myth

The following information is used for educational purposes only.


TED-Ed | July 2017


Elizabeth Waters:The left brain vs right brain myth


The human brain is visibly split into a left and right side. This structure has inspired one of the most pervasive ideas about the brain: that the left side controls logic and the right side controls creativity. And yet, this is a myth, unsupported by scientific evidence. So how did this idea come about, and what does it get wrong? Elizabeth Waters looks into this long held misconception. [Directed by Daniel Gray, narrated by Addison Anderson].


MEET THE EDUCATOR
Elizabeth Waters · Educator
Elizabeth Waters is a neuroscientist and educator working to enrich and expand science education.

Transcript:

Behold the human brain, it's lumpy landscape visibly split into a left and right side. This structure has inspired one of the most pervasive ideas about the brain, that the left side controls logic and the right, creativity. And yet, this is a myth unsupported by scientific evidence. So how did this misleading idea come about, and what does it get wrong? 

It's true that the brain has a right and a left side. This is most apparent with the outer layer, or the cortex. Internal regions, like the striatum, hypothalamus, thalamus, and brain stem appear to be made from continuous tissue, but in fact, they're also organized with left and right sides. The left and the right sides of the brain do control different body functions, such as movement and sight.

 The brain's right side controls the motion of the left arm and leg and vice versa. The visual system is even more complex. Each eye has a left and right visual field. Both left visual fields are sent to the right side of the brain, and both right fields are sent to the left side. So the brain uses both sides to make a complete image of the world. Scientists don't know for sure why we have that crossing over. 

One theory is it began soon after animals developed more complex nervous systems because it gave the survival advantage of quicker reflexes. If an animal sees a predator coming from its left side, it's best off escaping to the right. So we can say that vision and movement control are two systems that rely on this left-right structure, but problems arise when we over-extend that idea to logic and creativity. 

This misconception began in the mid-1800s when two neurologists, Broca and Wernicke, examined patients who had problems communicating due to injuries. The researchers found damage to the patients' left temporal lobes, so they suggested that language is controlled by the left side of the brain. That captured the popular imagination. Author Robert Louis Stevenson then introduced the idea of a logical left hemisphere competing with an emotional right hemisphere represented by his characters Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. 

But this idea didn't hold up when doctors and scientists examined patients who were missing a hemisphere or had their two hemispheres separated. These patients showed a complete range of behaviors, both logical and creative. Later research showed that one side of the brain is more active than the other for some functions. Language is more localized to the left and attention to the right. So one side of the brain may do more work, but this varies by system rather than by person. 

There isn't any evidence to suggest that individuals have dominant sides of the brain, or to support the idea of a left-right split between logic and creativity. Some people may be particularly logical or creative, but that has nothing to do with the sides of their brains. And even the idea of logic and creativity being at odds with each other doesn't hold up well. Solving complex math problems requires inspired creativity and many vibrant works of art have intricate logical frameworks. Almost every feat of creativity and logic carries the mark of the whole brain functioning as one.

Source:www.ted.com

R322-S106-TED ED-Brandon Rodriguez:The power of creative constraints

The following information is used for educational purposes only.


TED-Ed | June 2017


Brandon Rodriguez:The power of creative constraints


Imagine you were asked to invent something new. It could be whatever you want, made from anything you choose, in any shape or size. That kind of creative freedom sounds so liberating, doesn't it? Or ... does it? if you're like most people you'd probably be paralyzed by this task. Why? Brandon Rodriguez explains how creative constraints actually help drive discovery and innovation. [Directed by Bálint Farkas Gelley, narrated by Addison Anderson].


MEET THE EDUCATOR

Brandon Rodriguez · JPL Education Specialist
Brandon Rodriguez is the Educator Professional Development Specialist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory as part of a collaboration with Texas State University. Before working at JPL, he taught high school chemistry and physics. Prior to teaching, he spent seven years in the private sector doing research and development for green alternatives to petrochemical products. Brandon received his bachelors from Vanderbilt University and his Ph.D. in chemistry from Northwestern University. He holds over a dozen publications and patents, and has presented at numerous conferences in both science and education in the United States and internationally.

Transcript:


Imagine you're asked to invent something new. It could be whatever you want made from anything you choose in any shape or size. That kind of creative freedom sounds so liberating, doesn't it? Or does it? If you're like most people, you'd probably be paralyzed by this task. Without more guidance, where would you even begin? 

As it turns out, boundless freedom isn't always helpful. In reality, any project is restricted by many factors, such as the cost, what materials you have at your disposal, and unbreakable laws of physics. These factors are called creative constraints, and they're the requirements and limitations we have to address in order to accomplish a goal. Creative constraints apply across professions, to architects and artists, writers, engineers, and scientists.

 In many fields, constraints play a special role as drivers of discovery and invention. During the scientific process in particular, constraints are an essential part of experimental design. For instance, a scientist studying a new virus would consider, "How can I use the tools and techniques at hand to create an experiment that tells me how this virus infects the body's cells? And what are the limits of my knowledge that prevent me from understanding this new viral pathway?" In engineering, constraints have us apply our scientific discoveries to invent something new and useful.

 Take, for example, the landers Viking 1 and 2, which relied on thrusters to arrive safely on the surface of Mars. The problem? Those thrusters left foreign chemicals on the ground, contaminating soil samples. So a new constraint was introduced. How can we land a probe on Mars without introducing chemicals from Earth? The next Pathfinder mission used an airbag system to allow the rover to bounce and roll to a halt without burning contaminating fuel. Years later, we wanted to send a much larger rover: Curiosity. However, it was too large for the airbag design, so another constraint was defined. 

How can we land a large rover while still keeping rocket fuel away from the Martian soil? In response, engineers had a wild idea. They designed a skycrane. Similar to the claw machine at toy stores, it would lower the rover from high above the surface. With each invention, the engineers demonstrated an essential habit of scientific thinking - that solutions must recognize the limitations of current technology in order to advance it. Sometimes this progress is iterative, as in, "How can I make a better parachute to land my rover?" And sometimes, it's innovative, like how to reach our goal when the best possible parachute isn't going to work. 

In both cases, the constraints guide decision-making to ensure we reach each objective. Here's another Mars problem yet to be solved. Say we want to send astronauts who will need water. They'd rely on a filtration system that keeps the water very clean and enables 100% recovery. Those are some pretty tough constraints, and we may not have the technology for it now. But in the process of trying to meet these objectives, we might discover other applications of any inventions that result. Building an innovative water filtration system could provide a solution for farmers working in drought-stricken regions, or a way to clean municipal water in polluted cities. In fact, many scientific advances have occurred when serendipitous failures in one field address the constraints of another. 

When scientist Alexander Fleming mistakenly contaminated a Petri dish in the lab, it led to the discovery of the first antibiotic, penicillin. The same is true of synthetic dye, plastic, and gunpowder. All were created mistakenly, but went on to address the constraints of other problems. Understanding constraints guides scientific progress, and what's true in science is also true in many other fields. Constraints aren't the boundaries of creativity, but the foundation of it.

Source: www.ted.com

R322-S106-MOTIVATING PEOPLE-How to Keep Your Team Motivated, Remotely,by Lindsay McGregor and Neel Doshi

The following information is used for educational purposes only.


MOTIVATING PEOPLE

How to Keep Your Team Motivated, Remotely

by Lindsay McGregor and Neel Doshi

April 09, 2020

Photoboyko/Getty Images


Many leaders have crossed the first hurdles of moving their teams remote: ensuring colleagues have set up their tech tools, defined their processes, and permanently logged into their video conference accounts.

But this is just the first step towards creating an effective work environment for remote employees. The next critical question we must ask is: How do you motivate people who work from home?

This question is important now because, during crises such as Covid-19, people often tend to focus more on tactical work — answering the right number of tickets, or following the approved project plan — rather than adapting to solve the bigger, newer problems the business may be facing.

But some teams rise above the rest in times of turmoil, regardless of the challenges. They win market share. They earn life-long customer love. They keep their productivity high, or higher. In other words, they adapt. Though the academic research on remote productivity is mixed, with some saying it declines while others promise it increases, our research suggests that your success will depend on how you do it.

First, it’s important to note that right now, working from home is likely to reduce motivation.

Between 2010 and 2015, we surveyed more than 20,000 workers around the world, analyzed more than 50 major companies, and conducted scores of experiments to figure out what motivates people, including how much working from home plays into the equation.

When we measured the total motivation of people who worked from home versus the office, we found that working from home was less motivating. Even worse, when people had no choice in where they worked, the differences were enormous. Total motivation dropped 17 points, the equivalent of moving from one of the best to one of the most miserable cultures in their industries.

We identified three negative motivators that often lead to reduced work performance. These have likely spiked in light of the coronavirus pandemic. Emotional pressure and economic pressure are soaring as people worry about losing their jobs, paying their rent, and protecting their health. The barrage of news, questions on how to safely get groceries, and fears for relatives are deeply distressing. Inertia for work is bound to increase as people wonder if there’s a point in even trying.

We also identified three positive motivators that often lead to increased work performance. We believe these are in danger of disappearing in easy-to-miss ways during the current situation. Play, the motive that most boosts performance, could decrease if it continues to becomes harder for people to get things done from home. For example, people may miss the joy of problem-solving with a colleague, or the ease of making a decision when everyone is in one room. Purpose could also decline with team’s decreasing visibility into their impact on clients or colleagues, especially if no one is there to remind them. Lastly, potential could decline if people can’t gain access to colleagues that teach and develop them.

If business leaders don’t move to change this, shifts in people’s motivation will ultimately lead to a decline in adaptability, quality, and creativity just at the time when the post-cornavirus recovery will require productivity growth.

What Can Business Leaders Do?

When a colleague of ours was diagnosed with cancer, our first instinct was to reduce her work so she could focus on her illness. To be sure, there were times she needed 100% rest. But we quickly realized that we had taken away a major source of her play and purpose. Her work was a much needed break from the anxiety-inducing news she received each day.

This was also true for the firms we worked with during the financial crisis. We found that analysts trying to shore up the markets had the highest motivation levels of their careers during 18-hour work days. Military veterans we interviewed talked about their highest-stakes days in the same way. For the same reasons today, you see that rather than sit at home, many citizens are organizing volunteer bike courier clubs. Fitness instructors are leading classes from their rooftops or streaming them for free online. Academics are running virtual classrooms and workshops with their students.

It’s important for leaders to follow suit and remember that work can deliver a much needed boost to their teams, even when there’s little choice involved in their work-from-home situation.

The key is resisting the temptation to make work tactical only through strict processes, rules, and procedures. While some degree of boundaries and guidelines help people move quickly, too many create a vicious spiral of demotivation. In such cases, people tend to stop problem-solving and thinking creatively, and instead, do the bare minimum.

If you want your teams to be engaged in their work, you have to make their work engaging.

The most powerful way to do this is to give people the opportunity to experiment and solve problems that really matter. These problems won’t be the same for every team or organization. They may not even be easy to identify at first. Your employees will need your help to do this. Ask them: Where can we deliver amazing service to our customers? What’s broken that our team can fix? What will drive growth even in a time of fear? Why are these problems critical, valuable, and interesting?

Today, we’re collaborating with teams across the globe that are seizing this way of working. A pharmaceutical company’s clinical trials team is experimenting with ways they can help hospitals prioritize trials and maintain safety during this crisis. Teams across the tech unicorn, Flexport, are generating ideas on how to ship critical goods around the world, keep their clients’ supply chains running, and share tips to keep their suppliers in business. An insurance company is testing ways to prioritize their skyrocketing internal chat volumes and process claims in timely ways. In the teams we work with, we’ve seen productivity remain high, and in some cases, improve.

What has made them so successful is that they are not relying solely on giant new programs or approaches that need CEO approval. They are simply finding ways to make sure every single person on their teams feels like they have a challenge that they can help solve. In your own cases, this challenge can range from something as small as how to better greet customers or accommodate new schedules to something as big as moving your previously in-person business online.

Taking This Back to Your Teams

This all may sound great in theory, but if you’re wondering how to start, you’re not alone. Few organizations have been taught how to identify when and where it is OK to experiment with new ways of working — despite the fact that experimentation results in a 45-point increase in employee motivation.

Given today’s challenges with Covid-19, there’s a simple set of recommendations we give to teams who are working remotely.

First, what you measure is the single strongest signal to your people of what you care about. If you want to show them that you care about their motivation, you can measure it using our online tool or using your own preferred survey tool. Then, have a discussion with them about what might be driving their motivation up or down, and what would be helpful to maximize their motivation and experimentation in the weeks to come.

You might ask questions like: How is the current situation affecting you at the moment? What tips do people have for how to motivate yourself and find play and purpose in the current environment? This is your time to listen and create a safe environment in which everyone can talk.

Second, make sure your weekly routines are not focused only on the tactical work – the concrete plans you need to execute, like the tickets you need to answer, or boxes you need to check. Half of your week should also be focused on adaptive performance, where there is no plan to follow, but instead, experimentation and problem solving.

Generally, we recommend a simple rhythm for remote teams.

Monday: Hold a performance cycle meeting for the team that covers the following.

1-What impact did we have last week and what did we learn?

2-What commitments do we have this week? Who is on point for each?

3-How can we help each other with this week’s commitments?

4-What are the areas where we should experiment to improve performance this week?

5-What experiments will we run, and who is on point for each?

Tuesday-Thursday: Have at least one individual meeting with each of your team members. To help motivate your employees, focus on helping them tackle challenges that are a slight stretch. You can also coordinate small group meetings in which employees can collaborate on the week’s experiments and tackle problems together.

Friday: Focus on reflection. Showcase and gather input on the experiments of the week. This might include presentations from project groups during which team members share metrics and insights. It’s also important to check in on each other’s motivation and progress. As the leader, set the example by asking people how they are feeling: Where did they struggle with their motivation, and where did they thrive?

We know that this approach works because we used it during the financial crisis. When most financial services teams were doubling down on rules and processes, we helped thousands of people working in mortgage and home equity shops identify the problems they could solve, innovate, and adapt. Their motivation skyrocketed, and they outperformed the status quo by 200%, finding creative win-win solutions for the financial institutions they worked at and the customers who were in danger of losing their homes.

As we saw in the 2008, it is possible for teams to experiment and adapt. We also saw that it is possible for teams to freeze under pressure and recede. Make it your mission to achieve the former and achieve greater levels of growth and productivity as a remote team than as an in-person team. This is a challenge that can keep you energized and experimenting long after this crisis is behind us.


Lindsay McGregor is the co-author of the New York Times Bestseller, Primed to Perform, and the co-founder and CEO of Vega Factor, a technology and consulting firm dedicated to ending low-performing cultures. Previously, Lindsay was a consultant at McKinsey & Company, focused on large scale transformations. Lindsay earned her bachelors from Princeton University, and her MBA from Harvard University.

Neel Doshi is the co-author of the New York Times Bestseller, Primed to Perform, and the co-founder of Vega Factor. Previously, Neel was a Partner at McKinsey & Company, and the CTO of Genesant Technologies and Technology Director of Finance.com. Neel earned his bachelors in engineering from MIT, and his MBA from the Wharton School.



Source:https://hbr.org/2020/04/how-to-keep-your-team-motivated-remotely?

R322-S106-CRISIS MANAGEMENT-What Good Leadership Looks Like During This Pandemic, by Michaela J. Kerrissey and Amy C. Edmondson

The following information is used for educational purposes only.



CRISIS MANAGEMENT

What Good Leadership Looks Like During This Pandemic

by Michaela J. Kerrissey and Amy C. Edmondson

April 13, 2020

Left: Hagen Hopkins/Getty Images; Right: Jun Sato/Getty Images


The speed and scope of the coronavirus crisis poses extraordinary challenges for leaders in today’s vital institutions. It is easy to understand why so many have missed opportunities for decisive action and honest communication. But it is a mistake to think that failures of leadership are all we can expect in these grim times.

Consider Adam Silver, the commissioner of the National Basketball Association (NBA), who — way back on March 11 — took the then-surprising step of suspending the professional basketball league for the season. Silver’s decision was one of the earliest high-profile responses to the virus outside China. He delivered it at a time of great uncertainty; coincidentally, March 11 was the day that the World Health Organization formally designated the coronavirus a pandemic.

When the situation is uncertain, human instinct and basic management training can cause leaders — out of fear of taking the wrong steps and unnecessarily making people anxious — to delay action and to downplay the threat until the situation becomes clearer. But behaving in this manner means failing the coronavirus leadership test, because by the time the dimensions of the threat are clear, you’re badly behind in trying to control the crisis. Passing that test requires leaders to act in an urgent, honest, and iterative fashion, recognizing that mistakes are inevitable and correcting course — not assigning blame — is the way to deal with them when they occur.

In a moment of tremendous ambiguity, Silver’s decisive action — well before state governments began restricting public gatherings in the United States — set off a chain of events that almost certainly altered the course of the virus. Over a million fans would now avoid potential exposure at games. Moreover, the decision had a powerful ripple effect: The suspension of the NCAA’s historic “March Madness” college tournament; the National Hockey League (NHL), Major League Baseball (MLB), and other sports leagues halting their own operations; and the rescheduling of the Boston Marathon.

That this action happened in the sports arena may be material. Here was the NBA, an organization with more than $8 billion in 2019 revenue, known for physical prowess and competitiveness, not excess caution, acting with what appeared at the time to be great caution and reserve.

It got people thinking.

But could a politician ever show similar courage in getting out ahead of the virus before its impact was widely apparent? In fact, that is exactly what happened in New Zealand. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s response to the pandemic back on March 21 was bold and engendered public support. That day, Ardern delivered an eight-minute televised statement to the nation in which she announced a four-level Covid-19 alert system. Modeled on fire risk systems already in use in New Zealand, this familiar approach set clear guidelines for how the government would step up its response — and what would be asked of citizens as infection rates grew.

The prime minister’s announcement, when New Zealand had only 52 confirmed cases, set the alert level at two, restricting some travel and urging people to limit contact. But when cases grew to 205 four days later, the alert system was raised to level four, triggering a nationwide lockdown. While her political peers — heads of state around the world — worried about their ability to maintain public support for sweeping restrictions, Ardern’s actions showed that honesty and caring yield support. A national poll put her government at over 80% public approval as of March 27. And, although uncertainty remains high, as of April 7 the number of new cases in New Zealand had fallen for two consecutive days. The country reported only 54 cases on April 6 and only one Covid-19 death since the pandemic started, leading to the Washington Post headline: “New Zealand isn’t just Flattening the Curve. It’s Squashing it.”

Importantly, Ardern’s explicit step system meant that people knew in advance that escalation was coming. They knew what would be required of them — and they accepted the challenge.

How a message is delivered matters. Ardern’s communication was clear, honest, and compassionate: It acknowledged the daily sacrifices to come and inspired people to forge ahead in bearing them together. Ardern closed her March 21 address by thanking New Zealanders for all they were about to do. And her powerful parting words were soon picked up around the globe as people looked for direction in the fog: “Please be strong, be kind, and unite against Covid-19.”

What Ardern and Silver got right in March, before the situation was clear to much of the public, reveals a great deal about what good leadership looks like during this pandemic. Understanding what’s required of leaders in this moment starts with appreciation for the type of problem this pandemic presented in its initial phases. When warning signs are fuzzy and potential harm could be large, leaders confront what management scholars call an ambiguous threat. Given the human desire to hope a threat is small, we are drawn to act as if that is factually the case. Fiascos ranging from NASA’s Columbia Shuttle disaster in 2003 to the 2008 financial system collapse have brought into sharp relief the unique challenge that ambiguous threats pose to leaders: cognitive biases, dysfunctional group dynamics, and organizational pressures push them toward discounting the risk and delaying action, often to catastrophic ends.

It takes a unique kind of leadership to push against the natural human tendency to downplay and delay. Far too many leaders instead try to send upbeat messages assuring all is well — which, in the current tragedy, has unfortunately led to unnecessary lost life at a scale that may never be accurately counted. But this is by no means the only path for leaders to take. Building on the cases of Silver and Ardern, we distill four lessons for leaders in a novel crisis.

1. Act with urgency.

A well-documented and pernicious problem with any ambiguous threat is the (understandable) tendency to wait for more information and clarity. The risks of delaying decision-making are often invisible. But in a crisis, wasting vital time in the vain hope that greater clarity will prove no action is needed is dangerous — particularly in the face of a pandemic with an exponential growth rate, when each additional day of delay contributes even greater devastation than the last. Against the natural tendency toward delay, acting with urgency means leaders jump into the fray without all the information they would dearly like. Both Ardern and Silver acted early, well before others in similar circumstances and well before the future was clear. It was what Ardern publicly described as an explicit choice to “go hard and go early.”

2. Communicate with transparency.

Communicating bad news is a thankless task. Leaders who get out ahead risk demoralizing employees, customers, or citizens, threatening their popularity. It takes wisdom and some courage to understand that communicating with transparency is a vital antidote to this risk. As Ardern stated in her early national address:

I understand that all of this rapid change creates anxiety and uncertainty. Especially when it means changing how we live. That’s why today I am going to set out for you as clearly as possible, what you can expect as we continue to fight the virus together.

Since that announcement, Ardern has delivered regular public addresses, including some in a sweatshirt recorded obviously from home. Silver similarly sent a barrage of memos throughout the NBA organization as his decision-making process unfolded. As reported on ESPN, 16 (yes, 16!) “Hiatus Memos” were delivered to the teams as of March 19.

Communicating with transparency means providing honest and accurate descriptions of reality — being as clear as humanly possible about what you know, what you anticipate, and what it means for people. It is crucial to convey your message in a way that people can understand, as Ardern did by echoing the familiar four-level alert system. But communication cannot be utterly devoid of hope or people will simply give in to despair. Somewhere in that communication must be a hopeful vision of the future toward which people can direct their energy, because without hope, resolve is impossible.

3. Respond productively to missteps.

Because of the novelty and complexity of a pandemic — or any other large system failure — problems will arise regardless of how well a leader acts. How leaders respond to the inevitable missteps and unexpected challenges is just as important as how they first address the crisis.

First, they must not revert to defensiveness or blame when mistakes are made. Instead, they must stay focused on the goal and look ahead to continue solving the next and most pressing problems. For instance, when New York’s Mayor Bill de Blasio lambasted the unfairness of NBA players accessing tests that remained out of reach for the rest of America, Silver publicly acknowledged the criticism, accepted it as valid, and emphasized the (real) fundamental problem of the testing shortage — with an eye on the larger picture. He said, “I, of course, understand [de Blasio’s] point, and it is unfortunate that we are at this position in this society where it’s triage where it comes to testing. So, the fundamental issue is obviously that there are insufficient tests.”

In short, it is not our intention to suggest that the NBA’s response to the virus was perfect but rather to point out that Silver took the criticism in and kept focused on the key issue of fighting the pandemic and making tests more widely available. The important response to any misstep is to listen, acknowledge, and orient everyone toward problem-solving.

4. Engage in constant updating.

An all-too-common misconception of good leadership is that a leader must be steady and unrelenting in staying the course. Certainly, steadiness is required in these times. But given the novelty and rapid evolution of the pandemic, it is wrong to think that the work of the leader is to set a course and stick to it. Leaders must constantly update their understanding of prior probabilities, even daily, deliberately using strategies to elicit new information and learn rapidly as events unfold and new information comes to light.

Doing this means relying on expert advisors and energetically seeking diverse opinions. Silver drew on a long and diverse list of advisors as he has made his way through this crisis: from the NBA’s director of sports medicine, John DiFiori, to his colleagues based in China who saw the virus’ early toll, to a former U.S. surgeon general, Vivek Murthy. A leader’s advisory team in the face of an ambiguous threat may change over time, because new information often means new problems have surfaced and the necessary expertise will shift accordingly. Finding and leveraging the right people for evolving problems is part of the updating challenge.


Tapping into Suffering to Build Meaning

Perhaps Silver and Ardern’s proactive responses were accidents of history rather than a special brilliance. When the first reports of the coronavirus reached Silver, he was writing a eulogy for his longtime mentor, former NBA Commissioner David Stern. It was also not long after former star player Kobe Bryant and eight others suddenly died in a helicopter crash. These events, although unrelated to Covid-19, may have put Silver in a reflective mood that helped him to see the emerging threat of the virus through a human lens. Similarly, Jacinda Ardern was feeling somber in March, which brought the one-year anniversary of the Christchurch mosque shootings that killed 51 people, the deadliest mass shooting in her country’s history.

Most people in positions of authority have seen great suffering or experienced loss — or at least their advisors have — and yet far too many failed to decisively take potentially unpopular action in the critical days as the virus gained momentum. They might argue that they were trying to remain professional: to stay rational and dispassionate, to keep their personal emotion at bay, and bide their time. But the cases of Ardern and Silver suggest an opposite approach.

We believe that leadership is strengthened by continually referring to the big picture as an anchor for meaning, resisting the temptation to compartmentalize or to consider human life in statistics alone.

Leadership in an uncertain, fast-moving crisis means making oneself available to feel what it is like to be in another’s shoes — to lead with empathy. Perhaps in the coming weeks the unfortunate scale of this pandemic will make empathy easier for many leaders. But awful scale can also have a numbing effect. It will be incumbent on leaders to put themselves in another’s suffering, to feel with empathy and think with intelligence, and then to use their position of authority to make a path forward for us all. Crises of historical proportion can make for leaders of historical distinction, but that is far from guaranteed.

Michaela J. Kerrissey is an assistant professor of management at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

Amy C. Edmondson is the Novartis Professor of Leadership and Management at Harvard Business School. She is the author of The Fearless Organization: Creating Psychological Safety in the Workplace for Learning, Innovation, and Growth (Wiley, 2019).


Source:https://hbr.org/2020/04/what-good-leadership-looks-like-during-this-pandemic?