Category Archives: About Dorothy

Sending you season’s greetings for Christmas, 2012

About Dorothy,

Christmas Day is just four days away and today I shall be sitting down to write Christmas greetings.  The last few weeks have been busy and I feel as though I am running to catch up.  I take a moment to – well, breathe –  and find myself looking back over the year which is rapidly drawing to a close and forward to the year ahead.

It’s been a mixed year.  Please don’t tell my Mum but in March, I was actually quite pleased at the thought of a sun-drenched drought and connected with pleasant memories of 1976 – and then it started to rain, and rain, and rain… My tomatoes were a wash-out, though many other vegetables did well despite the slugs.  Any suffering is nothing compared to what many people are enduring who have had to leave their homes in recent weeks due to flooding – it seems quite out of order to complain.

In London, people did complain about every aspect of the Olympics ahead of time – until the opening ceremony blew our socks off and we all (yes, I think it was very nearly “all”) got caught up in the spirit of the games.  After Chad le Clos unexpectedly beat Michael Phelps in the swimming I bumped into his father on the underground and enjoyed a moment of celebration for him and his son as our eyes met on the stairs.  It was a sweet moment.

It seemed to be a year of holidays for me as I took in a few days to soak up the Olympic spirit, a meditation retreat with my dear friend Andy, a week in Scotland (around Scotland by train – the photo is from this trip) with my mother and, just last weekend, Luxembourg and Paris on tour with the London Symphony Chorus.  In the choir, Simon Halsey has taken us by storm since he joined us in the autumn.

Work has been steady, with coaching and assessment at its core.  I have particularly enjoyed the quality of relationship both with coaching clients and with colleagues (you know who you are).  I had some articles published.  Some things have taken longer than I intended – my new website is still a work in progress and yet to be unveiled.  At the same time, the process of working on my marketing and website has helped me connect to my yearning for one or two big projects in 2013 – working with an organisation to develop an effective senior leadership team, for example, or to develop a coaching style and culture throughout the organisation. I bless these yearnings and send them out into the world.

In my private life, there were entrances and exits amongst family and friends – my mother recently attended four funerals in a fortnight.  Some were timely but one was untimely – or so it seems to me at this time – and I hold his family in my heart.  In public life, one scandal followed another.  Barack Obama got elected for a second term.

I started the year in the midst of building works as my new kitchen was in progress – now much loved and enjoyed.  It ends with some work to the hall and stairs in progress – the sander, and Radio 4, are the background today to my writing this posting and sending Christmas greetings to you.

I would say “to you all” – but I catch myself just in time, taking time to connect with you – yes, you – individually even as I write.  I take a moment to notice what I wish for you as Christmas approaches and as 2012 gives way to 2013.  I notice I want the ultimate for you – not riches and prosperity in these challenging times so much as faith, deep faith, that your needs matter and that you will be supported on your journey no matter what life brings.  This matters not so much because (in the words of the song) there may be trouble ahead.  No, it matters because, when we have faith, as well as facing the challenges with equanimity, we can enjoy the good times without worrying for the future.

With that, and whatever road you are travelling, I wish you a merry Christmas 2012, and many good things in 2013.

Reflecting on my gardening year

About Dorothy, All articles, Developing as a leader, ,

Summer is drawing to a close – and what a summer!  Predictions of a drought to knock 1976 into a cocked hat became the subject of ridicule as the rain poured and poured and, well, poured… breaking one record and then another.  Sitting in my garden recently, I found myself reflecting on my gardening year.

This is the first year I have sown anything from seed and I have had a good number of successes.  I have grown broad beans, runner beans, French beans – the runner beans from beans harvested from last year’s crop.  I have grown Swiss chard, and three different types of courgettes – green courgettes, yellow courgettes and summer squash.  I have grown butternut squash, potatoes and tomatoes.  I have grown marigolds and nasturtium.  I have grown aubergine and cucumbers, lettuce, fennel – even cauliflowers.  Recently, visiting my local farmer’s garden, I noticed how many of the vegetables I most admired were ones I have in abundance in my own garden.

It hasn’t all been plain sailing.  The tomatoes have suffered terribly in the rain and I have had to pull out and dispose of tomatoes with blight.  Of those that remain, I have only had ripe tomatoes in the last two or three weeks and even then, very few – what a wash-out!  I have discovered that some plants really do need to be in a green house – the aubergines and cucumbers in particular.  I don’t (yet) have a greenhouse, though I have started to ponder what size greenhouse I need and where I might put it in my garden which is spacious by urban standards and nonetheless modest in size.

I really celebrate my learning.  I can grow things from seed and they are naturally inclined to grow.  In this less-than-sunny year my vegetables have grown much better on one side of the garden than the other.  I’ve learnt a few more ways to reduce the number of slugs and snails in my garden.  I’ve learnt – after upwards of 40 years without eating a broad bean – that I can eat broad beans and (in some dishes at least) enjoy them.  And as I learn more about my garden I am also slowly developing a plan for it.  I know where I want to grow vegetables, taking into account the position of the garden and where the sun shines.  I know where I want to have a seating area for breakfast and another shady seating area for lunch at midday.  I have learnt that I experience an unbelievable amount of pleasure – a deep, deep joy – from sowing and tending and planting my own seeds.  I have been reminded of nature’s abundance and the joy of giving away my excess harvest.

After a while I realised that my reflections were like the annual reviews that are carried out in many organisations.  I also realised that my reflection in hindsight were rather different from my reflections at certain moments during the year, when my focus was overwhelmingly on the challenges of my garden – the blight on my tomatoes, the impossibility of staying on top of the weeds and the slugs and snails in what seemed like interminable rain.  For me, this ‘annual review’ of my gardening year, seated with a cup of tea in the midst of the harvest of my labours brought nothing but joy, pure joy.  I was able to embrace my successes and to notice areas where I still have much to learn.  I was able to look ahead and to begin to plan for the year(s) ahead without any sense of being somehow in ‘deficit’.  I was able to differentiate between gaps in my learning and the impact of circumstances beyond my control.

If only the workplace annual review could be a joyous event, too.  I wonder, what would this take in your organisation?

For your holiday reading: The Hare With Amber Eyes

About Dorothy

It’s two years since my dear friend, Len Williamson, recommended a book I had not yet heard of – Edmund de Waal’s The Hare With Amber Eyes.  Of course, having been recommended to read it, I started to notice the window displays of this book, the winner of the 2012 Costa Biography Award.

My first response was to dip into the book and, discovering the book’s focus on a set of Japanese netsuke (tiny carved figures that would sit easily in the palm of your hand), I think immediately of my brother Alan, whose years of working with a Japanese company have made him a willing student of Japanese culture and language.  So, 18 months or more before reading it myself, I gave it to Alan as a gift.  More recently, I bought my own copy and started to read it, discovering far more than I had imagined in this biography of de Waal’s family, mediated via the journey of the netsuke through generations of the Ephrussi family.

Early in the book I am transported into familiar territory – it was Charles Ephrussi who first assembled the collection of netsuke in Paris in the second half of the 19th century.  Charles lived amongst artists and writers with whom I am familiar via my own studies so that I am transported back to the literature I loved so much in my late teens and early twenties.  I am intrigued to learn that Charles was one of two men who were the model for the book’s subject, Charles Swann.  There is something about this period of the netsuke’s lives that brings to life in a very vivid way the era in which Proust was writing, anchoring his work amongst the work of other writers and artists.

When the netsuke move to Vienna – as a wedding gift to Charles’s cousin Viktor and his wife – I am similarly transported into the territory of my studies, gaining new insights into the work of Robert Musil, Arthur Schnitzler and other contemporary writers.  De Waal writes of the opulent lives of his forbears in ways which remind me of his own life as one of the world’s leading ceramic artists – there is something about his use of language which renders it almost physical, as if one were feeling his words in one’s hands.  As well as writing an intimate portrait and memoire of his family, De Waal captures the sweep of history as it unfolds.

And it does unfold, into the territory of twentieth century anti-Semitism and warfare.  I did not expect to make this journey, though it makes perfect sense when I do – how could it be otherwise for de Waal’s Jewish ancestors?  Charles’ cousin Viktor invests heavily in the war effort in World War I, only to have his life and fortunes over-turned in the horrifying events of World War II.  Suddenly I am in a reading territory which has become familiar to me (through such books as Katrin Himmler’s The Himmler Brothers and Christopher Browning’s Ordinary Men) only this time, I am seeing it through the eyes of those who were the target of Nazi violence and anti-Semitism.

There are moments throughout the book when de Waal’s reflections of his own experience of researching his family history remind me of the great therapist and author, Irvin Yalom, who has the same ability to be present both to the subject of his writing and to his own response to those things – people, events etc. – he writes about.  It is these moments that help me to connect with de Waal and to connect the history I have so often read about elsewhere with real people whose lives have been so materially altered by historic events.

If you want some thriller to keep you company on the beach this book is definitely not for you.  For me it was a rare and unforgettable read.    

When it’s time for the big leadership speech

About Dorothy, Developing as a leader,
Singing Berlioz’s Grande Messe des Morts
St. Paul’s Cathedral, 2012

Thursday, 2nd August, 2012.  It’s a date that members of the London Symphony Chorus have been urged to earmark.  It’s a date that some have been waiting for.  Simon Halsey, recently confirmed as Chorus Director for both the London Symphony Chorus and the London Symphony Orchestra, is due to address members of the chorus.

I come to the meeting with both excitement and trepidation.  I am excited because I remember the standard of the chorus when I first joined and yearn for a return to the same high standards.  I am trepidatious because I am not as young as I was when I joined the choir in 1986/7 and I’m wondering if I have what it takes to commit – this is both about the “will I pass my reaudition?” question (and in my case, “should I be moving to sing with the altos?”) and about the time and commitment the choir has demanded.  It’s quite something to sustain this level of commitment year after year after year.

Starting at 6pm, Simon addresses the choir for about half an hour before taking questions.  He sets out his stall in terms of aspiration – in summary, that the Chorus under his leadership will be a world class choir that consistently produces staggeringly (I think the word was staggering) good performances.  He has also anticipated questions, and lays out his stall in terms of how he thinks we might get there – this is not the time for the big cull, but rather, a time to invest in voice coaching and careful preparation.

This doesn’t mean that every question has been answered.  So, when it comes to the question that is on many lips (reaudition), Simon is candid in saying that, whilst he has yet to agree an approach to reauditions with the Chorus’s council, he won’t be reauditioning existing members of the chorus until he has worked with them for a number of months.  He talks about the approach he has taken with other choirs and also about the principles which underpin his approach.

Listening both to his speech and to his answers to questions, I notice that I am excited and reassured.  I have such a sense of relief that our new Chorus Director has aspirations for the chorus that take us beyond our (albeit rather good – at times) current standards.  I am excited when I think of the possibilities that this opens up for us and I am excited about the possibilities for me.

There’s also something else going on for me, remembering the many leaders I have interviewed over the years who have started their tenure in a new role or organisation with the ‘big speech’.  Halsey is continuing a long tradition which embraces leaders of all kinds, from teachers in the classroom (“when I tell you to put your pencils down, I also want you to stop talking and listen to what I have to say”) to the CEOs of significant organisations and yes, to men and women who have made history.

The big speech is not about charisma or grand, sweeping gestures – it’s about substance.  It’s about setting out a vision for the future which engages and a way to get there.  It is an invitation to sign up to a clear direction or to notice that this is not your path – to commit or to stand down.  It says things are going to be different – and this is how.

Of course, as such, the vision is the beginning of a journey.  Its impact depends on the leader’s commitment to making that journey.  Ahead lies the difference between real progress and “we’ve heard it all before”.

I am looking forward to making real progress.

Yeah! It’s holiday time!

About Dorothy

I had a sweet moment on the London underground last Thursday, when I had the briefest of brief encounters with this man.  Walking slowly in one direction amongst crowds of commuters seeded with Olympic visitors, I suddenly recognised him coming the other way.  Before I even realised I was smiling, he beamed back.  And then he was gone as we both moved slowly forward and in opposite directions in the crowds.

And in case you don’t recognise this man, he’s Burt le Clos, father of South African swimmer Chad le Clos.  As if his son’s victory wasn’t enough (against le Clos’s swimming hero, America’s Michael Phelps) audiences were moved, both by le Clos’s barely contained emotion as he received his first gold medal and by his father’s impromptu interview with BBC’s Clare Balding which, memeburn reports, has quickly become an internet sensation.

London is gripped with Olympic fever.  And despite everyone’s worst fears (wrapped up as cynicism and criticism) it’s all going well.  The fact that I have had to negotiate a bit of a round London tour to get from the underground to London Bridge’s Platform 4 is amply compensated by tiny moments like the one above.  I knew they would be.

In the next couple of weeks I shall be taking time off to enjoy these and other experiences.  As I write – ahead of my holiday, though scheduled to be published as my holiday begins – I am thinking, I can’t wait!  So this is my ‘sign off’ for the next couple of weeks.

Just in case you want some reading, I’ve programmed some postings for you to enjoy whilst I’m away from my desk.  Have a great time.

When you need permission to see the wood from the trees

About Dorothy, Clients and testimonials, , ,

Every now and then I like to do something that coaches call ‘claiming a client’.  It’s a bit like asking someone you fancy to join you on a first date – letting someone know that you’d really like to work with them in coaching partnership.

In 2007 I reached out to an organisation whose service I have enjoyed for more years now than I care to remember:  Pret a Manger.  I wrote to the company’s co-founder, Julian Metcalfe, and told him how much I would like to contribute to the company’s success in my role as a coach.  As a result of reaching out I was asked to work with Glenn Edwards as part of his ongoing development.  Glenn has been Operations Director at Leon Restaurants for over 18 months now, though I first met him whilst he was still working at itsu – Pret a Manger’s sister company.  He had already had eight years with itsu when I met him and had built a strong relationship with Julian Metcalfe and with Clive Schlee, the company’s CEO.

Even so, when I started to talk with Glenn, I sensed that there was a risk for him of seeking to grow faster than was comfortable with itsu and I started to ask questions to find out what was going on.  As you can tell from Glenn’s later CV, he did indeed end up leaving itsu to join a growing brand which shares the Pret/itsu passion for good fresh food and for a level of service which, together, drew me to Pret a Manger in the first place.  (Recently, Pret’s new restaurant on New Oxford Street has become a regular haunt for members of the London Symphony Chorus before rehearsals.  You’ll often see me there on a Wednesday or Thursday evening at around 6pm).

The conversations I had with Glenn are an example of something coaches face on a regular basis – the possibility that the outcome a client and/or his or her sponsor most desires is not, ultimately, the right outcome for everyone concerned.  An individual may think his place is in such-and-such a role or with company X and still, when he looks more deeply, the role is only a partial fit to his or her most heartfelt needs.  The company concerned may want to retain a key member of the team and still – if only his or her manager will entertain the possibility – it may be that what’s right for my client is to move on.  This carries the risk for the coach of being seen as the agent of an unwelcome change.  It carries the risk for the coach that – by raising the question – he or she will be seen to be sure of the answer (which is always the client’s to determine).  Still, and even in the full awareness of these and other risks, it is the role of the coach to raise the questions that have not yet been countenanced, bringing them to consciousness for the client to consider.

Meeting with Glenn more than three years after we completed our coaching, I was curious to know how he looked back on our work together as well as how he was getting on in his new role.  He was kind enough to tell me and agreed to allow me to share his thoughts on LinkedIn as well as here on my blog.  He told me:

“When we finished our work together I honestly didn’t know how I’d benefitted from coaching.  A lot of things happened during and after coaching and yet I wasn’t making the link.  Later, I realised that the message from coaching was this:  it’s time to move on.


I realised I’d maximised my potential with itsu – coaching helped me to see it was time to move on.  I’d met the owners of Leon when they visited one of our restaurants so once I was ready to move it was the most natural thing in the world to make contact.  Working with itsu was formative for me – an important part of my career.  At the same time, I needed a new challenge and the opportunity to leverage my strengths to make a real difference to the business.  I’m glad to have found that with Leon.


Sometimes, people need the help from someone who’s one step removed from the situation.  You provided that through our coaching – and that’s why I’m happy to recommend you to others who need help to step back and see the wood from the trees”.

Glenn Edwards
Leon Restaurants

Reading Glenn’s testimonial I don’t want to take any more credit than is mine to take – at its best, coaching works because it helps the client to open up to truths that are already there if only the permission is there to see them.

(And yes, in case you’re wondering, I remain a fan of Pret a Manger, of itsu – and of Leon Restaurants, too).

Lost your temper with your staff? You need to express your regret

About Dorothy, Developing as a leader, Emotional Intelligence, ,

So, you did it.  Like Maestro Papadopoulos (see Lost your temper with your staff?  You may have lost more besides), you spoke sharply with a member or members of your staff.  Time has elapsed.  You realise you made a mistake in speaking in the way you did.  You’ve taken time to process your anger.  You’ve learnt from the experience.  What next?

You may be hoping that it’s enough to show up differently next time.  If you do, you’ll be joining the legions of bosses who, having lost their temper, are “extra nice” next time round – but it’s not enough.  Why?  After all, surely your staff can tell that you’re sorry from your behaviour?  Well, yes, and still, knowing this alone is not enough.

What more do your staff want?  They want understanding for the experience they had on the receiving end of your anger.  They want to know that you understand the impact it had on them – some call this empathy.  They want to know that you’re ready to take responsibility for your actions and eager to learn to handle things differently in future.  This helps them to feel safe.  They also want judgement – discernment, acceptance:  even if (especially if) you have to deal with performance that is below par, they need to know that you can separate them – the person, the people – from their behaviour.  These needs may be hidden from your staff behind their own “righteous anger” towards you – unless they have high levels of emotional maturity they won’t forgive you until you’ve expressed your regret.

Now, I do want to differentiate between expressing your regret and saying sorry.  This isn’t about beating yourself up or putting yourself in the wrong.  Nor is it about the kind of insincere apology that London commuters make even as they push you to one side to get to where they want to go.  This is about connecting with, and expressing, your sincere regret.  For Maestro Papadopoulos, such an expression might have gone something like this:

“I said a couple of things I regretted at our rehearsal on Tuesday.  I said it wasn’t acceptable to me that members of the choir were missing from our rehearsal and I said it in a way which put those of you who’d made the effort to get here on time in the wrong.  And I also compared the children’s choir with the ‘famous London Symphony Chorus’ in a way that put your choir in a bad light.  Afterwards I felt bad about this because I realised it was my nerves talking – I wanted to offer our audience a great performance and I felt anxious about the concert.  I also realise that, as amateur singers many of you came to sing at the end of a hard days work in preparation for a concert and the last thing you needed was to be on the receiving end of my anger.  I wish I had handled the situation with more grace”.


There is at least one paradox at play here, as there often is in life.  The first is this:  that beating ourselves up (“I made a right mess of that rehearsal… I shouldn’t have said what I did…” etc.) somehow doesn’t lead us to take responsibility for our actions.  Rather, it takes courage and self compassion to really step up to the plate.  A second paradox is this:  as leaders, it is our very ability to express our sincere regret about actions which fell below our aspirations that make our staff think highly of us.  We need to accept ourselves as human, just like everybody else, before we can make the kind of expression of regret that staff can receive.


So, I have said about as much as I want to say right now on the subject of losing your temper with your staff.  I wonder, what has been your experience?  And what have you found in these postings that has enabled you to do things differently?  I’d love to hear about your experiences via the comments section of this blog.

Singing the Grande Messe des Morts at St. Paul’s Cathedral

About Dorothy, All articles,
Photo: The timp line up for tonight's Grande Messe des Morts at St Paul's Cathedral - all 10 of them. It's completely sold out tonight but still a few left for tomorrow (http://bit.ly/PbpWlZ), and it'll be live on Radio 3 tomorrow too.
Yes, I was there, singing Berlioz’ extraordinary piece – the Grande Messe des Morts.  A requiem for the dead on a grand scale.  David Jackson, percussionist extraordinaire with the London Symphony Orchestra, took this photo of the timps section during rehearsal in the afternoon.  One of the players was a dead ringer for comedian Rob Brydon which intrigued me all the way through the rehearsal.  It was a noisy affair – the piece itself alternates between passages of great richness of sound and moments of sparseness.  (With more time I would hone my language in an attempt to convey something of this amazing piece).  And of course, in rehearsal, we shared the space with visitors to the cathedral with their murmurings and occasional applause.
The performance was altogether different.  Even with a full audience the sound space belonged to the performers and – more than the performers – to Berlioz.  The off-stage brass were high in the galleries so that the Tuba Mirum was a moment of high drama with the interplay between orchestra, off-stage brass and the men who were in fine sound.  I shall leave it to the critics to say more.
Singing in St. Paul’s is always a mixed blessing.  The sound reverberates around the space so that the old jokes are always about coming back in a week’s time to hear the performance for the last time.  There were moments when our conductor, Sir Colin Davis, paused so that we could, indeed, hear the sound before it faded away.  This is a new way of experiencing the phrase “right back atcha!”  This added to the heightened experience of an already grand piece.
At the same time, it is this very soundscape that makes it a challenging venue in which to perform.  You cannot rely on listening to know if you are singing in time!  There were moments when I thought fellow performers – singers, orchestra, off-stage brass – were ahead or behind Sir Colin’s beat and still, it’s hard to know what the effect was for the audience.
For me, it was something of a marathon.  Like all marathon runners, singers need the right shoes and the truth is that, for me, no shoes is the optimum way to stand for such a long period and also strictly verboten.  Still I might try it this evening (don’t tell my voice rep).  For yes, I’ll be performing again this evening before getting up at the crack of dawn tomorrow for a coaching session in the morning.  And now, I am on my way to meet one of my clients for another coaching session.
Before I press “publish” I take a moment to savour the rich privileges of a life in which I get to earn my living doing work I love and spend my spare time doing something else that I also love.  Maybe I’ll see you there this evening.

Berlioz and a tinnitus of timps

About Dorothy

Shortly I’ll be closing down my computer to go and sing – I’m taking the afternoon off to rehearse at St. Paul’s Cathedral for a concert this evening of Berlioz’ Grande Messe des Morts.  Yesterday we rehearsed at the Barbican and I wondered, “What is the collective noun for timps?”  A herd of kettle drums?  I don’t think so… a tinnitus of timps, perhaps.  I counted thirteen – for this is a work of epic proportions.  We are also two choirs – the London Symphony Chorus and the London Philharmonic Choir.

Whilst our focus is on the concerts that lie ahead, there are memorable moments – striking in the moment – during rehearsals and yesterday was one.  We gathered at the Barbican’s concert hall for our first tutti rehearsal.  The orchestra alone filled the extended concert platform so someone came up with the idea of placing our conductor – our much loved Sir Colin Davis – at the rear of the concert platform, with the orchestra facing him and the choir singing from the stalls.  The Barbican was ours and ours alone.  The effect was to combine the grandeur of the piece with a sense of intimacy as if, somehow, this was a performance for us, and us alone.


As I start to gather together all that I need for this evening’s concert – concert dress, black handbag, music, make-up – I start to imagine the same musicians in the much larger venue of St. Paul’s Cathedral and to recognise the challenge we face.  Yesterday Sir Colin was so far away – will we be any closer today?  We need to watch him like a hawk to follow his tempi for with so many musicians we cannot rely on sound which takes time to travel.  And that’s before we factor in the pauses, the changes of tempo in the midst of movements…

I take time for one final action from my ‘to do’ list before I go and send a quick e-mail to friends and family before I go.  It reads:

Dear friends and LSC groupies


I’ll be going off to rehearse shortly for our two concerts (this evening and tomorrow) of Berlioz’ Grande Messe des Morts.  You just can’t beat the live performance of such an epic piece!


Still, in case you won’t be at the concert and would like to know what I get up to in my spare time, listen out on BBC’s Radio 3 tomorrow – for details just follow this link:  http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01jz3z1.  And if you’d like to book tickets you’ll find them at http://lso.co.uk/page/3090/City-of-London-Festival-2012-Berlioz-Requiem/544.


Much love


Dorothy


Memories are made of such moments as this.

Lost your temper with your staff? You may have lost more besides

About Dorothy, Developing as a leader, Emotional Intelligence, ,

Without fail, singing with the London Symphony Chorus inspires me – and often to write a blog posting.  Sometimes, the inspiration is “not in a good way”. This is the way it was last Tuesday.

It started well for me – I arrived early and listened to young pianist Benjamin Grosvenor rehearsing Grieg’s Piano Concerto in A Minor for half an hour before rehearsal began.  He was playing some stretches and some brief extracts – repeating phrases over and over as part of his preparation.  It was a reminder of the many years of practice that lead to concert standard.  Several days later I found myself singing Grieg in my head as I went to sleep.  What a beautiful piece!

Then our 5pm tutti rehearsal started.  A touch of Grieg and onto Carmina Burana.  How quickly things went down hill!  Within minutes Maestro Papadopoulos was expressing his dissatisfaction that members of the Choir were missing and in a manner I found rather unpleasant.  I was having such thoughts as “Don’t take it out on me that some people aren’t here – I’ve made the effort to turn up!” and “If you want me to sing well for you, try treating me with respect”.  I was also having other thoughts I prefer not to share online.  Later, when the raggazi (children) rehearsed their contribution, the Maestro told them how well they’d done – better perhaps than the “famous London Symphony Chorus”.  It was clear he was angry.  So were members of the chorus – as people left the platform after rehearsal everyone’s backs were up.

We had a few minutes with Roger Sayer, in the role of Chorus Director, who was quick to acknowledge our feelings of anger – and also to remind us to sing well for the sake of the chorus if not for the Maestro himself.  Afterwards, as I ate my supper, I reflected on the fears that often lie behind anger – was the Maestro feeling nervous, perhaps?  And I took time to use a well-honed technique to let go of the anger I felt before going on stage.  It was enough to help me to focus my energies on singing well and still, I noticed that I took a little pleasure when the Maestro made a rather obvious mistake during the concert and also that I didn’t warm to those after-the-concert didn’t-you-do-well signs from the Maestro.  Not for me the cycle of punishment and reward!

The trouble is this:  that anger begets anger.  Not anger per se but the expression of our angry thoughts as if they are some inviolable and objective truth. (They’re not).  As a leader we lose our authority and the respect of those we lead when we express our anger in this way.  We also risk losing the best contribution of those we lead:  people need to know that you’re working with them – on the same side – to feel safe to acknowledge their mistakes as well as to risk their best performance.  Far better to play it safe if you expect a rollocking every time the boss is not happy.

I want to be clear:  we’re all angry at times.  So a key challenge for us as leaders – as well as partners, parents, children, human beings… – is to know how to respond when we’re angry.  One of the worst things we can do is to hold on to the idea that somehow we were “right”.  This opens up a widening gulf between ourselves and those we lead.  And in case you’re wondering “what else can I do?” keep reading – I’ll be offering some thoughts during the days ahead with all the humility of someone who, like you, gets angry at times.