Category Archives: About Dorothy

When you’re the boss – becoming the grown-up in your team

About Dorothy, Developing as a leader, ,

As I sit, I’m keeping one eye on the clock – I’ll be dashing out of the door in 40 minutes or so to sing Carmina Burana at the Barbican concert hall in London this evening.

I have fond memories of this piece from my early days with the London Symphony Chorus.  Back then it was a staple in our schedule – Richard Hickox used to start the year with this crowd puller, which has been used by any number of advertisers over the years for its great tunes.  Popularity didn’t stand in the way of high standards – Richard was famous for rehearsing relentlessly.  I remember rehearsing the semi chorus sections until the pianissimi were unfeasibly quiet as well as tutti rehearsals that ran to the last minute of our allocated rehearsal time – if not a little longer.  In those days, Richard would also give us a final ‘pep talk’ before the concert to remind us of the spirit of the piece and encourage us to sing well.  We were told this was a great piece, and we believed it.  We were prepared to make it a great performance, and we did.

Now, given that I joined the chorus in 1986 (or was it 1987?) you could certainly accuse me of a touch of nostalgia.  Those were the days.  But something else is also on my mind.  Recently, I was struck when a client of mine told me how disconcerting it had been for her to discover just how much weight members of her team placed on all sorts of comments she made.  The implication for her was this:  she was setting the tone for her team without even realising it.  If she expressed frustration about her boss’s latest initiative within earshot of her team she was sending the signal that it wasn’t something to be taken seriously.  If she responded to a mistake by one of her team members before she processed her initial emotions – well, the rebuke she made might cut deep for her team member and the effect would stay long after she’d dealt with the issues arising and got over her initial concerns.  It came as a shock to her to realise the impact of her comments.

My client was discovering the symbolic importance of her role as a leader.  The fact that she held this role, rather than anything about her in particular, meant that people looked to her for – well, a lead.  Effectively, she had become for her team members a kind of ‘parent at work’.  Her team members were projecting onto her all kind of expectations of what such a ‘parent’ should be.  One of their expectations was that she would know best so they took her views seriously.  (And in case you find this idea rather fanciful or my client’s experience an exception, you might like to dive into the research which shows that a leader has a significant impact on the climate in a team and that this, in turn, affects performance.  Try Goleman’s The New Leaders for an easily accessible read or Litwin and Stringer’s Motivation and Organizational Climate to dive deeper into the statistics).

What implications does all this have for my client?  Already she had become conscious of the impact of her comments.  She knew she had to choose her comments more carefully.  This is what is called ‘framing’ in the field of NLP (or neuro-linguistic programming) and it does exactly what it says on the tin – it’s about the frame you put around something you talk about.  The boss’s new initiative?  Well, it could be ‘just one more mad idea from the boss to keep us from our day jobs’ or it could be ‘a way to accelerate our progress towards our sales target’.  And if you can’t see the benefit of an initiative from the boss – well, you might want to thrash that out with your boss before you start talking to your team or at least to process your emotions.  In a sense, it’s this processing that makes you the ‘parent’ or the ‘grown-up’ in the team.

And Carmina Burana?  ‘That tired old piece’ or ‘a piece that continues to stimulate the senses and capture the imagination’.  In case you’d like to decide for yourself, click here to listen to an extract.  Meantime, I’m off to sing.    

For the fox in my garden

About Dorothy

Living in London I am in the constant presence of the urban fox.  At night I hear the eery sounds of their mating dance – like a child screaming.  By day I encounter them in my garden or catch glimpses of them from the train. Sometimes, when I’m walking, I encounter one in the road.  There will be a distance and wary glances but no running away.  In London, foxes know they belong.

Often, the state of their fur will tell its own story of their age and the challenges of living in an urban environment.  Only rarely do I see a young fox, free from injury and with a coat that speaks of a rich diet – perhaps of its mother’s milk.  And when I do I am both struck by the beauty of the animal and slightly unsettled as I remember my heritage as a farmer’s daughter.  It’s easy to imagine my father rolling in his grave – wielding some celestial shotgun, even.  Farmers and foxes are not friends.

Recently I woke up one weekend morning to spy a fox – a vixen – in my garden, nestled by the fence behind my baby broad beans.  You can just about see her in the grainy photo I took (above) on my mobile phone.  With a day’s gardening in prospect I wondered if she would still be there after breakfast.  She was.  When I stepped into the garden it was easy to see why:  as she left the garden she was limping, badly.  I had the sense she would not go far.

She didn’t.  Returning to the garden a little later I found her still there.  I trod lightly and still expected her to move.  She didn’t.  I started digging, knowing that she needed to rest and even so, quite quickly, I began to wonder.  It is not a natural thing for a fox to stay in the presence of a human, especially a human armed with a spade and digging just a few feet from its head.  I wondered whether to offer her water and sustenance and even as I wondered what I would use to put water in I realised that no, I needed to take advice from the RSPCA.  In the end they came and took her away.

It was only shortly before they arrived that I realised the full extent of her injuries.  Watching her move I caught a glimpse of the bones exposed at the top inside of one of her legs.  No wonder she had been so still and quiet.  I sensed that I was probably in the presence of a dying animal.  I wanted to ask the man from the RSPCA what the likely outcome was – and somehow could not bring myself to.  I am still wondering.

It’s hard to find words to convey the sacred quality of this experience.  It was a time to honour her in the midst of her own experience and, by honouring her, to honour life – and death.

Bring on the year ahead!

About Dorothy,
Britain weather: despite deluge, ministers tell us to do more to save water

It’s been a strange week.  In the midst of drought Britain has seen more rain in recent days than I can remember for a long time – and even the odd tornado.  I have been waiting for gaps in the rain to take my beloved seedlings outside for toughening up in their mini-greenhouse (and keeping an eye on the winds lest they get blown away).

My birthday on Tuesday was much as I expected it.  I took time to have an indulgent breakfast – coffee and a bacon butty (strictly against the doctor’s orders) before I started to work.  Edward, my nephew, was also up in time to join me in opening cards and presents on our shared birthday.  Then I took to my study to pore over notes from an interview I conducted last week.  First I pulled together my evidence and decided on the ratings against the client’s competency model and then, after lunch, I wrote the report and sent it off.  It was all finished in time for me to bring those seedlings indoors and go off to choir for rehearsal in the evening.  On the way back I bought myself a McChicken burger – not so much a birthday treat as a late-evening ‘what on earth shall I eat?’ decision.  Even after all these years, I still struggle to know what to eat and when on choir evenings.

And yes, there were cards and messages on Facebook and more besides.  I phoned Mum on my way to choir who told me she’d been awake at ten minutes past midnight remembering my birth.  I came home to a message on the phone from my younger brother and his family – singing happy birthday down the phone.  (My nephew, aged six, was doing at least as much giggling as singing).  The cards and messages have continued to arrive as the week has gone on including one from a lost friend who looked me up on the world wide web and dropped me an unexpected line.  And celebrations will continue today with the arrival of my mother and my niece and her husband and a birthday trip to the Spice of Life Indian restaurant.

At the same time, I have been grappling with some kind of low-level flu-like bug which has left me feeling rather weak.  There have been moments when it has felt as though my joints were on fire.  Yesterday, when all my reports were written and signed off I checked my diary and asked myself:  is there anything that can’t wait until next week?  When I decided there wasn’t I took myself to bed for an afternoon sleep.  Later, I got up and walked around the garden and realised that, feeling so weak, there was no way I would be going to choir.  I curled up at home and went to bed ready to resume that sleep.  Today I feel refreshed – and still glad the weekend lies ahead.

I wouldn’t change a bit of it.  In the end, a rich life is made up of tiny details as much as it is of its significant events.  As I finish the week I am celebrating with a glad and peaceful heart.  Bring on the year ahead!

Wouldn’t you just die without Mahler?

About Dorothy

On Sunday, along with my fellow ladies of the London Symphony Chorus, I sang in Mahler’s Third Symphony.

I could almost add “yet again”.  For this was one of countless performances of this symphony which always draws a crowd.  For members of the chorus it is something of an oddity – five brief minutes of singing tucked into this vast orchestral piece.  A brief glance at the reviews shows how little attention this commands from the reviewers if not the audience as a whole.  Rehearsals are similarly tucked away – for who can justify a whole rehearsal for just five minutes of singing?  So, usually, rehearsals for Mahler 3 happen after we have sung some other piece.

I must confess that, having sung this piece so many times over the years I do rather take it for granted.  In the midst of the rather busy affair that is my life I show up for rehearsals and sing before dashing off to the next thing.  Right now, for example, it is spring and time to get the garden going.  I was digging in the garden on Sunday until it was time to get ready to leave home to travel to the Barbican.  Out of my gardening clothes and into my concert gear (long black with strict rules about lengths of sleeves and length of skirt, though anything goes when it comes to cleavage… but that’s another story).

Even the experience of a new conductor had not entirely grabbed my attention.  Our piano rehearsal was brief and efficient and, besides, I was late after getting stuck in traffic.  Our first tutti rehearsal went without incident and our conductor, Semyon Bychkov, let us know that our presence would not be required at the second tutti. We were delighted – travelling into central London on a Sunday morning to rehearse just five minutes of singing is not something we savour.  I, for one, had already planned a Sunday-morning lie-in by the time I left the building.

So, it was not until the concert itself that I got to observe Maestro Bychkov at work and to reconnect with the vastness of Mahler’s Third Symphony.  I noticed that Bychkov’s movements were spare – no grand gestures or expressions of engagement (some conductors are famous for grunting and others for their pained facial expressions).  Instead, Bychkov gave a clear beat throughout and… well, not much more.  Even so, the effect was to bring life and drama to this already dramatic work which was anything but tired under Bychkov’s baton.  The audience’s response reflected the grandeur of this performance.  Some audience members – just a few – attempted applause between movements.  This is definitely “not the done thing” in most London concert venues.  The applause at the end of the concert was, however, strong.

For me, the last word belongs to Mahler.  As I sit and write I am especially moved by the final movement which emerges from beneath the rather jolly singing of the choir and pulls my heart-strings every time.  It evokes a stillness in me, speaking somehow to every longing.

I am reminded of Trish, in the film Educating Rita, who greets her new friend with the words, “Wouldn’t you just die without Mahler?”

Kitchen confessions

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I know, I know… it’s time I gave an update on the progress of my kitchen.  Is it finished yet?  In fact, Jeannie Morrison, my friend and fellow member of the London Symphony Chorus, was kind enough to e-mail before Christmas and to express her hope that I would be enjoying my brand new kitchen at Christmas.  Sorry, Jeannie,  I’m not there yet.

An old Chinese cupboard before its kitchen transformation

The amount of preparation has been prodigious.  The walls have been stripped.  The chimney breast has also been stripped back to the brick work along with a section alongside it.  And because the bricks were in such a poor state, Wills rebuilt part of the chimney breast.  The old sink has been moved round so that the window at the end of the room can be taken out to make way for a door.  And now the new door is in, Wills has started the process of converting the old doorway to a window.  I could carry on – but you get the idea.

You may spot part of the old cupboard as well as
getting a rough idea of the design of the new kitchen

Gary, who spotted a 19th Century Chinese cupboard (rather worse for wear) and saw its potential, has been working miracles with it in the kitchen, creating a cupboard as planned with the central section of the original piece and another wall-to-ceiling cupboard to house the boiler.  If only he’d consent to having his picture taken I might have caught his boyish delight this morning when we discussed just what a success this is proving to be.  And yes, the picture above also gives you some idea of the state of my kitchen at Christmas.  Fortunately, my nephew Edward, who lives with me, was away and – when I was not with friends and family – it was just me at home.  Oh!  Me and the mouse that is!  Seen once but not since.

New appliances are multiplying in the lounge   

Over time, various appliances have been delivered and some of them are biding their time in the lounge.  The new sink has been with me for a while, and now the dishwasher, a new radiator and (I confess) the first proper kitchen bin I have ever owned, are all ready and waiting.  It feels so grown up!

I’m smiling as I write, recognising that I, too, share a good deal of Gary’s childlike glee.  I’m also smiling because I recognise just how many of my friends see this kind of experience as the ultimate nightmare.  I think of Roger Hamilton’s book Your Life, Your Legacy:  An Entrepreneur Guide to Finding Your Flow which I’ve mentioned before on this blog.  Hamilton highlights different ways in which entrepreneurs generate wealth and I know that my own signature approach to generating wealth is primarily creative.  I am loving the creative process of designing the new kitchen.  Even in our private lives our key strengths and preferences show up.  

Emotions after the event

About Dorothy
Amidst the various commitments I have today – coaching calls, project calls – I am expecting a visit this afternoon from PC Jane Kilduff of Lewisham Police.
Jane called me last week to follow up the photos I submitted following the riots on 8th August last year.  She wanted to get some details from me in order to prepare a statement which I shall sign today.  After her call I sat down and read the posting I wrote at the time, entitled There were riots outside my front door today.  I realise that the notes I captured in that posting are, perhaps, a useful addition to anything I could say now, offering testimony written so soon after the fact.  I also realise that none of the sentiments I expressed at the time have changed.
In our call, Jane asks me questions about what happened that day and I notice something happening as our call proceeds, a rising of emotion that I didn’t feel at the time of the riots because – I knew it even then – I was in shock.  When I put the phone down I sit for a few moments with the emotions – not fear, not anger, but grief, sorrow…
As I write I am aware of the way the work of Elizabeth Kuebler Ross has been used in businesses to describe our natural responses to change in the workplace.  My own response is part of the same cycle.  In this moment, though, I simply write in the awareness that something happened last August which changed my world and which stimulates some sense of loss in me.  I can seek to rationalise that – to understand what it is that I feel so sad about and still, I can only approximate.  I decide not to rationalise in this way and take a moment to sit with the emotions.
UPDATES: Riots in Lewisham

Saying goodbye to 2011

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Today I post my last post of 2011 before enjoying a full ten days’ holiday.  My first posting of 2012 (and my second, and third…) is already written and scheduled for publication.

In the period prior to Christmas I have been sharing tales of my new kitchen and these continue.  The process has been slower than I anticipated (and I knew it would be slow) with the usual knock-on effect of unanticipated delays.  In particular, the new door to the back of the house has not yet arrived which means that the current back door has to be kept in use.  This, in turn, means delaying the conversion of this back door to a window and – until this conversion can take place – building the units along the side wall.

It’s a curious reminder of one of life’s inconvenient truths:  sometimes things just take longer than we anticipate.  When we understand this we can bring compassion and humour and adapt to new realities – though some prefer to find someone to blame than to accept what is true.  It seems to me that it’s a good thing to be reminded of this truth as we enter a time of reflection – moving from the end of one year to the beginning of another.

So, I close by reiterating my best wishes to you for the end of 2011 and for 2012.  And by sharing just a few photos from the kitchen at 14 Albion Way.

So much of the kitchen is currently in the dining room…


…or outside in the garden…


…whilst work in the kitchen goes on

Meet the workers

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In recent days, I have been writing about progress in my kitchen.  Today, I thought it’s time to introduce the workers – Gary and Wills.


Gary – camera shy – is nonetheless in the house

Gary has proven rather camera-shy, so I offer this photo of his coat and scarf, sitting in the dining room.  I first met Gary in the late 80s when I was furnishing my first home and he had a furniture shop in Blackheath.  Stripped pine was all the rage – the cupboard in the photo is one I bought from Gary.  Later, he closed his shop and started to offer his skills in the home.  Painter and decorator is definitely too narrow a label.  Interior designer is a label Gary shuns.  Nonetheless, he combines a talent for design with a vast array of practical skills.

Amongst the moments I have most enjoyed in working with Gary are those moments where we disagree.  I think “you can’t possibly strip back a wall to the bare bricks” but Gary says “let’s try it and see – we can always plaster over it if you don’t like it”.  We do, and the effect is wonderful.  Gary says, “You can’t possibly paint a bathroom purple” and here, too, we try it and see – my deep purple bathroom has often been admired in recent years.  I recognise that my creative self is well and truly indulged in the process of working together and balanced with Gary’s creativity, wealth of experience and practical skills.

Wills – Gary’s co-worker and right hand man

Wills is less camera-shy.  He and Gary are working together in my kitchen as they have done in the past.  Wills is hard-working, diligent and easy to get along with.  Last week I enjoyed watching Wills open up the fire-place and I appreciate the care he has taken to minimise the passage of dust into the rest of the house.  He and Gary seem to me like brothers – Gary, especially knows how to “wind up” his work companion and Wills seems easily to take the bate.  I enjoy having them in the house.

In the spirit of celebrating, I take a moment to reflect on how deeply in I trust Gary and how much I appreciate his contribution in my life.  It’s not just that I enjoy the work he does for me – which alone would be enough.  He has been a key-holder of my home for the last twenty years, as he has of many other clients.  His work contributes to my need for beauty and creativity.  I enjoy his sense of fun and play.  I love having practical support.

If only it were not so early in the morning, I might want to raise a glass to Gary and Wills.

Getting started in the kitchen

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There is a fine layer of dust throughout the house today.  Work on the kitchen has started.  Gary and Wills have taken great care to minimise the passage of dust from the kitchen to the rest of the house, creating a cover for the door which Heath Robinson would surely admire.  Even so, we know from experience that dust will travel.

One of the aims yesterday (Day 1) was to reveal the chimney breast.  It may be possible to make a feature of the bare brick work.

The initial work reveals a bit of a mixed picture:  the brickwork is not as pretty as it can sometimes be.  By the time I get to see it, Gary and Wills have already come up with a plan B – suggestions about how to display some of the brick work whilst repairing and covering some that really isn’t attractive.

By the end of the day, the unused pipe has been removed and some of the brick work has been stripped back on the adjacent wall with the aim of sealing it and varnishing it so that it can stay bare.  By the time they leave the house, Gary and Wills have popped the cooker back in place, cleaned the surface and uncovered the sink and surrounding area so that I have the use of the kitchen after they’ve gone.

Whilst they have been working, I have been reflecting on the years I have spent in the house.  During this time I have taken decisions to set up my own business, to study neurolinguistic programming (NLP) and nonviolent communication (NVC), to train as a coach… all decisions that I didn’t foresee when I moved in in January, 2000.  I didn’t anticipate the decisions, I didn’t anticipate the deep learning that would come with the decisions.  I have experienced the almost paradoxical combination of living at the edge of my comfort zone and beyond and becoming increasingly connected and comfortable with myself.

I couldn’t have done this without support.  Some of it has been professional – working with a number of wonderful coaches over the last ten years, taking courses, as well as the support of Hoss, my wonderful accountant at Brooks Carling.  So much of it has come from friends and colleagues, including some I have met along the way.

My family, too, have been an enduring presence.  If ever there’s an advanced school of learning, it is in the family.  Sometimes my experiences of family have stimulated me to explore new ways of doing things.  Sometimes I have applied new learnings in the context of my family – whether they like it or not.  Often, they have been on tenterhooks – how would I fare as the owner and director of my own business…?

As I write, I take a moment to sit with the sense of gratitude I feel for so much support in my life.  I am reaching for words to describe what it means to me and find them inadequate in this moment.

Musings at the start of the week

About Dorothy,

Monday morning.  I’ve been all round the houses this weekend – to a school visit on Friday as part of the Pearson Teaching Awards judging team (and when the visits are national they can be a long way away), to my niece’s Hen Party in Bristol on Saturday (catching up on Friday night with a treasured friend) and then to Birmingham on Sunday to join 599 other singers in our first joint rehearsal of Havergal Brian’s Gothic Symphony, which we’ll be performing on Sunday 17th July, 2011 as part this year’s series of Prom Concerts at the Royal Albert Hall.

So, it’s been quite a weekend!  I wish I could say more about my school visit on Friday and – because I am committed to the judging process and want to maintain confidentiality – I can’t.  My niece’s hen party was a blast as well as a reflection of so much that makes her who she is (and her parents the ones who have and continue to nurture her).  We have a buffet lunch as her guests – circa 35 assorted friends and family – gather in Bristol before going on a treasure hunt around Whiteladies Road, gathering answers in response to a whole load of clues and ending up with afternoon tea, scoring, prizes and much hilarity.  We get changed for dinner before a boat trip and then supper – a rather wonderful and ample supper – in a Chinese restaurant tucked away somewhere near the harbour.  On Sunday morning I catch the first train to Birmingham to sing.  It isn’t early – 9.30am from Bristol – and it isn’t fast, meandering cross country on it’s way to Brum.  Not early – though it seems like it!  The last few days have involved early starts and late finishes and they’re catching up with me.

Our performance next Sunday will be only the 6th performance of Brian’s Gothic Symphony since he completed it in 1951 and tickets have been sold out for some time now.  Why so rarely performed?  Members of the Havergal Brian Society will certainly protest at any suggestion that it is because this music is in any way lacking.  Rather, the symphony requires huge forces (including 6 – 800 singers, 190 orchestral players and soloists) a venue which can house both performers and an audience, funding and a conductor who is sufficiently audacious (or mad) to undertake to conduct such a complex and demanding piece.

As I travel back from Birmingham after our rehearsal I reflect on those people who are prepared to take on something which others have not – or only rarely – dared.  The composer, in sharing his or her work, faces the unknown in terms of the response s/he may get – a response which may change over time.  What may seem mad to some inspires the admiration of others.  And at the time of creation there is no knowing what the life story of a piece may be, including the life-story of the composer’s own relationship with his or her work.

This is, of course, true for us all.  This has been amply illustrated this weekend as the demise of the News of the World follows revelations whose impact reverberates far beyond the empire of Rupert Murdoch.  It seems to me that many people have their hands dirty right now – the journalists who hacked phones, the leaders (Rebekah Brooks, Andy Coulson) on whose watch they acted, the police who took money in exchange for information, the police who decided not to investigate, David Cameron… the list goes on and on.  Our actions follow us long after we have taken them.

The response of some is to look around them, seeking to determine what will be acceptable and taking care to be above reproach.  This strategy is utterly exhausting and largely ineffective – with so many people out there and with such diverse views there is always a judge.  And still, it takes courage to do the best we know how in a given moment, knowing that those who set out to judge may have little or no understanding of our aims and intentions.  The more ambitious the aims, the more we expose ourselves to judgement, to possible failure and perhaps, worst of all, to insignificance.  We all want to make a difference.