Lawyer and Writer
Today I'd like to give thanks - and there is so much to be thankful for. When a good friend of mine came out to his mother, she wept. She was devastated. Not because she loved him less, but because she saw a rough road ahead of him. "Life will be so hard for you", she explained. And... Continue Reading →
Recently, I've had a stream of people messaging about my TEDx talk. Half want to talk about the content and half want to talk about the process of speaking and speech writing. The question I most commonly get is "How do I get chosen for a TEDx talk?" which I might tackle in a future... Continue Reading →
"Managers are people too". That's what someone told me in my first week. At first, it seems like a strange, unnecessary observation. Most graduates understand that their manager is indeed a person, not a canary or an antelope. Sure enough though, we understand what people are getting at: managers have their own hopes, anxieties, lapses,... Continue Reading →
We will talk a lot of guff about 2020. In business speak, 2020 gave birth to the catchphrase "the new normal." Despite its prevalence, this concept doesn't seem ground breaking. Properly interrogated, it goes no further than working from home a bit more, flying a bit less, and (ominously) "leaner" business models. We all have... Continue Reading →
Like me, you've probably reading a lot of articles about how this pandemic will fundamentally change the way we work. That's a big call. It's also becoming the consensus call. "This changes everything", say we all. "Never in our lifetime have we seen such dramatic upheaval. Work will never look the same again." That forecast is fascinating.... Continue Reading →
When it comes to judging our own performance, we can be thugs. When we fail, we kick ourselves hard. We use angry, unflattering language, perhaps out loud, but more often in silent and invisible self-abuse. There are only so many times that we can uppercut our own jaw before we start to show the bleary... Continue Reading →
Last week I saw a job description that caught my eye. Someone was looking for a lawyer who was "NQ". NQ stands for Not Qualified. That means a trainee fresh out of law school who can't quite call themselves a lawyer yet. They are an inquisitive, nervous, enthusiastic bunch who wear suits on the first... Continue Reading →
Nobody tells you to go do Hip-Hop Dance. It's not that work doesn't want you to or doesn't find it interesting (in fact, changing into street wear can raise a few eyebrows in the lift wells). It's just that, in the scheme of things that your work cares about, finding your new hobby isn't one... Continue Reading →
One lesson in leadership really resonated this week at the Senior Associate induction down at Clayton Utz Sydney. There was a sheet of paper with examples of great leadership traits. One was refreshingly simple: "Cares" Cares about me, cares about juniors, cares about their family, their clients, their community... or not. "That person cares" is... Continue Reading →
The other day, I had lunch with a friend who recently moved from a job that sucked to a job that has changed him for the better. His new role seems to offer him a form of quiet bliss and a smooth grin appeared on his face as he described his newfound happiness. Knowing him... Continue Reading →
