Anthony Wilson writes:
Trevor, I note that there is a degree of erosion of the community of Lonehill being allowed by local authorities as they permit, or ignore, the purchase of houses in the residential area to be used for entirely commercial purposes, like the latest I have noticed, the Babor Institute’s “building,” which was formerly a private residence in Concourse. This practice differs from the less blatant practice which probably started the rot, which was to allow people, initially, to run businesses from home, which then outgrew the homes from which they were run, and now many of those owners have purchased separate new homes, albeit, in some examples, right next door!
“Quo vadis?”
Apologies for diving headfirst into a new subject without taking the time to recognize the positive manner in which you have expressed, once again, the challenges facing us, and simultaneously & adroitly encouraged participation by the community. I did appreciate your headline, especially the pun! Bravo!
Regards
Anthony.
ANTHONY WILSON
+27 83.592.61.33
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Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Monday, May 28, 2007
Promising SIGNS, Poor Execution
Let me begin by again continuing to encourage the LRA executive (or whoever rightly deserves the kudos) for the promising signs of improvement in the management of our initiative. And perhaps most important, to share a thought and vote of thanks for our proactive guards who are out in the middle of the night in this freezing cold.
The general overall neat look of the estate, the masses of yellow posters to attract feedback from the community, the new LARGE signboards, email newsletters in print slipped under our doors, and new bibs on our proactive guards all confirm that leadership is taking notice of the need to improve communication and visibility and are attempting to do something about it.
I like people who at least TRY to make things happen!
What a marked change from last year. 'Nuff said. It may well be that we are close to getting back to where we were some three years ago with massive potential ahead of us as a community.
However, as positive as I am feeling about the revival efforts of new leadership, I still see highly annoying evidence of poor execution undermining the promising signs being displayed.
The worst being the hard-to-read, woefully-poorly laid-out, BOLD copy on the noticeboards (please learn some basic copy and lay-out skills or use a professional to do this), the rubbish literally lying under the noses of proactive guards, and illegal posters on poles (two highly visible white ones on one pole in Franschoek have been there for over 10 days) confirm for me that our support staff and managers don't manage by walking around with their eyes open and still don't really care for our community as we do.
Let's put it like this, I am a huge fan of the IDOLS concept (particularly American IDOLS) as a world-leading business phenomeon, which is quite simply a strategic decision to take something common - a talent show - and convert it into something totally uncommon and unique - the greatest source of undiscovered musical talent in the world, having vitually re-established multi-million album sales in a fast-ailing industry.
So what's different in taking a common apathetic residents association concept and turning it into the most uncommon and unique community initiative in the world? It's all about strategy and vision. And, about the quality of people around in staff/service provider functions... can you imagine Simon Cowell accepting the display on our noticeboards right now? No way!
We were well positioned to take the uncommon and unique road three years ago... and BLEW it!
It takes a long time to recover, especially to recover the trust that is abused by such lack of caring and forethought. Don't blow it again.
Received this in from a Lonehill resident who concurs with my last post and whose comment I include because I think he touches on something that I have seen slipping into the current leadership ethos that will undermine its effectiveness in the future.
Anthony Wilson writes: 'Hear. Hear. I note with interest your accurate description of the two-fold manner in which unprincipled leadership manifests itself. ''I would venture that another feature of this kind of dubious leadership is the delegation of responsibility to the community it purports to serve, so that culpability appears to move to those to whom it has been delegated. This leaves “leadership” with no work and no responsibility – a typical political “soft-shoe shuffle!” Regards Anthony.
Yes, Anthony, I have a huge problem with a supposed service-support function that doesn't bend over backwards to make it easy to be a resident in Lonehill. Example: being made to feel like a heel for reporting to the LRA about sewerage spill into the dam that may just choke it up with unwanted organisms and being harangued with ongoing messages to first report such instances to the authorities. Or leaving individual residents to stand up alone against unacceptable noise emanating from developments seemingly in contravention of local regulations. Load of bull..!
For goodness sake, in the 'Community IDOLS' challenge that I envisage, I would reward every such concerned caller to the LRA with a medal for being so community-conscious. 'How can I help you' from our LRA offices should really mean 'How can I HELP you'!
Anthony's perceptive comment identifies what I believe is a very dangerous precendent currently being set that will undermine any reason to call the LRA offices. Why call if they don't care?
And, as if to underline the point, in the last week someone was obviously told to put up new LRA/Fidelity signs in our street. Mine was plonked on patently skew in a slap-dash manner as if to say - 'we truly don't care for you or your home'. If I didn't know how important the LRA initiative was to our collective community security I would change my service provider immediately for this overtly disgraceful show of poor commitment to the basics of service excellence. I'm leaving it up for everyone to see... or for our local manager to arrive and show that he cares... ;-)
George Joubert shares this insight: 'Hi Trevor, I had an interesting comment made by a senior executive (a non-Lonehiller) to a friend of mine - “Hell! I would not buy a property in Lonehill when the Residents’ Association ‘advertises’ all the problems in the area. Rising crime! Polluted dam, etc., etc!” - It just goes to show how careful one has to be! Perception is Truth they say!' Regards, George
What I believe that George is pointing to is that marketing is the essence of getting out the right message at the right time. Perhaps it's time to convey: 'How The LRA Works To Protect Your Family & Grow Your Property Investment in Lonehill'.
Simple to say but always challenging to get across on a noticeboard, so here are some ideas:
Lonehill Residents Meeting
LRA Rules..OK!
Protect Your Family
Your Property
(date)
(venue)
Lonehill Residents Meeting
How LRA Protects
Your Family
Your Property
(date)
(venue)
Lonehill Residents Meeting
YOU Are The LRA
Protect Your Family
Your Property
(date)
(venue)
I can only re-iterate that the moment any leadership stands up with integrity behind a great vision and strategy and stimulates an ethos of service excellence in delivery to their publics, is the moment that their publics will believe the message.
Don't let the promising signs by leadership be undermined by poor execution on the ground.
Regards
Trevor Nel - 011 705-2790
Lonehill Resident
The general overall neat look of the estate, the masses of yellow posters to attract feedback from the community, the new LARGE signboards, email newsletters in print slipped under our doors, and new bibs on our proactive guards all confirm that leadership is taking notice of the need to improve communication and visibility and are attempting to do something about it.
I like people who at least TRY to make things happen!
What a marked change from last year. 'Nuff said. It may well be that we are close to getting back to where we were some three years ago with massive potential ahead of us as a community.
However, as positive as I am feeling about the revival efforts of new leadership, I still see highly annoying evidence of poor execution undermining the promising signs being displayed.
The worst being the hard-to-read, woefully-poorly laid-out, BOLD copy on the noticeboards (please learn some basic copy and lay-out skills or use a professional to do this), the rubbish literally lying under the noses of proactive guards, and illegal posters on poles (two highly visible white ones on one pole in Franschoek have been there for over 10 days) confirm for me that our support staff and managers don't manage by walking around with their eyes open and still don't really care for our community as we do.
Let's put it like this, I am a huge fan of the IDOLS concept (particularly American IDOLS) as a world-leading business phenomeon, which is quite simply a strategic decision to take something common - a talent show - and convert it into something totally uncommon and unique - the greatest source of undiscovered musical talent in the world, having vitually re-established multi-million album sales in a fast-ailing industry.
So what's different in taking a common apathetic residents association concept and turning it into the most uncommon and unique community initiative in the world? It's all about strategy and vision. And, about the quality of people around in staff/service provider functions... can you imagine Simon Cowell accepting the display on our noticeboards right now? No way!
We were well positioned to take the uncommon and unique road three years ago... and BLEW it!
It takes a long time to recover, especially to recover the trust that is abused by such lack of caring and forethought. Don't blow it again.
Received this in from a Lonehill resident who concurs with my last post and whose comment I include because I think he touches on something that I have seen slipping into the current leadership ethos that will undermine its effectiveness in the future.
Anthony Wilson writes: 'Hear. Hear. I note with interest your accurate description of the two-fold manner in which unprincipled leadership manifests itself. ''I would venture that another feature of this kind of dubious leadership is the delegation of responsibility to the community it purports to serve, so that culpability appears to move to those to whom it has been delegated. This leaves “leadership” with no work and no responsibility – a typical political “soft-shoe shuffle!” Regards Anthony.
Yes, Anthony, I have a huge problem with a supposed service-support function that doesn't bend over backwards to make it easy to be a resident in Lonehill. Example: being made to feel like a heel for reporting to the LRA about sewerage spill into the dam that may just choke it up with unwanted organisms and being harangued with ongoing messages to first report such instances to the authorities. Or leaving individual residents to stand up alone against unacceptable noise emanating from developments seemingly in contravention of local regulations. Load of bull..!
For goodness sake, in the 'Community IDOLS' challenge that I envisage, I would reward every such concerned caller to the LRA with a medal for being so community-conscious. 'How can I help you' from our LRA offices should really mean 'How can I HELP you'!
Anthony's perceptive comment identifies what I believe is a very dangerous precendent currently being set that will undermine any reason to call the LRA offices. Why call if they don't care?
And, as if to underline the point, in the last week someone was obviously told to put up new LRA/Fidelity signs in our street. Mine was plonked on patently skew in a slap-dash manner as if to say - 'we truly don't care for you or your home'. If I didn't know how important the LRA initiative was to our collective community security I would change my service provider immediately for this overtly disgraceful show of poor commitment to the basics of service excellence. I'm leaving it up for everyone to see... or for our local manager to arrive and show that he cares... ;-)
George Joubert shares this insight: 'Hi Trevor, I had an interesting comment made by a senior executive (a non-Lonehiller) to a friend of mine - “Hell! I would not buy a property in Lonehill when the Residents’ Association ‘advertises’ all the problems in the area. Rising crime! Polluted dam, etc., etc!” - It just goes to show how careful one has to be! Perception is Truth they say!' Regards, George
What I believe that George is pointing to is that marketing is the essence of getting out the right message at the right time. Perhaps it's time to convey: 'How The LRA Works To Protect Your Family & Grow Your Property Investment in Lonehill'.
Simple to say but always challenging to get across on a noticeboard, so here are some ideas:
Lonehill Residents Meeting
LRA Rules..OK!
Protect Your Family
Your Property
(date)
(venue)
Lonehill Residents Meeting
How LRA Protects
Your Family
Your Property
(date)
(venue)
Lonehill Residents Meeting
YOU Are The LRA
Protect Your Family
Your Property
(date)
(venue)
I can only re-iterate that the moment any leadership stands up with integrity behind a great vision and strategy and stimulates an ethos of service excellence in delivery to their publics, is the moment that their publics will believe the message.
Don't let the promising signs by leadership be undermined by poor execution on the ground.
Regards
Trevor Nel - 011 705-2790
Lonehill Resident
Friday, May 18, 2007
Hear! Hear!
Anthony Wilson writes:
I note with interest your accurate description of the two-fold manner in which unprincipled leadership manifests itself.
I would venture that another feature of this kind of dubious leadership is the delegation of responsibility to the community it purports to serve, so that culpability appears to move to those to whom it has been delegated. This leaves “leadership” with no work and no responsibility – a typical political “soft-shoe shuffle!”
Regards
Anthony.
ANTHONY WILSON
+27 83.592.61.33
I note with interest your accurate description of the two-fold manner in which unprincipled leadership manifests itself.
I would venture that another feature of this kind of dubious leadership is the delegation of responsibility to the community it purports to serve, so that culpability appears to move to those to whom it has been delegated. This leaves “leadership” with no work and no responsibility – a typical political “soft-shoe shuffle!”
Regards
Anthony.
ANTHONY WILSON
+27 83.592.61.33
Thursday, May 17, 2007
Tribunal To REZONE Lonehill Shopping Centre?
As I am about to pen this post, I have just received a call from one of my INNER Circle Business Forum members to say that one of our member's elderly parents had been attacked in their home in Benoni last night. His mother was killed and his father is in surgery right now.
This sobering message is a chilling reminder why we all need to be constantly concerned about our Lonehill Community Initiative and to stimulate for the highest quality concern and commitment of its leadership.
Talking about community issues, a seriously harassed and frazzled resident tells me that there is an an upcoming rezoning tribunal concerning the Lonehill Shopping Centre scheduled for the 24th May. Given this resident's annoyance for noise levels apparently emanating from this centre, it was no surprise to hear the uncomplimentary perception of the LRA's apparent lack of interest on the matter. I know nothing about such tribunal, so I can't help much. Can anyone else?
The Lonehill Shopping Centre owners appeared in a recent news item: Sunday Times Metro - 29 April 2007 - The Battle of Lonehill Mall - 'A Joburg High Court judge has threatened to throw two wealthy property developers in jail if they continue to build on the Lonehill Shopping Mall without council permission'.
I suppose the question can be asked as to why the LRA does not make a clear announcement that such a serious tribunal is taking place over such a prominent Lonehill landmark and issue... and provide information for all parties, whether for or against, to lodge their views and opinions.
Hmmm... all of which introduces perfectly the topic I was going to lead with this week... that of the need for Principled Leadership in our Lonehill community.
Let's face it, leadership has been sorely tested and found desperately wanting in not only Lonehill's recent past, but also in the World Bank - see World Bank board majority want Wolfowitz to resign - and now once again in our own hallowed South African rugby halls of leadership shame - see Rugby bosses drop ball with impunity and further highlighted in this shocking interview - see Transcript of 702 Talk Radio presenter John Robbie's interview with Saru president Oregan Hoskins over the Luke Watson saga.
So where do leaders constantly get it wrong in today's society? Simply, in my opinion, they believe that their personal values can be imposed by their authoritarian decree on their community (note that deliberately ignoring problems is the other side of the same authoritarian leadership coin). When in actual fact, their community has a natural understanding of what rock-steady priniciples cannot and should not be violated. Non-principled leadership therefore undermines the very support and respect it desires from its followers.
What the Lonehill community needs desperately is to identify a set of PRINCIPLES by which the LRA leadership should be guided. This has not yet been done to date (hence my continued call for an indaba of all sector leaders and interested parties in Lonehill)... and therefore the community cannot expect to be led by anything other than the arbitrary whims and personal values of transient leaders. This oversight or lack of foresight will continue to hamper any 'leaders' efforts in Lonehill.
Principled leadership would see our community leaders (amongst all stakeholders, no matter who they are) maturely rising up above their personal values and openly-declared personal vested interests (which almost everyone must have in the community) to apply rock-steady principled decisions to solve issues such as raised in this post.
So what would Principled LRA Leadership do on the above Lonehill Shopping Centre issue... it would recognise that opposing stakeholders in the community have opposing values which are subject to an upcoming Tribunal Review. It would recognise that it needs to apply all its resources to giving maximum publicity to both stakeholders to represent their views and allow due process to take its course.
So the minimum that should be done is to make the community aware of the date of the tribunal and how the different interests can represent their opinions.
Regards
Trevor Nel - 011 705-2790
Lonehill Resident
This sobering message is a chilling reminder why we all need to be constantly concerned about our Lonehill Community Initiative and to stimulate for the highest quality concern and commitment of its leadership.
Talking about community issues, a seriously harassed and frazzled resident tells me that there is an an upcoming rezoning tribunal concerning the Lonehill Shopping Centre scheduled for the 24th May. Given this resident's annoyance for noise levels apparently emanating from this centre, it was no surprise to hear the uncomplimentary perception of the LRA's apparent lack of interest on the matter. I know nothing about such tribunal, so I can't help much. Can anyone else?
The Lonehill Shopping Centre owners appeared in a recent news item: Sunday Times Metro - 29 April 2007 - The Battle of Lonehill Mall - 'A Joburg High Court judge has threatened to throw two wealthy property developers in jail if they continue to build on the Lonehill Shopping Mall without council permission'.
I suppose the question can be asked as to why the LRA does not make a clear announcement that such a serious tribunal is taking place over such a prominent Lonehill landmark and issue... and provide information for all parties, whether for or against, to lodge their views and opinions.
Hmmm... all of which introduces perfectly the topic I was going to lead with this week... that of the need for Principled Leadership in our Lonehill community.
Let's face it, leadership has been sorely tested and found desperately wanting in not only Lonehill's recent past, but also in the World Bank - see World Bank board majority want Wolfowitz to resign - and now once again in our own hallowed South African rugby halls of leadership shame - see Rugby bosses drop ball with impunity and further highlighted in this shocking interview - see Transcript of 702 Talk Radio presenter John Robbie's interview with Saru president Oregan Hoskins over the Luke Watson saga.
So where do leaders constantly get it wrong in today's society? Simply, in my opinion, they believe that their personal values can be imposed by their authoritarian decree on their community (note that deliberately ignoring problems is the other side of the same authoritarian leadership coin). When in actual fact, their community has a natural understanding of what rock-steady priniciples cannot and should not be violated. Non-principled leadership therefore undermines the very support and respect it desires from its followers.
What the Lonehill community needs desperately is to identify a set of PRINCIPLES by which the LRA leadership should be guided. This has not yet been done to date (hence my continued call for an indaba of all sector leaders and interested parties in Lonehill)... and therefore the community cannot expect to be led by anything other than the arbitrary whims and personal values of transient leaders. This oversight or lack of foresight will continue to hamper any 'leaders' efforts in Lonehill.
Principled leadership would see our community leaders (amongst all stakeholders, no matter who they are) maturely rising up above their personal values and openly-declared personal vested interests (which almost everyone must have in the community) to apply rock-steady principled decisions to solve issues such as raised in this post.
So what would Principled LRA Leadership do on the above Lonehill Shopping Centre issue... it would recognise that opposing stakeholders in the community have opposing values which are subject to an upcoming Tribunal Review. It would recognise that it needs to apply all its resources to giving maximum publicity to both stakeholders to represent their views and allow due process to take its course.
So the minimum that should be done is to make the community aware of the date of the tribunal and how the different interests can represent their opinions.
Regards
Trevor Nel - 011 705-2790
Lonehill Resident
Friday, May 11, 2007
simplify, Simplify, SIMPLIFY ..1 ..2 ..3
Trevor writes:
From this post - MAD 7. It Only Takes 'HALF-A-DOZEN' Things! (extract below) - I am reminded that it is all to easy to fall into the trap of adding unnecessary complexity to ideas, projects, strategies, et al, that should be as simple as ...1 ..2 ..3
I am resolving to simplify every idea, project, strategy I have into a 'simple as ..1 ..2 ..3' graphic presentation.
Regards
Trevor Nel - 011 - 705-2790 - www.innercircleforum.com
trevor@innercircleforum.com
From this post - MAD 7. It Only Takes 'HALF-A-DOZEN' Things! (extract below) - I am reminded that it is all to easy to fall into the trap of adding unnecessary complexity to ideas, projects, strategies, et al, that should be as simple as ...1 ..2 ..3
Too many people look to make the simple things in life too complex to understand.
Yes, most often it takes only a few things... 1, 2, or 3 things... just a 'half-a-dozen' things to ensure success in most projects.
I am resolving to simplify every idea, project, strategy I have into a 'simple as ..1 ..2 ..3' graphic presentation.
Regards
Trevor Nel - 011 - 705-2790 - www.innercircleforum.com
trevor@innercircleforum.com
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