Design Your Own Bumper Sticker for 2020
This week is a homework assignment. After a year of blog training, it’s time for you to put it all together – in a bumper sticker all your own! By the end of this article, I am going to invite you to distill your #1 lesson learned in 2020. What can you put behind you, but use to propel you forward into the future? So jump in the car, and let me share the significance of a personal bumper sticker.
Beginnings
You may already know that I left high school and went straight into my policing career. Back then, in England, you could graduate from high school at 16, but I stayed on for an additional 18 months to top up my education.
I left my hometown when I was 17 ½ and moved to London. There I joined the Metropolitan Police Cadet Program, where I spent the next 12 months working as a helper in a palliative-care hospital. After my volunteer day was done, I headed off for more training in the evening.
That year introduced me to ‘life’ and prepared me for the police academy and to become a police officer.
I started at Hendon Police College, where every new Metropolitan Police Officer was trained, at the mature age of 18 ½ (tongue-in-cheek). For the next eight years, I learned as a “Bobby,”; a police officer in Notting Hill.
Regrets
I never went to college, and I suffered regret.
After immigrating to Canada, I joined the New Westminster Police Department in 1988 and enjoyed the next 27 years. My career flourished, and I grew as a professional. But I always felt slightly inadequate because – I never went to college.
All that changed when I enrolled in the Royal Roads University Master of Arts in Leadership and Training (MALT) program. I graduated in 2005. I remember having a conversation with one of my superior officers in New Westminster. He asked me if this was a program designed to develop me as a police officer. I assured him it wasn’t. His face reflected skepticism and disapproval.
I told him it was a program designed to develop me as a leader.
I remember telling him that there was only one other police officer out of the 40 other students in the cohort. I needed my superior to approve my 2 month-long residential commitment at Royal Roads, and I started to worry at his response. But, fortunately, he capitulated and wished me luck.
“Thank you, Sir!”
Think Bigger and Broader
I wanted to go to Royal Roads University because it wasn’t full of police officers!
I wanted to be amongst people that thought creatively and differently than me. I knew I couldn’t grow if I spent time with people who think and act like me. I needed to expand.
Those two years that I spent at Royal Roads University lit a fire inside me. It is an experience in my life that I will forever be grateful for.
As we move towards the end of what has been an incredibly difficult 2020, I have been reflecting on some concepts that my colleagues in the MALT program taught me. Their bumper stickers (outcomes from learning) still inform me and remind me to keep growing.
At the end of our studies, we had a pub night. (Of course, we did! ) We wrote out one-liners of inspiration to share together. We summarized key learnings in a simple phrase or sentence.
Bumper Stickers I Live Toward
Although they are bumper sticker size, the depth of their meaning and implication has kept me motivated and inspired for years. I want to share some of my personal treasures with you.
I am more competent than I tend to believe.
I see myself differently than others see me.
My perception of the world is only my perception of the world. Chances are, it is different from yours.
Differentiating my reality from fact is a difficult yet doable endeavor.
Checking in with others is the key to further inquiry and better understanding.
Be present in the here and now.
Do not underestimate your feelings. What you feel will influence what you think, which will influence what you do and how you do it.
True leadership is helping others become the best that they can be.
Be still. If you want to clear your mind, think about your thinking. You cannot think more thoughts when you are thinking about.
Notice your lenses, mental models, and self-talk.
When you find yourself disconnecting, tell yourself to be here now, or at least as soon as you can.
If you want to know your intention, notice where your attention goes.
I am committed to contributing when I have something to contribute. I will continue working toward sharing more of myself and all aspects of my life.
Ask for feedback. Provide others with feedback. Be authentic when doing so.
Every person I work with knows something better than I. My job is to listen long enough to find it.
As a leader, you are known for the questions you ask.
Sharing information with others. Ask for input. Seek out a variety of perspectives. Collaborate.
Your Bumper Sticker
I often think back to that teenager jumping on the train at the South of England train station, excited to be heading away from school to the big city to start his life and begin real lessons. I didn’t realize it back then, but I now absolutely realize that this learning journey continues every day. And I have met some incredible people who remind me of that fact each time we are together.
These bumper-sticker one-liners are important to me. They remind me of what is important in my personal and professional development and growth. I hope they work for you too. Feel free to borrow them and, better yet, make them your own!
Even better, take some time before the end of the year to look at your 2020 experience. Ask yourself, what did you learn that can propel you to a better and more fruitful future? Start your new year off with your own bumper sticker of hope and vision.
