What Now, Now What

Ever asked (wrestled with) these questions?

What Now?
Now What?


Two questions that often present themselves.

The first, “What now?”, is about recognising the moment you’re in. Naming the choices in front of you. Seeing the options clearly instead of reacting on autopilot.

The second, “Now what?”, is about movement. Choosing the next right step with intention, not urgency.

It’s not about having the perfect answer. It’s about creating space. Space to understand your options, try to turn down the noise and take a step that actually aligns with where you want to go.

What Now? Now What?

One question to ground you.

One question to move you forward.

Pause + Reflect.

Right Here, Right Now

We spend so much time planning the future…

…but the future is shaped by what we do today.

So here’s a simple question:

What is one thing—Right Here, Right Now—you could do that your future self would thank you for?

It doesn’t have to be big.

• Send the message

• Start the idea

• Take the walk

• Have the conversation

Small intentional actions compound.

What’s yours? Right Here, Right Now.

It Emerges.

Emergence is where Lean truly comes alive.

In Lean, not everything can or should be designed upfront.

Real improvement emerges through experimentation, collaboration and shared learning.

New ways of working can emerge when teams have clarity of purpose, respect for people (team members, customers, community, beyond...) and space to reflect.

Emergence is a signal that your system is alive. A signal that it is evolving and adapting through continuous learning.

What’s emerging in your team or organisation today?

What’s your story?

Every Lean transformation runs on a story.

Q. Is your team following a script of "doing Lean to people" or "learning Lean with people"?

The script shapes the culture — and the culture shapes the results.

Q. What’s the story you’re writing in your Lean journey?

Q. Are we following someone else’s script or writing our your own?

A few questions being shared and chewed on.

Curiosity: The Hidden Engine of Lean Improvement

Lean isn’t just about removing waste or streamlining processes — it’s about asking why again and again.

Curiosity is what turns a checklist into a culture. It’s what makes a team member stop and ask:

• “Why do we do it this way?”
• “What if there’s a simpler way?”
• “How could we make this better for the customer?”

When curiosity thrives, continuous improvement follows naturally.
But when it fades, even the best Lean tools become mechanical — improvement becomes maintenance instead of momentum.

Leaders who nurture curiosity don’t just get better processes — they build better problem-solvers.

Next time you’re walking the floor (or wherever your Gemba is), reviewing data, or running a Kaizen — don’t just look for answers. Look for questions.

Curiosity isn’t a distraction from improvement. It is improvement.

Lean In

(Lean) Posture check.

Lean isn’t just a set of tools or checklists — it’s a posture.

When we lean in to lean processes, we’re choosing curiosity over comfort. Choosing to question, simplify & improve (…continuously)

Where might you Lean In this week?

Invitation

Creating & holding space for another to bring forth, in words, what is moving, bouncing around, swirling, or brewing inside them is a gift.

Q. Where are the conversations today where this invitation, “Tell Me More…” can be extended to another?

Q. What did you notice that prompted the invitation? What began to emerge as this invitation was received?

Pause + reflect.

Q. How might our actions, words, and ways of being extend this invitation and invite greater depth of awareness—of self and others?

Q. What differences would it make to practice this posture - a posture with others of offering ways of opening up, rather than being curved in and closing up?

Attention

What do you need to pay attention to? Today. This week. This month.

Q. As you consider your Upward, Inward & Outward relationships what are the things that matter most, that require your attention?

Q. How might you move toward what matters most in the creative space between reality and possibility in each of these relationships?

Step forward with intention, discipline and vision as you seek to Plant, Grow and Harvest considering what matters most and requires your attention. Today. This week. This month.

Leadership Posture

What is the posture of your leadership?

What do you notice about the posture of your thinking?

When you reflect on your engagement with others, what comes to mind about the posture of your interactions?

What is the shape, or posture, of your leadership recently?

Hunched over, slouched, with leadership-shoulders curved in?

Eyes down?

Leadership-legs sluggish, heavy, and shuffling along?

Are you pressing in or retreating from challenges and commitments?

Take a moment to consider the image of what you would like to see more of in the way you are leading in your relationship with self and others.  

Q. How might you take action today to adjust your leadership posture?

Q. What would your thinking and engagement be like with your leadership-chin, eyes, and back upright?  What might it look like for your leadership legs and feet to be moving at an appropriate pace?

Take a moment to consider the current state vs desired state of your leadership posture.  Invite constructive feedback from those close to you.  What do they notice?

May you move and lead more freely today, and again tomorrow.   

Creative Tension

“If we are to live our lives fully and well, we must learn to embrace the opposites, to live in a creative tension between our limits and our potentials.” - Parker J. Palmer

Take time to reflect on and consider how you might you resource yourself to navigate this creative tension?

Perspective

Getting perspective can be tricky at times. 

Pace. Pressure. Noise. There are plenty of internal and external factors that can impact a healthy perspective on our reality. 

So, a question to consider.

How might you envision and explore your current reality from different angles, creating space for a more fully formed perspective?  

Take a moment. Reflect on these prompts.

They may be useful in resourcing you to nurture an expanded perspective as you navigate the space between reality and possibility.  

Context

Name (out loud, on paper) what you are noticing inside you and around you. What do you see, hear, feel? How can these inputs inform your perspective?

Community

Who might you be able to speak with, listen to, and be present with to expand your perspective?

Curiosity

Lean in. Be curious. How might a posture of curiousity guard against the fear and frustration that can undermine a more fully formed perspective?

Dealing with Derailers

There are many things that can derail each of us. Internal and external factors seek to knock us off course. This will not be news to you.

Derailers need to be dealt with—they deplete us and exhaust resources. In working with leaders, we see the difference intentional, visionary and disciplined leadership makes in confronting derailers.

Intentional
Being intentional involves naming reality and being clear on your values. This requires courage and honesty to name reality both to oneself and other stakeholders. When you name reality and are rooted in your values, you can move forward with greater focus and stop being pulled from side to side.

Visionary
This involves having a clear, overarching aim. What is your purpose? What are the goals that flow out of this purpose? If you are unclear on where you are headed, the derailers you face may not be identified or the weight of their threat may be underestimated.

Disciplined
Long-term commitment to live out your mission takes (day in, day out) discipline. What is your identity—as a leader in your organisation, as a family member, as a volunteer? Clarity on mission develops your ability to identify derailing behaviours that distract you from your commitment to live and lead each day in light of your mission.

In order to move toward more intentional, visionary and disciplined leadership, identify where you need to pause and reflect, and where you need to take action. You will keep yourself on track and the detailers at bay.

Leadership: honing your craft

Leadership takes place in a context. It involves relationships. Given that contexts are evolving and relationships are dynamic - one’s leadership needs to be treated as a craft, honed over time.

Viewing leadership as a craft reminds us that we are on a continuous leadership journey: discovering more about ourself, about others. Discovering more about what works well and what seems to fall flat, or backfire.

We are on a learning journey. If we approach this journey with curiosity we are more open to what might emerge. The same-ol-same-ol approach may not best serve the context and the people & relationships involved.

Coaching can help resource you to hone your leadership craft. Taking time to raise questions, explore options, and reflect on next steps can spark curiosity and lead to new possibilities where you and others flourish.

How might you hone your craft today?

Where can you invite new perspectives to inform how your are considering the context?

What tools or resources do you have before you and how might your deploy them in new, creative ways?

In The Craftsman, Richard Sennett writes:

“Acts of repair are a proving ground for all tools. More, the experience of making dynamic repairs establishes a fine but definite line between the fixed and all-purpose tool. The tool that simply restores is likely to be put mentally in the toolbox of fit-for-purpose only, whereas the all-purpose tool allows us to explore deeper the act of making a repair. The difference matters because it signals two sorts of emotional responses we make to an object that doesn't work. We can want simply to relieve its frustration and will employ fit-for-purpose tools to do so. Or we can tolerate the frustration because we are now also curious; the possibility of making a dynamic repair will stimulate, and the multipurpose tools will serve as curiosity’s instrument.”

Curiosity (2.0)

Take a moment today to pause and reflect.  You may want pen and paper.  A quiet place.  Space to think, hear, feel.

“Curiosity serves as a gateway to what we value and cherish most. We can reclaim the lost pleasures of uncertainty, discovery, and play from our youth.” ―Todd Kashdan, PhD

Q. How might you cultivate your curiosity today?

Q. Where can you navigate the space between with greater curiosity - increased awareness of what you value and cherish most?

Q. How might you allow this to resource you to lead amidst uncertainty?

Curiosity (1.0)

Curiosity sometimes feels light, whimsical, energising. Other times it seems draining. Curiosity fatigue sets in.  A solid dose of certainty would be nice.

Yet a posture of curiosity can enable us to remain open to the emergence of new opportunities, possibilities, and often helps keep fear and angst in check.

Curiosity can shine a light on things that matter to us and nudge us to explore options as we move forward.

Take a moment—today—to pause and reflect.

Q. Where do you notice your curiosity being sparked today?

Q. How might you respond to your curiosity? (today, this week, this season of life...?)

Consider the Context (2.0)

To Consider the Context involves awareness of and hospitality toward multiple perspectives. When we neglect this, conversations and relationships fragment. A way to approach this differently is self-differentiation.

In his book Clear Leadership: sustaining real collaboration and partnership at work, Gervase Bushe, PhD writes, “With self-differentiation, we find a place where belonging and individuality are not mutually exclusive, where I am separate from you and connected to you at the same time.

Self-differentiation is about having clear boundaries, being clear on what my experience is and the difference between that and your experience. Self-differentiation requires knowing the difference between the data I have and the stories I make up with it. Self-differentiation requires acknowledging that your experience will always be separate from mine and not needing you to have a certain experience for me to feel OK.

Self-differentiation is about being true to myself and true to the relationship I have with you. It is about putting equal emphasis on my needs and our needs, whether “our” means two people, a group, or an organisation. In order to do this, self-differentiation requires being aware of what my truth really is—knowing what my experience is what is really motivating my thoughts, feelings and actions.”

Pause and reflect.  Consider the Context - your context. 

Q. How might you move toward greater self-differentiation within that context and in reference to the relationships present?

Consider the Context (1.0)

In any context there are systems. Systems comprised of variables that sometimes align and play nice, sometime rub each other the wrong way, sometimes try to hide or are ignored, and sometimes are not known or acknowledged. More could be said, you get the gist.

These variables are (but not limited to, of course): people, relationships, values (shared and assumed), structures, norms, stories, vision, procedures, expectations,….

If we focus only on an apparent problem with a given variable, and not the interconnections and relationships between variables, we miss the picture.

Pause and reflect today.  Consider the Context - the reality in which you are leading.

Q. How might you resource yourself with different perspectives, gaining greater awareness of the relationships among variables in that context? 

Q. How might this increased awareness cultivate stronger relationships (with self and others) and better conversations - where you and others can be more fully known and systems can thrive?

Intention, Discipline, Possibility.

The ‘Space Between’ is an image that can help orient us to the context in which we lead: it is a journey—day by day, moment by moment—of navigating this space from where we are to where we’d like to be. This does not suggest you and I are not where we want to be today. But it frames the tension of where we are and what we hope the future might hold.

This navigating is marked by multiple relationships (with self and others), conversations, decisions, opportunities, challenges, hopes, setbacks. You know well what sorts of things are characterising the Space Between for you.

So, how might we navigate well this Space Between? This space we find ourselves in today and where we hope to get to and, at least, be moving toward?

Possibility: how do you imagine where you’d like to be? What do you see? What are you hearing? What is around you? What is no longer present? What might be a few steps—that can be taken today, this week, this month—toward that vision of possibility?

Intention: What might be a few steps you take today, this week, this month toward that vision of possibility? What are the values that are driving those steps?

Discipline: As you move forward—step by step—how might you resource yourself to stay curious, courageous and committed? Who can support you? What might you need to hold on to or let go of as you move forward?

Navigating the Space Between sometimes feels like you’re in flow and things are just working and ticking along. Sometimes its disorienting, fragmented, clunky, frustrating, zapping. Often its a blend of all this.

See how stepping forward with a vision of what might be possible and how you might step forward with intention and discipline can resource you to navigate the Space Between today. Then try again tomorrow.

What is the Script?

Understanding scripts—the narratives or stories we form, carry with us, and draw from—is core to better thinking and stronger conversations. 

Coming closer to naming the scripts, reflecting on them, questioning them, and considering new scripts is a big part of coaching. 

On narrative coaching with clients, Chené Swart, PhD writes: 

“Clients are connected to and shaped by the multiplicity of narratives of their own lives: the relationships they value, the communities and histories they come from, and the cities, nations, and economic systems that have formed them, as well as the narratives of the global world that they form part of through access to technology.

In the coaching conversation the multiplicity of narratives of the client are invited, welcomed, and explored, with all their ambiguity and competing natures, to come and be told, retold and re-storied.”

Q. What are the scripts you are running about yourself and others?  

Sometimes it can be tricky to get perspective on this on your own. It all becomes a bit muddled and too interconnected to get clarity.

Coaching can cultivate your awareness of and ability to understand current scripts and resource you to re-write new stories where possible and needed?

Q. What informs the scripts you are running? 

Q. How might you create space for other perspectives, new scripts? 

New narratives can free you up.  Allow you to lead yourself and others toward  greater flourishing and common good.

Be Curious.  Question the Scripts.  See what Emerges.  

The Space Between

You live in a space between. You lead in a space between. A creative space where you have options on how you will move from reality (where you are at today) to possibility (where you might like to be).

This a creative space. Sometimes it feels that way: plenty of options, potential routes forward, with curiosity and courage in full force. Sometimes, however, it feels distorienting, clunky, heavy, lonely or just too much to face.

In those time where the space between feels daunting, how might you resource yourself to consider a few next steps to move forward? To move toward what might be possible.

Take a moment to imagine what it would look like, feel like, sound like to be in that be in that place where what might be possible is your new reality.

Q. What do you see? What do you hear? What is no longer in the way?

Lean in with curousity today, creating a space where your can nudge toward that vision of what might be possible. Consider some options. Try some on for size. Take the first step.