I once worked for a boss who was a very determined character and reputed, on his commute home, to march across rush hour stations in London ignoring everybody and expecting them to get out of his way, which they generally did.
I tried this out at Waterloo station and just kept my eyes down and walked forward confidently. Amazingly I discovered that everybody moved out of the way. It's something to do with realising, perhaps sub consciously, that the person coming towards you is not looking and so needs to be given a wide berth. Try it - the only flaw is somebody looking at their phone when the normal rules don't seem to work at all!
What it did make me think however is that whilst this is an interesting experiment it is a very poor model for business. If you just proverbially keep your eyes down and don't look ahead then how can you know what direction your business is going in?
Somebody once said that a characteristic of a great leader was the ability to think and look ahead. Not just to stay in the jungle but to climb a tree and see what lies ahead and what direction to march in.
"Leadership is lifting a person's vision to high sights, the raising of a person's performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations." -- Peter Drucker
I tried this out at Waterloo station and just kept my eyes down and walked forward confidently. Amazingly I discovered that everybody moved out of the way. It's something to do with realising, perhaps sub consciously, that the person coming towards you is not looking and so needs to be given a wide berth. Try it - the only flaw is somebody looking at their phone when the normal rules don't seem to work at all!
What it did make me think however is that whilst this is an interesting experiment it is a very poor model for business. If you just proverbially keep your eyes down and don't look ahead then how can you know what direction your business is going in?
Somebody once said that a characteristic of a great leader was the ability to think and look ahead. Not just to stay in the jungle but to climb a tree and see what lies ahead and what direction to march in.
"Leadership is lifting a person's vision to high sights, the raising of a person's performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations." -- Peter Drucker
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