Category: 2022

The MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting

—

Tele-fear

Until recently, I had a marked reluctance to use the phone.

But that has changed.

What has happened to me and why?

There are two things. One is that the lockdowns forced me to use phone and video calling a lot, often with people that I had not met before. The other is an appointment approach to making and taking calls.

Efficiency Deficiency

I realised that my phone aversion stemmed from two things:

• One is the sheer inefficiency of playing voicemail tennis to make arrangements. Email can get details done so much faster.
• The other is that I really don’t like being caught unprepared by a phone call. What if they ask me a question that I can’t answer? What if I don’t have anything with me to make notes?

However, lockdown showed me that phone and video calls can be a great way to form and deepen relationships. What’s more, I realised that I actually enjoyed talking to people!

This led me to develop a compromise with my old phone-averse self.

Fix It Up

I now do calls by appointment. We fix a time when the other person and I will both be free. I even ask people I don’t know very well if we can fix up a time. Doing it by appointment means that neither of us is caught unawares, and we can prepare for the call. And it doesn’t suddenly interrupt whatever we are doing when the phone rings.

I hardly ever answer my phone, only when I recognise the number. Instead, I direct callers to my call booking system. I use Calendly, which I have found to be excellent. It offers callers a choice between automatically setting up a phone or video call. A few people find it an odd concept, but those who have tried it love it.

The MAGIC is in the POST

Knowing that I have a call appointment, I can prepare. I use a combination of POST and my MAGIC formula.

I was taught POST by the excellent business mentor William Buist. You can apply it to calls or in-person meetings:

Purpose – Why are we having this conversation?

Outcome – What do I want to be the result?

Structure – What form will the meeting or call take?

Timing – How long do we have?

Spend a few minutes thinking about your answers to those questions. Then you can actually use those points at the start of your call. Not in a robotic or formulaic way; it is better to make it natural, e.g.,

“Thank you for having this call to talk about our upcoming trip (Purpose). I have another meeting in 20 minutes (Timing), but I am sure we can work out the bare bones of the programme in that time (Outcome). I suggest that I outline my ideas, and then we can talk about them (Structure). How does that sound to you?”

I also use my MAGIC formula alongside POST when preparing for calls, especially if they could potentially be problematic. I make notes on the following:

Move – how can I engage the other person’s emotions?

Attune – how can I show that I understand their situation?

Give – how can I be generous to them?

Inspire – how can I give them a vision for something or encourage them?

Connect – what things do we have in common? Friends, organisations, holiday destinations, etc.

I don’t always manage to think of something for each point, but even if I can get two or three into the conversation, it helps. I often tick them off when I mention them in my call.

Time to Pick it Up Again?

So, if you are currently phone-averse, maybe it is time for a re-think? You don’t have to answer your phone all the time, but I discovered a middle way.

Let me know if this rings true.

—

Help Please!

I am writing a book about using The MAGIC Formula to manage yourself, particularly if you work from home.

If you are a freelancer, self-employed, or work from home in another capacity, I would love to talk to you.

If you would like to help, please get in touch:

Contact

The MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting

—

Monky Magic

I had something of an epiphany this summer. I was in France at the Taizé Community. At its centre is an ecumenical community of monks known as the Brothers. Thousands of people visit from all over the world, mainly from Europe. The food is rudimentary, and you sleep in tents or dormitories. It is not luxurious.

But I loved it! As well as the beautiful music, I loved the collective attempt to build unity by getting to know people and understanding each other. And I loved that this was achieved in a lightly chaotic and imperfect manner.

Reflective Cacophony

Many different languages were being spoken: French, Italian, German and Spanish and, mercifully, lots of English. The songs in the church services were in many different languages; each one was different, requiring you to get your tongue around different pronunciations. Each day there was a reflection given by one of the Brothers. Although he was French, he gave his talk in English. He would say a sentence, and then five translators would translate it. Not through fancy headsets, just through shouting! So there was this seesaw between a profound sentence and then a cacophony of different languages. Each language group sat near their respective translator. It was mad, but it worked.

After each reflection, we split into small discussion groups according to language. Although our group was English speaking, only three of the nine of us were from the UK. The rest were speaking English as a second language.

Making a Meal of It(alian)

Each person has a work assignment for the week at Taizé. Mine was serving the meals, so I got to see lots of people from all over the world. I made it my aim to learn to say “Hello” and “Enjoy your meal” in as many different languages as possible. Although I didn’t always get it right, the effort was always appreciated.

It was on the train on the way home that I reflected that learning a language can be an act of generosity. It is a sign that you wish to understand someone different to you.

Cultural Windows

I started a Duolingo habit several years ago and then ramped it up during lockdown. I enjoyed learning French at school and decided to rekindle it before going on French camping holidays a decade or so ago. In lockdown, I started to branch out and try different languages.

I gave Spanish, German, Italian, Welsh and even Arabic a go.

As well as intellectual stimulation, I have realised some other benefits:

– An insight into other cultures. Different languages are structured differently; they have different vocabularies and naturally emphasise different things. When I was learning Italian, among the earliest words to learn were pizza, pasta and cathedral. When learning Welsh, it was sausage, cabbage and fish and chips!

– Arabic was utterly alien to me. A different alphabet – most of my time was just learning what sounds to make when I saw a certain squiggle! But something of the poetry and different angle on the world started to come through, even in the early stages.

– I decided to learn German because I realised I had a ridiculous and irrational inherited British prejudice and slight fear of Germany. The language learning had the desired effect very quickly. My fear of “the other” evaporated.

From Monks to Habits

I have a busy life, so I realised that the only way I could learn anything was by establishing sustainable habits.

I spend 10 minutes on Duolingo just before I go to bed.

And I listen to audiobooks while I am shaving and dressing. For European languages, I highly recommend Paul Noble’s books, available on Audible.

Could language learning become a valuable and enjoyable part of your life?

When could you fit it into your daily routine?

—

Help Please!

I am writing a book about using The MAGIC Formula to manage yourself, particularly if you work from home.

If you are a freelancer, self-employed, or work from home in another capacity, I would love to talk to you.

If you would like to help, please get in touch:

Contact

The MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting

—

I have been working as a close-up magician for the last 25 years. I have entertained at thousands of events – hundreds of tables at weddings, corporate parties and significant birthdays.

At the same time, in the other half of my life, I have led and been a member of several teams. I have recently interviewed many other team leaders about their experiences and challenges. Many thanks if you are one of them!

I have observed that many challenges facing a close-up magician approaching a table of guests are similar to those facing team leaders. I have also realised that the MAGIC formula may be applied in both situations.

—

We have been around our imaginary wedding table and met all the characters. We have seen each personality’s unique challenges and how a magician might react in each case.

In these few posts, I make some general observations from working with the table as a whole to gain some valuable insights for team leaders.

—

The Most Rapportant Thing

Rapport is the foundation for any successful human interaction, whether it be a conversation, a meeting or a magic performance.

Immediately I meet a group of guests at a wedding or other event, I must build rapport. The extent to which I am successful determines whether or not the following entertainment slot flies or crashes.

The same is true of your team. If you want them to want to work with and for you, you need to build rapport with each member and with the whole team.

Comfort Zone Vibrations

So what do I mean by rapport? It is the state where you and the person you are interacting with feel comfortable with one another; you don’t feel threatened, and you are vibrating at the same frequency.

Sometimes rapport seems to be established easily, as if by magic. But most of the time, some effort is required by at least one of the parties. If you can be that party, you can start making your conversations, meetings and maybe even magic performances much more effective.

Your overall aim is to get to a state where the other person feels comfortable with you. How do you do this?

Modify First Impressions

First impressions can be notoriously wrong, but they are usually our only starting point. Occasionally, you might know a little about the person beforehand, so you could have some valuable conversation pointers up your sleeve. However, we mostly have to start with first impressions and then fine-tune them as quickly as possible as we learn more about the other person.

Beginning with a friendly smile and non-contentious topics is usually a good start. For example, at magic gigs, I tend to use “Hi, what’s your name? And where have you come from today?”

You will immediately get a clue about their character from their response. Then you can begin matching and echoing. Don’t copy the person exactly; that would freak them out and have the opposite of the desired effect! But as you talk, you can start to adopt a similar style and speed of speech and echo some of their mannerisms, thereby subconsciously encouraging them to adopt you into their comfort zone.

It is an iterative process. Bit by bit, as you learn more about them and pick up more clues, you can subtly modify your style and content to fit. It is important to remember that you are not seeking to abandon your own identity and become entirely like the other person; instead, you are seeking to present an authentic version of yourself to them in a non-threatening way.

Remember, you are aiming for a position where they feel comfortable.

Push It, Push it Real Good

Think of it as pushing a swing so that it swings higher. You need to push with the rhythm of the swing, not against it.

As you talk and interact more, you will be able to refine your initial assumptions and introduce other topics to make the swing go higher, e.g., holiday destinations, shared interests, and mutual friends. Be led by them.

Steer Towards Your Goal

You will have a goal in mind whenever you interact with someone else, particularly in a work context. As a magician, I want applause, for them to be entertained and repeat bookings. As a team leader, you probably want harmonious and productive meetings.

Keep your end goal in mind. Once the rapport starts to build, you can begin to steer the interaction in the direction you need without damaging it.

Different audience members will respond better to different effects and presentations, and your team members will have varying talents and work styles. In the case of magic, I may select certain tricks that I think will work with that situation. With a team, you will start to get an idea of which team members will be best to take on specific projects.

Remember, rapport is the foundation of any successful human interaction.

How can you build more rapport?

—

Help Please!

I am writing a book about using The MAGIC Formula to manage yourself, particularly if you work from home.

If you are a freelancer, self-employed, or work from home in another capacity, I would love to talk to you.

If you would like to help, please get in touch:

Contact

The MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting
—

I have been working as a close-up magician for the last 25 years. I have entertained at thousands of events – hundreds of tables at weddings, corporate parties and significant birthdays.

At the same time, in the other half of my life, I have led and been a member of several teams. Recently, I have been interviewing many other team leaders about their experiences and challenges. Many thanks if you are one of them!

I have observed that many of the challenges facing a close-up magician approaching a table of guests are very similar to those facing team leaders. I have also realised that the MAGIC formula may be applied in both situations.

—

We have been around our imaginary wedding table and met all the characters. We have seen each personality’s unique challenges and how a magician might react in each case.
In these few posts, I make some general observations from working with the table as a whole to gain some valuable insights for team leaders.

—

Delightful Differences

As I travel around performing magic in myriad different settings, I am reminded again and again about humanity’s beautiful diversity. No two people are the same. Outward physical characteristics are easy to spot, but people are so different on the inside, too.

The more we can remember that everyone is different and the less we make assumptions about them, the less we will run into problems and become stressed out about their reactions or approaches. This applies to a magic audience; it also applies to your team members.

No Devices in Devizes

I usually perform relatively close to London and Oxford. My typical audience is pretty tech-savvy, and I now assume this as a given. A couple of weeks ago, I got a gig in rural Wiltshire, a little further from home than normal. A card trick I have recently developed revolves around the idea of contactless payments using your phone. It involves jokes about how we don’t use cash anymore. My regular clientele lap this up; it feeds right into their everyday experience.

Not so with my farming audience in Wiltshire! Very few of them used their phones to pay for anything. Cash was still very much king in their culture. I had made an assumption that meant my jokes didn’t land. I very quickly had to adapt my new trick to make it work.

Shuffled Lives

When I trained as a coach, we learned how everyone has their own “map of the world”. You understand the world differently to me and to everyone else. Our maps have been constructed over time through our unique relationships, education and experiences, and no two will be the same.

When you shuffle a pack of cards, there will never be a pack in exactly the same order ever again. The number of possible combinations of 52 cards is 52! (52x51x49x48…down to x1), a huge number- roughly 8 with 67 zeroes after it! We have each had many more than 52 influences in our life, so you can see that no two people will turn out with the same view of the world.

Maps and Cultures

Similarly, our personalities are all different. We have all found varying ways of coping with life, and that is OK. That is the fundamental lesson that I take from the Enneagram. Similar insights can be gained from MBTI and other personality profiling techniques. These type indicators also reveal that we react differently in different contexts, sometimes even appearing to have changed personalities!

And lastly, people have different cultural backgrounds. Some will be very obviously different to yours; others may appear similar. When we think we are similar to someone, we might be more likely to trip up. I have already shared my Wiltshire example. Looking more internationally, George Bernard Shaw is reputed to have said, “The United States and Great Britain are two countries separated by a common language.” We look and sound similar, yet we can be very different.

Teaming with Variety

Think about your team members. How are they different to you? Are you making assumptions that they will or should react or think the same way as you? What about their values? Are they aligned with or different to yours? Is it possible for your team members to recognise and respect their differences and yet sign up to a shared set of values?

Is it time to do some work on this?

You have a choice: you can pretend everyone is like you and be constantly stressed out, or you can celebrate differences and be continuously surprised and delighted.

Which will you choose?

—

Help Please!

I am writing a book about using The MAGIC Formula to manage yourself, particularly if you work from home.

If you are a freelancer, self-employed, or work from home in another capacity, I would love to talk to you.If you would like to help, please get in touch:
https://www.work-life-magic.com/contact/

The MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting

—

I have been working as a close-up magician for the last 25 years. I have entertained at thousands of events – hundreds of tables at weddings, corporate parties and significant birthdays.

At the same time, in the other half of my life, I have led and been a member of several teams. Recently, I have been interviewing many other team leaders about their experiences and challenges. Many thanks if you are one of them!

I have observed that many of the challenges facing a close-up magician approaching a table of guests are very similar to those facing team leaders. I have also realised that the MAGIC formula may be applied in both situations.

—

We have been around our imaginary wedding table and met all the characters. We have seen each personality’s unique challenges and how a magician might react in each case.

In these few posts, I make some general observations from working with the table as a whole to gain some valuable insights for team leaders.

—

Happy, Nuts and Indifferent

At a typical banqueting gig, be it a wedding, Christmas party or corporate event, there will be 15 tables. There will typically be 11 tables that really enjoy the magic performance; two that go absolutely nuts and shout, scream and cheer; and one that doesn’t want to see any magic at all.

Human nature being what it is, it is all too easy to focus on the one that doesn’t work, the one that doesn’t engage, the one that rejects what you have to offer.

Team Not Playing

It can be the same with a team. If you have been a leader in multiple different settings, or been a member of many teams, it can be galling to find yourself leading a team that isn’t working, despite your best efforts. I had an experience like this fairly recently. I took on the leadership role thinking that, with my experience and character, mine would be a successful term, and everyone would love me and applaud what I did. As it happened, largely due to factors beyond my control, it turned out to be a bit of a disaster.

What do you do in such situations?

Multiple Outcomes

When designing a trick as a magician, it is always wise to think about everything that could possibly go wrong and plan accordingly. That way, most of the time, the audience won’t be any the wiser if something doesn’t go the way you had initially planned.

You can do the same as a team leader. Spend some time imagining how each individual might react to a given proposal or situation and how you can handle each response. The more you do this, and the more experienced you get, the less you will be wondering what to do on the spur of the moment.

Time and Management

Sometimes, probably most times, things are beyond our control. We are in charge of our own reactions to situations, but we can’t control the reactions of others. We can do our best to influence them, but we can’t control them.

And influencing others takes time and attention.

What could I do if a wedding table is not responding to my offer of magic, or if the chemistry is just not there for that group? In theory, I could spend time with each individual and the whole table to build rapport and dispel their objections to watching magic tricks at that particular moment.

But, the thing is, I don’t have time to do that. I have 14 other tables to entertain. In the moment, I have to recognise that at that time, the jigsaw pieces just don’t fit together, and I need to move on politely. There may or may not be a chance to work with the table later. They may hear the enthusiastic applause of another table, or have finished their in-depth discussion about something serious, and invite me back to perform. Or I might get a chance to show some tricks to individuals from that table when the meal is over, and they have started mingling.

The same is true with teams. Sometimes you just don’t have the time available to build rapport with each member. You haven’t got the resources to sort out all the issues, or your position means that you are not the appropriate person to do it. You can’t control the reactions of others, and you can’t change their personalities. Your powers of influence will increase with reflection and experience, but they will not work all the time in every situation. That is OK; you are only human, don’t give yourself a hard time about it. Learn from the experience and move on.

Next Table, Please

Walking away from a table is difficult. My ego wants me to think that I can handle any situation, but I can’t. I have to remind myself that these things happen and that there are many more tables who will love what I do.

It can be very tough to walk away from a team. It is a dent to our pride to admit that something isn’t working. We have to make a realistic assessment about whether we have the time, resources and team members to make it work better. If we don’t, we need to face up to that, and walk away to another position where we will have a better fit.

Sometimes you just have to move on to the next table.

—

Help Please!

I am writing a book about using The MAGIC Formula to manage yourself, particularly if you work from home.

If you are a freelancer, self-employed, or work from home in another capacity, I would love to talk to you.If you would like to help, please get in touch:
https://www.work-life-magic.com/contact/

I was delighted to be invited as a guest on Amy Rowlinson’s wonderful podcast Focus on WHY. Amy is a fantastic interviewer and has a real knack of going deep quickly with her guests.

I was already a fan of the podcast, listening en-route to many a magic and juggling gig. Being a guest encouraged me to spend time reflecting on what drives me.

Find Focus on WHY on your favourite podcast platform, or listen here:

The MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting
—
I have been working as a close-up magician for the last 25 years. I have entertained at thousands of events – hundreds of tables at weddings, corporate parties and significant birthdays.

At the same time, in the other half of my life, I have led and been a member of several teams. Recently, I have been interviewing many other team leaders about their experiences and challenges. Many thanks if you are one of them!

I have observed that many of the challenges facing a close-up magician approaching a table of guests are very similar to those facing team leaders. I have also realised that the MAGIC formula may be applied in both situations.

—

We have been around our imaginary wedding table and met all the characters. We have seen each personality’s unique challenges and how a magician might react in each case.

In the next few posts, I would like to make some general observations from working with the table as a whole to gain some valuable insights for team leaders.

—

Here Ego Again

An interesting thing happens when I approach a wedding table as a magician. I have to suppress my urges. That might sound a little alarming, but let me explain.

My instinct, when confronted by this diverse group of challenging personalities, is to bolster my self-worth and beef up my fragile ego. I feel the need to compete with Silverback Tarquin, Competitive Analyst Clint and Joker Jake. I want to get one-up on them. I long to look cool to Bored Ben the teenager and convert Timid Tina into a magic fan so that everyone likes me and I feel completely accepted.

If you are a team leader and are being particularly honest with yourself, those urges may seem a little familiar when it comes to your interactions with your team.

However, if we give in to these impulses we will not be serving our team in the best possible way. We always have a choice about how to react to any situation and we don’t have to follow our initial gut reactions.

But how do we make that choice, and how should we react instead?

Zero Sum Humbug

I have realised that I instinctively think that interactions with others are a zero-sum game in terms of status and self-worth. ie, that if they are lifted up, I am inevitably diminished. It’s survival of the fittest, and I need to be fittest. I am not sure where this Darwinian mindset has come from, but I have learned that, in most cases, it is a fallacy.

Instead, I have observed that putting others first does not mean that you won’t be first as well. The vast majority of the time, it just doesn’t work like that in relationships. The only exception might be if you are unfortunate enough to be dealing with a narcissist. However, in most cases, if you lift someone else up, you will end up being lifted as well. You are not going to lose out.

I watched a fascinating video about Bill Clinton on Tim Ferriss’ website. Whatever you think of his politics, his ability to focus eye contact on people and make them feel like the most important person in the room is legendary. And that ends up with both of them being lifted up.

Good Night Fight or Flight

Once we can acknowledge that social or work interactions are not automatically win-lose competitions, we can override the instinctive fight/ flight response. Our self-worth and our standing in the eyes of others will not be diminished if we concentrate on elevating others.

Increasingly I am coming to understand that our self-worth comes from our sense of who we are, rather than what do. And working out who we are is probably not best done in the middle of leading a team meeting or performing magic! Better to do it through reading, meditation, prayer, discussion and other reflective practices.

Purge the Urge

Can you take some time out to reflect on your interactions with your team? Are you instinctively viewing them as competitive situations?

Can you overcome your urges?

—

Help Please!

I am writing a book about using The MAGIC Formula to manage yourself, particularly if you work from home.

If you are a freelancer, self-employed, or work from home in another capacity, I would love to talk to you.

If you would like to help, please get in touch:
https://www.work-life-magic.com/contact/

The MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting
—

I have been working as a close-up magician for the last 25 years. I have entertained at thousands of events – hundreds of tables at weddings, corporate parties and significant birthdays.

At the same time, in the other half of my life, I have led and been a member of several teams. Recently, I have been interviewing many other team leaders about their experiences and challenges. Many thanks if you are one of them!

I have observed that many of the challenges facing a close-up magician approaching a table of guests are very similar to those facing team leaders. I have also realised that the MAGIC formula may be applied in both situations.

—

We have been around our imaginary wedding table and met all the characters. We have seen each personality’s unique challenges and how a magician might react in each case.

In the next few posts, I would like to make some general observations from working with the table as a whole to gain some valuable insights for team leaders.

Lift Them Up

As a magician, the first lesson for me is that it is all about the audience. They are the most important, I am there to serve them, and I need to do all I can to lift them up.

Likewise, as team leaders, our most important job is to serve our teams.

How might we do this?

Working through the MAGIC formula:

Move: I need to make my audience feel something. Most of the time, it will be most beneficial to stimulate positive feelings. As a performer, I want them to feel amazed, intrigued, excited and mystified, but I also want them to feel comfortable and relaxed. I might need some help from an audience member at some point, in which case I want them to feel confident in me and brave enough to take the risk of taking part.

Very occasionally, I might want to make the audience feel uncomfortable as part of the dramatic flow of a routine, e.g., by making them think that I have screwed up a trick and leaving an awkward silence. But I only want to do this if I know the situation will be temporary and quickly resolved and that the feeling of discomfort will only serve to heighten the effect that follows.

It is similar when leading a team. As a leader, you want your team members to feel comfortable and confident working with you and with each other. You want them to be energised, confident and excited. Occasionally you might want to throw in a bit of discomfort as a motivator, as long as you can also show that there is a way out by you all working together and triumphing somehow.

Attune: Magic at tables works best when you correctly judge the mood and characters of the table and tailor your presentation and routine to seamlessly start from that point.

In the same way, as a team leader, you will find it much easier if you can attune to the character and mood of your team members, both individually and as a group.

When performing magic, I have to work with the audience I have, not the audience I wish I had. As a team leader, I have to work with the team I have, not the team I wish I had. If you get it right, your actual team may eventually become very similar to your ideal team.

Give: One of the founders of The Magic Circle, David Devant, once coined the phrase “All done by kindness”. This saying is much loved by magicians and a great mantra for life and leadership in general.

When performing at a wedding table, I need to provide an experience that the guests could not have had without me being there. My role is to give them something that will stick in their memories with good feelings, maybe cause them to think a little differently about magicians, their lives and their fellow humans. This might sound a little grand for a magic performance, but I have had enough chats with audience members to know that it is possible. At the very least, I can aim to give everyone a positive and enjoyable time.

How and what can you give to your team members as a team leader? I would suggest, for starters, encouragement, fun, opportunities to learn and grow, information and your time.

Inspire: I want to leave my audience with a slightly different view of the world, one that will cause them to act differently, if only slightly. Maybe this will simply be in their reaction to future magic performances? Perhaps it will be in their thinking about how the human mind works or how different people see things in different ways? Maybe they will want to go and learn some magic tricks themselves?

How can you inspire your team? What do you want them to want to do as a result of interacting with you? It is worth considering that you will inspire them to act in one way or another no matter what you do! This might be positive or negative. It is more likely to be positive if you are intentional about it. Spend some time thinking about how you would like to be inspiring your team and how you might be able to go about it in your actions, encouragement and general dealings with them.

Connect: The more successfully I can connect with an audience and individual audience members, the better the resulting performance will be. It is exactly the same with team members. Time spent one-to-one with team members or in building relationships with the whole group will never be wasted.

Elevation

How can you serve your team?

How can you lift them up?

—

Help Please!

I am writing a book about using The MAGIC Formula to manage yourself, particularly if you work from home.

If you are a freelancer, self-employed, or work from home in another capacity, I would love to talk to you.

If you would like to help, please get in touch: https://www.work-life-magic.com/contact/

The MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting

—

I have been working as a close-up magician for the last 25 years. I have entertained at thousands of events – hundreds of tables at weddings, corporate parties and significant birthdays.

At the same time, in the other half of my life, I have led and been a member of several teams. Recently, I have been interviewing many other team leaders about their experiences and challenges. Many thanks if you are one of them!

I have observed that many of the challenges facing a close-up magician approaching a table of guests are very similar to those facing team leaders. I have also realised that the MAGIC formula may be applied in both situations.

—

Home on the Range Rover

The last person to meet at this wedding guests table is 17-year old Taramasalata. She is sitting next to her dad, Tarquin the Silverback, who has been ostentatiously boasting about his wealth and rich-person-type activities. Tara (for short) has been talking about how she has been learning to drive in her new Range Rover on the family’s second field and how it was such a hassle because they had to move the pony.

With my comprehensive school chip on my shoulder, I have a strong urge to slap her around the face and tell her to get a life, meet the real world, and wake up and smell the coffee. Who does she think she is?! She wouldn’t have all this if it wasn’t for an accident of birth and daddy’s money. How can she be so crashingly insensitive to the rest of those around the table?

Entitlement Resentment

OK, maybe I have painted an extreme caricature of an entitled teen. However, I am reasonably confident that those feelings of incredulity mingled with slight resentment are familiar to many people to some extent.

Do you have someone on your team who raises even a fraction of these emotions in you? You feel that they are only there because they are related to the boss, whereas you had to work your way up or get the job on your own merits? They come out with the most inane rubbish and have no real grasp on the real world. And, what is worse, you are stuck with having to manage them because they have ended up on your team!

What do you do?

Controlled Reaction

Is it even possible to Move, Attune, Give, Inspire and Connect in this situation?
Well, I think it is. It is not easy, but it is possible.

In life, in general, the only thing we can really control is our response to a situation. We can’t change what is going on in someone else’s head, and we rarely have much influence over most events in the world. But we can change our reactions.

Take Tara at the wedding table. My initial reaction is that I feel resentment and want to write her off. Not a great start if I am there to entertain!Neither is it a great start for you if you are there to manage a team member.

How to do MAGIC

So, what can I do to manage my reactions in this instance?

Move: What emotion do I want Tara to feel during and after my performance? I need to resist my desire for her to feel humiliation; I actually want her to feel wonder and a sense of experiencing something special with the rest of the table.

Attune: How can I understand Tara more? She clearly comes from a different world to me, but how would I be behaving if I had the same start in life and the same life experience? I have to acknowledge that she is not actively trying to be obnoxious and intimidating as she flicks her perfectly styled hair…

Give: What do I want to give Tara? I have to remember that I am there to serve,  as is a team leader. How can I be generous to her?

Inspire: How do I want her to behave or think due to my performance? Well, I would like her to experience being part of an audience with the other guests, and as a result, not feel like she is so very different from them after all. 

Connect: My initial reaction is that Tara is from a different planet to me. But is that really true? Within a couple of icebreaking questions, I can probably discover some points of connection, places we have both visited, or activities we have both tried.

As a magician, I have to go through this process very quickly, in a matter of minutes. As a team leader, you will have a bit longer. But the principle is the same. Your real challenge is to start with yourself, to take control of your own reactions and allow yourself to view yourself as the servant of your irritating team member.

Do you have a Taramasalata on your team? 

Identify the emotions they stir up in you and reflect on how you could modify your internal reactions.

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Help Please!

I am writing a book about using The MAGIC Formula to manage yourself, particularly if you work from home.

If you are a freelancer, self-employed, or work from home in another capacity, I would love to talk to you.

If you are able to help, please get in touch: https://www.work-life-magic.com/contact/