A Failure of Leadership – Ireland 2018

On Housing and Homelessness

Who is Yvonne Walsh and why does she matter? Think of her as the canary in the coal mine.

Thank you, Caroline Lennon-Nally

#YvonneWalsh, the poster child of everything that is wrong about home repossession in Ireland.

Yvonne’s efforts to engage with the government approved Vulture Funds, to protect her home and children, were undermined and short-circuited by a technicality. As a result, Yvonne has refused to back down on the charge of contempt; and her children can stay in their home as long as she’s kept in prison on the contempt charge.  Whilst the detail is complex, the situation is not. Under no circumstances should any woman, in this modern age, be sitting in prison on a contempt charge defending her home.

The National Housing Agency has no suitable options as is the case for thousands of other families defending their position.

This situation needs to be recognised and resolved by the Irish Government. Yvonne, innocent of crime, incarcerated and degraded, needs to be released from prison to rerurn home to her children.

This entire issue of forced homelessness for families and children needs a National solution and Yvonne needs our full and immediate support. Let us not forget that Yvonne is representing a vast number of women and mothers right across the social structure in Ireland.

The Irish Government has a number of solutions at their disposal. Yvonne must be released now.



On Echoing Irish Voices Congruent with Irish Values…

My hope/wish/prayer for 2018 is that Ireland will be a safe place for a #Whistleblower and an increasingly unsafe place for politicians who take cover with “it’s what’s legal” vs. “it’s what is ethical, proactive and kind”.

A government that is far more congruent with Irish values.

To create that Ireland, we need to find our voices. We need to speak up, shout out and demand better leadership. Our silence serves only those who would lie to us, steal from us, and oppress. That individual and collective behaviour in law it is called ‘willful blindness’ and it is actionable.

Action requires embracing our entitlement to a ‘legitimate sense of outrage’. Or call it ‘righteous indignation’ over our leadership’s major failures and small slights.

Major failures among which are:

  1. closing rural Post Offices and locating a new Children’s Hospital in the centre of Dublin (a 5 hour drive from Donegal, 4 hrs from Kerry)
  2. ignoring a tri-city/county regional economic development approach to Cork/Limerick/Galway by continuing to drive Foreign Direct Investment primarily to Dublin
  3. failing to gear up for the additional housing required by post Brexit growth of financial service sector jobs relocating from London – creating more upward pressure on housing costs

…and only one of many small slights

  • a citizenry that accepts that it’s okay for taxpayer-funded RTE to make you wait over 1 minute through advertising to hear an RTE Player broadcast of newsmakers interviewed on all the above

The bold texts links to articles or videos of interest; for more information on the work of ordinary citizen activists –

Homelessness – @Right2Homes; Website; Founder, Brian J Reilly
Healthcare – @Bumbleance; Website; Founders, Mary & Tony Heffernan
Transparency & Accountability; @I_S_B_A, Seamus Maye, Ireland, Democracy or Corpocracy
Corruption in Banking – @WhistleIrl; Website; Jonathan Sugarman
Legislative Oversight & Abuse of Powers – @ChangeisUptoYou; Website, Founder, Tom Darcy

For perspective and an insight into how things get so bad – and what we can change – I encourage you to consider –Willful Blindness – @M_Heffernan In her book and TED talk

Not one person here is in it for the glory! Most are reluctant activists, they have worked individually and collectively, doggedly determined, while cajoled, undermined, harassed and in some cases bankrupted, to speak up and give voice to others.

Pick a cause, focus and support their efforts. Each has made great strides, advanced new agendas and empowered change. Follow, engage and if it resonates, support their efforts. Or bring forward your own.

*David McWilliams’ testimony references findings published in his 2005 book The Pope’s Children.

 




On NI, flags & the ‘je ne sais quoi’ of leadership…

Thank you to Alan Carson for suggestion my attendance and to Stephen Gough for organising “The State of the Union; Beyond 2021” event in East Belfast this week. The impression I left with was that we are all aching for great leadership.

This is the first of two posts I will offer on my insights from the session.fullsizeoutput_161




Mother’s Day, Martin & Me

“If you want to understand any woman you must first ask about her mother and listen carefully. Stories about food show a strong connection. Wistful silences demonstrate unfinished business. The more a daughter knows the details of her mother’s life – without flinching or whining – the stronger the daughter.” Anita Diamont

Mothering, all parenting – is not a benign undertaking. We give as good as we got. Well mothered children grow up to be parents who can offer the same. For less well-mothered children, even in spite of our best efforts, our woundedness becomes inter-generational, having rendered us less than perfect parents.

English paediatrician and psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott addressed this in outlining the concept of good enough mother. He was writing 50+ years ago, so it’s fair to read ‘mother’ as ‘parent’.

Dr Jennifer Kunst describes Winnicott’s ‘good enough mother’ as:

… sincerely preoccupied with being a mother. She pays attention to her baby. She provides a holding environment. She offers both physical and emotional care. She provides security. When she fails, she tries again. She weathers painful feelings. She makes sacrifices. Winnicott’s good enough mother is not so much a goddess; she is a gardener. She tends her baby with love, patience, effort, and care.

And in a TED Talk, Why good leaders make you feel safe, the author Simon Sinek compares good leaders to good parents.

“The closest analogy I can give to what a great leader is, is like being a parent…What makes a great parent? We want to give our child opportunities, education, discipline them when necessary, all so that they can grow up and achieve more than we could for ourselves.

Great leaders want exactly the same thing. They want to provide their people opportunities, education and discipline when necessary, build their self confidence, give them the opportunity to try and fail, all so that they can achieve more than we could ever imagine for ourselves.”

I’d like to pitch the idea of “good enough leadership”.

This week’s coverage of death of Martin McGuinness – Northern Ireland’s former Deputy First Minister, IRA Commander, and one of the main architects of the Good Friday Agreement – reminded me of the Diamont quote.

Praised by many who knew and empathised with the details of his life, vilified by others – his legacy was and will be debated for decades. I’m choosing to see it her way:

“The more a [people] know the details of [a leader’s] life – without flinching or whining – the stronger the [people].”

Those who saw him as a great leader, experienced great leadership and benefited. Those who saw him as a good enough leader, also benefited.

And I’d like to believe that the impact of “good enough parenting” and “good enough leadership” is not what it says about us – but rather how it may benefit the next generation.

Because even those who have vilified him – having suffered horribly as a result of his paramilitary leadership, are now experiencing the benefit of a generation of Northern Irish Nationalists reared to be unwilling to take up arms.

Rationalisation? Perhaps – but on this Mothering Sunday, 2017, I’d like to believe that ‘good enough’ really is good enough because for all our missteps, we shared a commitment to providing:

… opportunities, education, discipline… when necessary, all so that they can grow up and achieve more than we could for ourselves.




Tangible Leadership

  Where we’ve been and where we’re going!

challenge-1024x576

In 2009, David Allen Ibsen
published, “Leading your way out of the recession”.

It was a recipe for what it would take to survive the global economic crisis.

The ingredients included:

• Self Confidence
• A clearly articulated and broad vision
• A willingness to be flexible
• The skill to act upon intuition
• A talent in mobilizing resources (the right type, at the right time)

The skill to act upon intuition” was evident here in Ireland when, in January 2009, Raymond Sexton convened what he imagined would be a “one-off” session to bring a group of colleagues together. The meeting was designed to kick off the New Year and attend to:

• the move from despondency to a sense urgency and passion which would lead to focused actions, individually and collectively
• rediscovering the basic elements of success, in his view- Time, Treasure and Talent
• providing each other with needed inspiration, encouragement, and support
• curating a body of knowledge which would provide participants access to mentorship, connections and empathetic financial resources

The enthusiasm generated that day resulted in a call to “do this again”. In April, they convened Limerick. An ancient city and home of Shannon Development, created by some of the most forward thinking and action oriented change-makers in Ireland. Their initiatives from the 1960s forward have made Ireland the commercial gateway to Europe it is today.

In the three months between those the Howth & Limerick meetings, attendees at the first had launched nearly a dozen positive initiatives. Clearly, Tangible energy was catalysing change.

The momentum generated in Limerick drove the initiative forward to New York City in May. Scheduled on the morning of the annual Ireland Funds Gala, it was enthusiastically received. A July seminar followed in Sutton, Co Dublin and the leadership series was born.

As the series enters its ninth year, with over 60 seminars behind us, it includes 7 annual sessions in Ireland. Thanks to the enthusiasts, ambassadors and conveners we have met along the way, the global outreach now extends from New York to Sydney, and London to San Francisco.

We’ve proven that resilience is born, as the Irish proverb puts it, Ar scáth a chéile a mhaireann na daoine, “In the shadow of each other, the people live”.

You are welcome to join us in Oranmore, County Galway on 6. October or in London on 17. November for the remaining #Tangible16 seminars.

In 2017, alongside our “events as usual” we will begin to deliver a structured programme designed to offer continuing professional development.

Next year’s events begin as we “Bring it On” in Howth, Tangible’s 65th event in it’s ninth “new year”!

Oranmore, County Galway

Oranmore, County Galway

 




Do something! Complacency is failing us…

"Do what is beyond your strength even should you fail sometimes."

“Do what is beyond your strength even should you fail sometimes.”

As the brilliant documentary “Older than the Ireland” so vividly illustrated, 100 years is not a long time.

It does, however, highlight how action taken today can significantly impact the Ireland of 2116.

I for one think we need to seriously adjust the trajectory.

Heartened and inspired by the leadership evidenced in the stories shared at Tangible Ireland’s Ambassador Summer School – 48 hours later I was faced with the critical need for a seismic shift in the expectations of the citizens of this island.

The state of Dublin is a disgrace.

We’ve invited the world to share in our commemoration, to witness our progress and experience our energy.

I joined an American tourist, spouse of a convention goer, who had no intimate knowledge of the Irish or Ireland. And I was deeply ashamed.

Navigating the streets, even outside the GPO is near impossible. Construction, broken pavements and crowds of pedestrians detoured around significant destinations, were confused, huddling over maps and tripping on obstacles.

Public transport is rerouted, the place looks dirty and disheveled.

It was a bit like being invited to a wedding when halfway down the aisle the bridal party decided that a change of hair, makeup and dresses was in order. And then they changed right there.

Let this serve as a call to action: We’re better than this!

Our emigrants have built cities all over the world. The children of this island have gone on to impact excellence in military, political, business and civic leadership all over the world. And we tolerate less than mediocrity here. I propose that we proclaim that:

The days of “whatever you say, say nothing” are over.
The days of “ah, sure they’ve got the run of themselves” are over.
The days of “sure, it’s grand, besides, you’ll never change it” are over.

Take action. Use digital media to bring examples of the unacceptable to light. Deficits in the delivery of public services, entitlement programs and long term planning can be brought to the attention of us all. Use the airwaves and Twitter-sphere to highlight failures and abuses of systems. Hold the names- just tell us what ought to be and is not. Use the hashtag #BetterThanThis. If #Shameful suits, use that too.

We’ll amplify each other’s frustrations, research and post the wisdom and experience of those who have overcome similar challenges and together we can bring the ideals of the founders to fruition in this our second century.

Alternatively, use and follow #PositiveIreland for the good news stories.

Let no one less than Charles Stewart Parnell inspire the call to action.

“We have never attempted to fix the ne plus ultra to the progress
of Ireland’s nationhood and we never shall.”




Leadership, Tangible style

“Do as I say, not as I do!” …or not!

When Tangible Ireland began in 2009, we were experiencing a lot of that kind of leadership in Ireland.

Founder, Raymond Sexton believed that an emphasis on the positive was required.

• What was going well?
• Who were the people driving the success stories?
• Did anyone else believe we were better than our bottom line?

He began to examine what drove excellence in leadership both at home and abroad.

The perspective was that of an engineer and project manager experienced in helping multinationals invest and build facilities in Ireland, a homecomer returned from a decade in Australia, and a closet historian.

Who the Irish are in Ireland and who we become when we go abroad is a fascinating study.*

And the many Tangible ambassadors, partners and guests have joined him in studying it – up close and personally, across the island of Ireland and worldwide.

There have been over sixty Tangible seminars in global cities – Dublin, London, New York and Sydney; regional capitals – Belfast, Limerick & Galway; and in the urban & rural villages that lie at the heart of Irish life and values – Howth, Kilmallock and Crossmaglen.

There’s a common denominator in all these communities. We honor our original associations, whether counties, communities, schools, or team affiliations, we pay it forward and take care of our own. We are industries, joyous, playful and determined.

Here’s what we do:

Imagine the simplicity of a “3 pinned plug” and the energy it channels. It’s the way each Tangible Seminar is designed. We showcase and model the best business and civic leadership in a region by:

• focusing on the maverick and entrepreneurial “live wires” – the local leaders driving change
• highlighting and sharing connections to the startup, trade & inward investment support offered in the Republic and in Northern Ireland
• recognising our citizens at home, abroad and in transition, uniting them in their efforts to prosper both here and across the Diaspora

Here’s what we’ve learned:

• at home and abroad our values never change
• our Diaspora represents our greatest asset; vast supplies of human capital available for spending and investment
• our citizens never cease to be our citizens

Here’s what we believe:

• Personal, business and trade relationships empower us individually & collectively, in our new lands and across Ireland.
• Our citizens never cease to be entitled to be heard.
• At home, abroad or in transition, we owe each other a duty of care, including responsible stewardship of this island, economically, environmentally and politically.

This drive for excellence in leadership and best practices reflects our duty of care to the next generation by making this island fit to come home to, or to never be forced to leave.

We are survivors.

Who we are and who we become, whether we stay here or go abroad needs to reflect our best hope for the future of our Irish or Northern Irish children and grandchildren in the Americas, the EU, the UK, Oz or elsewhere.

To join us in San Francisco on Thursday, 21. July  or at the annual Ambassador Summer School here in Ireland follow the links to register.

For a great summary of why Tangible travels the globe in search of “live wires” – here it is:

*…who we become when we go abroad as described by one of our own:

Beehan; psychosis

 

 

 

 

 




The Irish Language

My relationship with the Irish language has evolved over the half dozen years I have been here.

It’s doubtful I’ll learn to speak it, I’ve little facility with language, but what I’ve learned about it has certainly informed my understanding of the people of this island.

Three people opened the door to that understanding.

Carol Conway, Freelance Catalyst, facilitator and youth leadership trainer was the first. I’d no idea that she “had Irish”. She’d studied it for the love of the language.

She held my frustration with the use of it – often politically on the border – as a weapon designed to divide an audience into “them vs us”.

“Eve, you won’t understand the Irish people until you’ve studied the Irish language .”

She got my attention with two relevant aspects of the language:

  • The absence of the possessive to have. I don’t have a coat. It’s the coat on me or the coat beside me.
  • Tenses are constructed differently. We haven’t had a conversation – the absence of a “past perfect” means we’re “after having a conversation” and after living here, one learns to ask, is anything really in the past?

The net effect informs our use of English – and I’ve heard it posited – makes us the storytellers we are.

Linda Ervine, is a Belfast teacher and an Irish Language evangelist. She sees merit in teaching the “Hidden History of Protestants and the Irish Language” going so far as to suggest that in refusing to become familiar with it we deny the connection of the language to the culture of Ulster.

Beyond opening my eyes to the inclusive nature of the language she opened the door to tolerance. In delivering “The Hidden History of Protestants and the Irish Language” as a talk at the 2012 PUP Conference she even addressed my intolerance of what I once thought was a Northern Irish ignorance of grammar. It’s not! *

This abstract is from the Slugger O’Toole blog on the event.

Linda Ervine spoke about the “hidden history of Protestants and the Irish language”. In what was probably the best delivered session, she explained how she had been filling out the recent census online when she looked back at the 1911 census and discovered that her husband’s relatives had lived in East Belfast and spoke both Irish and English. Yet their signatures were listed on the Ulster Covenant. Linda deduced that their knowledge of Irish wasn’t linked to their politics…

She quoted Douglas Hyde, son of a Church of Ireland minister, first president of Ireland and founder of the Gaelic League in 1893, an organisation set up to preserve the Irish language. In 1905 he said:

The Irish language, thank God, is neither Protestant nor Catholic, it is neither a Unionist nor a Separatist.

 Linda went on to illustrate how Irish is behind many place names, and words and phrasing we use in everyday vernacular. She also pointed to the Red Hand Commando’s motto which is in Irish! During the coffee break, several delegates signed up for Irish language classes at East Belfast Mission!

She concluded that language was neutral, only a tool to communicate.

She drove home Carol’s point about the structure of the language and what we have carried over into English. Things she used to correct about her Belfast students’ grammar were actually correct in Irish. This among people who are many generations removed from Irish speakers.

She is “Beating swords into plowshares” in Belfast.

And lastly, a cultural and evolutionary observation which bears out the message of both women:

Anthony McCann has proposed imagining an Irish cultural equivalent to “Ubuntu

Garaiocht: An Irish Value for an Energised Ireland

A linguist, musician and  a coach he reflects on Garaiocht as a deeply hopeful value which allows an understanding of the possibility of potential and an openness to a deeply hopeful future.

The link will take you to a brief video describing it in greater depth. In short- imagine the folks of this island – at our convivial best, in good company with a pot of tea and the time to express ourselves in stories. This concept of Garaiocht embodies:

1. Nearness
2. Hereness
3. Withness
4. Helpfulness
5. Conviviality
6. Continuous Action (verbal noun – a noun that acts as a verb) Can’t have an absence of action in the notion of Garaiocht
7. Mutual support/interdependence
8. Resourcefulness/Entrepreneurship the ability to make the best use of the resources that you have (opportunities for helpfulness)
9. Response-ability appropriate to context. Leadership quality with its core values at the heart of Irish life This notion of leadership which is not authoritative – not reliant on command and control.

In “sourcing” the wisdom from this ancient language – he reiterates Douglas Hyde’s point, Linda Erivine’s point and Carol Conway’s widsom when she told me:

You won’t understand the Irish people until you’ve studied the Irish language

We can better understand each other with the gift of a language that predates our generations of conflict. A language that is neither Protestant nor Catholic, it is neither a Unionist nor a Separatist.

Thank you Carol, Linda and Anthony – for opening the door to knowing what I might never have otherwise known!

For more on this subject: “Beating Swords into Ploughshares”

 

 

* at 16:55 Linda Ervine discusses the structure of the language. To “twig on” begin a bit before that for a fascinating overview of the words that have entered the Northern Irish vernacular directly from the Irish.

Here’s a  2022 update on Linda Ervine’s work




Global Ireland, Global Cities

Dublin DipticGlobal City!

Tangible Ireland’s Dublin meeting October 9th is a special one. It marks the first session of my “senior year”* at Tangible.

Four years ago, with the help of Linkedin’s algorithms, I found my way to a meeting at the Dublin Civic Trust.

Welcomed by Dan Feahney, an enthusiastic, ex-pat American, I felt comfortable. Joining over 20 men and women from Northern Ireland & the Republic – it was the best collective company I’d found since arriving two years earlier. Remarkably, a full quarter of the group were women!

2010 was a bleak time in Ireland. We’d already hit bottom. My response was that there was no where to go but up. Everywhere I turned I saw opportunity.

Not so my Irish neighbours.

I was frustrated. The passivity of most and their despair was overwhelming. Where was the outrage? Where were the protests? Why were people saying “We got the run of ourselves, now we’ll pay”?

No one deserved it. It was clearly a failure of leadership, abuses of power and downright incompetence and it was going unpunished. (Sadly, still is…)

Compounding my frustration, I was still confounded by life on the border. The Good Friday Agreement was over a decade past and I lived every day with new messages about “them” & “us”. Somehow we could rail against historic wrongs, be willing to fight imagined enemies over exaggerated slights, but we were passive about the real and present danger.

Not at Tangible. It was different there, among these people.

One by one people rose to present.

I finally heard a language I recognized. Passion was alive in the voices of those calling for new & responsible leadership, self-reliance and a prosperity process!

Presenters came from across the island. I heard the language of respectful citizens of both governments interested in addressing the needs of the island’s economy with no political agenda.

Everything I heard at that meeting affirmed my vision of what life in Ireland could be. This community and their messages have sustained me.

There were 11 speakers that day. They included a young activist and social entrepreneur, Killian Stokes. He’d created a charity. Conceived in Dublin driven by a software platform built in Belfast, he recounted fundraising in America. Nothing passive about a young man equipped with a file of Google images, doorstepping executives and funders at meetings and conferences in New York. Here was passion, confidence and enthusiasm I could relate to!

Next up was Paul Smyth. The quiet dignity of this Belfast based Chief Executive of Public Achievement – belied the passion behind founding WIMPS – Where is My Public Servant? He was answering my near constant musing: Why isn’t anyone holding politicians to account? He was empowering teenagers in Northern Ireland to “speak truth to power” – with microphones in their hands plus the training and wherewithal to disseminate the interviews.

And then Ronan King took the floor. The theme of the day was Excellence in Ireland and one of the most powerful moments was when he put up a slide and said: “Do you know what happens when you Google Fianna Fail & Dynasty?”

Suffice it to say much blood was spilled to form a Republic that is shockingly dynastic.

His focus on demanding the accountability of regulators and bankers was refreshing in light of the self-flagellation I was used to hearing.

Noreen Bowden, an American ex-pat then living and working here presented on diaspora relationships, specifically, the disenfranchisement of emigrants.

Talks on talent management and leadership development by Alan Jordan & Danica Murphy were delivered in language I recognized. Empowering, not self-effacing; proactive and not passive.

Carol Conway then went on to deliver a summary of the first Ambassador Summer School. I knew I’d found a home. She and Dan Feahney closed by moderating a discussion: A Shared Future, the potential to design an Ireland of excellence.

Every seminar since has done precisely that. Tangible Ambassadors share the vision of an excellent, prosperous and sustainable island of Ireland fueled by the wisdom, strength & wealth of Global Ireland.

Join us as we gather annually in other Global cities – London in November, New York in May or Sydney in the summer; Belfast in February, Limerick in March;  Howth in January, Crossmaglen in July & Kilmallock in August.

Why? Noreen Bowden has returned to America, Killian Stokes is living and working there, along with 1000 like him who leave Ireland every week. Let’s develop the leaders who will create a dynamic, sustainable and prosperous Ireland for our children and grandchildren to come home to!

 

*College & high school years are called freshman, sophmore, junior & senior in America.




International Day of the Girl/Woman?

United Technologies placed this ad in the Wall Street Journal, 1979

United Technologies placed this ad in the Wall Street Journal, 1979

Playing “catch up” in Ireland.

Imagine the surprise at 53 years old discovering I was, yet again, a girl.

Imagine the surprise in finding my accomplished, professional peers were also girls.

Imagine my sadness on realising they didn’t have a problem with it.

Please let us consider the underlying misogyny and join in rejecting the appellation.

When I moved here in 2008, the feminist in me never expected to be back at square one.

This tattered copy has hung in one office or another since 1980. The Christmas gift tag added in 1985 was a reminder that my bemused staff didn’t think it was important either. They got it eventually.

One hopes the New Yorker cartoon illustrates the absurdity of accepting something we can change…

…or else we conspire in our own oppression.