Latinos in Virginia Center

new client

Strengthening a Growing Team with the Latinos in Virginia Center

In March, we'll be diving into a robust team strengthening program with the Latinos in Virginia Empowerment Center (LIVE Center), which supports Spanish-speaking individuals impacted by violence and injustice in Virginia.

The young organization has grown during the pandemic, and many team members have only connected virtually. While this won't change, the team will be carving out intentional time -- four two-hour workshops planned over eight weeks -- to orient around the LIVE Center's Mission and Vision, explore team dynamics and opportunities for increased effectiveness, and develop a Team Charter to better guide their virtual work together.

Serena Fulton will be leading the engagement with the LIVE Center team, using Insights® Discovery as a platform on which to build individual and team awareness. She'll also be relying heavily on the individual passions of each team member, and their own stories about the work of the LIVE Center.

Williamsburg Buddhist Sangha

new client

Exploring the Noble Eightfold Strategic Plan with the Williamsburg Buddhist Sangha

It's hard to believe it's been two years since we met with the nascent board of the fledgling Williamsburg Buddhist Sangha for a strategic retreat. A gentle snow was falling as we convened on the bank of the James River for two days.

We're excited to bring the band back together this winter for a completely different glimpse into the Sangha's future. It looks like we may well have snow again, but our backdrop will be different -- the living rooms and offices of a dozen board members and Sangha instructors seen through a Zoom screen.

A lot has changed in two years, and not just because of the pandemic. The Sangha's community has grown and expanded, and the experiences they've been able to offer their growing community has increased as well. Together, we'll cast a eye toward the future, and walk a strategic planning version of the Noble Eightfold Path to uncover the next steps along the path.

Letter from John (February 2021 Newsletter)

Hello John,

My kindergartener was almost brought to tears last week when the groundhog saw his shadow. He recovered over the weekend when I dragged him and his sister out for the perfect morning of sledding at Bryan Park -- an hour of falling snow, and not a single other sledder on the slope with them. There's a pinky promise floating around the house involving walking around Bellevue in the dark, listening to the ice crack on tree branches (if the weather forecast holds).

My kids feel a little frayed around the edges one year into Covid. I don't think they're alone.

I wasn't joking during Floricane's first team meeting of 2021 when I said it was the 370th day of 2020. I was beginning to doubt we'd ever reach escape velocity on the year. By my watch, last year ended just 10 days ago -- February is the official first month of this new year.

Our team has noticed a shift in recent weeks. It's a little like the moment in a long train journey where you start to notice your fellow passengers preparing for what's next. Everyone is checking their phone, organizing their belongings in their laps, glancing out the window with a new intensity. People are tired from the trip, a little worn around the edges, but they're energized by the prospect of reaching a destination.

Floricane's client conversations feel like we're getting closer to the station. The tone is lighter, and the focus is on possibility. More organizations are centering their focus on the future. More people are sifting through last year, curious if there are lessons worth carrying into 2021. There is a real focus on strengthening (or building, or repairing) relationships within teams.

Here's hoping that stepping off the train onto the platform will mark the next stage of a journey.

I told someone last weekend that when I travel overseas I try to spend a third of my time just wandering the streets, a third doing traditional tourist things, and a third being present with other human beings over coffee, a meal, a concert. In work terms, I'd characterize this as exploring and being curious, working the plan, and building meaningful relationships.

My next overseas trip isn't likely to happen before 2022 -- I have five scheduled in my mind -- but I'm already thinking about ways to bring that traveler's mindset to my own team, and to my new client engagements.

And at home? That spontaneous sledding run was just the first of many adventures we'll have this year.

-- John

P.S. Speaking of the New Year, the Year of the Ox begins on Friday with the Chinese New Year. The Ox points to hard work and strength, to honesty and dependability, and to perseverance. (Strangely, it is the Year of the Metal Ox. Metal is associated with the lungs, nose and respiratory system.)

Kathy Greenier's New Adventure (January 2021 Newsletter)

Kathy Greenier’s New Adventure

We dug deep into the Floricane Photo Archives to find our very first team photo featuring Kathy Greenier -- and Julie, and Lesley, and Debra, and John! (Get a glimpse into who Kathy was way back in 2015 here.) Unfortunately, our last "team photo" of Kathy looked more like Hollywood Squares thanks to unfortunate marriage of Covid and Zoom.

Last week, we said goodbye to Kathy, who worked as a consultant and practice manager for Floricane for the past five years. Late last fall, she somehow backed her way into the dream job she didn't know she was looking for -- on January 18, she joins the University of Richmond School of Law as Director of Career Development for Emerging Careers.

We're going to miss her!

John met Kathy late in the summer of 2015 when she attended Floricane's fledgling Manager Development Program. (Thanks for sending her, Claire!) As the program wrapped up, John mentioned that Floricane was looking for a new consultant focused on Insights®. A month later, Kathy was our new consultant focused on Insights®.

Thank goodness for Insights®! Our favorite self-awareness tool gave Kathy and the rest of our team the language we needed when her Blue/Yellow creative style collided with John's Green/Red creative style. It wasn't all collision, though! Far from it. Kathy's approach to work was flexible, and often paired well with our team -- creating space for good collaborative work, and creating space for other voices. Her strong orientation to building lasting business solutions for Floricane, and our clients, is a key part of her legacy.

If you worked with Kathy over the years, you've probably been inspired by her commitment and professionalism, her care for individuals and teams, and her integrity. As might be expected, the triple pandemics of 2020 created moments where Kathy's best self helped Floricane adapt to Covid and its economic fallout. We're fortunate in so many ways to have had her creativity, personality, and talent in our corner for so long.

And we're going to miss her, even though she's only one Zoom meeting away.

Letter from John (January 2021 Newsletter)

Like many of you, I had thoughts of leaping boldly into 2021, and I saw the turning of the calendar as an important reset moment.

Obviously, the world has other plans for us.

We still have opportunities to reset. There is a continued need to assess and adapt. And we can't afford to dawdle, and let these important choices pass us by.

That said, many of us are starting the year with a variable throttle as we try to make sense of the busy, and confusing, intersection where pandemic, vaccine, economic recovery, and political uncertainty meet. The 14th of January is, I'll wryly suggest, the 380th day of 2020.

It's at times like this that we all need clarity, empathy, and purpose.

• The clarity we need is likely different from the clarity we'd like to have, or to provide to others: Despite all of the continued churn in the world around us, what is it that our organization must do well in the coming weeks and months? How do we strengthen our connection as as team? How do I sustain my energy and passion, find time to recharge or decompress, balance the demands of those around me?

• The empathy we need is both empathy given, and empathy received. What are the ways in which we can, and should, slow down to connect with our teammates, our clients, on a personal or emotional level? How do we ask or better intuit what people need to feel centered and healthy? And, perhaps most importantly, how do we periodically scan ourselves and reflect on what we need to stay healthy, physically and emotionally? (And to ask others to support us where they can!)

• The purpose we need creates the fuel for everything else. Why are we waking up each morning and investing our energy in our work, our families, our community? How can we be more intentional and oriented around those things that matter most to us? How do we help those around us orient toward something bigger, and more essential?

Surprisingly, none of these things emerge from whole cloth. They take intention. And they can benefit from inviting others to collaborate, share, or support us in these spaces.

They also require action. If not now, then when? The current environment absolutely cries out for clarity, empathy and purpose, and it is up to each of us to not just find these things within ourselves but to create space and support for those we support and care for to create them with us.

As we move through the coming days and weeks, I am sure we will each encounter many difficult moments around which we have little control. What we do have control over, as you well know, are our choices, our decisions, and our mindset. We have control over our orientation, and how we balance that orientation in service to self and in service to others.

It is, quite honestly, my most essential work right now. It is, quite possibly, your most essential work, as well.

Stay healthy, stay connected with those who matter most to you, and wash your hands.

-- John

New Client: VSCPA

New project, long-time client. The Virginia Society of CPAs was one of Floricane’s first clients, and we’re excited to be working with them again this spring on a variety of fronts — from a team engagement session using Insights® Discovery to a "Coffee Break” session on organizational culture during times of change.

New Client: Project Homes

We’re excited to begin working with Project Homes as they begin to develop a new strategic plan. From building new homes to rehabbing and repairing existing homes, the organization works across Virginia to ensure that people can live — safely and affordably.

Birthdays, ER Visits and Business

You don’t have to look far these days to see how connection, action, and emotion thread through our daily lives in the Time of Covid, and how these same impulses shape our work. 

In the span of 24 hours this past weekend, my life at home tapped on three essential things our organizations -- and families -- need from us right now. Neuroleadership expert Dr. David Rock’s message, which my teammate Debra shared with us after a webinar she attended, are simple and sensible. To lead through adversity, you must: 

• Take care of yourself

• Look after each other

• Deliver what matters

Thea was a baby when Floricane was born. She turned 12 this past weekend. And what a weekend it was. 

Her last day of being 11 was more involved than we could have expected. Jack woke Friday with an inflamed eye, so we juggled schedules to get him –- homemade Pokémon mask in place -- to the pediatrician. Diagnosis: unclear. Instructions: keep Dr. Smith updated, as needed. 

The evening brought a quiet stream of visitors – a card here, a vase of flowers there, a wrapped package. Some snuck in and out unseen. A few lingered, physically distant but socially present, as we reconnected – Thea with her friends under the magnolia, parents on the sidewalk. It was nice, this slow distant mode of reconnecting.

Jack’s eye became increasingly swollen and painful as the evening wore on -– Nikole was up with him for several hours around midnight, and I snuggled him with a warm compress as we half-watched cartoons from 4:45 in the morning until sunrise.

Thea woke, we sang happy birthday to her, and I sent our pediatrician a quick message about Jack. Before I could start my first cup of coffee, Dr. Smith texted back, “Go to the ER right now.”

There was more to her message, but the gist was, “Move.”

We all know that everything feels bigger these days, but I literally felt sick as Nikole and I quickly strategized who was going to take him. Jack insisted that Thea open a birthday present before we left, and then we bolted -- a new, fairly irrational fear of walking into a hospital churning in my gut.

Long story short, St. Mary's pediatric ER staff was fantastic. The hospital doctor and our pediatrician compared notes and Jack was released. (And he's fine now.) We were home 45 minutes after we left. Thea was curled on the couch with her new birthday iPhone. 

Later that morning, I called my mom and found myself unexpectedly sobbing on the phone. (Who knew that six weeks of surfing the waves of a global pandemic would lead me to internalize all of my fears and anxieties? BTW, I'm fine now, too.) 

Our family quickly regained our birthday celebration stride. Thea’s lemon-raspberry cake, baked by a friend of Nikole’s, arrived. More friends swung by with cards, and banana bread, books, and notes. We lit candles, and sang an officlal Happy Birthday song. We hopped in the car and safely delivered slices of cake to a few of her friends in the neighborhood. One of her grandmothers dropped by and chatted in the front yard. And then our 12-year-old girl hopped on her bike to go socially distant trail riding with two friends in Bryan Park.

Delivering what matters this past weekend involved connection, action and emotion. It meant shifting gears from anxiety to celebration.

Looking after each other this past weekend was more about the actions, and connection, and emotions of others. The nurses and doctors, our neighbors and friends, invested in small ways to the experience of our children (and our family).

Take care of myself? I'm working on that one. (I had a socially distant yard beer with a friend last week! It's a start.)