Your world has changed. Did you have a say in what’s changed?

Everything changes all the time. What was normal years ago, or even last week, is no longer so. Some things change what’s normal in a instant, like 9/11 or the Global Financial Crisis.

Things change and we just passively accept the new status quo as normal.

But did you have a say in what the new normal was going to be? Do you like what is now normal?

Would you like to actively change what’s normal in a more positive way?

Lots of folk talk about difference and change, whilst doing things the way you saw them do it last time you saw them. The incongruence between the message and the messenger talks louder than the messenger. Ian Berry has this uncanny “Edge” that is both a little unsettling and intriguing whilst creating an enticing urge in you to explore further out than you normally explore. Somehow he has managed to bring his very unique way of being into print. Yet again, you impress me and stretch my mind!
--- Allan Parker, Managing Director, Peak Performance Development.
2009 National Speakers Association of Australia, Educator of Excellence Recipient

This package is for you if you are passionate about:

• Creating organisations people really care about
• Being the difference you want to see in the world
• Doing something pioneering, breathtaking, and truly innovative
• Change where everyone can win
• Leaving a legacy for your children and their children
• Change people can actually believe in and make happen
• Changing what’s normal for the good of people, our planet, and for profit

What you will learn?

Most business books tell you what to do, or relate case studies about how some icon or guru made millions. My book doesn’t do any of this. Who am I to say I have any solutions to your challenges, or that what works for me, would work for you! I prefer to partner with you to solve your challenges in your own way.

In each sparkenation I state what I feel/think is normal and then I explore some ways to change what’s normal. I end each sparkenation with a possible actions section and encourage you to do your own unique work, because what I have written is not important. What you intend, feel, think, and ultimately do, that’s what’s important.

I’ve never read so many thought-provoking ideas in one book. The beauty of the book is that you can pick one sparkenation and explore it without having to read the rest of the book. It is a fantastic consolidation of a diverse range of incredible ideas that I found quite blessed to be gifted in one book!
--- Simon Starr, 10X Business Coach

I was thrilled to be interviewed about my book and philosophies recently by Alicia Curtis, the Founder of Revolutionary Lives. This interview is 27 minutes and you can access it here.

Each sparkenation is concluded with a Possible Action/s section when you can decide what work you will do to change what’s normal in your own way.

Action 1: Change yourself. All change is personal first.
Discover, Distinguish, Develop, Differentiate, Deliver. Sparkenations 1 - 23

Discover

1. Closing your knowing-doing gap
2. I’m not normal and neither are you
3. History is not my story or yours
4. Is your progress being delayed by dogma?
5. One solution to the world's pre-eminent problem
6. Discovering your life’s work and your shining eyes

Distinguish

7. Living our lessons from 9/11
8. When our worst triggers our best
9. Feedforward is often more powerful than feedback
10. Where have all the people of character gone?

Develop

11. Stepping up to personal significance
12. Crossing the discipline bridge
13. The Rise of the Social Entrepreneur and Intrapreneur
14. There are rarely rewards without first taking risks

Differentiate

15. The toughest yet most rewarding journey
16. Wanting and getting and having and giving
17. Grandpa’s Legacy and a key law for living a good life
18. Compete with yourself

Deliver

19. Just showing up isn't enough
20. Have an attitude of gratitude
21. A human being fully alive
22. Being indespensable
23. The pain and pleasure of being an exception

Action 2: Change Your Relationships.
Relationship change follows personal change.
Connect, Commune, Collaborate. Sparkenation 24 - 28

Connect

24. Networking with purpose - introducing Networlding

Commune

25. Be a hero in your own home first
26. Life/work balance is nonsense

Collaborate

27. The triumph of tribes
28. Only collaborate with people when you have achieved a shared view

Action 3: Change your organisation. The most powerful organisational change follows relationship and personal change.
Be aware, be clear, be inspiring, be attractive, be engaged, be authentic, be generous.
Sparkenations 29 - 58

Be aware

29. What is the purpose of business, really?
30. Management by Wandering Around
31. Is your story as compelling as nectar is to a bee?

Be clear

32. Do you have a Plan A for where you’re going?
33. Four key answers that may well determine your future
34. Is the co-operative business model one you could emulate?
35. What are you prepared to risk to fulfill your dreams?
36. Are you driven by enlightened self-interest
37. Authenticity and accuracy

Be inspiring

38. Why must come before how
39. When profit is a reason we confuse what we do with why we do it
40. Create a manifesto
41. Breaking your manifesto down to six words

Be attractive

42. Assumption: You know what your stakeholders want
43. Creating a supplier-customer chain structure
44. Stop recruiting and retaining the wrong people
45. Creating a snapshot of your strategy and your execution plan

Be engaged

46. Cascading strategy down to teams and individuals
47. Appraisals are dead; just not buried yet
48. Confuse people with their performance at your peril
49. Enhancing their gifts

Be authentic

50. Decisions must be made where and when it matters
51. Great service is normal - wooing and wowing is an entirely different matter
52. Ensuring change programs actually result in desired change
53. We get what we give
54. Other people don’t rule the world, you do
55. Business may be the last bastion of hope

Be generous

56. Are you a card carrying member of Generation G?
57. Do you do things every day that amaze you?
58. Change where everyone can win

Epilogue - Fulfilling our promise

I strongly recommend this book to people who share a passion for making the world a better place through collaboration, shared values, noble objectives and a desire to get the very best out of the people around them and as a consequence out of themselves.
--- Terry McGivern, Smurfit Kappa United Kingdom

My 58 sparkenations have been gleaned from partnering with passionate and enlightened leaders in several countries since 1991, to change what’s normal for the good of yourself, other people, our planet, and for profit.