Loading...Business Experiments in the Test Kitchen of Life
February 8th, 2010 in Uncategorized
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Tags: Accountability Partnership, business coaching, Celebrate, Challenge, Coach Buffet, Connection, relationships, saboteur, Seth Godin, Stuck, Unstuck
I am just back from a weekend in Toronto with my dear friend and business partner Tanya (hereto forward known as Tanya with no preamble about how we are both best friends and business partners!). The working weekend was set up about a week ago when we recognized that some face time was our answer to busting through the Seth Godin style resistance our lizard brains had been mounting at various times over the past month about next steps for our beloved Coach Buffet.
After a couple of successful Coach Buffet events in the fall and some demand for more, we found ourselves royally stuck. A new approach was the answer, we decided, so we spent several meetings in January designing a new virtual approach. And then, lizard brain again. It seemed that something was keeping us from moving forward to ship it out and make it happen.
As part of our weekend plans, we decided it was important to include some fun. We recognize that while all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, it makes us grumpy and grumpier! As coaches, we also know that inspiration can be found in funny places. Tanya challenged me to come up with something we could do during our visit that would be so memorable that I would write about it in my 2010 recap of what I am most proud of. No pressure.
You guessed it. Once again. Stuck. Zut, alors. What could we do? I help my coaching clients get unstuck on a daily basis and there I was stuck again.
Luckily, when you have a business partner who is also a coach, you don’t have to stay stuck for long. Together we brainstormed a challenge for ourselves that very well could make the ranks of things I am most proud of in 2010.
Our challenge:
Make a meal together for Saturday night. Big deal, right? Hold on.
The rules:
- Visit at least 3-4 foodie neighbourhoods in Toronto together
- Spend exactly $50 each and not a penny more (Tanya’s husband Greg sprang for the wine)
- Split up to make purchases
- Make no menu plans in advance
- Hide our purchases from each other for the entire day. In other words, NO discussion on what we were each buying independently for our joint meal
- Make a full meal together that would include every single ingredient we bought.
- Eat every dish.
- Insist that Greg eat every dish
The results? A pinch of stuck, a sprinkling of anxiety, heaping scoops of laughter, and five surprizing courses. All this and some almost espionage too. You will have to read my next post for that.
Related posts:
- Coach Buffet: A Satisfying Soup
- What's a Coach Buffet Anyway?
- Four Short Words for Business and Life
- "Ship, then test!" says Guy Kawasaki
- All you can – - -?