A big benefit of being a JCI Manchester member is that you can access a wide range of events organised by the JCI community from around the world. 

A regular event that JCI UK organises is Kickstart. This year’s event was a huge collaborative effort between JCI UK, JCI Scotland, JCI Ireland and JCI Malta. The event involved networking opportunities, discussions around JCI RISE projects and a training course on effective leadership, with a few typical technical issues that we all experienced with these online events, “can you hear me?!”. 

One of our highlights was the keynote delivered by Mike Stevenson from Thinktastic about ‘The Best is Yet to Come’. Here are some of our key takeaways that we can learn from:

Life is pivotal around communication

Mike started his talk with an interesting insight into how each day we are part of 100’s of interactions and within those interactions, we have the power to either lift one another up in those interactions or leave people feeling down and devalued. One example Mike gave was how on the first day of his new job someone came to put an arm around him and said ‘welcome to the team’ which had never been done before and instantly made him feel good.

Key takeaway - sometimes it’s the little actions that you take for granted that can make a big difference. 

Think like Alex Ferguson (even if you’re not a united fan)

Another story Mike told us was how when Alex Ferguson was the manager at Manchester United, he believed in having leaders all throughout the club and letting them know that everyone was responsible for ensuring the team was a winning club. By putting this into place and extending it beyond just the players themselves even down to the cleaners at the club he ensured the mentality was the same for everyone and that everyone was working together to achieve one goal and be a part of the win. 

Key takeaway - Include the whole ‘company/team’ in the process and instil leaders to manage the activities and allow ideas to flourish. 

Female leaders

Women make extraordinary leaders and Mike believes this is due to two things: 

1. Women generally tend to be more empathetic which allows them to understand the feelings of others which can help them to create a stronger relationship and balance of trust and honesty to share. 
2. Women generally tend to think more long-term, which allows them to think further into the future and plan ahead. 

Key takeaway - ensure you have a diverse mix of leaders within your team. It’s important to have a range of skills, genders, ages, and experiences to ensure you can get the best out of each other.

Change doesn’t take time, it can happen overnight and we are experiencing that right now. 

The world is beginning to change and young people are coming up with ideas and putting these into place, think about package free shops and how popular they are becoming. Meanwhile, multinational companies will suffer due to their principles in which people are no longer supporting. 

Key takeaway - Remember, what you do tomorrow doesn’t have to be the same as what you do today. Saying things like “I can’t” will still have an impact and a negative one that no one will benefit from.

If you were at the event I’m sure you will back us up on that Mike’s speech gave us all a lot to think about and if you didn’t make the event we hope this blog showcases what you missed. 

Finally, we remind you to keep an eye out for future JCI UK events so you don’t miss out. One event for your calendar is the JCI UK Coaching for leaders course on 20th and 21st of February, find out more information here.