The secret Big Bang Team Days (a post that only the chosen ones will understand)

Well, I am not President anymore, but for them, I am always going to be "MCPiiiiiiiiiiii" (with Alex's drunk voice). Yesterday we used Skype Beta to all see each other, even though we are scattered in Norway, Sweden, Finland, Belgium and Romania, it felt just like our crazy days in the office. So here is a picture of our team days:

It just coincides with the closing of the books of our term, which made me get very happy for the effort we put in turning the organization around. Before our term, the year result was a loss of 1 million kroner. In our term, we had 111 thousand profit! Way to go my dear Big Bang (and, of course, some special individuals in the organization, to name a few: Hege, Halvard, Andreas, Elizabeth, Kjerstin, Andrea, Catherine, Ane, Tine, Christian and Jan Robert).

Sorry for the random post, but my team deserves it.

Lamebook

I wonder if this is a joke or people really know very little about the most obvious things out there.

AWESOMENESS POST

I keep postponing to talk about the amazing things I've experienced so far as President of AIESEC Norway because I want to write about them in details - bad, bad habit, because there are so many amazing things that they pile up and this leads to a situation where I never talk about them. So, I will try to put them all together in one post. The AWESOMENESS POST.

1 - Coaching visit to Local Committee University of Stavanger

In our national board job, we have a huge role which is to coach local committes. I am the coach of UiS and what this means in reality is that I have to do a consulting job with them to increase their performance. UiS is a very small local committee, they started just 2 years ago and almost no structure were in place. In fact they barely had members, only 4 or 5.

When I arrived there, I could see there were lots of things not in place, like for example the corporate relations - in 6 months they had only 3 business meetings, a total disaster. They were struggling and the few members they had were feeling they were failling big time, thus making the general mood being very down, because these guys have been working a lot. In fact 2 of the executive board had quitted also and a 3rd one was also thinking of quitting. Terrible state to be in, especially when you just recruited new members. This was looking like the recipe of disaster, if they kept the same pace, they would lose all the new members recruited and frustration would be in the air.

Instead of puting me down, their problems in fact energized me, I was excited to be back at the ground level to help them solve problems. I decided to step up and change the game. I gathered the executive board and had an intense day of work on feedback and suggestions to the LC and building up solutions. I felt energized because even though the problems were deep, I totally believed in their ability. The only thing they needed was passion and direction. And we built up this together.

Today (1-2 months after my visit), I can see the changes in UiS. Their members are passionate and motivated. They are having tons of fun while working very very very hard. And they have super talented people. If in 6 months they booked 3 meetings only, in one week they booked 8, talk about improving fast. I am 100% confident that these people that are in UiS now will change this local committee in an enduring way, shaping their culture for the next generation.

Extra random point about the visit: I never felt so welcome in any coaching visit: I had my own room, we went to 2 parties, 1 norwegian typical dinner and people really wanted to make the changes in UiS.


2 - Excel 2009 - AIESEC Norway National Conference

This one absolutely blew my mind. It was even more positive then I was dreaming it could be. What I saw was a different AIESEC Norway for ever before. Everything was just absolutely perfect:

- The content - the agenda was very well built and the content delivered with passion, creativity and focus. I believe at the end of the conference it was very clear the country direction and who was responsible to make it happen and how.

- The delegates - very lively, energetic, smart and willing to learn. What a crowd. I am so proud of our members. If they keep that kind of energy level and fun in their AIESEC every day work, I am sure they will do good.

- Facis - it was mainly the national board and some talented local committee vice-presidents. The content was delivered smoothly and in lots of cases in a very creative way.

- The conference organization committee and logistics - they were so amazing people. Always smilling, very focused on client satisfaction, these people put on a real show: amazing food, everything on time, great session rooms, party, everything. From the basics to details, the organization committee rocked the house - and, of course, the conference ended up in a profit.

- "Externals" - in AIESEC conferences all around the world we have this word "externals" to say about the people who are not in AIESEC, but they are there in the conference as representatives of other organizations or the government. In the case of Excel, we had 2 sets of externals that were just mind blowing: DnB Nor and CTI.

DnB Nor put a show that will be hard to match in the future. They delivered a full day of leadership development to our AIESEC members, which was part in fact of their own leadership development program. It was a great added value to our members and, not only that, it was also extremely fun and impressive. They had famous classical musicians, normal plenary sessions, skills workshops and also in the end a huge interactive session where every member had a different percussion instrument. The analogies with leadership were perfect: when playing, you have to combine listening to what is around you and playing your own music; the diversity of instruments (talents) made possible that in fact we had good music (if everyone had the same instrument, it would be very difficult for 80 amateurs to pull this off); leadership is about giving a base that people can use as a guideline, but also giving the possibility for people to solo with their own way, etc etc etc. I loved it. Some pictures of the DnB Nor leadership day with AIESEC Norway:








CTI had a short session on what is coaching. They offer an appetizer to our members, that thanks to our partnership can get professional coaching with very very competitive prices. They also give the whole national board a 3 days coaching course that is so amazing. I cannot describe how lucky I am for having this opportunity. Here are the coaching couple dancing in the moment:



- Sunny Bergen - believe it or not, it was sunny most of the time during the conference!


3 - National Board Team Days

Each quarter the national board gets together, stops for 2-3 days and evaluate where we are, where we are going, what we need to change, etc. It's the most powerful team management tool I use, because it's a mix of interpersonal relationship, direction, celebration of success and adjusting the things that didn't work so well, strategic creative discussions, etc.

It's just too awesome to describe, you have to be there and live it - and to live it, you have to be a member of the national board. I consider myself very lucky, because my team is simply the most awesome I ever saw. Such talents you don't find easily everywhere. They are challenging to lead, as any room full of only talented people, and I learn everyday with them.

I am so grateful for being the President of AIESEC Norway. This kind of opportunity, with this level of job I won't see very soon in my career. Probably it will take at least 10 years in a "normal company" to do the same things I am doing today at the top of my 27 years old.

I wish every human being have the same opportunity as I have, that's why I want AIESEC to keep growing, especially here in Norway.

Engage 2009 - swedish AIESEC conference

AIESEC is always opening doors for cool opportunities and one of the amazing opportunities I was offered some weeks ago was to chair the AIESEC Sweden's national conference, called Engage.

Being the chair of a national conference is a great honor, because it's the only AIESEC opportunity you don't get o apply to, but you are invited only. The chair holds a lot of influence (sometimes even more than the president), because he is responsible for creating the atmosphere of the conference, connecting messages and make sense of the agenda, lead the logistics and the facilitators team, etc.

I must say that I absolutely had a blast as chair. It was a very challenging experience, but I believe I managed to get the organization committee in my side and also get the respect of facilitators and delegates. I believe I could inspire (and have fun) with all these 3 target audiences. I believe it was a great success.

I cannot describe how happy and honored I felt for having this opportunity. Again, only AIESEC could have given me this.

Some pictures from the conference:

Canon Japan: cruel talent management technics

Canon in Japan came up with this amazing idea:

- What if we remove all the chairs from the offices?

And they didn't stop there. They had also a new brilliant idea:

- What if we put sensors in the corridors that horn sirens and red lights if some employee is walking slower than 5m each 3.6 seconds? (talk about fast-paced business environment).

Well, Canon Japan went beyond the "if" and did it:



Check the details here.

That's the kind of thing that leads to people thinking Japan is an extreme place to work. I am sure it's more an exception than a rule, but it's a little scary that it can actually happen there and people do keep working without torching the place.

Work union, anyone?

Next time you see one jap in any touristical place with a Canon camera, offer your respect, that's a though guy.

International Presidents Meeting 2009 – IPM

IPM 2009 or Global Leaders Summit 2009 (a more comercial name used to promote the conference) is the annual meeting where all AIESEC national presidents (from current term and elected to next term, as me) get together to:

- Elect the new President of AIESEC International and give confidence vote for his Directors and Vice-Presidents
- Start the global planning process, giving input to the global focus areas that AIESEC International for next year will have
- Prepare the elect presidents to lead the organization by leading high performing teams and managing well strategies and operations
- Help current presidents to wrap up their experience and prepare for next steps

But the above points really don’t describe the greatness of it. IPM is basically great because of 3 things: AIESEC International elections, presidents and content.

Elections for AIESEC International

When I joined AIESEC (back in 2005), I imagined AIESEC International people as the big super hardcore dudes. Respect, you know? It’s really funny when you see your friends, people that you have worked with, with all their qualities and improvement points, with all their successes and failures to apply to those positions.

It somewhat break the magic, but at the same time remembers us about the AIESEC magic: you will develop, it will be fast and if you are up to it, you can go sky rocket to the top.

And the AIESEC International President election, with 5 candidates, all of them current members of AIESEC International was a very special moment. It was very inspiring to hear those guys. It demands tons of balls to apply to this position, because it’s so much pressure, expectations and it’s there, in front of every AIESEC country, if you fail or win, it’s very public. I respect the people who applied.

AIESEC International President results announcement:


Aman Jain, candidate speech:


Directors announcement:


Vice-presidents announcement:



Presidents

First thing about IPM and the other AIESEC conferences is that IPM doesn’t look like a conference, it’s basically a meeting. You meet people and exchange tons of ideas. It’s a 10 days conference, but it passes so fast as 45 minutes Lost episode. You want always more, but it’s already over.

Around 200 AIESEC presidents, from 107 AIESEC Countries, this is something especial in itself. All of these people with the same role, sharing similar realities, problems, solutions, ideas. People usually say the AIESEC President is a lonely role, since you cannot talk about everything with your team. This conference is where all these people get together and identify “hey, I can talk to you! You understand me!” I myself already got some very good friends that are also elected presidents that I know I will talk a lot during my term.

Discussing the balanced scorecard


People from Western Europe and North America Growth Network


Content

I was agenda manager for the conferences here in Norway (and back in my local committee in Brazil) and one thing is very obvious: it’s extremely hard to make a conference to a too diverse audience. The magic of IPM is that everyone there is a president or will be. Thus, the content is tailor made and very relevant, doesn’t matter if you are in a weak or strong AIESEC country, hardcore management in financial crisis is all the same.

It’s been a long time since I didn’t have such an empowering AIESEC conference in terms of content also. I am more than satisfied and lots of sessions just blew my mind in ways that made my though “wow, I really don’t know anything”, “how I didn’t think of that before” and “jesus, these guys are doing a great job, I want to do that too”.

One extra point to the content was related to the AIESEC partners that were delivering sessions. At least the ones I attended - Tata Consultancy, Future Considerations and Time Management International - were extremelly useful. Thanks a lot!

IPM was the AIESEC conferenceexperience. (not to mention Rome, which is probably a point on next posts)

My teams

On the last post I just mentioned how cool the conference and my elections were, but I didn’t mention the coolest part of it (save the best for the last): selecting my team.

To be really sincere, the selection was even better than my elections (even the moment of being elected, when the water spills on your head), because selecting my team is for sure my first important decision. This decision will affect me for one year at least and AIESEC Norway for sure more than that, at least 2 year.

So, one day after being elected, I engaged in a series of interviews, both phisically and by skype, to decide who would be the people that would be my vice-presidents. In other words, these 5 brilliant individuals who would come together so that we lead the AIESEC Norway for the term 2009-2010.

Fortunately, I didn’t do it alone. I had more 4 great people who helped me to make up my mind, giving inputs, asking questions, telling their experience. I am sure, without them, I would not be so confident in the outcome of the selection (or, if I would be, I would only not be aware of the possible dangers that I could face). I need to especially thank them, the selection committee:



First, Jan-Petter Westlie, from Horton International. This was a key man in selection committee, since he was the expert leader. He guided us so well that after a few moments with him it was just natural to trust his process. Without him and the support from Horton in the competencies assessment, the selection would take a lot more time and, I am sure, wouldn’t be so clear. Secondly I need to thank Camilla Nihuus (AIESEC alumni and member of the AIESEC Norway Board of Directors) and Prashant (President of AIESEC in BI) for the support, good questions and all their time. And, the last, but the most important, to Sonam, the current President of AIESEC Norway, who arranged with all these people before hand so that it would be as easy for me to select my team as it could be.

But, enough of that, let’s talk about these amazing people who I selected to work as the main strategic heads of AIESEC Norway:

Camilla Gullberg - she was elected to take care of the corporate relationship and sales (again), since that’s her current position on the current national board. It takes a lot of passion to run again to the same position in AIESEC, since it burns you out quite a lot, because of the super-fast-passed environment, pression for results, low pay, etc. I admire her for that. I believe she is the best for the position in AIESEC Norway.

Lyubov Byessonova - I don’t believe my luck, because Lyuba applying to this position is just too much luck to be true. She is Ukrainian and is current working in AIESEC Ukraine’s national board as the responsible for communication. For the ones who know AIESEC, knows the AIESEC Ukraine is doing very well in communication. So I couldn’t be more happy with her as our external relations and communication vice-president.



Mari-Anna Johansen - her current position is the equivalent of Camilla, but in University of Oslo local committee. She was running to the same position also as Camilla. How did she end up in the team then? During the interview, it was clear that she had a passion for finance (she is dealing with that currently in her bachelor) and also talent to that area. The final and best touch: she was passionate about AIESEC and flexible enough to assume as vice-president of finance, because she knows how much she can learn being in the national board, no matter which position. I am so grateful to have found this girl, without her, most probably I would have to end up with a non-norwegian finance person and that would bring a lot of problems to me.

Rolf Schmachtenberg - I consider Rolf one of my term’s achievement as VP Talent Management. Serious. Currently he is VPTM in the local committee of University of Oslo and I could see the amount of development this guy had. Of course he is only where he is because he himself is brilliant, willing to improve and that takes action by himself. I am very grateful to have his in the team and also very happy that he is my successor. I believe I could not find a best sucessor.



Us (well, Lyuba is not a piece of paper, but she was in Ukraine during the conference):


There’s one more person, just that I don’t know him/her yet. Since there was no one selected to VP Exchange, because I was not fully satisfied with the 4 candidates, we decided to open a 2d round. I can’t wait to know who will be the 6th brilliant element in the team.

But, just to not be ungrateful to my current team, here’s one of the nicest moments of 2009, us skiing together (me and Sonam for the first time):

Achieve 2009 feelings and elections

Achieve was such a different conference to me. I don’t know if it was because I was running for president of AIESEC Norway; or because I had to select the team that will work with me next year; or because I worked with very experienced people that gave me great insights; or because of the small number of people (nether less very important people) that were there; or because the organizing committee was so smiling and helpful; or because of the new people I met; or because of the old people I knew and met again; or because of Deniss, the Estonian chair; or maybe everything at once? I don’t know, but the thing is that Achieve 2009 in Trondheim was one of the most exciting conferences I had. Not tiring at all. Full of joy and fun - even when the problems came with the venue and everything needed to shift place one day before the conference actually started.

This is one of the moments that I am wordless. I just enjoyed the moment and lived it fully. And I could feel members were exactly with that feeling. I could see, maybe for the first time in large scale in Norway, their drive for the organization, their shining eyes and how much fun they had, even though it was hard work. It impressed me in several ways. I think MC, facilitators, OC, chair, LCPs, EBs and other delegates made the best they could out of it, took everything and contributed with everything. It was one AIESEC Norway, which I hope to keep for the next months to deliver in our huge goals. Because now we need to “achieve” as the conference name stated.

And, well, yes, I was elected the next president of AIESEC Norway, which throws me right to the infamous worst-paid-CEOs hall of fame. Not that I do it for the money, which obviously I don’t. I do it for basically 3 reasons:

1) what I will learn and take from leading and managing a country unit of a global organization with more than 33.000 members, present in more than 100 countries;

2) the belief I have in the organization, a true passion, a passion only possible because I experienced the product (the AIESEC experienced) and it trully changed my life by making me discover and develop my potential and what I want to do later in life;

3) the impact I can bring to AIESEC Norway, generating more results, which will turn up into more life-changing experiences like mine. Only this is a great deed on itself, I hope I am up to the task.

It’s hard to describe the feelings (including the happiness and the weight of the responsibilities), but for sure they are generally very good and, of course, lots of times very scaring. But I wouldn’t do it if it wan’t challenging and scaring, so I guess this is the right feeling.

Well, take some pictures of the conference and mine elections (in the next post, I will talk about the selection of my team):

The Talent Management team's rap...



...against the fabulous sales team song:



Members enjoying one session:



Bizarre themed parties, always present in every conference:





The organizing committee:



Captain Plenary (the dream from ScaLDS post-meeting coming true):




Random dancing:



Dressed for the election speech:



Dressed to take a bunch of water if elected:







Hugs afterwards:



and, of course, MCP elected roll call:

Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Talent Management Unit meeting (not in this order)

Last week I went to the Netherlands (also known as Holland – which Wikipedia told me is a wrong usage) to go to a meeting in Rotterdam. The meeting gathered some of AIESEC’s elite talent managers from all continents to review the long-term talent strategy, solve some problems with the implementation of AIESEC’s competency model, work on how to make our processes more flexible and bring quicker results and so on. It was loads of fun and a lot of work that helped me to understand a little more about AIESEC in the global level and the challenges we face.





But I don’t want to talk about the meeting.

Don’t get me wrong, I feel this meeting has an important contribution to AIESEC’s global network and that we generated there some basis for the evolution of the AIESEC Experience and breaking some paradigms. But, hey, I don’t want to talk about it, because soon the output of the meeting will be released and that will be much better than my words. What I want to talk is something more free and personal: my experience (in the meeting and far away from it – because I managed to spend one day in Amsterdam just for the fun).

First the people

In the end, it’s always about the people. I have been to enough AIESEC conferences and meetings to understand that if it sucks or rocks, usually more than 50% is because of the people you interact and put the conference mood up in terms of learning and fun. Not that the content is not important, but usually it’s less than people. And in this meeting we had some of the best talent managers’ vice-presidents in AIESEC, so, definitely, it was great. It was very cool to meet again people such as Daz, Sophie and Letzu (with their amazing creativity and passion) and meet new ones such as the brilliant Vicky and the best-buddy-ever Mayank. And I didn’t even talk about the ones that were not members of TMU, such as Stephane Le Camus (from Unilever Global Expertise team), Evert Temminck (CEO from Humexx), AIESEC International people such as sweet sweet Lucy and funny Juan, people from other support teams, such as Shawn (whatever it is written) and old old friends, like Conrado, Bê, Maurício, Lilian and Gabriel (all from Brazil).

It’s very good to be among people who are also passionate about AIESEC and work hard to make it evolve.

Second, Rotterdam

Rotterdam is fairly nice, but not really. All you can find is Turkish junk food every(any)where and a kind of uglier, smaller and with less options and bikes Amsterdam. Comprehensible, Rotterdam was fully rebuilt after WWII, because Hitler made it as an example for those who would not surrender.

I must say that AIESEC International office is quite nice, as well as their living conditions – which is a big plus plus in AIESEC terms.

Ok, maybe my views of Rotterdam are quite unimpressive because of lies bellow:

Third, Amsterdam, the sin city



The flag and coat of arms of Amsterdam says a lot about the spirit of the city: “XXX” (whatever you are up to date to the crazy internet slangs, where “XXX” means “sex” [or maybe “pornography”?] in the cybertech-oompa-loompa-interNERDway). Amsterdam transpires (inspires?) sin, while also being very classy – somehow it remembers me of “the Story of O”. Old (and pretty) buildings from 1600, canals all over the city that make it humid and with shades of green everywhere, bikes everywhere you go and dodgy alleys holding “coffee shops” usually even more dodgy. Ah, and let’s not forget the Red Light District. The city is actually small (I walked from center to east, than south, then west and then center again in 7h), but there’s greatness on it.



Maybe I am not a good writer, but all of the above is actually GREAT. Here are some of my pictures from the one day walking trip:

The architecture is truly amazing (especially for a Brazilian that has very little experience in Europe).







The canals add a touch to the city (and a very helpful way to find out where you are in the map, if you have any).








Bikes everywhere. You can’t see a place without them.




Some cool parks too (but not nearly as green as Oslo, of course)








I don’t have pictures, but some other stuff:

- Coffee shops. After 7 hours walking, I had nothing else to do, so I went to the “Bulldog”, the first coffee shop in Amsterdam (founded in 1975), just by the Red Light District. For those not versed in the NETHERLANDER language, coffee shop means “marijuana shop”. I had to taste the aspect of smoking with the blessing of the law, even though I am a totally non-smoker (proved by how many times I actually coughed while smoking, making a total fool of myself). I bough pre-rolled joints, because I had never rolled one (as I said, I don’t smoke). I can say the feeling of that was pretty interesting, it was like being mild drunk and mild LSD: a little problems with motion coordination, blurry vision, lots of thoughts and some strange senses and 6th sense. Definitely good, but, still, I hate the act of smoking itself, so there’s no way I am going to do it again.

Besides that, even smoking pot being legalized in the Netherlands, I believe that smoking is also helping international drug dealers, because the source of the weed is the same anyway. So, in the end, even thought it was wrong, I did it - mostly because I am very pro legalizing hemp. I don't smoke it, but if cigarretes and alcohol are legal (and we humans are quite keen on poisoning ourselves with it), I don't see any reason with hemp shouldn't be. I would not go for it anyway, but, hey, let those guys smoke their pot in peace.



- Red Light District* (it is “forbidden” to take pictures).



I didn’t know exactly what to expect, but, really, I was not expecting anything good at all. Public places with whores tend, in my Brazilian view, to be decadent, filled with dodgy (dangerous) characters, with ugly & sad girls and a possible a place to get:
a) drugs
b) diseases
c) robbed
d) killed

What I found in the dodgy alleys of Red Light, just by a big beautiful church to save us from our sins, was lots of happy smiling tourists (mainly men, of course) and damn pretty girls illuminated by red lights (which is kind of a sad thing in its own ways). I do believe a lot in energy (not in a new wave fashion or freak-o-teric way) and definitely Red Light District has a weird energy around it. Besides being a happy, sexy and cool place on the surface, it is a very sad and frightening place, full of vices and bad bad people. I could sense that those girls using underwear, behind glass windows, so angelical and devilish at the same time, are afraid to be punched or stabbed by some crazy psycho, are probably addicted to some shitty thing and exchange their flesh and soul for money (with men that can’t get such pretty girls for one reason or another). Don’t get me wrong, I don’t pity them, such pretty girls probably chose that path and most of them might even be proud of it. But, anyway, they are screwing up their body and soul (NOT in a catholical way, sex per se has NO PROBLEM at all and it’s not a sin – in fact it’s a sacred thing). But I guess I can’t explain that without sounding crazy, so I just say: go there and check out those babies, you will be impressed. But beware and protect yourself.

Sad story in the district: I was passing by one of those alleys and there was this guy on a wheel chair. A high tech one, that you can drive around as a electric car or something. I overheard his conversation with the beauty:

- But I won't hurt you.
- Yeah, I know, maybe tomorrow. (generating excuses voice)
- Yeah, maybe tomorrow... (disapointed voice)

I could not help but to notice that, besides the guy being on a wheel chair, in case the whore would accept him, he would have to climb the everest of 2 steps to actually get into the little room. Sad.

If you want to check all the pics of my Netherlands experience, check it on my Picasa.

And, finally (not connected to red light at all):

BEST HOSTING AWARD goes to Daniel Prestes. Thanks a lot, man! Prestes hosted me his house, even cooked to me one chinese meal and made everything possible for me to have an A-class stay. That was amazing.

* there are several “red light” districts, but the one I am mentioning here is the true one, near the church. In the others, I was told, there are ugly girls and/or transvestites (indicated by blue lights, instead of red).