ABSTRACT
Everything is there at the beginning, if we are able to see it. In Conan Doyle’s story ‘The Adventure of the Cardboard Box’, Sherlock Holmes reflects on a successful case and reminds Watson: ‘We approached the case, you remember, with an absolutely blank mind, which is always an advantage. We had formed no theories. We were simply there to observe and to draw inferences from our observations.’ ‘Beginnings’ begin with the very first pieces of information and emotional experiences we have concerning our potential client, such as eagerness, delays, style of communications, tone of voice and body language. The physical environment and how it is used can also provide clues about key organizational dynamics (see Chapter 9). We use our emotional intelligence to understand what is going on below the surface: it is detective work.
