Twin Peaking: Share the top executive job!
Corporate convention wants one alpha dog to be in charge. The board needs one person to roast, the employees need one person to toast, and the customers need one throat to choke. That’s just the way...
View ArticleManagerial Sandwich: 7 ways to survive middle management purgatory
Are you feeling like a cold cut in the middle of a managerial sandwich? Do you have a heavy slice of executives on top, a cheesy slab of company politics stuck to your back, a heavy dollop of HR...
View ArticleFrugal Failure: 4 reasons to let your employees make cheap mistakes
I recently drove my VW through a time warp and ended up in a future where no one was allowed to make any mistakes. The confluence of big data, ubiquitous quasi-intelligent computers processing endless...
View ArticleOptical Delusion: 8 steps to a better executive presence
You should take this article with a grain of salt since I have the executive presence of a partially trained monkey with anxiety problems wearing a miniature tuxedo t-shirt. Sure I can do a few tricks,...
View ArticleGuerrilla Goals: 10 ways to make corporate goal setting…fun?
Here’s how goal setting normally happens: Ferguson from Fargo flies in, flops a folio on your office futon, and says, “There’s your new freakin’ budget.” You say, “What about goals? It’s not all about...
View ArticleTroubled Water: 6 leadership tactics to help you through tough times
When things are sailing along, you are keeping the customer satisfied, growth is a steady five percent, employees know their jobs, and your market is stable, leadership may seem like a fun hood...
View ArticleClik here to view.
How to be a Managerial Superhero
Unknown millennia ago a cloud of dust inside a routine nebula collapsed and formed a solar system with a single planet. The planet was called Managerion and from it came creatures that looked human,...
View ArticleClik here to view.
6 Business Benefits of Being a Best Place to Work
If I were a 1920’s industrialist I would own a Gatsby mansion, drive a Duesenberg, wear a monocle, and scoff at being on a Best Places to Work list. I’m not a 1920’s industrialist, I live in a modest...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Culture Booster: 10 tips to improve your company culture this year
Why should you want to improve your company culture this year? Because of this equation: (Employee Engagement (Teamwork))² + (Collaborative Decision Making (Clear Communication)) + Winning Strategy =...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Teamwork Vote: One guaranteed way to improve teamwork
If you want to improve something, measure it. But how do you objectively measure teamwork? That was the question we faced years back when creating a Green, Yellow, Red traffic light scorecard for our...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Human API: 7 Tips to Interface Better with Coworkers
On top of your skills and experience, the next most important thing may be how you interface with your coworkers. Are you pleasant but firm, opinionated but clear thinking, methodical and reliable,...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Three Natural Laws of Teamwork
I’m ecstatic to have recently stumbled across three natural laws of teamwork. You won’t believe this story. It turns out the men’s room at my local Starbucks turns into a time travel portal if you...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Bears to Bulls: One Way to Boost Employee Engagement
Employee engagement doesn’t necessarily mean employee happiness. You won’t get there simply by making people do trust falls at a team building ranch or organizing a laser tag outing at the local fun...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Reality Reaction: The End Goal of a Sharing Culture
It used to be that men wearing pantaloons and powdered wigs made all the decisions. They ruled over peasant workers by hoarding information and arguing amongst themselves in overly affected accents....
View ArticleClik here to view.
Idea Food: 5 Steps to Promote Team Initiative
Here’s how a lot of performance plans work: Run fast on your own hamster wheel, and you’ll get a yummy food pellet. Mmmmmm. But don’t worry about where the pellets are coming from, how much it costs to...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Idea Avalanche: Effectively Dealing with Employee Feedback
You decide to create an open collaborative culture at work, but when you first ask for feedback from the team, all you hear is crickets chirping. No one wants to open up. But you keep sharing...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Introvert’s Guide to Sales Success
Years ago we did a company team building exercise where we all took personality tests. After being labeled either an introvert or extrovert, we separated into groups to discuss the opportunities and...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Superhero 101: Eight secrets to delegating more effectively
Telling a manager they need to delegate more is often like telling a superhero they need to set aside their vast powers and watch their employees do the world saving: “Did you save the world like I...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Bite-size Vision: How great leaders spur progress
The novice visionary points skyward to an uncharted planet that pulses with untapped potential. “This is where we’ll go!” he declares to his motley team of travelers. The team says, “But nobody’s ever...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Leadership Butterfly Effect: A tactic to vastly improve teamwork
There is a concept in chaos theory called the butterfly effect where a butterfly flapping its wings conceivably causes a hurricane weeks later in a different location. It’s a bit unsettling, and it...
View Article
