“Thinking outside of the box” is a difficult thing to do – especially when you have been ingrained within an organization or industry for many years. Following are a few techniques to help us all “think different” which are from a recent article in Harvard Business Review.* They are designed to help us identify possible strategic opportunities we had not seen before. 1. … [Read more...] about Strategic Creativity
Advice from My 95 Year-Old Self
You might think this is odd, but a couple of years ago I started to have chats with my 95 year-old self. It is especially odd when you consider that I may not even live to be 95 years old! Basically, I ask my 95 year-old self for advice. After all, everything I do directly impacts him. We are aligned on the goal to maximize our joy, fulfillment and contribution we … [Read more...] about Advice from My 95 Year-Old Self
Better Ways to Provide Feedback
Can you count the number of times that someone gave you feedback that was not helpful? I know, you can’t count that high. Guess what, maybe people you have managed feel the same way. A recent article in Harvard Business Review* provides us with some interesting perspectives on providing feedback: Understanding Excellence. The authors suggest that many of us make the … [Read more...] about Better Ways to Provide Feedback
The Chemistry of Team Communications
Researchers at MIT have uncovered some of the “mysteries” of team chemistry.* Not surprisingly, it is all about communication. But just exactly “how” do the most effective teams communicate? By equipping members of a wide variety of teams with electronic “badges” that captured communication behavior – tone of voice, body language, whom they spoke with, how much, and more – … [Read more...] about The Chemistry of Team Communications
The Importance of All Stakeholders
You might think that only the “senior” people in your organization feel like they have a “stake” in its current operations and future. You would be wrong. I have heard all of the excuses. “They don’t know enough about the substance of the issues to provide input.” “They don’t really care.” “We already know what they think.” Wrong, Wrong, and Wrong. There are … [Read more...] about The Importance of All Stakeholders