Doing More For Less (of us) Getting the most out of people is not a bad thing but in the extreme it translates into squeezing the life out of them. As Deming exclaimed, “beat horses and they will run faster—for a while.” Doing more with less implies squeezing more and more out of people until [...]
Archive for the ‘Quality’ Category
Parasite Or Partner
Posted in Economy, Leadership, Morality/Ethics, partnership, Quality, tagged Business of business, Critical Thinking, Economy, human spirit, Leadership, Moral Values, partnership, Progress, Quality, relationships, Systems Thinking on May 8, 2012 | 1 Comment »
Not All Data Are Valid
Posted in Leadership, Management, Problem Solving, Quality, Systems Thinking, tagged Critical Thinking, Decision-making, Leadership, management, Problem Solving, Quality, Systems Thinking on April 30, 2012 | 2 Comments »
Many people—probably with the exclusion of politicians—have come to believe data based decision-making is the way to effective action. In the words of Lord Kelvin, “to measure is to know” and so if our decisions and actions are to be directed by knowledge—not just by what we believe—then we must base them on data. While [...]
Which Energy Fields Do You Use
Posted in Leadership, Life, Quality, tagged Change, Creativity, Culture, Development of Self, human spirit, Leadership, management, Progress, Quality on April 1, 2012 | 2 Comments »
There is little doubt that life requires energy and in life we each are free to canalize our energy as we choose. As the saying goes it is not what happens in life so much as what you do with what happens that makes all the difference.
From Whence Creativity Emerges
Posted in Creativity, Leadership, Quality, tagged Culture, human spirit, Leadership, Learning, management, Progress, Quality, relationships on March 25, 2012 | Leave a Comment »
Alessandro Di Fiore, CEO of ECSI, reports that a recent ECSI survey found “68% of business leaders firmly believe that great innovators are born and cannot be made.” Alessandro also notes in a HBR blog post “scientific evidence of the last 30 years has proven just the opposite.” So is this just a little factoid [...]
Facilitate Performance, Don’t Appraise It
Posted in Leadership, Management, partnership, Progress, Quality, tagged Development of Self, human spirit, Leadership, Learning, management, organizational design, partnership, Progress, Quality, relationships, Systems Thinking on March 11, 2012 | 2 Comments »
Ah the annual performance appraisal! Let’s deconstruct this. Annual means every year. Performance means accomplishment. Appraisal means offering a judgment on the value of something or someone. So the annual performance appraisal is a yearly judgment of another person’s value to the organization.
Performance Appraisal: Pathway to Mistrust
Posted in Leadership, Management, partnership, Quality, Relationships, tagged Culture, Decision-making, human spirit, Leadership, Learning, management, organizational design, partnership, Progress, Quality, relationships, Systems Thinking on February 4, 2012 | 3 Comments »
Robert Galford’s HBR Blog Network article, “How to keep your cool during a performance review” suggest there is a widespread abhorrence and likely fear of the annual performance review. To make what is often a not-so-good experience better Robert offers four tactics: relax; prepare yourself to hear one or more unexpected ‘somethings’; if you don’t [...]
Rethinking a Fixed System
Posted in Change, Economy, Life, Problem Solving, Progress, Quality, tagged Business of business, Change, Critical Thinking, Decision-making, Economy, human spirit, Leadership, Learning, Moral Values, partnership, Problem Solving, Progress, Quality, relationships, Systems Thinking on January 21, 2012 | 1 Comment »
Is the system broken? No, not at all! It is fixed just as desired. Our economic system has no (explicit) concern for ‘we’ in its design, it is all about ‘me’ getting what I can for ‘myself’—it is best labeled an egoistic economic system. The pursuit of material self-interest is the guiding principle for [...]
Hidden Leadership Lesson #31
Posted in Leadership, Management, Quality, tagged Culture, Development of Self, human spirit, Leadership, Learning, management, organizational design, Quality, relationships on January 14, 2012 | 1 Comment »
Those in authority can provide leadership experience to people in their organization by striving to provide them the opportunity to realize joy in work. Accordingly, in a New York Times interview, Ori Hadomi (CEO of Mazor Robitics) asserts, “It’s important that people are happy in what they do. I believe my role is not to [...]
Retaining Talent
Posted in Leadership, Management, partnership, Quality, Relationships, tagged Development of Self, human spirit, Leadership, management, organizational design, partnership, Progress, Quality, relationships, Systems Thinking on January 3, 2012 | 1 Comment »
In a Forbes.com article Eric Jackson presented the following top ten reasons why large companies fail to keep their best talent.
Better Questions Afford Better Solutions
Posted in Education, Quality, Systems Thinking, tagged Decision-making, Education, human spirit, Leadership, Problem Solving, Quality, Systems Thinking on December 2, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
There seems to be a debate over the use of standardized test results for accountability as the way to improve student achievement, and thus our education system. Effectually, this debate is turning attention away from understanding the concrete educational experience toward the abstract measures. No wonder teachers and children have to be incentivized to respectively [...]
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