This item continues our series on so-called classic business rules that can become corrupted in practice by poor leadership. Another classic says “develop a sense of urgency.” Yes. Everyone is in favor of cutting through imbedded bureaucratic delays. But if EVERY day is filled with meetings in which everyone seems to be flapping around, it’s [...]
This item continues our series on so-called “classic business rules” that can become corrupted in practice by poor leadership. As a leader you’ve been coached to make sure you “set stretch objectives for your people.” This is good enough advice if you are careful to make the objectives realistic. Too often, however, the stretch goals [...]
This blog post continues our series about how some “classic business rules” can be corrupted in practice by poor leadership. What if your boss says “I will leave you alone to run your own show, but the rule around here is that you NEVER miss your number.”? That’s autonomy with a big caveat attached. How [...]
This item is the next in our series about “great classics,” the business rules that make common sense but are often corrupted in practice if leaders are careless. We are told we should always benchmark against others if we want to be best in class. Serious benchmarking was especially drilled into business leaders at the [...]
There are many recommended business practices that everyone knows you are supposed to do, but which often get corrupted in practice. In a series of blog posts upcoming in this space, we will explore them. College students from the 1960s and early 70s can remember many of those great protest songs that erupted in those [...]
When the senior VP was about to retire the “word” went out that the company desired there be a “large appreciative crowd” that would fill the company’s auditorium for the farewell ceremony that would honor the officer’s long service. The “request/order” to have all departments strongly represented cascaded through the email forwards for several days. [...]
Recent events have returned the notion of accountability to our attention. While we’d like to think that leaders of character never stray very far from always remembering the need to be accountable, the reality seems to be that there is a wax/wane cycle like the moon. But the combination of the economic crisis of the [...]
Layoffs are obviously difficult times for the employees in firms whose leaders have chosen to make the layoff decision. The difficulty increases if a firm does more than one round of layoffs. As layoffs have become more frequent in the faltering economy, some leaders are learning that serious issues exist for the employees retained, the [...]
A family here has an Australian Cattle Dog. You know the breed–diligent hard-working energetic herders who must always “have a job.” Doggie lore says one cattle dog lived to be more than 29(!) years and spent 20 of them working. Over the recent holiday the visitors included four cats and the CATtle dog quickly realized [...]
It was late in the spring of 1981 when the owner of a small construction company that worked on highway construction jobs walked into a federal courthouse to face a federal grand jury that was looking into whether bid rigging had occurred on recent highway contracts in the area. The man was understandably nervous. He [...]
