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No More Mediocrity: Making Meetings More Effective and Enjoyable

Posted on 08/14/2013 by ·
No More Mediocrity: Making Meetings More Effective and Enjoyable by Laura Stack #productivity

"Meetings are indispensable when you don't want to do anything." -- John Kenneth Galbraith, Canadian-American economist. As we can all attest, business meetings often waste valuable productive time and tend to last far longer than they should. But until we learn to communicate telepathically, they will remain a necessary evil—not just as a means of exchanging ideas and information—but also as a way to build relationships with others. That doesn't mean we have to like them. In fact, as economist and social theorist Thomas Sowell once quipped, "People who enjoy meetings should not be in charge of anything." Whether he meant it facetiously or not, there's a grain of truth in Sowell's statement, since someone who enjoys meetings might actually prolong them and anything else they laid … [Read more...]

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Breaking It Down to Move It Forward: How to Simplify the Complex

Posted on 08/12/2013 by ·
Breaking It Down to Move It Forward: How to Simplify the Complex by Laura Stack #productivity

"The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak." -- Hans Hoffman, German-American abstract expressionist painter. The modern business world is becoming more complex, competitive, and unpredictable by the day. Those of us at the leadership level must remain constantly aware of this reality, because the decisions we make affect the lives and careers of everyone on our team, and they may ultimately determine the fate of the entire organization. Occasionally, one must stop, take a good look around, breathe, and attempt to do what we can to reduce the complexity we face. While you may have no control over issues associated with overarching trends like globalization, rapid technological change, or national economic policy, you can certainly … [Read more...]

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Stop Thinking and Start Acting: Seven Tips for Making Executive Decisions

Posted on 07/22/2013 by ·
Stop Thinking and Start Acting: Seven Tips for Making Executive Decisions by Laura Stack #productivity

There's an image making the rounds on the Internet titled "Executive Decision Making System." It shows a picture of both faces of a penny, heads labeled "Yes" and tails labeled "No." From an outside perspective, that may seem hilariously true—and as a leader yourself, you've probably run into cases where you'd prefer to just flip a coin to settle something, rather than wade through all the pros and cons. You may even have done it once or twice. And don't you feel better after having made a decision? Most of us do. Rita Mae Brown, an American activist and novelist, once said “A peacefulness follows any decision, even the wrong one.” She was certainly no stranger to high-level decision making. Though the world mostly knows her as a writer of cozy mysteries, Brown is an ardent civil … [Read more...]

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Facing Down the Beast: Understanding and Overcoming the Bureaucratic Mindset

Posted on 07/15/2013 by ·
Facing Down the Beast: Understanding and Overcoming the Bureaucratic Mindset by Laura Stack #producctivity

"The greatest evil is conceived and ordered (moved, seconded, carried, and minuted) in clean, carpeted, warmed, and well-lighted offices, by quiet men with white collars and cut fingernails and smooth-shaven cheeks who do not need to raise their voices." -- British author C.S. Lewis, in his preface to The Screwtape Letters. “Bureaucracy destroys initiative. There is little that bureaucrats hate more than innovation, especially innovation that produces better results than the old routines." -- Frank Herbert, American author. Say what you will about bureaucrats—they serve an important function. If it weren't for them, who would take care of all the details the rest of us don't have time to deal with, and keep us on the straight and narrow both fiscally and procedurally? Administrators … [Read more...]

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Dangerous Ideas: Achieving Success Through Innovation

Posted on 07/12/2013 by ·
Dangerous Ideas: Achieving Success Through Innovation by Laura Stack #productivity

One of the many things the late Peter Drucker taught us was that only two things really make a business money: marketing and innovation. Everything else is an expense. Some people would add a few other profit-makers to the list, but few would deny marketing or innovation their places. At least, not publicly. But what about privately, or at least subconsciously? That's another matter. Many of us just don't want to deal with innovation, because it's too much trouble. New ideas push you out of your comfort zone, requiring you to scramble, to work harder, and to think more. For those of us already overstressed by a challenging work environment, that's asking a lot. Oscar Wilde, an Irish playwright and poet, said, “An idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea at all.” … [Read more...]

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Squeaky Wheels: Troublemakers or Drivers of Change?

Posted on 06/24/2013 by ·

"The squeaky wheel doesn't always get greased; sometimes it gets replaced." -- John Peers, American humor writer. We've all heard the old adage that goes, "The squeaky wheel gets the grease." It seems to make imminent sense: he who makes the most noise gets the most attention. This works well when it comes to customer service, which is why the bravest among us have long made our voices heard when it comes to getting special deals and better treatment. You've probably seen squeaky wheels in action in the workplace, too. Often, those willing to step forward and ask for what they want—or simply to complain—get the lion's share of attention from the leadership. Indeed, no organization can grow without innovators willing to ask for what they need and stand up for what they believe in. As a … [Read more...]

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Changing Direction: How to Keep Cultural Inertia from Limiting Productivity

Posted on 06/21/2013 by ·

"The reason men oppose progress is not that they hate progress, but that they love inertia." Elbert Hubbard, American writer and philosopher. "Life leaps like a geyser for those who drill through the rock of inertia." -- Alexis Carrel, Nobel Prize winning French biologist and surgeon. Dictionaries define "inertia" as a tendency to resist change. In physical terms, a body in motion tends to stay in motion in a straight line, while a body at rest tends to stay at rest. But other types of inertia exist, and cultural inertia represents the one that applies to most of us most often. You probably know all you care to about bureaucratic inertia, for example. Once a bureaucracy makes a rule, woe to the individual who tries to buck it. Similarly, some corporate cultures resist change, often to … [Read more...]

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Letting Go: When Should You Cancel a Failing Project?

Posted on 06/19/2013 by ·

"When things go wrong, don't go with them." -- Elvis Presley, American singer. "Don't throw good money after bad." -- American folk saying. As much as it goes against the grain for most of us, sometimes the most productive thing a manager can do is give up on a project. Now, I'm not suggesting you throw in the towel as soon as the going gets a little tough; productive people never give up without a fight. But there may come a time when you hit a point of diminishing returns, when investing further resources in the product would just be wasteful. Remember Microsoft Bob, or Gerber's attempt to create adult entrees? Both companies wisely dropped those products when they flopped. Little Clues As a manager, canceling failing projects may be one of your most important secondary … [Read more...]

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The Snowball Analogy: How to Make Your Organization Lighter and More Agile

Posted on 06/17/2013 by ·

"Good business leaders create a vision, articulate the vision, passionately own the vision, and relentlessly drive it to completion." -- Jack Welch, former CEO of General Electric. "Efficiency is doing better what is already being done." -- Peter F. Drucker, Austrian-American management guru. Back when I was a kid, a big winter storm hit my hometown, delivering perfect snowman material—so naturally, my brother and I decided to build a huge one. We started with a very large base; easy enough. The real challenge was the next snowball up...it was just too heavy for us to lift. Luckily, my brother was a budding engineer. Using our Red Flyer wagon as a fulcrum and a 2 x 8 board as a lever, he lifted the middle snowball onto the base while I guided it. After that, finishing was easy! In a … [Read more...]

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Crises and Firefighting: How to Avoid Managing by Exception

Posted on 06/14/2013 by ·

"Excellence is not an exception, it is a prevailing attitude." -- Colin Powell, former four-star general and U.S. Secretary of State. In recent years, I've observed the increasing popularity of "management by exception" in business. This concept basically boils down to leaders making decisions and assessing performance based on significant deviations from a project's goals, while otherwise ignoring its daily execution. Leaders who practice it don't want to be bothered unless something goes seriously wrong. But there’s a difference being agile and being disengaged. Given the nature of business today, this comes as no surprise. First of all, fewer managers juggling more projects means they can spend less time on traditional management, even as they face demands for higher productivity. New … [Read more...]

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