Sometimes people don’t always act the way that’s expected of them. This might be someone in our team breaching rules of what’s acceptable, a business partner violating an agreement, or … Continue reading Showing you can do the hard thing
Category: General management
Learn to disagree well
Is it okay to talk about politics in the workplace? If so, what are the limits? Or are there none? In some private sector companies it’s forbidden (and that’s been … Continue reading Learn to disagree well
Operating in adversity
Adversity isn’t welcomed, but if we are forced to recognise it we can use it to our advantage. I was thinking about this recently after one tech leader commented to … Continue reading Operating in adversity
You make your own luck
I came across a blog post recently provocatively entitled “I Cheated on My Microsoft Interview”. The gist of the story is that the author got a chance to interview for … Continue reading You make your own luck
Intellectual honesty for sustainable progress
A short time ago I wrote that productive conversations come from intellectual honesty and engaging positively. But intellectual honesty is important for organisational culture, too. Without this things can go … Continue reading Intellectual honesty for sustainable progress
The value of presentational details
This week I was writing a business case, and for a moment caught myself wondering why I was spending so much time fiddling around with the paragraph spacing. But very … Continue reading The value of presentational details
Ask the people impacted
Fairly early in my career I needed to make a change in my team—I needed to make a couple of people line managers, because the number of direct reports I … Continue reading Ask the people impacted
Keeping ideas open
Most people I know want to improve things, and many have ideas about how to do that. In presenting these ideas it’s easy to become possessive of them, however, and … Continue reading Keeping ideas open
Choosing between people and technology skills
Great people can compensate for poor technology, but great technology can’t fix poor people. Great people can work round, improve and replace poor technology. Great technology just sits there being … Continue reading Choosing between people and technology skills
Taking a stand
As Russia attacked Ukraine a few days ago, and generally horrified the world, I encountered some discussion about the extent and value of sanctions. The discussion was about the rights … Continue reading Taking a stand
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