Whether you are a captain of industry, wielding the helm of a multi-national mega-corp; or, a solo-professional entrepreneur, wielding a broom in your spare time just to make cash-flow — you could be your own worst competition.
With all the competitive forces taking aim at the big red circle on your back, you can’t afford to […]
One critical element in a well-written novel is that the characters seldom do anything “out of character.”
Accomplished novelists take care to give their characters believable behaviors by crafting credible backstories. My favorite novels are those where normal people react to abnormal situations in ways that are outside my own experience, but totally acceptable […]
In a global environment that is growing exponentially more competitive with increasingly fewer boundaries, your organization’s core competencies are less relevant than your ability to adopt new ideas and metamorphosize into something different.
[Counter Intelligence – May 2011] I’ve had the pleasure lately of getting to know members of a local chapter of STC – The Society of Technical Communicators. These are the folks who write Operator and Policy Manuals for complex machines, software applications and services. One member has been writing articles for medical journals for 30 […]
One out of two employers (48%) say they are aware that “long hours” and ” doing more with less” is costing them in stress-related loss of productivity — and only one in twenty bosses (5%) say they are taking remedial action.
That’s one unfortunate bit of data from a talk by Lisa Jordan of Human Solutions, […]
What Do You Pay Them to Do?
I serve on the board of a small private school in my town and because of some previous non-profit experience I was asked to help with the task of creating a new Employee Manual. During one of our committee meetings, someone joked that, “when we […]
Here’s something to ponder:
When someone asks, “What do you do for a living?”
Do you answer with your job title, or a description of what you do?
Do you reply, “I’m a Project Manager.”
Or, do you say, “I coordinate a complex series of steps to that result in a project that is finished on time and within […]
One of the pitfalls of playing to your strengths is a tendency we all have of dialing in our performance when the activity involves a personal strength.
One of the definitions of a strength is the way you automatically fall into a rhythm of the activity. You’re a natural. You take to certain things like a […]
I’ve been noodling with some numbers related to the value of employees participating in Strengths training. What is the real payback?
When a manager asks,
“What’s the business reason for doing this?”
how do I answer?
Thoughts:
The training I provide helps people focus more intentionally on using their unique strengths to improve personal performance. So let’s imagine […]
When I follow the rules, the process may not always be as fun but the results are usually better.
I learned this while baking cinnamon rolls: There are times when “leaving well enough alone” is the best approach. Good cooks know when they have the achieved that “just right” taste – and so should managers when […]