Leadership & Mindset
Negotiating with a "bad" counterpart
Most of our negotiations with vendors should be amicable and balanced. Once in a while though, you come across a vendor that simply does not want to partner and only sees you as an additional revenue stream. For these rare cases, you sometimes may need to resort to extra-ordinary measures to regain control of the situation. Take a Step Back In most situations, if a vendor “feels” that they have won the business even before the official terms are negotiated, they may decide to take a hardline stance.
Are you generating value for your company or you?
In past articles, I have written about the new reality of work where, regardless of your title or work agreement, you are a service provider selling YOUR services to your firm. You company is NOT buying 40 hours a week but rather your specific skill-set. The next reality I need you to accept is that job security no longer exists. Whether you are a contract employee or an old timer, your job is only as secure as the value of your skills.
Peter’s Principle – Promoted to your level of incompetence
Dr Laurence Peter and Raymond Hull wrote an interesting book entitled The Peter Principle (in 1969). The basic premise is that employees are promoted as long as they work competently. This cycle eventually leads to a promotion above their “level of competence”. Interestingly, we have seen Peter’s corollary “in time, every post tends to be occupied by an employee who is incompetent to carry out their duties”. The concept of managing upward is the science of managing your incompetent boss to limit possible damage.
When group decision making goes wrong
Every time I am asked about decision making, I remember a mantra one of my earlier bosses use to chant all the time A company is not a democracy . Many modern managers have taken the completely opposing position of managing by consensus. Personally, I believe that there must a be balance in all things and this is no different. For those times when a group decision is required, when is the group too big? Marcia W Blenko, Michael C Mankins and Paul Rogers wrote an interesting piece called Decide & Deliver: 5 steps to Breakthrough Performance in Your organization .
How to build a real business partnership
Spend enough time in the business world and you will soon be overwhelmed by the number of useless and meaningless catch phrases. Most of the time, they are best described as verbal diarrhea. Many consider the term partnership (sometimes called strategic alliance) as one such term. Let me respectfully disagree. A well thought out partnership can yield huge synergies for both parties but it is a fickle and fragile creation. If you too are a believer in the value of partnerships then the next logical question is how do you make it work?
Your project teams may be hiding problems and negative information
An interesting article was published in the Journal of Applied Social Psychology Volume 41, Issue 2, pages 401 428, February 2011. It is clearly demonstrated that as a project get's closer to completion, decision makers are more likely to conceale problems that may jeapordize it. This interesting work was undertaken at George Washington University using undergraduate students. The crux of the analysis is that a 90% complete project meant that 81% of decision makers were likely to hide nagative information or problems.
Internet Addiction in teens can lead to higher Depression Risk
Today's entry focusses on an interesting article I read August 2010 about Internet addiction with teens. It showed that teens have a 2.5 percent higher risk of becoming depressed when addicted to the internet. An interesting quote from one of the researchers is : "The results of the study indicated that young people who use the Internet pathologically are most at risk of mental problems and would develop depression when they continue with that behavior." - lead researcher Lawrence T.
The steps to achieving greatness
Regardless of your chosen field of expertise, you most likely want to be great at it. When coaching individuals, I am often asked “What takes someone from average to good to great?”. Putting aside your field-specific characteristics, there are some immutable laws of success that I want to share with you. The first golden rule comes from Stephen Covey’s book “7 habits of highly effective people” and is “start with the end in mind”. Regardless of how YOU define great, spend some time to think about it.
Why you should you allow working from home and how to do it right
What are the benefits of teleworking? Before we talk about how to do it properly, I want to take a minute and quickly brain dump some of the benefits of teleworking. Not every organization will identify with every one of the items on this list but you should be able to pick out a couple that are applicable to your reality. The environmental benefits Whether you believe in this point because of your commitment to the environment or simply because of the monetary savings it provides, this is a reality most organizations will highlight.
Empower your people to perform
Over the last couple of month, I have written many articles extolling the benefits of empowering your employees. In case you have not read them, the Coles Notes version of the concept is that you are no longer a manager but a coach. Your job is to train and support your people. Your success is determined by their success. So what should you do to ensure their success? Growth Most of your employees should be knowledge workers and they want a clear path for growth.