Management
Every project manager should be performing a pre-mortem
[caption id="" align=“alignnone” width=“2500”]Image by StockMonkeys.com [/caption] As a business leader, I have participated in and managed hundreds of post-mortem reviews for projects and deals. It is a sound strategy to identify the elements that failed or that could be optimized/ “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” — George Santayana But what if you could gain all of the benefits of this activity before the initiative fails thus potentially saving it? A pre-mortem (or premortem) basically is a role playing game where participants assume the project has already failed and then determine why it failed and how failure could have been prevented.
Why working from home may harm your career
When you hear about non-traditional work arrangements, you probably think about a hot tech startup where employees come to work on Segways wearing Hawaiian shirts but most companies now offer some type of non-traditional work arrangement. The most common is flex time and work from home. These arrangements benefit the employees & employer. The employee gets a comfortable home work environment that is distraction free and saves dozens of travel hours. The employer gets a more productive employee and considerably reduced secondary costs (office, phone, internet, etc).
Lenovo CEO distributes his $3M bonus to employees
Most tech company CEOs are accustomed to receiving large multimillion dollar salaries just for showing up to work. In extreme cases, some CEOs have received huge paydays while their company tittered on the brink of bankruptcy and employees faced huge layoffs. Imagine my surprise when I learned that Yang Yanqing, CEO of the very successful Lenovo, decided to breakup his $3M supplemental performance bonus into 10,000 small chunks and award it to his lower level employees (line workers, assistants, etc).
To to handle interruptions at work
With the economic realities we have been living with since 2008, companies are forcing employees to do more with less. Not only are companies asking employees to be more creative and use less resources, they are also asking less employees to do more work. An interruption is anything that distracts you from the primary task at hand. Common workplace distractions are emails, phone calls, drop-in meetings, etc This means that most people you talk to, working in a corporate environment, have too much to do and not enough time.
The Getting Things Done (GTD) Weekly Review Process
As a GTD fan, I have read the book, listened to the 10CD audio seminar, read the articles on GTD Times and subscribed to David Allen’s audio blog. In all of these mediums, one of the key messages that seems to come up over and over, is the requirement to do the weekly review. What would happen to your car if you never changed the oil? The car would get sluggish and eventually the engine would die. Same thing for GTD.
Crowdsourcing design work with 99designs.com (a review)
If you are planning to start a new small business or have a small business that requires some design services, you may be tempted to try out one of the newer crowdsourcing websites. The first time a customer asked for my advice about these sites, I had no idea. As a manager in a larger organization, I have never used these types of services but decided to check them out. I asked my network of contacts and found a handful of individuals that provided their real-world experiences.
4 Tips to remember when Outsourcing to China and beyond
I have spoken and written about outsourcing to China for a couple of years now. Although China does require special handling, many of the high level recommendations are the same as regardless of where you decide to outsource. So here is a summary style high level overview of some of the important considerations: Ask Why: Ask yourself exactly why you are outsourcing. It is because you want to reduce your costs, access specialized skills or as a risk management exercise? Understanding exactly why you want to outsource should be your first question.
Weather Trends 360 predicts weather 1 year out
My local news station weatherman seems to have a 50/50 success rating predicting the 5 day forecast. Imagine my surprise when I learned about a company called Weather Trends International that claims to provide weather prediction for up to 365 days into the future. At first I thought this was another fly by nights hocus pocus type website, then I checked out their client list. It includes names like Walmart, Loblaws, Target, Coca Cola, Heinz and many more. The prediction
Management versus Leadership
As people read the new authorized Steve Jobs biography, they are realizing that although he was one of the greatest thinkers of our time, he seemed to lack “management skills”. This brought up an interesting management debate about which is more important for the success of a company: management or leadership. What is Management? Management is the art and science of controlling people, processes and technology to deliver maximum value through the prism of corporate values and beliefs. What is Leadership?
Research shows that Nice Guys DO Finish Last
If you have read any self-help books, you have undoubtedly read the adage “Nice guys finish last”. Now research from Notre Dame and Cornell Universities show how being too agreeable negatively impacts your earnings. More recent research from Stanford, Northwestern and Carnegie Mellon) continued on the same path showing that people who are overly caring, for overs, generally tend to make bad leaders. In particular, being overly nice generally means that you will likely fail in 2 important leadership domains: prestige and dominance.
DEALING WITH CHINA (PART 3)
The importance of “Saving Face” Having spent many years in Asia, I quickly learned the importance of maintaining “face” when dealing with Asian businessmen. This becomes important when engaging in negotiations (for example). You must always allow the other participant to have a little wiggle room [even after submitting their best offer]. Even tough the new offer may be only minimally better, it should allow the Chinese participant (whether customer, partner or other) to have the final say and maintain face.
DEALING WITH CHINA (PART 2)
... continuation Intellectual Property The previous paragraph highlighted the difference between laws “on the books” and the extent to which business people are willing to bend them for profit. As a foreign company entering into the Chinese market, you should be thinking about how you will protect your Intellectual Property. A common example of this is that of Will-Burt. Will-Burt is a company that manufactures and sells Night-Scan telescoping masts for police or military use. They entered the Chinese market and sales boomed.
Dealing with China (part 1)
If you have spend any time at a multinational company, the one topic that comes up is how to benefit from the rise of the dragon (aka China). Over the next couple of entries, I will provide some information about China that I hope you will find useful. The socialist impact Although it is easy to overlook China’s socialist political system, it is important to understand that it influences every aspect of their business style. As an example, they have very little creditor protection.
Consumerization is here and you have to deal with it
What is consumerization Consumerization is a term used to describe the trend where manufacturers release new innovative technologies in the consumer market before the corporate one. Interestingly these same technologies then find their way into the corporate world through the employees. “Consumer IT will affect every enterprise" said David Mitchell Smith, vice president and Gartner Fellow. "Attempts by enterprises to deny this are doomed to failure, just as previous attempts to deny Wi-Fi, 'smart' mobile phones, the Internet and even the PC itself failed.
5S is an easy Japanese philosophy to improve your work environment
My current employer is committed to achieving excellence and empowers its employees with simple yet powerful work strategies. One of the tools we use is called the 5S. It comes from the management practice of the Japanese giant Toyota and each of the 5 guiding principles start with the letter S: Seiri – Means to sort. It mandates that you get rid of anything that is underused or not used. It allows your employees to work in a clean environment with less distraction.
Getting Things Done may be the most important business skill
From a very young age, I realized that if I really wanted to succeed, I had to be smarter, faster and better than everyone else in my field. I have spent thousands upon thousands of dollars on training products and seminars. When working with younger professionals, the question I get asked most often is this : “What do I consider the one most critical skill required for success in business”. This is a great question and the answer is simple, learning a technique that allows you to GET CONTROL of your to dos.
So you hate change?
Change makes people uncomfortable. They feel anxious, overwhelmed and just plain scared. Change means you have to deal with the big unknown instead of the warm and comfy day-to-day routine you have gotten used to. “The only constant in business IS change”. Re-read that sentence and repeat it at least 10 times a day. The days where you joined a company out of school, worked for 40 years and retire are long gone. As the rules of business change, so do the qualities demanded by employers.
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 partnershipsthen the next logical question is how do you make it work?