Category Archives: Management

When it comes to change..speed kills

Posted on June 4, 2013 by Curious and Interested

When it comes to change, speed can kill. The desire to get things in quickly, be decisive and prove you are an action leader can create a false sense of momentum. Those change efforts appear to leap out of the … Continue reading →

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What I like about the Balanced Scorecard for business

Posted on September 8, 2011 by Curious and Interested

When Kaplan and Norton developed the Balanced Scorecard they were seeking to develop a broader perspective of what needs to be measured and managed to achieve success in business and also how to communicate and integrate the measures and targets … Continue reading →

Posted in Decision Making, Leadership, Management, Strategic Planning, Strategy | Leave a comment

Growth initiatives – how do we grow?

Posted on July 6, 2011 by Curious and Interested

We need to grow the business faster than “system” growth (i.e. faster than the overall industry growth rate). The Board is challenging the lack of top-line or profit growth and senior executives are scrambling to find the next big thing. … Continue reading →

Posted in Creativity, Innovation, Leadership, Management, Strategic Planning | Leave a comment

When decisions turn out wrong how do you react?

Posted on February 17, 2011 by Curious and Interested

When decisions turn out wrong how do you react? Is it a case of moving on quickly and hoping people forget, undertaking a review and despondently wishing that it was something someone missed and thereby not your fault, or is … Continue reading →

Posted in Behaviour, Creativity, Decision Making, Leadership, Management, Teamwork | Leave a comment

Why would treating staff badly be a good leadership strategy?

Posted on November 20, 2010 by Curious and Interested

In trying to solve problems it is sometimes useful to flip them around and look from the other direction. This might mean starting from the last step, which is useful in showing what needs to remain, or taking the opposite … Continue reading →

Posted in Behaviour, Leadership, Management, Motivation | Leave a comment

Stress testing your Strategy

Posted on October 28, 2010 by Curious and Interested

A recent HBR article by Robert Simons discusses seven questions to stress test your strategy. There are two aspects of this that I like. The first is the use of questions as an approach to facilitate broader consideration of issues. … Continue reading →

Posted in Choice, Leadership, Management, Motivation, Strategic Planning | Leave a comment

How can service areas like HR increase their influence?

Posted on September 29, 2010 by Curious and Interested

I know what it’s like to work in a service division (I spent 13 years in Human Resources or Personnel as it was sometimes called back then), rather than in the front line business functions of sales, manufacturing or product. … Continue reading →

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Getting Things Done

Posted on September 13, 2010 by Curious and Interested

For those struggling with overload at the moment a you tube video called Getting Things Done by David Allen (author of a book by the same name and a website at http://www.davidco.com/ ) may hold some ideas on how best … Continue reading →

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Why do leaders need to focus on building trust?

Posted on September 2, 2010 by Curious and Interested

A UK study http://bit.ly/dCgVbt has found as little as 10% of employees trust what senior managers are saying about the performance of their business. In the absence of trust leaders will miss out on so many more aspects of employee … Continue reading →

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Seven Deadly Sins of Setting demands (or goal setting)

Posted on September 1, 2010 by Curious and Interested

During my development as a leader I was urged to set BHAG (Big Hairy Audacious Goals) and whilst this can be useful in generating new thinking (e.g. a 40% increase in revenue is not going to be achieved with a … Continue reading →

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Diversity in decision making is good

Posted on August 28, 2010 by Curious and Interested

On HBR Blogs Tom Davenport asks..Does Better Judgment Come With Age? see http://blogs.hbr.org/davenport/2010/08/does_better_judgment_come_with.html Tuesday August 24, 2010 To quote “Building good judgment in an organization is not as simple as giving our youngest leaders silver-haired counselors. It’s the result of drawing … Continue reading →

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Reflections on Leadership experiences

Posted on August 17, 2010 by Curious and Interested

Recently I left an organisation after 11 years in a leadership role that included great financial, sales and customer results. At the end of that time I look back and reflect upon those things that I am most proud of … Continue reading →

Posted in Behaviour, Happiness, Leadership, Management | Leave a comment

Decision Making

Posted on July 12, 2010 by Curious and Interested

A lot of the time our role as a leader requires us to make decisions. Some times they are tough, and sometimes we get them wrong.  So how do we minimise the risks of getting decisions wrong whilst avoiding procrastination … Continue reading →

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