Posts in the ‘Management’ category
“There are plenty of good idea men. A lot of them are collecting tolls on the thruway as we speak.” It is a rare individual who can be counted on for ideas and for action. Over time, as I hired and led teams, I realized that while I loved to have people who were both […]
I started my first team from scratch and it took us over two years to hit our stride. My second team had a mix of experienced and novice members on it. We took about a year to begin to fire on all cylindars. The next team was pieced together from other teams. The individuals were […]
Two companies competing in the same market can have wildly different results. One company will thrive and the other will flounder. Why? Does one company have smarter people? Or better information? That is unlikely. There is not a shortage of smart people in business today. The people available for businesses to hire have never had […]
It’s like a sad Dilbert cartoon. A leader sitting in his office shooting email after email off to people he can see through the glass window of his office. It’s sadder when he has set up a culture on his team that he expects an immediate response to his emails. Is this a Dilbert cartoon […]
He was a borderline narcissist. His reaction to my coaching often approached rage. I hired him for his past performance in another industry. But, I failed to fire him quickly when I realized he was unwilling to change. Every now and then I add another entry to my un-resume. These are my leadership screw-ups and […]
“Dave, you are not the messiah of wayward sales people.” My boss had a way of being direct – sometimes with a sting. She knew me and my desire to help others. I didn’t like the delivery, but she was right. The problem was, once again, I was hanging on too tight to someone who […]
Skilled workers are available. In this economy, there is always someone available who can do the job. Skill and competencies are not hard to find or to hire. Character is a different story. As I have worked with oil and gas companies, large integrated medical systems, large regional banks and Fortune 50 companies, I see […]
Email is a terrible way to communicate. There are multiple studies showing about 50% of all emails are misinterpreted. My experience and your experience probably support that fact. I have received angry emails from my customers, my peers and my leaders through the years. They can make me both angry and frustrated. Unfortunately, the way […]
If everything is a priority then nothing is. I sat in hundreds of meetings in the twenty years I spent in the corporate world where we discussed our need to focus. The irony is we developed new areas for focus at each meeting, but we never eliminated a thing from our to do list. We […]
All real growth comes from mistakes. My son did not go from crawling to running a few months later without falling down. When he learned to walk, he fell after one step and got back up. He fell after 2 steps and got back up again. This pattern continued until he was running full speed […]
