Blog
Take a look at recent insights in leadership, strategy and more.
Are you pushing away the very thing you’re trying to achieve?
You might be. Or you might be pushing away the very people you hope to attract. You see... It’s all very well setting an intention about what or who we want—and we do need to do that—but we also...
Goals, and how you present them
The studies show that having written goals makes all the difference to what we achieve, and the more we have to lead ourselves, the more that is probably true. But how exactly do you write them...
Working back from the future
When there's a problem, we tend to try and evolve things from how they are now. That's natural. It's logical to start from where we're at. It's the obvious thing to do. Actually though... Sometimes...
Straightening out your business
In program and project management, people talk about “straightening out the program,” meaning to set it on an orderly basis, with dependencies between one task and another, and resource availability...
The double benefit of focus, and how to achieve it
Some lessons keep coming round, for me they do anyway... Getting focused has a double benefit—probably more than double actually. Dropping some tasks—disengaging from some projects or...
They don’t know they’re doing it, and nor do we
I imagine you’ve had this experience... Someone keeps repeating a behaviour that causes problems for everyone else. “Why do they keep doing that?” we ask ourselves. “Why do they not see that there...
Do you know enough to not know?
How much knowledge do you need to have before it feels OK to say you don’t know? Seems like a paradox, doesn’t it? If we know quite a bit about something, we probably have a good idea just how much...
Are you playing pinball?
It’s a strategy for corporate or organisational survival... “Getting the issue off my desk” (and onto someone else’s). I think we all do this, one way or another—in our personal lives too. It’s one...
Does change come before leadership?
In the dictionary it does, of course. And perhaps in real life too. Certainly the two things are closely tied up with each other. Is the need for leadership prompted by external change, or should we...
One thing at a time—how hard can that be?
...em, quite hard. That's my experience anyway. Doesn't mean it isn't the right principle though, just that it isn't that easy to achieve, especially if our vision isn't very clear. I remember......
“Gut feel”—unerring guide or subjective interference?
In a world obsessed with "evidence," what's the place for what we call "gut feel"—that inner signal which seems to let us know whether something—or someone—is right or wrong? Many of us have been...
How do you tell if you’re making a difference?
Quite possibly, you can’t. If you’re in a situation where you have a high degree of authority, you might well be able to associate cause and effect. On the other hand... If you know you’re one of...
If other people lean on us…
... our first thought might be to push back. If someone treats us as a resource to be drawn upon; as someone they can “unload” with; as a person who will always have resilience for them, it can be a...
When making the case for something different, don’t forget…
... that we probably need to keep some of the existing order too. In our conviction that something different is needed, it's easy to fall into the trap of advocating wholesale adoption of the new,...
Sticking to the budget, or doing what you need to do?
Which is more important? That's a serious question. Maybe it is more important to be in control of your business; for everything to be predictable. It could be. On the other hand, it might be more...