Building a great organization–one that is sustained, meaningful, rewarding, and valuable–doesn’t necessarily mean building a large organization. Living a wonderful life–one filled with freedom, happiness, growth, and creativity–doesn’t necessarily mean living a large life. Now that we have that out of the way, good leader, what’s to stop you from building a great organization and […]
If our strategy is to hire only stars, it will be expensive and we will have a tough time finding people. We will also have a tough time when the stars stumble in the face of new things. Often stars stick rigidly to what made them stars. And there are always lots of new things. […]
Most gatekeepers–those who would keep us out–are powerless. In the short term they throw up obstacles. But in the long term they’ve got nothing. Secretly they know it, are simply afraid, and deep down want us in. The only real gatekeeper–the one who can actually keep us out of anything–is inside us. Secretly we know […]
You know that important project? The one you’d get to someday when you had some time? The one that maybe takes you out of your comfort zone? If today isn’t that someday–if you haven’t yet taken advantage of these times to launch that project–maybe it’s not the right project and you can let it go. […]
Until I came to IBM, I probably would have told you that culture was just one among several important elements in any organization’s makeup and success — along with vision, strategy, marketing, financials, and the like… I came to see, in my time at IBM, that culture isn’t just one aspect of the game, it […]
It’s not market share, innovation, or strategy. It’s not earning per share, EBITDA, or another round of funding. It’s also not left-wing, right-wing, or centrist policies. Though it sounds like Sunday school treacle, we wise leaders know the way to sustained happiness, growth, and freedom. It is to help others achieve sustained happiness, growth, and […]
It can look like complaint, frustration, withdrawal, fear, defensiveness, anger, worry, guilt, pushing, or avoiding. No matter. If anything has led you to believe that you are separate, above, below, isolated, or disconnected from any and all others, please–please–look again. The deep-down insight here is that, despite appearances, all of us are intimately connected. We […]
Two simple thoughts cause most of the pain and dysfunction we see around us. They are, “We are separate,” and, “There is not enough.” Consider what would happen if people started believing the opposite: “We are one,” and, “There is more than enough.” How would our own lives change? How would all the nasty, divisive, […]
Here are five business plan mistakes. If we can avoid these, we will get the promised benefits of business plans including clarity, alignment, performance, and confidence. Mistake #1: The plan is the thing. Most of the power of a business plan is not the plan itself. The real value is in the work–the research, conversations, dreaming, and thinking–that […]
This is the thing about growth: our businesses cannot reach beyond our ability to run them. Any lack of business growth is a good sign that we need to grow. Luckily, we can measure and improve our leadership capacity. We need only a bit of self-trust to get going. Learn and go grow, good leader. In […]