At the end of the day, workplace supports business operations. It’s the place where employees perform the tasks that keep the company operational and earn the company revenues. Done well and everything is a well-oiled machine, done poorly and activities can grind to a halt. Operations that are running smoothly often perform like a well-practiced orchestra….
Pareto was right. The world operates at 80/20.
Striving for perfection is the opposite of operating perfectly. Getting to 100% has a cost disproportionate to the added value – 80% is usually more than enough. Look around at what you do. How often does something new get released that can answer every single question around it with perfection? There are always grey areas…
Very little is impossible to accomplish when you define the problem correctly.
So much of success comes down to how you define success. It’s a feat that is self-fulfilling if done right. One person’s success may be in completing a marathon while another’s may be walking around their block three weeks in a row. Success is what you need it to be at the moment of definition….
Give yourself time to be creative today.
Art is the key to successful work. All great work contains the seeds of art. A well-structured email must be clear, concise, practiced and give meaning to a specific audience. This is not much different in concept than what a painter does on her canvas. Art happens when we are inspired to do more than…
Your mind’s clutter is nothing more than thoughts waiting to be let out.
I often find myself sitting at my desk, hands on my head, staring at the ceiling as I try and make sense of the many ideas floating around in my head at a given moment. Usually, it is right before I find the inspiration to put the finishing touches on some task at hand. It’s amazing…
Comparing top down process changes versus guerrilla improvements.
Process changes can come two primary ways: top-down direction on how things need to be done going forward or people on the ground deciding to do things better. In the top-down bucket, changes may be driven by new technology, new reporting requirements or just a new way of thinking about things. Usually, these are accompanied…
Just because you haven’t been told the plan does not mean that there is no plan
Good communications are hard to do. Over communicating can take up all your time. Under communicating can leave your team in confusion. Figuring out the right line for their team is a manager’s primary job. People need information in order to make good decisions but they also don’t usually need incomplete, possibly wrong or sensitive…
Delegation can be a dangerous behavior (even though usually it is beneficial).
Delegation is often considered one of the signs of a good manager and leader. Ensuring that large tasks have shared delivery is often the only way to get things done. But delegation has a dark side. Some people interpret the above paragraph as meaning that managers are supposed to only delegate and not own things…
Just because a document is comprehensive doesn’t mean it actually says anything.
It’s funny how often 1-page documents can tell you everything you need to know about a topic while 100-page whitepapers barely address the meat of an issue at all. Many people feel like most readers judge a document’s comprehensiveness by its weight and length. Some will even give active support to an idea simply because it…
What is the value that you, personally, add to your team?
A good team is comprised of members that make each other better. Teams built to shore up individual weaknesses while also having broad capabilities will generally have greater success. The thing about teams is that they are built from individuals with all of their strengths, weaknesses, quirks, idiosyncrasies, personal lives, and future plans. Over any…