Show Me The Money!

Around the world's coffee machines, talk about the culture of an organisation and its impact on performance wastes thousands of hours a day. We talk about the results that would be possible if the culture were just right; we complain where we see issues of organisational culture impacting performance. Talking is one thing; what’s rare, however, is real recognition of the fact that great leaders explicitly manage the culture of their organisation. They understand that results are not only linked to culture, results are the expression of an organisation's culture.

How Long Are You Going To Put Up With It?

These days we're meeting a lot of people with a particularly frustrating problem: their business is in a constant state of crisis. We're talking about when making the numbers always turns into a frantic sprint to the finish - and you have no real time to recover before you're in the middle of the next sprint. What can you do about this?

Change, Growth And The Life Cycle (1)

Once there was a couple with serious problems in their marriage. They asked the advice of a counselor in a last attempt to resolve their conflict. After some sessions, the counselor confronted the couple with the bottleneck;

Change Management at General Motors in Oct of 2006

It looks like General Motors is getting ready to lay off a whole bunch of people in the tens of thousands. Recently Mr. Kirk Kerkorian has been trying to buy up more shares of General Motors and continue to take over the company. It makes sense from his standpoint to buy General Motors stock on the cheap and then repair the mistakes and watch the stock go back up again. He stands to make a tremendous amount of money when General Motors recovers.

The Greatest Lesson Is To Learn Faster Than Your Competitors

Th way to compete going forward is to learn faster than your competitors. The world is changing very fast and the best bet to outwit and out run your competitors is to learn and cope faster.

Rumour is Like the SARS Virus, It Can Spread by Mouth, by Phone

Troubled companies are often plagued with negative unverified information, otherwise called rumour mongering. This is extremely unhealthy and can be deadly and infectious like the dreaded Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) virus. Misinformation and rumour are very dangerous for companies.

Can A Minus Become A Plus?

Every business makes errors. Having a process for discovering them and eliminating them will substantially improve how you do business, improve customer satisfaction, improve staff satisfaction, eliminate waste, and raise the overall compentency level.

A Sick Company Needs to Concentrate on its Core Competence

The surgeon operates only one patient at a time. Similarly, a sick company needs to concentrate on its core competence.

Your Propensity to Change - How Far Would You Go?

It is easy to dream about an exotic island. It takes a bit more to prepare a trip to this island and spend some time there. But the real challenge is to take your stuff and migrate to this little island. Knowing your propensity to change is knowing - in advance - how far you would go.

Four Cs for Restructuring: Communication, Concentration, Cost Cutting and Cash

Typically in a major restructuring exercise, the timing is extremely short for you to deliver the positive results. There are many things to do and remember. However, you need to prioritise and remember these four Cs.

Criticism Gets You No Where

Any one can criticize, condemn and complain. But it takes character and self-control to be understanding and forgiving. It is also a much smarter way to live. Read about ways that are more effective since they lead to more solutions, improvement and change than any amount of criticism could ever do.

A Troubled Company Cannot Do a Quick Fix by Marrying Another Problematic One

You cannot fix a bad computer with another bad one. The viruses residing in each of the partner will spread to one another causing both to be ruined

People Like Change

I've often heard it said that People Don't Like Change. But is this really true? If it were true, wouldn’t we still be hunter gatherers, eking out a nomadic existence?

Change - Not Without Having a Break

Is it possible to change without having (using) a break? For instance you write a series of articles, day in day out without losing one, you just continue writing about different topics, but with the same mindset.

How Hiring Corporate Executives Could Improve in a Heartbeat

It has always been a mystery to me why certain chief executive officers do such a poor job hiring key executives for their management teams. I submit that one reason is because chief executive officers spend company money and the stockholders' equity in the hiring process. What if the chief executive officers had to hire their key people with money out of their own pocket? You better believe their judgment and discretion would improve in a hurry.