We live in challenging, if not unprecedented times. It’s hard to not be reflective about both the past and future. I’ve had the privilege of leading teams and organizations in my professional life. I’ve experienced both success and failure. I’d like to think more of the former than the latter. Reflecting on that experience in…
Presented to Work In Progress Las Vegas, June 18, 2019.
Wow! What a World Series! I’m somewhat of a neutral party (being a long time and now long suffering Dodger fan), so I was able to calmly sit back and enjoy the intensity and drama of the Series as it unfolded. And hats off to the Cubs who finally brought the trophy home after 108…
Full disclosure: I love wine. It’s a fascination and affection that goes beyond just consumption. So, one has to cut me a bit of slack in trying to connect entrepreneurship with a glass of wine. Truthfully, it’s an enticing framework to share some more serious observations and insights gained over the years. So, pop the…
Have you ever been “dressed down” by your supervisor in front of your peers? I have on more than one occasion in my business career. It’s a tactic of intimidation and a sure sign of a supervisor that considers fear to be an important ingredient in getting things done. After all, you can’t be soft…
The terms leader and manager are often used interchangeably. C-Level executives are often referred to as company managers or senior management. In a typical corporate structure, there is generally a manager position and title, often indicating the first opportunity for one to oversee people or other resources. At the same time, there isn’t ordinarily a…
Why? Because it is likely that it will be an unproductive, wasteful use of your time. Now, meetings do have a value if held for the right reason and managed properly, but one doesn’t have to survey too many studies to conclude that the odds are against you. Late last year, I read with interest…
When I was a young Product Manager at Mattel, I was tasked with negotiating an important promotional deal. It was really my first meaningful negotiation assignment and involved confronting an eclectic artist/designer whose external eccentricities actually belied his business savvy. I recall vividly sitting in my boss’s office with my “adversary” and stumbling my way…
It occurred to me recently that certain concepts, trends, guideposts, whatever you want to call them, kept coming up in my reading, research, discussions, and consultations. They’re not necessarily new or comprehensive, but definitely relevant as businesses succeed and fail faster in a business environment that is increasingly global and digital. And they all begin…
At an early point in my career, I worked in the manufacturing division of a Fortune 500 company. I did production analyses and planning. In all honesty, I wasn’t too crazy about the gig. I was young and inexperienced and quite intimidated when I had to make my weekly trips from headquarters to the nearby…
Articles I’ve read recently in The Los Angles Business Journal and The Wall Street Journal that indirectly touched on the topic of how to measure the performance of employees were the inspiration of this piece. It made me think about the decades-old and well-used tool known as the “Annual Performance Review.” Goodness knows, I’ve had many given to me,…
The topic of honesty is somewhat unavoidable. That’s a likely product of a couple of obvious things: First, we inevitably face choices everyday which challenge how we define our notion of honesty. Beyond that, issues related to honesty, or more prominently, the lack thereof, serve as constant fodder for the news media-drenched world in which…