I wrote earlier about 10 Key Lessons in Managing a Virtual Team. Here are a few more pointers: “Business is a contact sport and management is a social act.“ – Lisa Haneberg said this in 2006, and it is even more relevant today when managers are struggling to get their geographically distributed teams aligned to […]
India’s economic growth is largely attributed to its “demographic dividend” – a large pool of talented, competitive and growing young workforce. For India Inc., this is an opportunity as well as a challenge. Today, India Inc. needs more business leaders than ever before, who can not only direct the energies of the young professionals but […]
Many years back, when I ran a web development shop, I once visited a customer who owned a flooring tiles manufacturing unit. Since they were one of the leading players in their industry, I was curious to see how they worked. Our customer took us to visit their manufacturing plant where I could “see” a […]
I wrote earlier about leadership and creating a learning organization. Further thinking revealed that a learning organization is not possible without learning individuals. Here are my top 20 lessons to cultivate lifelong learning: As professionals, ability (and drive) to learn constantly is a competitive advantage. Learning is not a one time event, but a lifelong […]
I recently came across a company (somewhere on the social web) that claimed that they “shipped leaders”. It looked like they offered leadership training services. It took me back to the old debate of whether leaders are born or made. One thing is clear – leaders cannot be manufactured in a training factory and shipped. […]
Improvements don’t happen if organizations don’t have someone responsible for it. This is the reason why a lot of organizations have senior executives who think about and plan improvement initiatives. From a strategic viewpoint, this makes a lot of sense. However, there is another side to it. Just because there is one person responsible for […]
Drucker got it wrong. Drucker famously wrote that “the purpose of business is to create and keep a customer.” I’m as much a fan of Drucker’s as any management scholar, but I have to part ways with him here. The purpose of business is NOT to create or to keep a customer. Certainly it is […]
Across the web, I have recently read articles/posts that underline an important thing – technology is taking a toll on our productivity and is keeping us from doing work that really matters – that is, if we allow. I have seen both sides of the coin. I often get into a state when my work […]
Last year, Seth Godin showed us a way to become a Linchpin. This year, he urges us to “Poke the Box” – to act, to start, to initiate, to experiment, to try (and fail and learn from it) and most importantly to finish and deliver. Poking the box is about taking initiatives, not just waiting […]