Thoughts on people, teams, organizations, communities, effectiveness and success
Our 20 week-old Terrier-mix pup Porter’s maiden trip to Dolores Park brought back memories of the countless mornings and evenings spent with our much beloved, now-deceased, mutt Roady playing chase, kong fetch, and rolling on his back (Roady, not me) playing “sharky.”
It may turn out that you can go back, but will you find your former beliefs and behaviors in the future?… Read the rest
As an advocate of the early warning, Chicken Little had it all wrong.
Lacking facts (the sky was not falling) and the type of receptive audience that Paul Revere had, running around warning people was a poor tact to take.
Rational thought, after all, has limits. Sometimes the best way to move something important forward is to change your normal MO (modus operandi).… Read the rest
“Facts,” as former President Ronald Reagan once noted, “are stupid things.” And as John Adams more accurately noted, “Facts are stubborn things” as well.
So when your normal mode of operation squares off with the facts of evidence-based research, it’s time to stop being stupid or stubborn, and think about changes to your way of behaving.… Read the rest
She had been a life preserver of wisdom when my career as a senior exec hit the intersection of homophobia and high corporate politics (“I think,” she had offered, “that someone in your situation should get good legal counsel quickly.”) and now over a decade later we had the chance to reconnect over hot chocolate and conversation.
This time – unfortunately – she was the one who was on her way out, and it was my chance to offer advice and guidance.… Read the rest
The question from my client was common: who do you spend limited resources for coaching and development of high potential employees? And, even harder, how do you know it’s money well spent?
The takeaway from working in and around corporations for almost 30 years is that most of the efforts spent on high potential employees – employees who their employer has deemed as having the skills, abilities, and interest to move to more senior positions with the corporation – is a waste.… Read the rest
Some people plan all their lives to become a senior executive – and it never happens. Others, through talent, timing, hard work, and or luck, become one though it was not something they sought, or even to which they aspired.
What will be in your future?
I think of these latter types of folks as “accidental execs.” I should know – I’ve been one as a Senior Vice President of Human Resources with a US Fortune 15 corporation – and any career planning behind the occurrence is as precise as the path of a butterfly on a warm, windy San Francisco day.… Read the rest