I’m in the UK at the moment and one of the banks has just had an IT issue that means customers are unable to access their money. For days. It’s a classic case of an update going wrong live when it was OK during testing. This kind of thing has happened before and it could […]
Learn and lead through dance.
If you ask me what my art form is, dance is not my answer. Yet I love dancing in my own older stiff male way and I love to see the joy visible when good dancers are in full flow. As the world learns more about what’s happening everywhere, it’s easier to see how dance […]
Lessons from the tropics
I’m in Ubud. The temperature is high but up here in the hills there’s also a gentle relief when a light breeze blows through. Our room is in a solid stone building with marble floors and big teak doors that close with a wooden bar. In this town everything is changing and everything has been […]
Three paths to executive improvisation
I’ve been made to think recently about the importance and power of improvising, and how it applies to leadership. I’ve always admired musical improvisation, as there’s so much involved. It also feels different from how many people view organisational life. After all, an organisation needs to be organised. But the reality is that organisational life […]
Grasp your long-term impact. Or shrivel up.
How far do your decisions reach? Running a company, your decisions extend the lifetime of the company – or cut it short. Understanding how you create a long-term impact is vital. That’s about more than making a string of good decisions. It’s not even about ‘strategic decision-making’. You need to hold to the right timeframe. […]
Hard turns in life are the essence of growth
To turn harder we must dig deeper. Like a rower, we carve hard into the fluid depths of our soul to find a resistance that will help us turn. It hurts at first because that deep place is still ‘me’ and wants to stay untouched. But when we are hurtling in the wrong direction down […]
What industry are you in? An annoying question!
Surely this one thing about your organisation is settled – your industry. Real life for high-performing executives is not so simple. As markets change, the organisation matures and as you develop in your role, this annoying question becomes more important, and may lead to the breakthrough that ensures your survival. I had a friend raise […]
Make big decisions fast.
Here are some scenarios about making big decisions. A swimming pool. Marika goes to the swimming pool at lunch and swims for an hour. When she returns, her assistant comes into the office and they clear all the day’s key communications in 30 minutes. A long flight. Anton sits with earphones and a mineral water […]
Is love relevant to your career transition?
Noise. Scientists have a definition of ‘white noise’, that incoherent hiss in the background. It used to be just background, but now noise is amped up, foreground, invasive. Real noise, such as the music-as-tranquiliser everywhere in cities. And virtual noise, the background information that thrusts itself into our foreground. This throws us into a state that […]
Win the career strategy numbers game
Career strategy is not a numbers game. Oh, wait, it is…. ‘Hi, tell me, how many people have you spoken to in the last year about your desire for a distinctively new role?’ 1-5 6-10 10-50 50-100 more than 100. I’m pretty sure that if your answer is anything other than e. you’re frustrated with […]