How to achieve Tipping Point Leadership

How many managers face obstacles that include:

  • people locked into a stagnant culture,
  • limited resources,
  • demotivated staff, and
  • opposition from powerful interests?

A now famous article in the Harvard Business Review, titled ‘Tipping Point Leadership’ (W Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne, April 2003) offers a helpful example of how to constructively tackle these issues, which I summarise here together with practical steps to apply in your own or any situation. Read more of this post

Do you believe every australian counts?

What about the Australian recorded in the 6 minute video below:

He could be anyone.  He could be you or me in a few years from now.

If you’d like to do something about it, for him, or for you, or for others you may know, or for Australians in general, then now is the time to act, while there is a once-in-a-lifetime window of opportunity, and while it’s being made easy.  Just visit http://everyaustraliancounts.com.au/emailleaderaction/ for details.

Is your business owner holding the company back?

It could be that he or she is stuck in ‘The Founder’s Trap’.  Maybe that person is you!

Most entrepreneurs want to make a lot of money and run the show. But research shows that it’s tough to do both. And if you don’t figure out which matters more to you, you could end up being neither rich nor king.

The attached article entitled ‘The Founder’s Dilemma‘ by Noam Wasserman – which appeared in the Harvard Business Review in 2008 – includes research, findings and practical suggestions for dealing with the tradeoffs between financial gains and control that every entrepreneur faces as their business grows.

If you’d like to do something about navigating this dilemma, consider attending my upcoming information breakfast specifically for business owners, CEOs, Managing Directors and General Managers.

Hiring your next CEO from within or outside?

“It is the responsibility of the Board to make sure it has the most talent available when it needs to make the decision” according to a recent article in The Boardroom Report, Volume 9, Issue 16, published on 24 August 2011 by the Australian Institute of Company Directors.  But there are complications with family businesses. And small businesses do not always have the scope to develop suitable candidates from within.  Should you look for a successor who is similar or different to the current CEO? Read more of this post

How to collaborate in 18 minutes

18 minute TED video with excellent insights about planning methods, incentives and facilitation skills.

Like to leave your own comment?

Is your business in its prime?

All living creatures progress through stages of growth and decline, beginning with birth and ending in death. However, organisations do not have to decline and age. Indeed, they can remain at the high point of their vitality for a very long time.  They can even return to those peaks from stages of decline. This article is not about achieving eternal youth, but about practical methods to pursue and maintain perpetual vitality for your business.

As organisations change and transform themselves, moving from one stage of the lifecycle to the next, they develop problems. Some are passed over quickly, but others can stymie an organisation, causing serious or terminal illnesses. ‘Prime’ organisations passionately nurture both their expansive, creative energy and their need for structure and discipline. That is the dynamic of truly successful organisations.

So says Ichak Adizes in his book ‘The Pursuit of Prime: Maximise Your Company’s Success with the Adizes Program’ . Within this text, Dr Adizes gives company leaders a ‘how to’ guide to reach and keep their companies at maximum vitality, creativity, profitability, performance and commitment, which he calls “prime”.

In a series of posts over the coming months I will summarise how Adizes describes the steps in seeking, and staying in, this phase of business development.

Will you be able to recognise the stage of your business? Will you agree? What steps will you take so your business can reach or stay at optimum level?

What follows is the first topic of eleven, introducing the nature of different problems encountered during business growth, and how to tackle them appropriately. Read more of this post

Understanding CEO selection

“CEO selection is one of the most important events in the life of an organisation. It has never been more critical than it is today.”  According to this paper surveying the existing literature to identify the most important variables in the selection process, including a model of the variables and their influence on selection outcomes.  Read more at www.CEOselect.com.au

You are not in business if you are self employed

This is a tough pill for many start-up entrepreneurs to swallow.  But if the business still relies on your input of time and expertise, then it’s not yet a ‘system of work’ that can be sold without you, and therefore it’s not yet a ‘business’.  Until you make yourself redundant, the market value of your enterprise will be severely impaired.

Do you really think that no-one else could actually be a better leader and manager than you?  Maybe if you formed a Board, you and they could focus ON your business while another more qualified to ‘manage’ takes care of operational matters?

From the first day you started your business you’ve grown it by successively replacing yourself with people who took over aspects of your responsibilities up to then.  From an executive assistant to a bookkeeper to a sales person, and so on.  And it’s very likely that each now does a better job in that role than you ever would have.  It’s the same with the ‘top job’.

Issues surrounding the reluctance of founders to ‘hand over the reins’ are well described in an article entitled ‘Time to let baby go‘ which appeared in BRW, 10-16 March 2011 edition, pp 40-41.  But you’re not really ‘letting go’.  You’re taking your business forward.

If you have any concerns about how to recruit and select a suitable person to be your new General Manager or CEO, consider the services of CEOselect.

Are people really your greatest asset?

The Human Capital Edge: 21 People Management Practices Your Company Must Implement (Or Avoid) To Maximize Shareholder Value (2009) by Bruce Pfau and Ira Kay, includes details of Watson Wyatt’s Human Capital Index (HCI) which identifies practices that drive a 47% increase in shareholder returns and prove that there is a cause and affect relationship between human capital management and financial outcomes.

The following explains the research and the critical findings, including a quantification of performance drivers. Read more of this post

Applying the 7 habits of highly effective people

Many have been profoundly assisted by the pages of Stephen Covey’s best seller ‘The 7 habits of highly effective people’.  But not all of the ‘habits’ are easily formed or perfected in us individually or in groups.  Crucial Conversations may provide a valuable addition to unlocking the benefits described in Stephen’s book.

Thanks to John Cluer for sharing this with me.

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