We are living in interesting times. All countries are struggling to control the COVID-19 pandemic.  Societies are challenging their histories of racial and social injustice.  Fundamental beliefs are being scrutinized. Considering how we think and understanding our cognitive biases will be essential as we adjust to this “new normal.”      What we consider to be […]

“If you can’t describe what you are doing as a process, you don’t know what you’re doing.” W. Edwards Deming Our work and home lives our bounded by standard operating procedures and process—and too many of them stink.  We all have encountered Byzantine-like bureaucracies where the lines are long, the rules are contradictory,  and nothing makes any sense.  Poor user experience (UX) design […]

“…when faced with a difficult question, we often answer an easier one instead, usually without noticing the substitution.”  Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow In the midst of the pandemic, we have and will continue to face numerous complex decisions where there are many unknowns and no clear choices.  Organizations and individuals are grappling with challenging issues.  […]

Feedback is a critical and valuable management tool.  For managers, it is the engine of continuous improvement.   For employees, it is the gift of valuable insight.  Unfortunately, many managers feel uncomfortable giving regular feedback, which deprives them of the ability to affect change.  And, many employees mistake feedback as criticism and miss the message.  The […]

Imagine you were invited to be part of an experiment, to judge violin performances. You’re brought into a room and sat in front of a TV to watch videos of the violinists play. The recording starts, you watch the violinist walk on stage, pick up their violin to get ready to play, but then the […]

Productivity is defined as our ability to create value.  Traditionally manufacturers and farmers became more productive by adding resources—people and machines—to the process.  Knowledge workers can generate more value by working smarter, rather than harder.  The massive shift to remote work caused by the pandemic has exposed complexities and inefficiencies in how we work.  Through […]

The coronavirus pandemic is the most frightening, disruptive, and widespread crisis of our lifetime.  As managers and leaders, none of us have faced challenges of such a magnitude or scale.  Over the next several weeks and probably months, our teams will look to us for guidance, support, and leadership.  In this article, I draw from […]

Here are five powerful principles that will help you make the right decisions in your business and your personal life as you navigate through the COVID-19 pandemic. They’re a framework, not a formula, for leading with ethical intelligence. I’ll include questions to reflect upon so that you may put these principles into practice immediately. Principle […]

The Coronavirus pandemic has completely changed the work culture dynamic as many of us know it. Social distancing and quarantines have forced countless employees to uproot from their office environments and create a new normal for the foreseeable future — if not permanently. And those are just the lucky ones who get to keep their […]

Many organizations struggle with project governance, oversight, and control.  The truth is that most projects are not successful.   Over the past 25-years, only 30% of all projects are delivered on-time, on-budget, and with the desired scope.  Traditional waterfall projects have phase gates that theoretically establish defined control and governance points.  The project must complete the […]