20 Most Recent Ideas
The Power of Random Coffees
One of the biggest challenges in fast-growing companies is silos. Imaginary walls spring up between departments. Before you know it, the sales team and the engineering team, for instance, feel like two totally different companies. They’re not meshing socially and — just as worrying — they’re not collaborating or exchanging information on projects. This lack of coordination inevitably hurts the final product and the customer’s experience. This is a huge … [ Read more ]Author: Ryan Holmes | Source: "5 cheap old-school hacks for building company culture in 2017" | Original Publication: Medium | Subjects: Human Resources, Management, Organizational Behavior | Company: Hootsuite
GOTE Framework for Maximize Meetings
Companies train people in their computer systems, HR policies, and more. They devote energy to optimizing production lines and supply chains. They invest in innovation workshops. Yet they seem to assume that the ability to effectively lead and participate in meetings is somehow embedded in the human genetic code. Perhaps it seems too basic a skill. However, if any organization adds up the amount of … [ Read more ]Author: Eric J. McNulty | Source: "How to Maximize Meetings" | Original Publication: strategy+business | Subjects: Management, Organizational Behavior, Productivity/Work Tips
Whisper Courses
This reminds me of something our leadership-development team launched last year with behavioral nudging. We created what we call “whisper courses,” which were based on the premise that, as leaders, we have the best intentions yet get so busy and forget to do the many little things that matter so much. I recall us talking about how nice it would be to have this invisible … [ Read more ]Author: Tamara Ganc | Source: "Getting Ready for the Future of Work" | Original Publication: The McKinsey Quarterly | Subjects: Management, Productivity/Work Tips, Training | Company: Vanguard Group
OKR: An Agile Goal-setting Process
High-performing managers create simple goals, make sure they are clear and transparent, and revisit them regularly. Google, for example, uses an agile goal-setting process called OKR (objectives and key results), which was originally developed at Intel. The process is simple and effective: Each individual (from CEO down) sets ambitious and measurable objectives (like “launch Gmail version X by year end”) and are asked to define … [ Read more ]Author: Josh Bersin | Source: "Becoming Irresistible: A New Model for Employee Engagement" | Original Publication: Deloitte Review | Subjects: Human Resources, Management | Company: Google
Surveying Your Employees about Your Strategy
Involve a larger part of the organization in a discussion on how the company is doing on strategy and execution. Like the annual employee survey, organizations should take the pulse around the most important strategic topics. Such a survey provides powerful insights about how well your employees — the people who know the company best — think it is positioned for success, how well they … [ Read more ]Author: Paul Leinwand | Source: "8 Tough Questions to Ask About Your Company’s Strategy" | Original Publication: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Management, Strategy
Communications and Messaging Guidance for Your Managers
I’m a big believer in teaching leaders to fish. That’s why we’ve rolled out a weekly(ish) email for leaders … that summarizes all the things they need to be thinking about in terms of managing and messaging to their team. We break it down into a few sections: things to know, things to do, things to share. It sounds simple, but let’s be real, leaders … [ Read more ]Author: Terra Carmichael | Source: "The Top Comms Mistakes Startups Make — And How To Avoid Them" | Original Publication: First Round Review | Subjects: Human Resources, Leadership, Management
Upward Feedback and Culture Feedback Surveys
Managers must be evaluated both on what they get done and how they get it done. The “how” is often overlooked and undervalued. In terms of the “how,” determine whether the person works well cross-functionally, represents the company‘s values in both word and deed, receives strong upward feedback, and whether their team of reports has a high level of satisfaction working at the company. To measure … [ Read more ]Author: Mike Brown | Source: "What I Learned about Management and Culture from Growing Uber’s Asia Business from Zero to Billions" | Original Publication: First Round Review | Subject: Management | Company: Uber
Skip-Level Meetings
If you manage managers, it’s very powerful to set up a recurring catch up with their direct reports. These are commonly referred to as “skip-level” meetings, and they're the only way to get an accurate sense of how your direct reports are leading — and how people on their teams are feeling about the business and the strategy you've set. It's also an efficient way … [ Read more ]Author: Mike Brown | Source: "What I Learned about Management and Culture from Growing Uber’s Asia Business from Zero to Billions" | Original Publication: First Round Review | Subject: Management | Company: Uber
Assess Your Organization’s Bureaucracy Mass Index (BMI)
An excess of bureaucracy costs the U.S. economy more than $3 trillion in lost economic output per year. When you look at all 32 countries in the OECD, the cost of excess bureaucracy rises to nearly $9 trillion. To dismantle bureaucracy, the first step is to be honest about how much it’s costing your organization. These costs fall into seven categories:- Bloat: too many managers,
Authors: Gary Hamel, Michele Zanini | Source: "Assessment: Do You Know How Bureaucratic Your Organization Is?" | Original Publication: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Management, Organizational Behavior
Identify the Current Constraints on Your Company’s Progress
Imagine you are a new CEO, looking at your company with fresh eyes. Ask yourself: What function or resource most constrains our progress? Where would the smallest improvement yield the biggest impact on our business? In other words, you need to identify your “Herbie-group.” Are you limited by how well field staff in sales, operations, or customer support translate new offerings, new markets, or improved … [ Read more ]Author: Elizabeth Doty | Source: "Finding the 'Herbie' in Your Change Initiative" | Original Publication: strategy+business | Subject: Change Management
Create a Sales War Room for Better Post-Merger Integration
After a merger, it is a mistake to expect sales reps on their own to address all of the inevitable questions from customers and tactics of competitors. Unfortunately, sales managers are often too preoccupied with integration issues, so the front line is left to its own devices. To resolve this problem, successful acquirers create a temporary sales war room, or interim leadership group. Led by two … [ Read more ]Author: Matthias M. Bekier | Source: "Merging? Watch Your Sales Force" | Original Publication: The McKinsey Quarterly | Subjects: Marketing / Sales, Mergers & Acquisitions
New Leader Tip: Learn What Is and Isn’t Working
One of the first things I did when I joined [Philips], in late 2010, was to write an open letter to about 700 people—basically, the group we call the Consumer Lifestyle leadership and a layer below them. I invited them to tell me what they thought was working well in the business and what wasn’t. This gave me a pretty good idea of what was … [ Read more ]Author: Udo Kopka | Source: "From Bottom to Top: Turning Around the Top Team" | Original Publication: The McKinsey Quarterly | Subjects: Leadership, Management
Introduce a Secondary Domain for Better Email Inboxing
By creating multiple sending domains, email marketers have a great opportunity to increase inboxing as a result of segmentation. First, marketers can use multiple domains to mail different subscriber segments (more and less engaged) or different types of campaigns (one domain dedicated to marketing campaigns, another dedicated to support emails, a third dedicated to triggered, etc.) Domain separation also helps maintain a consistent deliverability rate by setting … [ Read more ]Author: Ivy Shtereva | Source: "Five Tips for Increasing Email Engagement and Improve Inboxing" | Original Publication: MarketingProfs | Subjects: IT / Internet / E-Business, Marketing / Sales
Developing Perceptual Acuity
There are several tools you can use to develop perceptual acuity for yourself and your organization in this way. One of the most valuable is a simple exercise at the start of any staff meeting. Allocate the first 10 minutes to learn about and discuss anomalies in the external landscape. Ask a different staff member at each meeting to present to the team a structural … [ Read more ]Author: Ram Charan | Source: "20/20 Foresight" | Original Publication: strategy+business | Subject: Innovation
Marshall Goldsmith’s Triggers: Creating Behavior That Lasts, Becoming the Person You Want to Be
Every night, Marshall Goldsmith forces himself to do one of the most difficult things imaginable. He has a friend call him and ask the same 22 questions. These questions all start with the phrase, “Did I do my best [today] to,” and the endings may be strategic (“Did I do my best to set clear goals?”), professional (“…preserve all client relationships?”), philosophical (“…be grateful for … [ Read more ]Author: Art Kleiner | Source: "Are Marshall Goldsmith’s Triggers the Only Way to Change?" | Original Publication: strategy+business | Subject: Personal Improvement
Questions to Facilitate Collaboration
Collaborating effectively requires helping others. And helping others requires compassion, which in turn means learning about who they are and what they want. So in order to help my clients, at the start of each relationship, I devote two or three hours to asking the following questions:- What are your proudest accomplishments and biggest disappointments?
- Which activities energize you and which drain you?
- How do other people
Author: Susan Cramm | Source: "What’s Love Got to Do with Business?" | Original Publication: strategy+business | Subjects: Organizational Behavior, Personal Improvement
Don’t Leave the Interviewing to the Bosses!
In every interview I’ve ever had with another company, I’ve met my potential boss and several peers. But rarely have I met anyone who would be working for me. Google turns this approach upside down. You’ll probably meet your prospective manager (where possible—for some large job groups like “software engineer” or “account strategist” there is no single hiring manager) and a peer, but more important … [ Read more ]Author: Laszlo Bock | Source: "Here's Google's Secret to Hiring the Best People" | Subject: Human Resources
Do You Publicly Reward Failure?
Create a safe, open environment that gives employees the confidence to share ideas, failures, and the learning points in between. 3M holds formal meetings called “failure forums,” which gathers together staff who worked on unsuccessful projects to discuss barriers to success. When plastics company W.L. Gore & Associates kills a project, they host a celebration with beer or champagne, just as they would if the … [ Read more ]Author: Lisa Bodell | Source: "Why You Didn’t Meet Your Innovation Goals in 2014" | Original Publication: strategy+business | Subject: Innovation
Onboarding Program for New Executives
Bank of America ... has created an onboarding program for executives one to two levels below the C-suite. The program aims to ensure that the new executives understand role expectations, quickly develop a network among key stakeholders, build relationships with their team, and learn from other leaders what it takes to succeed, especially in their particular role. To achieve these objectives, the program must transfer … [ Read more ]Author: Dorothy Leonard | Source: "How New BofA Executives Learn its ’Deep Smarts’" | Original Publication: HBS Working Knowledge | Subjects: Human Resources, Knowledge Management, Management
Developing Non-IT Managers with Robust Data Skills
Perhaps the biggest challenge for companies seeking to take advantage of its data resources is how few non-IT managers possess robust data skills. A consumer products company addressed this issue by requiring its MBA hires to go through an intensive orientation on data and its use, which includes placing recruits on the data team for some time. This program has enabled the company’s business side … [ Read more ]Author: Ramesh Nair | Source: "The Quantified Self Goes Corporate" | Original Publication: strategy+business | Subject: IT / Internet / E-Business
