This powerful concept arose in a recent leadership meeting, but what does it mean? We are often told there are 2 kinds of people in this world; those that make things happen and those that watch things happen. I’ve always tried to be in the former category but my leadership journey is teaching me it’s …
Everyone leaves at some point. How do you lead through the change? Rule #1: Never try and hold on to good people who have simply decided to make a career change within the company. They will feel restricted, demotivated and eventually leave anyway. Get over your feelings, look them in the eye and genuinely wish …
This great quote by Robert Newton Peck is a constant reminder: less is truly more. We are all guilty; while appearing to listen to the other person we are actually just thinking of our own reply. Do we truly participate in meaningful dialogue any more – verbal communication has become a ritual, a necessity to …
Never pass up an opportunity to keep your mouth shut Read More »
Either pick up the phone, apply the 24 hour rule or do something differently. When I learnt to drive I remember being told, “if you hesitate, stop” and this is true in the jam packed highway of corporate email. Millions of largely inconsequential written messages flood all of our inboxes every day but surprisingly few …
…begins with one step,” and you must lead teams so they are willing to take it. This famous Chinese proverb (Lao-tzu, The Way of Lao-tzu) is a powerful antidote to the analysis paralysis mindset that strangles many large projects. Actually doing something rather than meeting and talking about it often seems like a novel idea …
Sometimes an ambitious goal requires you to cut off your own escape routes. During the Spanish conquest of Mexico in 1519, the naval commander had his men destroy their boats when they landed on the enemy beach. This war tactic has been used many times but it meant the soldiers had to conquer the land …
Drive design quality by having team members present their work. It’s initially a bit uncomfortable but once it becomes like a heartbeat in your programme you will wonder how you ever achieved real design quality without it. During a large scale design phase of a waterfall programme it can get very difficult to track all …
Deliverable reviews; The X-Factor of Programme Management Read More »
Unlock your next level’s leadership potential and they will never look back. Most IT professionals reach a point in their career where they need to transition from relying on their core technical skills to managing people. Being asked to run a team simply moves them from writing their own code to managing other people who …
Don’t confuse product quality with execution excellence. Unless you are talking about Gordon Ramsay, most chefs perform a very different job from the person who actually runs the restaurant. There are good reasons for this and yet in business and even with personal projects we often let the pursuit of quality trump actual progress. Quality …
Agile is about forward thinking not last minute risk management. “We’ll have to push this release out because the monthly changes on the mainframe only go live the following week.” This is common where systems integrate to back-end transactional platforms that follow a stricter timetable for implementing changes. The temptation is to delay but either …
