blog.
What Keeps Leaders Awake?
In a recent risk management survey by Aon Global Risk Consulting, organizations cited 50 concerns that are “keeping them awake at night.” The top three are: the economy, regulations, and competition
Time and Money—An Organizational Focus
Poorly run organizations waste time (and time is money). This inhibits the company’s ability to hit markets at optimum times. Allow me to give you an example..
Fueling Productivity through Employee Engagement
Sarah Van Allen of Gallup, Inc. says, “To win customers—and a bigger share of the marketplace—companies must first win the hearts and minds of their employees.” Sarah is correct.
Long gone (or should be) the days when employees were treated as “things”—useful only for specific tasks and considered to be easily replaced. This “assembly line” mentality is no longer the norm. Employees demand more from their employers and must get more to stay engaged.
Brainstorming—Not for Everyone
Many of us have participated in a brainstorming exercise at some point in our business careers. In fact, brainstorming seems to be the preferred technique by which organizations generate creative ideas and solutions for problems. However, it may surprise you to learn that brainstorming is no more effective for developing creative ideas than having individuals work on their own.
The Little Things ARE Important
When we focus on getting things done, we typically focus on allotting time for the important and time-consuming tasks. If it’s very important and it’s going to take a long time, we must get it done first, right? Yes and no.
In prioritizing, it is easy to forget to take care of work that can be done in a minute or two; regardless of its importance. When we consistently defer doing the little things, they can become big things. And big things can be a lot harder to manage.
Leaning for Success
Lean is a management philosophy aimed at reducing waste—a philosophy that, to be effective, must become “second nature” to the way we work. Lean’s roots can be traced to the early 1900’s, although the term was coined in the early 1990s. The following illustrates Lean's evolution…
Controlling Time
A search on amazon.ca returned 68,588 books relating to time management and a similar search on amazon.com returned 108,557 titles. The prevalence of these resources seems to indicate that we have a problem in understanding how to manage our time.
Psychology Today defines time management as the “ability to plan and control how you spend the hours in your day to effectively accomplish your goals.” In short, if you don’t set goals, you are more likely to have time management problems. But research also shows that even those who set goals can struggle with time.
Perhaps the question that needs to be addressed is not how to manage time, but how individuals need to manage themselves to achieve their goals. If achieving goals is the (pardon the pun) goal.
How are you managing yourself? Does your typical day start with checking e-mail and then tweeting about last night’s party? Do you browse Facebook to catch up on what your hundreds of friends did over the weekend? Or do you review the list you created last night outlining your priorities for today?
Triage—Best Served Regularly
Triage helps us decipher between the important and unimportant and is essential to ensuring we do the right work at the right time and to/for the right person/thing. But be aware: Avoid the trap of triaging work just for the sake of keeping workflow moving.
Clutter: If it's organized, is it still clutter?
Understanding what constitutes clutter from an organizational perspective helps staff eliminate clutter—both electronic and physical. While experts agree that there is more to clutter than just physical and electronic space, the organization’s primary concern needs to be in these two areas and include the following categories…
Tradition and Productivity
In the acclaimed Broadway musical, Fiddler on the Roof, the main character, Tevye, explains his society’s traditions in the song “Tradition.” The song juxtaposes village life to a world that is changing all around them.
In many respects, struggles faced in today’s organizations may be rooted in difficulty in letting go of tradition—an inability to change.
Purge Parties are a Team Sport
For organizations focused on improving their productivity, there’s nothing like a purge party to get staff motivated. Not only do purge parties help staff manage their work space, but purge parties are especially useful for clearing outdated and useless office records.
By “purging” all unnecessary items, including records, from individual and shared workspaces, more space is acquired and essential items are kept and categorized for efficient retrieval.
Changing Culture: One Person at a Time
Culture is defined as “group norms of behaviour and the underlying shared values that help keep those norms in place.” For example, look at the typical meetings in your office. Is everyone on time or do meetings usually start five to ten minutes later than schedule?
What about attention to detail? Do final project reports receive a thorough review and commentary or are they filed as received? These scenarios represent organizational culture.
If your employees are stressed, overwhelmed, or procrastinate on deadlines, or if your company is always underperforming, don’t blame your employees. Blame your organization’s leaders.
The Good and Bad of Habits
Habits allow us to not “think” about what we are doing, they’re an automatic response to stimuli. They can be useful when we are engaged in rote or mundane activities like the way we get up in the morning, the way we shower, or the way we clean the house. Because we don’t have to think about these activities, we can do them quickly and free our mind to think about other things such as planning our day.
The Facts on Multitasking
The term “multitasking” is derived from “computer multitasking,” first coined in the 1960s by I.B.M. A computer’s ability to multitask is due to its many core microprocessors; each microprocessor capable of performing one task. With microprocessors running simultaneously, there is a perception that computers are multitasking where, in fact, the multiple microprocessors are performing separate tasks simultaneously.
Edward Hallowell, noted psychiatrist and author, describes multitasking as a “mythical activity in which people believe they can perform two or more tasks simultaneously as effectively as one.” As any efficiency expert can tell you, Hallowell is correct – people cannot perform two or more tasks simultaneously as efficiently as one. Several research studies have been conducted to support this finding.
Technology and Social Media on a Collusion Course
In the olden days (remember those?), technology didn’t have a place at work other than as a tool to get work done faster. Today, technology in the workplace is much different than it was even a decade ago.
Efficiency is in the Toolkit
Social media, instant messaging, and other similar information sharing mechanisms all contribute to an ever-increasing overload of demands for more-better-faster. This information overload isn’t going away; it will only increase. While tools help us navigate the ever-increasing complexity of our work, organizations need to catch up.
Organizations, be it public or private enterprises, typically implement infrastructures, tools, and processes that make it easier for the organization, but not necessarily easy for the individual. This is because most organizations don’t think down to the level of the individual doing the work.
Effective Leaders Enable Productive Organizations
As an effective leader, you know that certain competencies are necessary to your success on the job. Things like building yourself as a whole person (emotionally, intellectually, spiritually, creatively), building winning teams, being respectful of others to earn their respect, communicating effectively, inspiring others to build trust ... just to name a few. You may also know that proven leadership methods aren't always the answer in every situation.
The Productivity Mindset
When I first visited Croatia in the 1970s, I was struck by the negative attitudes of retail workers and their reluctance to provide assistance to customers. I remember entering one shop where I felt I wasn’t allowed to touch the merchandise, let alone ask for assistance. I quickly exited.
A-Z Filing is Not a Best Practice
I was surprised and amused recently to learn that a well-known productivity guru is a proponent of alphabetical filing systems for individuals – i.e., an “A-Z” arrangement for reference materials. In addition, he advocates having on hand “lots of fresh folders” and a rule of thumb to reorder folders when the number on hand drops below one hundred.
My advice is that if you really have so much filing, it’s time to stop and evaluate what you’re keeping and why. Having fresh file folders on hand to file anything that looks interesting is just ridiculous, not to mention a waste of time and resources. And if you are doing this, when was the last time you looked at that article you saved on gardening? And do you even remember where you filed it? G for gardening? P for pruning? F for fertilizer?