Archive
on making things happen
Some days are just routine, others more varied and now and again they can be frantic. We get them all, but, for me, it doesn’t matter what the day turns out like as long as I can enjoy the intellectual challenge of getting through it with the least hassle. I have been at it for a long time and have my own time management methods which I have taken from two sources; Eisenhower and Pareto. Read more…
on being back in the office
A strange thing happened the other week; I found myself in an office building. It was one that I had been in before, albeit that my last visit to that site was twenty five years or more ago when in was rented by someone else. It was looking out of the conference room window and recalling that previous visit that I realised that it is almost three years since I was last in an office block. Read more…
on sharing your thinking with your team
If you have followed the last couple of Musings you will see that I advocate effective communication between the leader and the team. The idea of sharing your thinking with your subordinates is alien to many, but it is beneficial in a number of ways. Read more…
on the JFDI principle
Back in the early 1970s I was on a management training programme with a company that operated throughout the UK and was doing the rounds of every department in the business to learn the ropes before, hopefully, getting onto the management ladder with a promotion to a line job. One of the people I worked for during that period was a big influence on me, firstly positive, but then negative and the thing that tipped the balance was the JFDI principle. Read more…
on demotivating people
We all have obsessions and those of us who lead teams may have a few for we are driven people. We like to refer to these foibles as being focussed, having a clear vision or something of that kind, but behind whatever management speak we wrap it up in we are still obsessed.
on getting things done
There are the things that we love to do and then there is everything else, but whatever our job is we have to get done what needs doing.
Planning helps, but as any military person knows your plans ho out of the window on first contact with the enemy. For most of us civilians the enemy will take the form of colleagues, customers and life in general all of whom will be queuing up to screw our best intentions.
What we have to do is to get our heads down and get on with it, doing our best to prioritise our time. If we work alone that is not too hard as long as we stay focussed, but when you are part of a team you need to be thinking about colleagues too. There is little point in sitting back smugly regarding your own success if everyone else is deep in the smelly stuff and your contribution to the team goals should be more important than your own.
So how do you do it? There is a lot of nonsense out there in terms of time management, but the one or two true sets of guidelines. One is the Eisenhower Method, the other is Pareto. I use both and have done for many years, but the key to both, and any other way of working, is being able to overcome procrastination.
If you dither nothing will get done, so work out what needs doing and get it done. No matter how hard it is or how much you loathe doing it, once it is done you can move on and most of the time you will better for having done it.
on consequences
I had been watching a documentary on TV and had become bored enough to have picked up my tablet and started checking emails by the time that the programme ended. I was so engrossed that I did not realise that a new programme had begun until some of the dialogue started to prick my hearing. Read more…
on censorship
One of my circle on social media has felt some pressure to cease blogging on a certain current political topic. Thankfully she has thought it through and decided to carry on, not least because she feels it is important to express her views. Read more…
on the myth of certainty
A local business pundit wrote this week about the need for certainty, in the case in relation to the UK leaving the EU. I will not get into the Brexit debate here, but do want to address the question of certainty.
People often think that if you are uncertain then you are weak, but if we are in a tight spot the last thing I want is to have a leader who is certain because they will do the wrong thing. Read more…
on twenty five years of America
I am back in the USA again twenty five years after my first visit and I have been here at least once a year since bar one (I missed 2016 for various reasons). Many of those visits have coincided with elections here and on this trip the mid-terms are pretty much decided, although here in Florida we have three significant posts all in the midst of recounts. Read more…
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