Steven Sinofsky

Tools are often successful because of the culture that implemented the tool, not because of the culture the tool created. […] The key to introducing a new tool is looking at what is being abandoned in tools and processes, not what is being added.

Michael Beer

Training works when the organization is ready both in terms of the systemic culture and pattern of management that exists.

Michael Beer

The system of organizing and managing is so powerful that individuals and teams returning from training will not be able to be more effective unless the system enables them to apply their learning. So, efforts to change the system must come first.

Alexis de Tocqueville

Nothing tends to materialize man, and to deprive his work of the faintest trace of mind, more than extreme division of labor.

To Make a Team More Effective, Find Their Commonalities

Teams, not individuals, are the future of work. As organizations mobilize to solve increasingly complex problems at an ever faster pace, cooperation and trust between employees has become paramount. But how do you move teammates from collegial behavior to true collaboration? By building their empathy and compassion.

Don Faul

Most startups don’t spend nearly enough time recognizing people. Most people need to know their managers and org leaders see their hard work and value it. They’re hungry for this type of acknowledgment. When you tell a story about them, you kick their motivation into hyperdrive, and you make them a model for the rest of the team to follow their lead.

Don Faul

If you don’t have a past experience you can use to connect to your team’s current plight, get familiar with what’s happening for them now. Listen to their stories, so you can eventually tell one that will speak to people and make them feel seen.

Don Faul

I firmly believe that leaders at companies need to be in service to their people. They need to ensure they have everything they need to succeed. One of the most critical needs they have is a complete picture of why they should show up and pour their heart into their work every day. It’s not a nice to have, it’s a basic need.

Don Faul

… people attach emotion to individuals. They love rooting for people. They love experiencing the world through others’ eyes. The more you can tell stories about actual people that connect to the broader purpose, the more your audience will feel and not simply hear what you are trying to tell them.

Hiring “Builders”

At the core of the hiring criteria for our venture capital firm, and what we see at top tech companies, is of course things like (a) acumen and talent, (b) relevant experience, (c) culture fit and often (d) domain expertise. But if you’re a rapidly growing (or hope to be) tech company or VC firm, there’s a missing element in that list. A lot of … [ Read more ]

Joel Peterson

[Joel] Peterson provides three tests for deciding who to trust. The first is character. “We can’t trust a leader without integrity, who we can’t count on to do what he or she says,” he explains. Next is competence. You trust your mom, for example, but would you trust her to fly a 747 to London? The third, he says, is authority to deliver. There’s no … [ Read more ]

The Problem with Rewarding Individual Performers

Given that group membership is such a deeply rooted part of human nature and organizational success, a central element of leadership is the management of group identities. In short, great leaders are “entrepreneurs of identity.” They embrace our tribal nature and seek to shape the identity of their fellow group members. To cultivate a strong group identity, leaders can take the following steps.

Functional versus Unit Organizations

Company organization structure defines both how and what a company builds. It is also one of the few decisions that a CEO can clearly make. Because organization (org) structures appear to be easily distilled down to simple graphs, it is frequently the case that when a company is doing well a given org structure serves as a model for others to follow; and when things … [ Read more ]

W. Edwards Deming

Our prevailing system of management has destroyed our people. People are born with intrinsic motivation, self-respect, dignity, curiosity to learn, joy in learning. The forces of destruction begin with toddlers — a prize for the best Halloween costume, grades in school, gold stars — and on up through the university. On the job, people, teams, and divisions are ranked, reward for the top, punishment for … [ Read more ]

How to Accelerate Learning on Your Team

As Peter Senge wrote in The Fifth Discipline (Doubleday Business, 1990), a learning organization is one in which “people continually expand their capacity to create results they truly desire.” When we view learning in this broader sense, we build feedback right into the system as an integral part of the work. If you want to accelerate learning on your team, first engage them in a … [ Read more ]

Neill Occhiogrosso

For every “make decisions quickly” there is an equally compelling “make decisions carefully” directive. In The Halo Effect, one of the best books I’ve ever read on business, and on critical thinking more generally — author Phil Rosenzweig talks about how the same business decision can be described as “decisive” or “impulsive”, a strategy can be considered “innovative” or “straying from the core.” There are very few, … [ Read more ]

Why You Should Know How Much Your Coworkers Get Paid

How much do you get paid? How does it compare to the people you work with? You should know, and so should they, says management researcher David Burkus. In this talk, Burkus questions our cultural assumptions around keeping salaries secret and makes a compelling case for why sharing them could benefit employees, organizations and society.

Simple Ways to Take Gender Bias Out of Your Job Ads

Iris Bohnet’s new book, What Works: Gender Equality by Design, discusses how organizations can leverage findings from behavioral science research to fight gender bias in the workplace—starting with job listings.

Jesse Sostrin

As an effective leader, it’s […] imperative to act as your team’s capacity keeper, or the shepherd of the time, energy, resources, and focus that your employees have to devote to their essential work. We do this to avoid what I call the manager’s dilemma, the phenomenon that occurs when the gap between the demands you face and the resources you have available to meet … [ Read more ]

Us versus Them: Reframing Resistance to Change

Anyone attempting to lead change in an organization knows to expect some resistance. Change is not a rational process; no matter how positive the future you are creating, it’s natural for humans to struggle with it. Faced with negative remarks, critical questions, or stony silence, change champions naturally begin to interact more with those already on board, consciously or unconsciously distancing themselves from those who … [ Read more ]