I have been doing some coaching work with cross-functional teams in mature organizations and one topic that comes up over and over again is this: when a team finds some process or data that indicates something is clearly not delivering the desired outcome, how do they speak the truth to Senior Leadership? Many of you […]
Having been on both coasts, as well as Canada, to meet with multiple clients has confirmed something I’ve been hearing for awhile: demand is up and businesses are seeing a resurgence in their top lines. With the structures they’re using to fulfill business demands close to capacity, as well as an ongoing talent shortage, it’s […]
When answering the question in the title, the answer that comes to mind first is to hire more people. But as we’ll dive into below, there’s a lot more to it than that. Some of my recent travels have provided me the opportunity to spend time with more than a dozen CEO’s of growing mid-sized […]
It’s one of the most exhilarating and rewarding things we do in pilot recurrency training. The instructor puts the plane into an “unusual attitude” while you are looking at the floor to induce a bit of mild vertigo. The instructor then takes the controls and purposely flies a disorienting maneuver and says, “Ok, you’ve got […]
I was recently asked to help a firm improve its completion performance on breakthrough projects. The decision to bring me on board was triggered by a backward-looking review of the business case documents that were generated for funding the programs. These are the kind of projects that lead markets, build brands and provide services to […]
I’ve had a really engaged and focused set of workshops recently around growth options with C-leaders of mid-sized, complex firms. To become a complex firm, each had to develop competencies in one of the four main growth drivers: Internal R&D, M&A, Partnerships or Venturing. Each of the firms I was working with has had […]
Have you ever spent a lot of time, money and resources on things that appear to be effective in improving your firm’s competitiveness – only to find that your market position has not budged? One of the privileges of the work I do is having the ability to speak with C-level leaders in complex firms. […]
I’ve had three conversations in the last few weeks with the kind of people you wish you had on your team. These are individuals who have a good, solid track record of contribution and who are seen as leaders by their peers. In fact, you do have them on your team. They are bright, […]
“Walk with me for a minute.” At a session recently, a senior leader asked me to go on a sidebar walk through a windowed view far above the city. “So if I get what you are saying, there are two ways to fall off the path. One is to use the operations side of the […]
“How did my growth team miss something so big in their forecast?” This question came up recently in a conversation with a senior growth leader. She was surprised that the team missed it and very, very unhappy that they would now need to go back to the management board for more resources. Like a well-placed […]
