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Wisdom of Crowds
It was 1906. A statistician named Francis Galton conducted a mathematical experiment in Plymouth England while attending what we would call a ‘county fair’. There was a dead ox that was dressed up for the event. A crowd of close to 800 had gathered. The crowd was asked to guess…The Shorter the Sermon the Fuller the Pews.
When I was a kid growing up in Upstate New York there was a priest who I remember for a specific reason. His name was Father Hillary. In the summertime he was especially liked by the parishioners. He instituted what he called ‘The 5-minute sermon’. His pledge to the parishioners was that from…The Bike Shed Effect
When speaking to groups on the topic of leadership I like to get into a segment I call ‘Barriers to High Performance.” One of the things I cover is The Bike Shed Effect. Maybe you’ve heard of it. The tendency of teams to give a disproportionate amount of attention to…Head Coach Compared to CEO
As Super Bowl LX approaches let’s connect football to leadership. Here’s the setup. As we know, football teams have an offensive and defensive coordinator that serve under the head coach. These coordinators are subject matter experts. Their experience goes deep and they are laser focused on what takes place on…Owning Mistakes
No doubt we all heard about the tragedy that happened over New Year’s Eve in Switzerland. Around 1:30 a.m. on New Year’s Day a fire ripped through Le Bar Constellation in the Alpine Ski Resort Town of Crans-Montana killing 40 persons and injuring more than 100. A tragedy to be sure.…Until They’re Out, They’re In
It happens. We have an employee that’s not cutting it. You know the steps to follow. First, we have a sit-down with them and lay it out. We tell them that they are coming up short, we offer specifics, we tell them what’s expected moving forward, we offer assistance, and…Not Inviting Pushback Can Have Consequences
It was 47 years ago this week that one of the more high-profile plane crashes in U.S. history took place. It was United Airlines flight 173. The route was JFK to Denver to Portland. In all, 10 died on that day . The plane crash-landed in a Portland suburb after…Regrets, I’ve Had a Few
As leaders, we need to practice what we preach. Move over, Frank Sinatra. It's my turn to eat humble pie.First, the background. Like so many other leaders, I tried to extol the importance of establishing a healthy work culture during the peak of my career. I talked about values, vision,…The Blind Spot of the Boss
Often as bosses we think the team made up of our direct reports is getting along better than it really is. Last week I had the opportunity to speak to a group of 70+ management professionals on the topic of leadership. It was a Zoom session and the participants were…Strategic Planning: Be first; then do.
When preparing your strategic plan, before diving into the establishment of goals and objectives, make sure to re-commit to ‘who you are’ as an organization. I’ve seen it so many times. It’s strategic planning time, and an organization is poised and ready to get started on drafting its plan for…