So here it is, the Prologue. “As long as the general population is passive, apathetic, diverted to consumerism or hatred of the vulnerable, then the powerful can do as they please, and those who survive will be left to contemplate the outcome.” Noam Chomsky. In the second half of the twentieth century corporate power began to grow, most notably in the United States. The rest of the world followed, bowing to the might of the US dollar. Politicians of the…
Decisions and Delegation. Nobody can know everything. Do you have a problem with decisions and delegation? Do you find it difficult, even impossible, to admit that you don’t know everything? You need to ask yourself why that is? Nobody can know everything. Especially when faced with crucial business decisions where you really do need to know everything. Perhaps you are afraid that your staff will lose some of their respect for you. Honestly, if you have anybody on your team…
Now I’m not one to moan about the injustices of life, I’ll just get on with it and I’ll figure it out in the end. Lately though, I’ve become quite a bit more proactive. Why only now? Well, it takes time to mature and reach the right time in ones life for everything to come together. It is time for a change. I suppose that this article is also intended to cover an aspect of leadership. Not in terms of…
How do we evaluate our personnel? How can we ensure that our staff are never undervalued? Some organisations use a checklist filled with standard questions, other insist of a hand written report. The most common is a combination of the two with several variations. It really doesn’t matter which method you follow, the end result should be the same. There are various names for the same process; evaluations, assessments or appraisals, and they are all pretty much the same thing.…
What makes a good manager? Are they the ones who consistently meet their targets? Well, for that matter a bad manager can also reach his or her targets consistently, but does that make them good then? A good manager is much harder to define than simply by using the stats, in other words the numbers don’t always count for everything. In fact there are so many variables that are involved in the making of a good manager that, perhaps, we…
What is the purpose of your business? Perhaps you should ask yourself that question before we begin. The obvious answer is to make money; some would argue as much money as possible. Now, while it’s true that a business needs to turn a profit, is it possible that the pursuit of profit can actually have a negative impact on the people who work for the business and depend on it? Customers and clients are actually starting to become aware of…
How much profit does your average company have to make? When is it enough? Is it ever enough? Well, take the case today of Foxconn, the world’s largest electronics contractor manufacturer and one of the largest manufacturers of Apple products. These guys must have made of significant profit over the last year only on the back of Apple’s record earnings. But apparently it wasn’t enough. The quote from the link below, “declining revenue growth”, only illustrates how wrong the current…
Always try not to over-stretch the resources of your business. You may push to the limits but be very careful or you will create an overly stressful work environment. Then, the problems may really start and one of the first casualties could be productivity. In smaller businesses it is not uncommon to exist within the delicate balance of cash flow with very little room for manoeuvre. The temptation, even the obligation, to stretch your resources that little bit further can…
Never promise anything to a client unless you have full knowledge of the subject matter. Delay, research and getting back to them as soon as possible are more preferable than an impossible promise. Let us explore a little further the consequences to the business that has been bullied into accepting a contract for work that will prove to be, if not impossible, then at the very least extremely difficult. The same or similar results, as we shall see, can occur…
When a client has a new business requirement, quite often the may only have a vague idea of what they want. Your job is to guide them and help them achieve the clarity with their business requirements. Let us consider this scenario. Whenever a new or existing client makes a request, for a new product or service or for an extension of an existing one. One of the worst mistakes to make is to assume that the client knows exactly…