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Sweat the Small Stuff

10 September, 2018 by James Lawther 4 Comments

Things go wrong There is small stuff that goes wrong and there is big stuff that goes wrong. Size matters We are taught to focus on the big-ticket items, to seek out the silver bullets and pull the big levers. Think big not small Focus on revolution not evolution Be radical not incremental We are […]

Filed Under: Blog, Process Improvement Tagged With: continuous improvement, pareto principle, waste

The Puzzle of Motivation

3 September, 2018 by James Lawther 1 Comment

who've been studying motivation have given us this new approach.

TED Talk Dan Pink Improving employee performance is as easy as 1, 2, 3: Write an objective Define a metric Provide an incentive Then set people off to hit the goal.  It is just a question of building motivation. In his entertaining TED talk Dan Pink explains why this approach destroys motivation  instead of creating […]

Filed Under: Best of the Web, Blog Tagged With: beliefs, command and control, Daniel Pink, human nature, incentives, motivation, performance management, targets, video

Pointless Conversations

30 August, 2018 by James Lawther 1 Comment

Management meetings Do you ever lose the will to live in management meetings?  Sometimes they are so bad I want to scoop out my eyeballs with a tea-spoon.  I’d do anything to get out of the conversation. I hate futile meetings that are a waste of everybody’s time — usually highly paid people’s time. Here […]

Filed Under: Blog, Employee Engagement Tagged With: bureaucracy, command and control, cost saving, diversity, effective meetings, employee performance measures, forced fun, key performance indicators, management style, motivation, objective setting, office productivity, performance management, targets, waste, wasted intellect

The Pirate School of Management

21 August, 2018 by James Lawther 1 Comment

Pirate Management

I think Mrs Lawther has a crush on Johnny Depp I watched Pirates of the Caribbean last night. If I have seen it once I have seen it twenty times… My 10-year-old daughter loves watching it My 15-year-old daughter loves watching it Even my wife loves watching it… I suspect that they enjoy it for very […]

Filed Under: Blog, Employee Engagement Tagged With: culture, employee ownership, incentives, management style, recruitment, video, workplace conditions

Research: To Be a Good Leader, Start By Being a Good Follower

12 August, 2018 by James Lawther Leave a Comment

Harvard Business Review Kim Peters and Alex Haslam Who does the best job of finding good leaders? Assessors: managers, recruiters and trainers.  People whose job it is to find and promote talent. Leaders: the person themselves. Individuals who are convinced that they have what it takes. Followers: the team who have to work for the leader. The […]

Filed Under: Best of the Web, Blog Tagged With: beliefs, human nature, leadership, teamwork

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