A quick tip to improve any implementation: Write active sentences. What’s an active sentence? A sentence where the subject performs the action of a verb. Examples: The dog ate the biscuits. The mechanic threw away the batteries in the blue recycling bin. You will sign your name at the bottom of the page. An active […]
This week’s quote isn’t a quote; it’s a conversation. Person 1: I’m excited to work with your group. Person 2: How exactly did you get here to work with us? Person 1: I asked if I could. Person 2: You asked? I’ve never thought to ask. Imagine what opportunities are out there that you’re missing
I’ve never thought to ask Read More »
Have you ever heard of the word “voluntold”? It’s a combination of volunteer and told. It typically means your boss ordered you to serve on a committee that you never would have chosen to serve with if you were given the choice. Unwords.com lists the definition as: 1. (v.) When one has been volunteered for
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This quote must be posted and it must not wait. We are now faced with the fact, my friends, that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history, there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of
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You need top level leadership to support the change you are driving, but do you need them to attend all your meetings? Too frequently teams bog down because they can’t tell the difference between leadership support and leadership attendance. When attendance fades (as it always seems to do with top level leaders), teams immediately assume
What you do speaks so loud that I cannot hear what you say.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson Typically someone uses a quote like this to encourage you to raise your actions to the level of your rhetoric. I’m not going to offer you another tired version of that message. Instead, I say you embrace the
Most of the time when we talk about driving change we’re focused on: the goal, the wins along the way, and the pace of our progress. Don’t forget to watch for the fabulous friendships you can form along the way.
I’ve started a list of things change implementers (that’s you) can learn from the hit TV show, The Biggest Loser. Seek out volunteers. Ask for permission to push these volunteers to their limits. Live the lifestyle you recommend. Allow people to quit. Praise liberally. Keep the goal in sight. Measure your progress often and publicly.
It had long ago come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things.” – Leonard Da Vinci Join me in a pledge: I will happen to things in 2011. They will not happen to me. The world needs your action
Daniel Pink has some resolutions for us for 2011, including a new term I love: Vuja de. We’ve all experienced déjà vu—looking at an unfamiliar situation and feeling like you’ve seen it before. Vuja dé is the flip side of that—looking at a familiar situation (an industry you’ve worked in for decades, problems you’ve worked
