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  Daily Thoughts

March 15th, 2019

‘Getting out of the way’ as a leadership strategy

First published September 2018 Also called get out of the room and don’t interfere. Also asking the question ‘may I […]
March 14th, 2019

If the business is the mission, culture is the strategy

First published back in November 2018. If one thing has become clear after all these decades of management soul-searching for […]
March 11th, 2019

If I were the CEO’s speechwriter for a day, this I will say

Don’t look at us, at the leadership at the top. We are the wrong mirror. Of course, we are committed […]
March 7th, 2019

‘If’ the management poem. c2019

Every year I review the version of this list and share with my community. Here is again, 2019 mode, with […]
March 5th, 2019

Culture is what happens when compliance leaves the room

The unwritten rules of the organization tell you more about its culture than all powerpoionts of its leadership programmes. The […]
February 28th, 2019

The intensity of the discussion is often inversely correlated with the importance of the issue

There are many versions of the same principle. We spend disproportionate amounts of time on issues. We often have deep […]
February 26th, 2019

Company culture is the fabric, the tapestry. David Brook’s wants to find all the weavers (tejedores, tisseurs…)

David Brooks, columnist of the New York Times and author (too conservative for the liberals and too liberal for the […]
February 25th, 2019

Forgot to ask what motivates you (but we all people are the same, anyway)

Organizational life can go on, driven by management, without asking people about their motivations. These are assumed in a rather […]
February 20th, 2019

15 random organizational irritations and inconvenient truths

Bottom-up is not more (of the same) workshops but at the bottom of the organization. Changing the geography of top-down […]
February 19th, 2019

‘But, how many people need to change for a culture to change?’

The ‘critical mass’ concept, as the number of people required to move forward, to change collective behaviours, to see a […]
February 18th, 2019

The Free Rider Problem in organizations

The Free Rider problem is studied in social sciences and refers to people who benefit from a collective (mainly public) […]
February 15th, 2019

The obvious but overlooked fact that connectivity and collaboration are not always good.

Increasing the connectivity of people, who will benefit from enhanced collaboration ,to achieve good things better, faster, differently, is a […]
February 14th, 2019

‘Every Corpse on Everest was once an extremely motivated person’

I don’t know where this comes from but it’s in posts and posters all over. It’s perhaps one of these […]
February 13th, 2019

Clues to mobilize people inside the corporate tent, come from outside that tent.

People reading these Daily Thoughts may be used to common themes, indeed. After all, I am not writing about nuclear […]
February 8th, 2019

Kids characters are shaped in the playground, not the classroom

And employee characters, and company culture, and all the unwritten rules of the organization are shaped in the cafeteria, the […]
February 7th, 2019

The painting is a beautiful, delicate masterpiece. The artist’s workshop is a mess.

The process of creativity can be very messy. In fact, it is perhaps necessarily messy. Like the artist’s workshop. The […]
February 6th, 2019

There is a strong case to start reading a book backwards. And other rambling comments

Given our growing impatience and limited attention span (our minds are overheated in the filtering of information, like traffic control […]
February 4th, 2019

Monochrome cultures ( and their Royal Courts)

Possibility is perhaps the most beautiful word in management. There are organizations in which possibilities seem exhausted, work is an […]
February 1st, 2019

Purpose kidnapped?

Suddenly purpose is back. We are told that Millennials want purpose. Which may be true. As much as many other […]
January 31st, 2019

‘If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change’

Attention Chief Transformation Officers, Offices of Transformation, Change Management Units, and Change Offices, and Projects of Future A,B,C,. Units of […]