eWeek interviewd IBM’s Janet Perna as she retires this month (“Interview: IBM’s Perna Predicts Changes in What ‘Data’ Means”). She’s been with the company for 31 years, and in that time became one of the leading forces behind databases. Her closing comments about what she is really proud of is interesting and worth hearing. [eWeek:] Looking back, what are you …
How To Get Double Digit Growth In Your Business
A recent interviewee gave me this statement. It matches so well with what I have been writing on lately (outside of here) that I can only believe that I heard it and subconsciously started chewing on it. It’s a great statement from someone who took a company from 1-2% annual growth for seven years to double digit growth in one. …
Increase Sales 30% In A Recessionary Flat Market
I wrote the following for another site. It will be pretty heavily edited and changed prior, but I’m pretty pleased with it as is. So I’m posting it here for y’all’s enjoyment. I will upload the image files later. They aren’t necessary but you get a good idea of the structural changes that this company underwent. When Mike Thieneman and …
Offshore Outsourcing: Undeniable Failure?
One the biggest problems facing outsourcing projects stems from the cost savings themselves. Most companies determine the size and level of a project or work by its cost. They don’t assign work based upon its strategic value or (following Dr. Jaques and Lord Brown) on a measure of complexity. They simply assign it based on cost. Let’s look at what this does for outsourcing work.
![HQ of the Council of the European Union, Justus Lipsius building, meeting room for working groups [detail] (2007) by Szilas. Via Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 3.0)](https://i0.wp.com/www.manasclerk.com/wpress/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/HQ-of-the-Council-of-the-European-Union-Justus-Lipsius-building-meeting-room-for-working-groups-By-Szilas-Via-Wikimedia-CC-BY-SA-3-DETAIL-1900x955.jpg?fit=862%2C433&ssl=1)
Velvet Gloves & Iron Fists
A post by Al Gorman The managerial objective of every workplace is to create a supercharged environment where employees work in cooperation with each other, employing individual best effort, to deliver the outputs defined within the task assignments delegated by management to the employees. A little later we’ll explore the concept of Objectivisim…objective/ objectivism seems compatible doesn’t it? The reality …
I’ve Got You the Discount: Get To The Most Important Conference of Your Career
I don’t shill much. Ever. I don’t even shill my own services here. But I’m going to shill a great conference that is being held in Toronto, Ontario, Canada in early August. From 8-11 August 2005, the Global Organization Design Society is holding its first conference on scientific management. It’s an incredible opportunity to learn more about the findings that …
What is a Team?
HR.com’s recent interview with Jon R. Katzenbach piqued my interest. Katzenbach wrote The Wisdom of Teams, among others. He was probably interviewed to shill his new book, but the idea of teams is one that intriguing. Do teams work? is really my question. Katzenbach admits that the team approach to work is tricky in implmentation: What we have learned since …
Wolfowitz on Decision-Making
In this summer’s Atlanitc has an article describing a series of interviews that Mark Bowden held with Paul Wolfowitz from September 2004 to April 2005, before the American deputy secretary of defense took his new job heading the World Bank. Wolfowitz is a fascinating thinker, regardless of whether or not you agree with his politics of conservative realism. For the …
Replacing Management With Project Management Is Disastrous
CIO (Australia) Magazine had an interesting article last month by Sue Bushell on Information Technology (IT) organizations and their spectacular failure to the business [“Just Deserts”, 2005 May 5]. Bushell quoted Kathryn Cason of Requisite Organization International Institute on the problems of IT being caused by the organizational structure itself: The fact that IT has primarily been pushed into a …
Coordinating Work Is Harder Than The Tasks Themselves
This complexity level of the real business, the coordination of other people’s efforts, is the essence of management.