Wake-Up Calls for Managers
For the hard parts no one prepares you for
When the path isn’t clear, the stakes are high, and the answers aren’t obvious—this is where managers struggle most.
Wake-Up Calls for Managers delivers practical, real-world guidance for navigating:
- Tough conversations
- Leading through uncertainty
- Building influence without authority
- Driving results through others
The Leadership Caffeine Blog
Leadership Caffeine™—Small Changes in Your Routine and Approaches Can Generate Big Results
I regularly talk with managers and leaders who believe they are grinding harder but getting nowhere. One described himself as working in quicksand: "The more hours I spend and the harder I push, the faster we are sinking. I need to do something different." Raise your...
Leadership Caffeine™—Small Changes in Your Routine and Approaches Can Generate Big Results
I regularly talk with managers and leaders who believe they are grinding harder but getting nowhere. One described himself as working in quicksand: “The more hours I spend and the harder I push, the faster we are sinking. I need to do something different.” Raise your hand if you’ve ever felt this way. Here are ideas to help you adjust your approaches and regain control:
Leader: The Company Might Be Virtual, But the People Are Real
One of the wonderful benefits of modern technology is the ability of organizations to scale without investing in bricks and mortar. It is commonplace in a number of industries for people to work together for years and never set eyes on each other. It’s also common for the leaders in these virtual organizations to lose track of the fact that there are real people behind the e-mail and text messages. Over time, they reduce to faceless names behind occasional e-mails or text messages.
Clearly, people choose a virtual professional lifestyle because they like the freedom and flexibility that it provides. However, when a virtual organization is faced with the need (or desire) to shift gears into a new growth mode or to change its strategy, it is essential that the leaders of this firm rethink their communication and engagement with their remote knowledge workers. For many technical leaders used to not communicating frequently with these invisible associates, this can mean a significant change in behavior.
Improving the Product Management and Sales Relationship
The relationship between the Product Manager (or PM team) and the Sales force is one that is filled with great potential for all parties and also prone to frequent misuse or abuse. Frankly, it is a complicated relationship that should be governed by some shared rules of engagement and some good commonsense about when to throw the rules out in support of getting the job done.
The Best Marketing Ever: Employees that Surprise and Delight Customers
When was the last time that you had one of those “Wow” experiences as a customer, where you walked away “surprised and delighted” about how you were treated?
Travel a lot? It probably doesn’t happen for you with the major air carriers. Most of my customer experiences with the airlines leave me shocked and disgusted. I’m convinced that the airlines study Customer Service Secrets of Attilla the Hun. Shop in Big Box retail stores? Similar story…perhaps without the edge of nastiness that the airlines (or cell phone or cable) companies have mastered.
All of this changed for me recently, as I found myself on the receiving end of two different transactions that left me absolutely surprised and delighted. And no, they didn’t take place with an airline, cell-phone, cable or big box company. They were two retail establishments that clearly didn’t get the memo that you have to be nasty to your customers to succeed in this world.
What is it about leaders that tolerate miserable customer service from their employees?
Avoiding Derailment and Disaster in Product Management
y posting, The Product Manager as MVP, offered my perspective on the potential for the professional in this role to have a material impact on a firm’s success. I truly believe in the power of this function to shape firms, and for individuals and teams of Product Managers to serve valuable formal and informal leadership roles in organizations.
I’ve also seen some remarkable wholesale failures in Product Management—at the team and individual levels. Truthfully, these failures often have their root causes at the top of the team or even elsewhere in the leadership or organizational design structure. Nonetheless, the symptoms become visible in Product Management.
While we all love studying and reading about best practices and successes, in my experience, most of the best lessons come from studying the train-wrecks. Consider these as cautionary tales.
How Good Leaders Approach a Recession
While I don’t know too many business leaders that look forward to a recession, I know a few strong leaders that do a remarkable job of working through them from a “glass is half-full” perspective.
It’s not yet clear whether we are in or heading for a recession, but the topic is on the collective mind of people in the U.S. and around the world. If we are heading for recession, the right attitude and the right actions on your part will help your firm weather the storm and even prosper during or shortly after any period of business contraction.
A Dozen Interviews, Two Job Offers and Not One Discussion About Leadership.
A good friend that knows my passion for all things leadership, recently switched jobs and offered some comments on the nature of his dozen or so interviews. I paraphrase:
“My leadership skills, experience or approach were not discussed during any of the interviews.”
I was shocked.
“None of the top executives that I spoke with singled out and discussed leadership or people development during discussions about their business and strategy.”
I started to get depressed.
And: “Nope, it wasn’t covered with the recruiters either.”
I had a headache.
What gives?
More Challenges for the Technical Leader-Choosing a Successor
In my posting: Leadership Development and Technical Professionals, I talked at length about the challenges of moving from an individual contributor role in a technical environment to that of leader. The combination of lack of support/mentoring afforded these early career leaders and the personal growth that it takes to recognize that the skills that got you here are not the skills you need for success going forward, make this one of the toughest and most mismanaged transitions in business.
Over coffee with a valued associate and accomplished technical professional who has moved beyond the early-awkward phase of being a new leader, we talked about a new leadership challenge that she was facing—finding her replacement.
Merger Reality-Trust Your Gut, Not the Press Release
If your company is involved in a merger, there is one certainty. Everything will change. Regardless of the carefully crafted words in the press release. (Unless of course your company is being purchased by Warren Buffett, who is famous for only buying well-running companies and leaving them alone to run well.)
During the past few days, I talked with two associates going through mergers in very different industries, and both were attempting to convince themselves that things would be fine following the merger. They both cited the “no expectations for layoffs” verbiage in the press releases announcing their deal, and both engaged in some self-rationalization about the importance and “safety” of their respective departments. My instinct was that neither individual truly believed what they were saying. They should trust their gut on this issue.
Does the Lack of A Clear Vision Mean Your Firm Is Flying Blind?
s a strategy consultant, I see clients wrestle with the exercise of creation or articulation of a “Vision” for their business on a regular basis. In some environments, the exercise of clarifying or creating a vision is motivating and galvanizing, and for others it is futility personified. My question for the day: How important is it for an organization to have a shared vision–a view as to what the future desired state of the organization will look like?