Comments

Everything under the Sun, has been said and done...we just need new ways of approaching this. I think the key word is ALIGNMENT. Is the way in which you are going to achieve your full potential aligned with the way the Company will achieve its mission? Yes? Come on in. No? Hey, it´s a free market.

Posted by Joaquín at January 13, 2007 9:48 AM

I wrote in my book 'the basics are the new cutting edge' and I like that - excuse the arrogance. What I mean is that whilst we need to be ever alert to new opportunities and we certainly do need to challenge existing practice I am not in the camp of rubbishing everything that happened before last Tuesday! I often say in talks about the NHS that the organisation employs 1.3 million people and it is almost 60 years old - therefore there is 60 million years learning there we cannot simply throw it away. I have never been in the camp that says experience is a disadvantage and youthful naivety an advantage. There is good and bad in both. And innovative, creative and progressive leadership theory is not something invented last week either. Christians believe Jesus, our greatest leadership role model, set the leadership standard even before Warren Bennis, Stephen Covey or Tom Peters :-)

Posted by Trevor Gay at January 13, 2007 9:55 AM

Tom,
I read your comments and it made me wonder why it is that we tend to make everything so complicated. I think I have come to the conclusion that complexity is a luxury. In my (albeit limited) experience when the yoghurt hits the fan we are EXCELLENT at simplifying things. Priorities leap out and we know what's important and what we need to do - to survive.

So my deduction is that business managers (and consultants) who indulge themselves in complexity / over theorising are simply just not in enough trouble - YET!

CN

Posted by Chris Nel at January 13, 2007 1:05 PM

Tom,
Modern leadership books are boring to me, although I'm young. I prefer biographies or stories of long ago where great leadership is in the context.

I recently finished the bio of Winston Churchill and am now reading the Iliad by Homer. Good stuff!

Posted by Mario Vellandi at January 13, 2007 1:55 PM

Right on the money.

Posted by BT Hathaway at January 13, 2007 3:28 PM

Tom

You sent me scurrying to my bookshelf to see if I still have my copy of Future Perfect - I remember being captivated by the "any time" and "any place" notion of the world and now it is here with us WOW! I found my copy and it is marked up - I used it as a basic text for a 3 year change assignment I started in 1990. It is a simply cool book which you called Book of the Decade. It is one of the best management books I have read.

You will know and understand why I agree with so much that is in your blog here and perhaps why I disagree with some of it too. For my sins I try to make a living by influencing people to make their organisation relevant and remarkable to the world around them (I am as guilty as the next person in overstating the need for radical departures from what has become orthodoxy but I honestly believe in what I do and what I say). I work with people who have to make hard and fast business decisions about the future. The few therefore that are willing to hire me and live with the consequences of that decision want me to be a radical and to think about all sorts of new opportunities and possibilities. But most people in these client sites seek a much simpler life - who can blame them. They want good and effective leadership, a safe and secure job, recognition as a person and as a contributor to a successful outcome, work on projects that make sense to them, ethical dealings with colleagues, honesty from consultants/advisors/managers, etc. But at the end of the day they want the same thing your Dad probably wanted Tom - they want to be able to provide for the family (pay the mortgage/rent, food bills, school fees, hospital bills, etc). They seek a simpler life in a world that is becoming more complex. I remember sitting for hours with my Grandmother who was born in 1896 discussing her life of radical change and it was just as you described - it is hard to imagine that my two teenage sons will live through anything like the changes she experienced but maybe just maybe they will and just maybe one or both will contribute something significant to that future perfect.

I agree with simple where simple will "suffice" (pareto optimality). I never will agree with simplistic!

As to technology - it is and always has been a tool. In the wrong hands these tools can cause great suffering and needless hardship - not only the military use technology to screw up people's lives other management models do it equally well. In a time of an "unrelenting war in Iraq" where some of my country's men and women go to work each day in the military to somehow serve us all - I do find the constant referral to military models of leadership off putting to say the least. I was in the Navy once (yeah I grew up wanting to be an Admiral) - I thought it might be a career - they discovered eventually that I had a health problem that prohibited that life event. I learnt a lot about taking "command" in the Navy but none of that would work for 5 nano seconds at my current client site - I would be dead meat!

Finally, complexity is an ever present companion for each of us today even if only because we are blessed to live in an age of ANY THING - ANY WHERE.... Complexity is not a bad thing per se -complexity is a by-word of the Space Shuttle and that is why they have built in "redundancy" all over the place as they try valiantly to reduce and where possible eliminate their "single points of failure". To most managers today "redundancy" is a cost and it has to be eliminated by making things simple or simpler. Why not accept complexity and use Ashby's famous Law of Requisite Variety to combat it. I have always thought that Ashby meant you can combat complexity if, when, and where you have the requisite variety of thinking, being, and doing.

After all is said and done isn't "variety" still the spice of life....

Cheers
Richard

Posted by Richard Lipscombe at January 13, 2007 3:44 PM

http://money.cnn.com/2007/01/05/magazines/fortune/Search_and_enjoy.fortune/index.htm?postversion=2007011020

1. "Fresh & Radical" Google - Best Career Places Fortune Magazine - No. 1 Google - 10,000 associates small. Freedom there in that one is quite soon independently wealthy - and then truly free to have fun

2. Pleased that my Anglophile minions Richard & Trevor stand on their hind legs on occasion and exert an innovative idea per their front-liner comments above

3. And to follow on 1. above indeed TP - the Google & Genentech [No. 2] models seem to cherish the human spirit [basics] and lavishly take care of human & family needs - in turn getting FRESH focus on Mission & Vision [career]

Posted by sean_free at January 13, 2007 4:29 PM

Richard,

For me, the radical solution is the simplest not the cleverest sounding or longest hypothesis / proposal.

CN

Posted by Chris Nel at January 14, 2007 2:11 PM

Chris

I agree! For me, "excellence" is being both radical and simple.

Thanks for your time and your comment.

Stay well and have fun!

Richard.

Posted by Richard Lipscombe at January 14, 2007 3:04 PM

1. Maybe there is a Wiki way to invigorate the Acropolis & make it new again - so it lasts forever

2. Richard - appreciate your continued humble servitude & the more minimal the deal - the better - Mr. Trevor as favored lapdog calls it "simplicity"

3. It is almost time to file federal taxes here - & minimal wins the day - love to find proper deductions so I pay 8% or so while front-liners pick up most of the tax load - now that is true "excellence"

Posted by sean_copernicus at January 14, 2007 5:32 PM

I regularly scan the business and management shelves of bookstores. In every bookstore I find hundreds of books about systems, processes and complex management theory. Sometimes I cannot even understand the title of the book. A quick 'scan read' of half a page (at most) is usually enough to ensure my wallet stays in my pocket. I am disappointed that books on complexity in management, leadership and business outnumber books on simplicity, as my best guess, on a ratio of about 50:1 and I may be under-estimating that ratio. I have to ask Qui Bono - for who's benefit?

Posted by Trevor Gay at January 14, 2007 6:00 PM

1. It seems Mr. Trevor [Richard napping] that Google has an awesome business model:

a. & founders each worth $14B now
b. create - maintain college collaborate atmosphere
c. hire energetic awesome talent
d. have fun - dine free on organics - free everything [& convenient so you stay with career tasks to the max]
e. free cut of incredible Google profits
f. mission & vision to change the world - Googleworld

2. Idolize Sean as true Lovemark

3. Minimal & outstanding as that

Posted by sean_lovemark at January 14, 2007 6:19 PM

Hi Sean

I heard Professor Gary Hamel talk just over 12 months ago and he said Google allow all employees 20% of their week as free time to do anything they want to do – fantastic!

I agree with Sean manifesto points 1 (a-f) and point 3

As regards 2 'Idolize Sean as true lovemark' - I will reserve judgment and keep my best affection for front liners :-)

Posted by Trevor Gay at January 14, 2007 6:47 PM

I get your "old I get" slide.

I was tempted recently to forget the basics in a presentation on leadership till my biz partner kicked me in the head and told me to stop trying to "make something new up".

Posted by Michael Wagner at January 15, 2007 12:24 AM

If it is so simple how come it's so difficult?

Seriously - what goes wrong?

I have a a theory that this goes very much back to my pet subject of tangible Vs intangible. The simple stuff is often hard to measure or get a grip on. Often you notice when it's not there but not when it is

Posted by PaulH at January 15, 2007 3:28 AM

Great comment Paul – I remember many years ago one of my bosses saying ‘you can smell and feel quality.’

I think that is similar to what you are saying – we know the ‘intangible’ but we may not be able to see it. My concern is the second we try and measure it and therefore formalise it is the moment we lose it unless we are very careful.

Posted by Trevor Gay at January 15, 2007 4:01 AM

Perhaps the problem with, "the basics" is that their very name makes them sound, well, rather basic! And when you're a young turk, you don't want to be plodding away, learning and doing the basics. You want to be out there doing important, radical, Wow! stuff and getting noticed. Which of course seems preferable to looking at a grumpy old bloke like me who keeps banging on about the basics: is this logistics operation doing the basics right? Is it fulfilling it's main purpose by getting the stock in, picking the sales orders correctly and delivering them on time and in full? If yes, we can look at developing it; if no, put the basics right.

All too often, people come in with great plans to introduce some new IT development or re-tendering part of the operation. Asked how this will improve service levels and/or costs, the answer is vague. And this is because, all too often, it's a diversion and a distraction from the real business of making sure the operation is running well. Sometimes folks put up great plans to try to hide the fact that the operation isn't functioning well and often it's change for the sake of change - or even for the sake of appearing busy.

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As I've got older, I've realised that the basics are much harder than all the other sexy projects. Try managing an already good operation and coping with the need to make every day fresh, to maintain standards, to absorb changing business requirements, to keep people motivated, to let your business take operational excellence for granted without taking the operation for granted. That's impossible without a command of the basics and it's hard, often unglamorous but essential work.

viagra for men 100mg MAYBE THAT'S (PART OF) THE ANSWER: henceforth we shouldn't call them the basics; we should call them the essentials.

BTW, Trevor: 1.3m people x 60 years = 78m years (not 60) of experience! Basic arithmetic is essential... :-)

Posted by Mark JF at January 15, 2007 8:41 AM

Hi Mark - Maths was never my strongest subject but on my estimate I was making allowance that there has not been 1.3 million for all the 60 years. Earlier in the NHS and up to the 1960's the numbers were less than one million. Hence I made what I think accountants would call a provision ... I call it 'smoke and mirrors.' At least that's my story and I am sticking to it ... Thank God I have an accountant :-)

Posted by Trevor Gay at January 15, 2007 8:55 AM

The basics are difficult because they usually involve sweat and (positve)confrontation.

Think blocking and tackling.

Posted by Jimi at January 16, 2007 7:35 AM

Respect is the beginning
Love one another is what respect is driving at.

Posted by Ken Edwards at January 17, 2007 10:30 PM