Bob Frisch and Cary Greene: Simple Sabotage

For over 30 years, Bob Frisch has worked with Senior Executive Teams and Boards on their most vital strategic and organizational challenges, both as a consultant and a corporate executive. Cary Greene has over 20 years’ experience working with senior executives and boards on challenging and complex strategic issues. They are co-authors with Robert Galford of the book Simple Sabotage: A Modern Field Guide for Detecting and Rooting Out Everyday Behaviors That Undermine Your Workplace*.

Key Points

When creating a book on how to sabotage an occupying enemy’s industry, the OSS (precursor to the CIA) recommended a list of organizational sabotage techniques. Ironically, these techniques look very similar to common actions we see in our organizations today.

Committees

Make sure a committee is appropriate for the task.

What is the purpose of a committee?

Who actually needs to be on a committee?

Make sure committees are structured and have an agenda.

Make it clear what authority the leader of the committee has.

Is the committee being asked to make a recommendation or asked to make a decision?

Emails

Overusing the CC function in emails creates an overwhelming and unnecessary amount of communication.

Remember that sometimes it’s best to just pick up the phone or walk down the hall to communicate with someone.

Use the email subject line effectively.

Resources Mentioned

Simple Sabotage Field Manual (1944)

Simple Sabotage: A Modern Field Guide for Detecting and Rooting Out Everyday Behaviors That Undermine Your Workplace* by Robert Galford, Bob Frisch, and Cary Greene

Related Library Episodes

Communication in a Family Business, with JoAnne Norton (episode 74)

How We Do Things Around Here for Results, with Kent Rhodes (episode 144)

How to Tame Workplace Incivility, with Sharone Bar-David (episode 210)

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