Sometimes rules lead to unintended consequences that cause more damage than the problem they were designed to prevent. Here’s a classic example, and advice on what to do about it. Phil Renshaw is a consultant and coach for financial executives at Circulus in Buckinghamshire, England. Having spent seventeen years in corporate finance himself, he’s personally [read more]

Part of dealing with issues of race and prejudice in a healthy manner starts with recognizing that we all have deep-seated preconceived notions about others. Some we’re conscious of and know how we got them, and others we’re not. But both can and do affect how we view and interact with other people. A university [read more]

My guest this week is Lori Silverman. She’s a management consultant, speaker, trainer, and the author of a number of fabulous books, including: Wake me up when the data is over: How organizations use stories to drive results, Stories Trainers Tell: 55 Ready to use stories to make training stick, and Business Storytelling for Dummies [read more]

IMAGINE CONDUCTING this experiment. Put five monkeys in a cage with a bunch of bananas hanging from the ceiling. Underneath the bananas, place a ladder just tall enough to reach them. Then any time one of the monkeys tries to climb the ladder, spray the entire cage with cold water. Pretty soon, the monkeys learn [read more]

Our natural inclination in hard economic times is to curtail all spending. Unfortunately, that short-term view sometimes means we forgo investments in people and technology that we’ll wish we had made when the good times return. It’s times like that a good “permission story” comes in handy. It helps provide both wisdom and the courage [read more]

In 1983, Joe Willke was still an analyst with Nielsen-BASES—a consumer research firm that specializes in predicting the sales of new products before they’re launched. Their technique starts by exposing a few hundred people to the concept behind the new product—just a few words to describe what it is and how it works. Then they [read more]

My guest this week is Glenn Leibowitz, the head of communications for McKinsey & Company Greater China. He’s also the host of the podcast Write for Impact and a popular blogger on LinkedIn. So, suffice it to say, he knows a lot about writing both on-line and in a more traditional corporate sense with email, [read more]

One of the quickest and effective ways to create caring, productive relationships between employees is also one of the easiest. And it just requires sharing a few stories. The day I learned that lesson was the day I had a long conversation with Jamie Johnson. . . Starting a new job is one of those [read more]

One of the most attention-grabbing and change-producing surprises you can use with your clients might also be the simplest. And it can be delivered with as little as a single word. Consider the following examples from Gary Cofer. Stopping the CEO in his tracks At the time, Gary was executive vice president at dunnhumby USA, [read more]

Keeping a team motivated when they’re doing a traditional role is easy, because you have all the traditional tools of leadership at your disposal. But what if you’ve asked a team to do a job that isn’t normal? A job without the typical and recognizable rewards—that atypical “special assignment” off the standard career path? The [read more]