Some organizations go through CEOs and department heads like Kleenex. Today, the average tenure of a CEO is 4.6 years. In other cases, C-Suite leaders rotate out of the organization within 1 or 2 years, and a new leader is installed. And it's always "This one is the right one - they're bringing incredible experience/ideas/perspective to the organization." They try to install a few changes that typically don't stick, and are moved out in short order. Then the pattern repeats.

The greatest stories start with imperfection. Something went wrong - usually in a dramatic fashion - then a roller coaster of ups and downs until the recovery and eventual happy or hilarious ending. Perfect stories - where everything goes smoothly - aren't stories at all. They're a lecture.

It's easy to document and communicate the "what". What is your department doing this quarter? You have a laundry list to show them. It reinforces that you have "lots to do" and are valuable to the organization. But where's the strategy? Why is this approach different, unique, compelling, or the right way to achieve the bigger goal? 

Imagine two people meeting up on a blind date. The first person begins by introducing themselves, going through a 10-15 minute detailed introduction and overview of their life and history. They then move quickly into explaining how and when both of them will get married, buy a country house, and have three children, illustrating how this plan is the best and right option, and that no other person is as suited as they are for this.

This sounds weird and presumptuous, yet that’s how many companies approach their customers.

What is Conway’s law? It comes from a 1967 paper by Melvin E. Conway, and the basic idea is that organizations tend to design products that reflect their internal communication structures.

Put another way, Conway’s law implies that the quality of a product or service is reflected in and linked to the working methods of the business that produces it. This means that successful product or service design depends on communication: between designers, product owners, marketing, and sales, not to mention customers, who should have a strong influence on the creation process.

Most business leaders stress the importance of understanding and responding to ever-changing customer needs to stay relevant and competitive. Yet why do so many companies spend the majority of their time focusing inward?

Poker is a game of concentration, reactions, and critical thinking. While luck still plays a large factor in the distribution of the cards, your skill at reading common poker tells can give you a significant edge. This means focusing on your opponent’s body language to decipher subconscious shrugs, sighs, and signals that give away their hand. It's the same in business, but often tells are even more obvious - coming right out of the individual's mouth.

Floods are typically predictable. There are forecasts which discuss river levels, and projections for where the water will rise to and over what period of time. No one dismisses these projections, and we always prepare accordingly. But these floods don't happen because there's monsoon-level rain in the area. It happens because of extensive snow hundreds of miles north of us. The snowpack depth and melting rate where the Mississippi River begins determines our level and timing of flood risk. While most companies don't have this type of clear correlation or prediction capability to determine what will impact their organization, each and every company has its own proverbial 'flood risk'. 

We're all familiar with the concept of financial debt - money you owe, often with interest. Some of us are familiar with technical debt - taking shortcuts while writing code (or making repeated changes to code) that has downstream consequences later. Financial and technical debt plays an important role in organizations. But another type of debt exists — organizational debt. Organizational Debt is the "interest" companies pay when their structure and policies stay fixed and/or accumulate as the world changes.

While politics are inherently part of business, time wasted and money lost are typically blamed on inefficiency and lack of productivity. People aren't working hard enough. They're slacking off. They're not really working when they are working from home. This all stems from the perception that people can't really be trusted to do their jobs without extensive supervision or oversight. (But that's a debate for another day)