Insights To Boost Your Career and Success Why Companies Fire in Bulk Insight #357 Once again, we read reports of companies firing thousands of employees at once. Even the federal government has now tried its hands at it. (Yes, I know the decision came from elsewhere, but the outcome is the same. And what is also the same is that the decision came from corporate minds, not federal heads.) Have you ever wondered why firing happens in bulk? You know what I mean. When bosses in large companies...
6 days ago • 1 min read
Questions To Trigger Your Thinking You Saw the Problem. You Found the Fix. But Did You Act? Trigger Question #32 Two boys and a dog are out in a field. The boys are standing and chatting; the dog is sitting and howling. “Why is your dog howling?” asks the one boy. “He’s sitting on a bed of thorns, but he is too lazy to lift his butt,” replies his friend. (I saw this as a cartoon when I was but a lad myself. It made an impression on me. Like thorns are wont to do.) Now picture this. You feel...
10 days ago • 1 min read
Insights To Boost Your Career and Success How AI Solves the Management Dilemma Insight #356 Do you know why AI is called artificial intelligence? Because it is not intelligent! If something is artificial, then it is fake, imitation, unnatural, not genuine. Thus, if something is fake intelligence, then obviously it cannot be intelligent. So, why on earth do executives in corporations give so much power to something artificial that isn't intelligent? I'll tell you why. Because it solves the...
13 days ago • 2 min read
Questions To Trigger Your Thinking Are You Direct or Directive? Trigger Question #61 Be direct. You’ve been told that, haven’t you? But have you ever been told to be directive? No? Well, I’m telling you, “Be directive!” If you are a leader, a manager and/or a parent, then you should be direct and directive. The catch is… Because there is always a catch. The catch is that you must understand the difference between the two, and to know when to use which one for maximum effect. Effect? Yes. As...
17 days ago • 1 min read
Insights To Boost Your Career and Success To Succeed, Don’t Play Nice at Work Insight #128 Do you work for a nice boss at a nice organization? You do? I’m so sorry to hear that. Nice is seldom successful. At work. Here’s why. In organizational life, nice normally means nice to work with. And nice to work with too often means people like you, meaning people who are like you like you. What do you get when you have likeable people who are too alike? You get people who make the same perceptual...
20 days ago • 1 min read
Questions To Trigger Your Thinking Do You Land Your Message in the Touchdown Zone? Trigger Question #169 When we are called upon to speak up, many of us go roaming. We waffle, we duck and dive, we pussyfoot, we beat around the bush, we tiptoe. We do almost anything except get to the point. Obviously, it is in our nature. Why else would the English language have so many synonyms to describe how we tiptoe around an issue? But here’s the thing. Some information, like bad news, is best...
24 days ago • 2 min read
Insights To Boost Your Career and Success How To Make Change Happen When Wishing Won’t Insight #355 There’s a funny thing about autocratic leaders. When they want something to change or something new to happen, they say so. And expect their word to be done. Come to think of it, that’s how ordinary leaders, normal managers, and even bossy bosses act. As if expressing a wish will make it so. Maybe the air is thinner higher up the hierarchy, thin enough to make us light-headed. When we want...
27 days ago • 1 min read
Questions To Trigger Your Thinking Do Your Excuses Create Better Plans? Trigger Question #168 ... We plan. And then we make excuses if our plans don’t work out. Not so? Come on, admit it. We all do it. We often find time to make excuses for not having had the time to plan properly in the first place. But what if we use these excuses to our advantage? What if we make a list of all the possible creative excuses we might need… before we need them… while we are still actively planning? Let’s list...
about 1 month ago • 1 min read
Insights To Boost Your Career and Success Why I Cannot Give You a Definition of Nonsense Insight #354 (Why no pretty picture? Because it finally dawned on me how much it costs our suffering planet every time I ask AI to produce a few sample pictures for me to choose from. No, it’s not free. Not even the “free” ones. Not only that, but somewhere another starving artist is packing paints away under a bed. What was I thinking!) ... Do you remember what Steve Ballmer, then CEO of Microsoft, said...
about 1 month ago • 2 min read