Management Snippets
- A leader cannot improve his performance and that of his team without obtaining candid feedback. But it is hard to come by, unless stimulated. One of the ways to prompt such a feedback so that you can zero in on things that you have to cause change is by asking them these three questions:
- What should I stop doing? Ask which behaviors stand in your way of success.
- What should I keep doing? Inquire about what you do right, and should continue to do.
- What should I start doing? Once you’ve stopped unproductive behaviors, you’ll have more time and energy for new behaviors.
Source: “Management Tip of the Day” by Harvard Business Review.
- In this highly competitive and chaotic market place, the sine qua non of success is to covet, dream and toil towards the goal on all cylinders.
- If you are a manager, look the part – well-groomed and smartly shod.
- A lynchpin:
“Every organization has a few people who are respected and generally listened to. They may not have a very high sounding designation but if you get them round to see the merits of an idea, you can be sure that it can be carried through the organization without any trouble.”
- Don’t ask for acceptance, earn it!
- An executive’s job is “task-driven”, whereas an entrepreneur’s is “idea-driven”.
- It is lonely at the top.
- Organizations can thrive today only if they have:
- Less hierarchy (Flat organization)
- Smaller egos and
- More teamwork.
- Trees always die from top – so do some organizations for want of integrity at the top level of management.
- Someone has to take responsibility. I will.
~ Sir Winston Churchill. - If you want to achieve excellence, quit doing less than excellent work!
~ Thomas Watson, Founder – IBM. - The best way to get nothing done is to take up intractable problems which no one else has been able to solve in the centuries before you!
- Work must be more fun than fun!
~ Noel Coward. - Change is a door which can be opened only from the inside.
~ A French proverb. - There is no such thing as a “Good man”. Good for what is the question.
~ Abraham Lincoln. - Don’t do anything that someone else can do for you.
- A “well-rounded person” is a sure-shot prescription for mediocrity!
- There are no buffer zones at the top. Winners and leaders do not live off buffer zones.
- Actually, a Government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we will ever have on earth. No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. Government programmes once launched, never quite disappear.
~ Ronald Reagan. - “I look back when I was 19 years old and a friend of mine, Paul Allen and I had a dream. And the dream was that computing will be very different.”
~ Bill Gates. - Talk to your customer as if he is a long-lost friend!
~ From FISH! - If we choose to love the work we do, we can catch the limit of happiness, meaning and fulfillment everyday.
~ From FISH! - People spend about 75% of their adult wake time doing work-related activities – getting ready for work, traveling to work, working and decompressing after work. If we spend that much time in that part of our lives, we ought to enjoy it and be energized by it.
~ Ken Blanchard, Ph.D. - An executive has to talk and then walk the talk!
- Avoid verbal diarrhea in business communication. Abhor filibustering and gibble-gabbling.
- Let your letters and talk be crisp and to the point. When time is directly proportional to money, why indulge in the pastime of farting through the mouth!
- Golden rules of written communication:
- Ask yourself, “Is it really necessary, anyway?”
- Clarify your ideas before even putting pen on paper (or, booting your Personal Computer!)
- Meditate a while on the true purpose of the communication
- Ensure that every sentence serves a purpose, and conveys something of value to the reader. In short, don’t waffle!
- And never ever forget this axiom:
The moving finger writes, and, having writ,
Moves on; nor all thy Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a line,
Nor all thy tears wash out a word of it.~ Omar Khayyam
- Man ages by managing!
- Management is essentially to be focussed on attitude instead of skills.
- Ask yourself how you would like your boss to manage you and you’ll get a reasonable idea how to manage your people.
- An iron-clad hierarchical organization breeds obsequious behaviour with superiors, competitive behaviour with peers and indifferent behaviour with subordinates.
- Time and people have to be woven together to achieve the set objectives.
- Remember, diamonds are formed by extreme pressure! People harness their faculties only under pressure!