diversity

Organization innovation dies when industry myopia prevails

Industry myopia is business risk.   People who grow in one industry or cycle through only one industry may seem safe to hire, because they may slot in quicker or bring competitive advantage, but industry myopia rarely meets innovation’s need to break things to start over or to view things from a new angle.  Innovation depends on [...]

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Fistful of beans 09/21/2011

4 of things I’ve seen, read, or thought might seed results: 1.  Why being wrong is good for you — CNN.com Most of us go through life assuming we are right, almost all the time, about pretty much everything:  our political, our values, our tastes, our religious beliefs, our view of other people, our memory, our [...]

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Fistful of beans 05/11/2011

4 of things I’ve seen, read, or thought might seed results: 1. Think About Diversity of Thought — Diversity Executive Magazine Organizations have cultural norms that employees are expected to work within.  Ideas presented by employees need become judged on value, not judged on the different perspectives they represent.  Thought diversity introduces not only different viewpoints, but also differences [...]

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Fistful of beans 03/16/2011

4 things I’ve seen, read, or thought might seed results: 1. Screening for Resiliency Adaptability and Resilience — Talent Management Magazine Change is constant, whether we, as individuals, our team, or our organization like this reality, change demands resilience from people, teams, and organization. Change also causes constant challenges to some more than others. Those who adapt thrive, [...]

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Fistful of beans 03/02/2011

4 things I’ve seen, read, or thought might seed results: 1. Implementing Planned Change: An Empirical Comparison of Theoretical Perspectives — American Journal of Business Planned change has been viewed from a variety of conceptual perspectives, but few models of planned change we’ve all been part of have been studied using empirical research designs.  With a study [...]

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Fistful of beans 02/09/2011

5 things I’ve seen, read, or thought might seed results: 1. Apple, With or Without Steve Jobs — Bloomberg Businessweek Perhaps there is a coincidence last week’s Fistful of Beans presented an article to divine Google’s possible transformation through their leadership queue, but it looks like Apple is heading into their own multiple-choice risk scenario.  Now [...]

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Low risk, low return human resources

My 11-odd-years in business and talent management consulting [the other 9 in marketing] have shown a few disturbing trends that I see from most poorly-run companies.  These type of organizations, across all industries, ascribe to, what they believe is a low risk strategy, but in reality it is a low return strategy for human resources: [...]

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Innovation Boston and Budapest, or Dirty Water and the Blue Danube

13 years offers a great opportunity to revisit most relationships.  At first blush, Boston and Budapest seem to have little to share or offer each in a study on innovation.  However, both share unique innovation environments that reveal themselves upon further review. I am a Boston native and, after my undergraduate degree from Berklee College of Music, Boston [...]

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Googled again: cost of culture is innovation

What, really, is the cost of culture? Is culture tangible to business bottom line or is culture an intangible behavioral science term only useful for dissertations? Culture, innovation, values, diversity, opinion. Related? Perhaps to each other, but related to the bottom line? I read a recent blog on Fistful of Talent had me revisit diversity’s [...]

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Innovation, the technical risk to IQ

I see and read so much about offers to teach or facilitate innovation, but what is innovation? Innovation is risk Innovation is dialogue Innovation is opportunity (also known as diversity) Are you innovative: Do you ask good questions or do you listen without judgment or without looking to interrupt? Do you allow yourself and people [...]

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The bully in the corner office

I challenge myself to write blogs that might start a conversation either leading to change or to sustain what is working. I want to present an idea to provide a spark for action or follow-through. Anyone can come up with an idea, that’s easy, the hard part is to take an idea into implementation. My [...]

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Diversity facade, part 2: diversity hijacked

On 2 earlier blog posts I write 1) that motivation is the bottom-line success and 2) diversity is about opportunity. In this blog I want to dig into how diversity can negatively affect motivation. First, let’s look at 2 definitions*: Of, relating to, or supporting broad social, political, and educational change, especially to redress historical [...]

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Competing values drive organization resistance

Organizations, like people, develop.  A start-up has different organization qualities than a 25-year-old, Fortune 500 company.  As operations increase in scale and scope a start-up faces new pressures.  Each increase in production, staffing, or market share increases their operating risk.  What worked as a start-up company with a staff of 5 and $500,000 in sales [...]

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The most difficult industry to work in

I admit each organization is unique. Each handles and manages industry and firm-specific stress and demand differently. I do not admit that organizations are anything more than a system of human interrelations. The organization is a product of human interaction and social construction. Organizations do not follow ordained, industry-driven culture. There is no set of [...]

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Diversity facade, part 1

Intelligence does not guarantee insight. However, diversity does. The very leverage of knowledge is dialogue. And dialogue, a true exchange of ideas and opinions, is only possible in an environment that welcomes and fosters diversity, not the diversity facade, but the diversity lever of possibility. Although diversity can be a sensitive and often incendiary issue, [...]

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In review: Leaders and fishing

May 2009 in review.  A roundup of blogs from the previous month: Leaders and fishing — Leaders craft the vision and convey how to embark on a course from what is to what could be.  Leaders must rely on their managers to manage, but leaders need to roll their sleeves up and steward the message [...]

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Culture war

Does your company have a hiring philosophy to find people who fit into the company culture? Do you interview people to fit into the culture of your division? Do you interview people to fit into the culture of your team? Why do we look for people who will fit in when what your business needs [...]

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