Leadership

My work identifies four fundamental organizational forms: the personal organization, like an entrepreneurial start-up; the programmed organization, like McDonald’s with its standardized processes; the professional organization, like a hospital, which relies on the expertise of its professionals; and the project organization, like a film company or ... See more

Left unchecked organizations default to bureaucracy. People default to distraction.

It doesn’t take long for 3 priorities to become 10. It doesn’t take long for 2 people in a meeting to become 8. It doesn’t take long to move from people making decisions to committees.

The most productive organizations and people spend a lot of energy fighting what fe... See more

When leaders exercise authority where they lack competency, they undermine the organization’s efficiency.

Peter Cundhill on finding the right fit for talent:

“You can teach a donkey to climb a tree but it’s easier to hire a squirrel.”

It’s a truism that you always want to hire folks with very high standards, but I’ve seen a staggering number of folks fail in an organization primarily because they want to hold others to a higher standard than their organization’s management is willing to enforce.

It turns out that reality has a surprising amount of detail, and those details can matter a lot to figuring out what the root problem or best solution is. So if I want to help, I can’t treat those details as a black box: I need to open it up and see the gears inside. Otherwise, anything I suggest will be wrong—or even if it’s right, I won’t have en... See more

If the product doesn’t work well, the code is not good.