Posts Tagged ‘Philosophy’

Monday night I had the opportunity to attend an Agile Groupies meeting.  It’s a semi-regular gathering of folks (developers, business analysts, product managers, etc.) interested in a specific approach, Agile, toward software development.

For those of you not familiar, Agile development focuses on smaller development teams, working on smaller deliverables, in highly iterative, somewhat less structured approach.  Part of the thinking is that if you are delivering in smaller, more discrete ‘chunks’ of working product, that the overall process will be more ‘agile,’ more adaptive to ongoing change during a product’s overall life cycle. The idea is to move away from ‘heavy’ less flexible disciplines, and back toward lighter, freer, approaches. Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve been interviewing business leaders in preparation for my presentation at next month’s It’s a Duesy II Manufacturing Revival.  I won’t give away too much before the March 17th event, but there are a few common topics that have come up.

One topic, Flexibility, was mentioned, unsolicited, in each interview. Their respective domains included Manufacturing, Finance, and Human Resources.  As you may expect each brought the topic up in a different context.

From a manufacturing perspective, there is a need to be flexible in how companies are organized.  Many manufacturing concerns use organizational models first developed in the post-World War II era.  Companies like IBM, United Technology, Ford, GM, and the like, developed rigid, deep, hierarchical organizations.  As a result, their ability to change to meet current needs was all-but beyond their grasp.  Not until experiencing near-death experiences, such as with the Domestic 3, were they finally desperate enough to change.

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Leadership opportunities can be found in all kinds of places. Sometimes they pop up in the most unusual of circumstances and you adopt the role without even thinking about it.

Not too long ago, I led a group of motorcyclists on a ride. We started out in downtown Asheville, North Carolina. Traffic was heavy enough that even with GPS, safely and correctly leading the group through the lump of spaghetti masquerading as a series of closely clustered interchanges proved challenging.

15 minutes, and I’ve already had to make a half-dozen impromptu leadership decisions—each one with 5 friends mentally critiquing my every move.

So about 10am in the morning, we’re somewhere north of Asheville, as our small group begins to work its way westward. We’ve left the big city rush well behind us, we’ve unwound ourselves, and eventually roll into a small town that the crush of time seems to have left alone. It’s the sort of town where everything’s almost sleepy, peaceful, with that small town ‘clean’ about it.

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I’m pleased to let everyone know, March 17, I will be speaking at the It’s a Duesy II Manufacturing Revival Conference.  You’re encouraged to come.

Dennis Jeffrey of Tekni Consulting is the event’s organizer.  Heading into 2010, we begin to catch our breaths, having simply survived 2009.

Now, is the time for revival!  But, not revival just as a dictionary would describe it.  One definition is, ‘…restoration to use…’  We need not to simply revive, restore, or return to pre-‘09 conditions, we need to find ways to thrive, to strengthen ourselves and move forward positively.  With this in mind, I was happy to accept Dennis’ invitation to speak.

My discussion is part of the event’s Management track, focusing on Change.

The world around us continues to evolve; nothing new there.  But many organizations, even as they change what they look like, have largely stayed the same inside.  Social, technical, global evolution has now come so far organizations simply have no choice but to finally begin changing who they are inside.

Register Now! Early Bird Pricing until February 15th! Price is only $89/ person, group rates available.

For those of you who have followed my blog, you understand that my focus is on providing thoughtful business leadership.  Come listen as I discuss areas often neglected by leaders, allowed to fall by the wayside, which are increasingly important in today’s world—areas that need to change.

In preparation for this event, I am actively interviewing business leaders and soliciting input—including yours, dear reader.  I encourage you to provide your input regarding how businesses need to change in order to thrive, moving forward.  Feel free to Comment, or send me an email (results@jtpedersen.net).

From my perspective, Seth has written perhaps his most impactful book yet. The Linchpin is a new category of person, one who engages their personal ‘art’ in what they do, who can see the course to take when a map doesn’t exist.

This book is a mix of looking at how we think; how we decide; how we got here; and, what is going to be needed to be successful moving forward.

To become a linchpin is to become indispensable.

Seth does a good job encouraging the reader to apply their ‘art’, that ‘extra something’ you enjoy doing, to become indispensable, to leader your organization forward–regardless of your position within it. Rather than simply be a cog in the boss’ machine, do more, be more, whether you reap direct reward (e.g. $$) or not.

Along the way, you might learn a few other things. One of which, led me to post, "Mid Life Crisis Explained.”

The world has changed. Permanently. We can struggle to maintain status quo, or, at least contemplate the options Seth presents.

Recommended.

In Seth’s latest book, Linchpin,  he spends a lot of time talking about maps and artists.  That being an artist means you create your own map, your own path.  And, that society is changing.  Rather than spending your life following a map someone else created, to be successful you’ll need to create your own map moving forward.

While I’ve not been an assembly line worker in a literal sense, it took me awhile (couple dozen reiterations) for what Seth was talking about to truly sink in…appreciating how much of it related to my own life.

Life was relatively easy, for a long time.  With a clear goal in front of me, I could move mountains to achieve it.  I would feel a sense of accomplishment, and life was grand.  So, for the first 3/4 of my life, this is how it worked.  Goal, after goal, after goal.  Going into the service, I bought a map out of the carousel, having chosen to go into aviation.  Once there, the Navy gave me a nice [flight] bag of additional maps to follow (exams, flight certifications, instructor certs, regular performance reviews, etc.).

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Ever wonder why customer service just plain sucks in so many cases?  Ever wonder why?   Perhaps you’ve been just so amazed, like ‘made your whole day’ amazed, when you actually receive good customer service?

A lot of it just plain comes down to a pure desire for the provider to care, passionately care, about the job they’re doing…for you.  After all, it isn’t about ‘where’ the service came from, or ‘who’ provided it, or ‘what’ they were providing it on.

Here in the U.S. it can be popular sport to gripe about the latest ‘terrible’ customer service experience.  All too often we blame it on some poor sap in India, sitting amidst 4 b’zillion other reps, that can’t speak ‘my’ language, and hasn’t gotten a clue.  Hey, I’ve been there, got the shirt, sure you do too.

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“How We Decide”
by: Jonah Lehrer
ISBN: 978-0-618-62011-1

Thinking about how we think.  That’s the gist of Jonah Lehrer’s book, “How We Decide.”

I’ve read books in the past about how the brain works. What the amygdala does, what the prefrontal cortex does, and so on. They’ve all been rather clinical, dry in nature.  Certainly not engaging. In surprising contrast, Lehrer has not only crafted a book on the topic of the brain and it’s constituent parts, he also puts it all in context of our daily lives.

Going all the way back to Plato’s day

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Does your company stand for anything? Do you just go to work each day to, ‘make money?’  If you don’t have an answer, why not?

The best place to find it, if there is one, is in an organization’s Mission Statement.  Too many mission statements though are simply great places to collect a bunch of fancy words used to simply obfuscate any underlying meaning. Hmm.  Obfuscate: to confuse, hide the meaning of, be ambiguous.

Google has a 10-point Philosophy.  The most famously quoted is, ‘…do no evil.’  While one might question this basic tenet, it is there, it is understood, and it can be used to help align the organization toward a common purpose.

Even if your organization has lost its way, its never too late to start on a path toward recovery. Maybe this is part of what Google’s doing today, with it’s recent stand against Chinese censorship.  Is what Google’s doing noble?  It’s an interesting question.  See what HBR has to say in, “Why Is Google Doing Government’s Job?”

It’s never too late to Pick Your Fencepost and decide whether to Focus or Flounder.

(Photo Credit: Rainer Topf)