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May, 2013

• Uncomfortable Productivity: Stepping Outside Your Comfort Zone for Maximum Effect Sent Wednesday, May 22, 2013 View this message in your web browser."The comfort zone is the great enemy to creativity; moving beyond it necessitates intuition, which in turn configures new perspectives and conquers fears." -- Dan Stevens, British actor. Uncomfortable Productivity: Stepping Outside Your Comfort Zone for Maximum Effect Comfort may be nice when snuggling into bed, but in the workplace it leads to laziness, complacency, and stagnation. To get ahead (much less retain your […]
• Managing UP:Maximizing Efficiency forYour Boss's Sake by Laura Stack Sent Wednesday, May 15, 2013 View this message in your web browser."Hire people who are better than you are, then leave them to get on with it . . . Look for people who will aim for the remarkable, who will not settle for the routine." -- David Ogilvy, British advertising executive; often called The Father of Advertising. Managing UP: Maximizing Efficiency for Your Boss's Sake Most people regard management as overseeing and directing the work of subordinates: giving orders, delegating […]
• Go, Speed Racer, Go! How to Think Faster on Your Feet by Laura Stack Sent Wednesday, May 8, 2013 View this message in your web browser."Fast is fine, but accuracy is everything." -- Wyatt Earp, Old West gunfighter and lawman. Go, Speed Racer, Go! How to Think Faster on Your Feet As a professional speaker, I'm frequently faced with questions I haven't been asked before and must think quickly on my feet. Or suppose you're the team expert on Boxlets, your company's proprietary spreadsheet program. If your boss needs a quick fact or a doubtful customer starts […]
• Increasing Creativity in Your Organization: Six Ways to Spark Innovative Thinking by Laura Stack Sent Wednesday, May 1, 2013 View this message in your web browser."The most empowering condition of all is when the entire organization is aligned with its mission, and people's passions and purpose are in synch with each other." -- Bill George, former CEO of Medtronic, and leadership expert Peter Sims The 3T Approach: Aligning Strategy with Daily Operations One of the business world's standing challenges is aligning long-term organizational strategy with day-to-day operations---the […]

April, 2013

• Increasing Creativity in Your Organization: Six Ways to Spark Innovative Thinking by Laura Stack Sent Wednesday, April 24, 2013 View this message in your web browser."You cannot discover new oceans unless you have the courage to lose sight of the shore." -- André Gide, French author (winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1947). Increasing Creativity in Your Organization: Six Ways to Spark Innovative Thinking While the business environment requires a certain level of built-in routine in order to maximize productivity, that doesn't mean you can't have creative fun at work. Remember […]
• Warts and All: Taking Ownership of Unlikable Tasks by Laura Stack Sent Wednesday, April 17, 2013 View this message in your web browser."Eat a live frog first thing in the morning, and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day." -- Mark Twain, American writer and lecturer. Warts and All: Taking Ownership of Unlikable Tasks Have you found that perfect job yet?Of course not, because the perfect job doesn't exist. Every job in the world includes unpleasant tasks that may bore you to death, strain your capacities, or require such brainless repetition […]
• Making Time for Strategy and Tactics by Laura Stack Sent Wednesday, April 10, 2013 View this message in your web browser."All men can see these tactics whereby I conquer, but what none can see is the strategy out of which victory is evolved." -- Sun-Tzu, Chinese strategist. Making Time for Strategy and Tactics Which function should demand the lion's share of a leader's time: short-term tactics, or long-term strategy? The short answer, as is often the case, is "it depends." Good leadership requires a continual balancing act. On the one hand, […]
• Strategic Planning, Then and Now by Laura Stack Sent Wednesday, April 3, 2013 View this message in your web browser."No battle plan survives contact with the enemy." -- Helmuth von Moltke the Elder, nineteenth century Prussian Field Marshal. Strategic Planning, Then and Now Recently, the concept of strategic planning has become a popular business focus, especially among companies scrambling to keep up with our brave new world's frantic pace. We've always practiced strategic planning at some level, of course, but what we meant by the term […]

March, 2013

• Voluntary vs. Involuntary Attention: What Grabs Your Focus by Laura Stack Sent Wednesday, March 27, 2013 View this message in your web browser."The cobra feeling is an almost muscular albeit mental bearing-down on a subject or object, which you rise above, hood flaring to block distractions, and hold steady in your unblinking focus." -- Winifred Gallagher, author of Rapt: Attention and the Focused Life. Voluntary vs. Involuntary Attention: What Grabs Your Focus What we call "civilization" dates back no more than a few thousand years---and in many ways, our biology […]
• How to Be a Fixer, Not a Finger-Pointer by Laura Stack Sent Wednesday, March 20, 2013 View this message in your web browser."When a man points a finger at someone else, he should remember that four of his fingers are pointing at himself." -- Louis Nixer, noted American trial lawyer. How to Be a Fixer, Not a Finger-Pointer Few of us truly appreciate criticism, because no matter how valid or constructive, it can be embarrassing or annoying (especially when someone fails to offer a solution to the perceived problem). Poking holes in something is […]

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