All Features
Festo Didactic
Manufacturing in the United States and Canada is marked by negative stereotypes left behind from 1955. Repetitive and simplistic duties in grimy workplaces, without a chance to change or advance a career, are the images most people see when they imagine what it means to work in a factory. But, a…
The Un-Comfort Zone With Robert Wilson
Over the years, I’ve beaten myself up over business breakdowns, lost relationships, and countless other failures. I would only look at what I’d done wrong and where I was at fault. And, of course, this would only make me feel worse.
People would tell me, “Rob, you need to love yourself.” Wow,…
Knowledge at Wharton
Steve Klasko, president of Thomas Jefferson University and CEO of Jefferson Health, is the co-author of We Can Fix Healthcare (Mary Ann Lieber Inc., 2016) with Wharton adjunct professor Gregory P. Shea and Michael Hoad. In the book, the authors propose 12 disruptive transformations to the…
Chip Bell
Francie Johnsen is my very favorite pharmacist. When the petite, redheaded bundle of energy first came to work at the Eckerd Pharmacy (now CVS) near my home, she encountered a store spirit painted plain vanilla. Employees were creating a completely memory-less experience. Nothing was wrong, mind…
Michelle LaBrosse
According to well-known business executive Don Tapscott, the technological development that will most affect the way we live in the next few decades is not the newest iPhone, or flying drones, or self-driving cars. It’s something many of us may not have heard of: blockchain technology.
Blockchain…
John Maxwell
Have you ever considered the time investment required of some of the world’s greatest achievements?
• It took 26 months to build the Eiffel Tower. • It took Da Vinci four years to paint the Mona Lisa. • It took Michelangelo four years to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. • It took Leo…
Marlene Chism
The world needs leadership, and there’s no better way to lead than to listen. A leader who listens controls the conversation, and has the power to build bridges instead of barriers.
Listening requires you to be present, to set aside your own agenda, to use discernment.
When someone says, “Black…
Michelle LaBrosse
Before you can do a project well, you must first make sure it’s the right one for you at that time. A project is “right” when it moves you closer to your long-term goals, aligns well with your unique strengths, and is achievable given the resources and people you have available. Once you’ve…
Afaq Ahmed, Yves Van Nuland
New technologies have empowered customers to seek out the best products and services at the lowest cost and shortest delivery times. Customers can compare price and delivery information as well as reviews about product quality. Thus, the importance of sustaining outstanding quality in order to…
Harish Jose
Today I’d like to take a look at a lesson from Taiichi Ohno regarding the pursuit of quality. His comment, “The pursuit of quantity cultivates waste, while the pursuit of quality yields value,” struck a chord with me. Among other things, he's referring to the importance of resisting mass-…
Manfred Kets de Vries
Thrill-seeking employees’ addiction to risk can create havoc in the workplace. Managed correctly, however, their fearlessness can be a great advantage to any organization.
People who knew Lawrence Devon, a VP of sales in a large retail group, viewed him as the quintessential sensation seeker—a…
“Honest feedback is hard to take, especially from a relative, a friend, an acquaintance, or a stranger.”
—Franklin P. Jones
I once found myself needing to find new employment. The situation that I was leaving had been complex, to say the least, and I worried that perceptions of failure would dog…
Michelle LaBrosse
Ihave studied systems dynamics modeling for three decades. What I’ve experienced first-hand is that when you establish several key core values, you can create an entire self-replicating system for your organization.
I experimented with this idea first with Cheetah Learning, where our three core…
More than 313 million global work-related accidents occur each year, according to the International Labour Organization, with a high percentage of those accidents resulting in significant time away from work. Each accident bears a personal and financial cost for the worker and the employer. Yet,…
Stephan Manning, Marcus M. Larsen
One of the big themes in the current presidential race is how decades of free trade have dealt a heavy blow to the U.S. worker as millions of jobs were shipped overseas to take advantage of cheap labor.
That’s even turned some pro free-trade Republicans into protectionists. As a result, the…
Davis Balestracci
I’ve mentioned that design of experiments (DOE) is one of the few things worth salvaging from typical statistical training, and I thought I’d talk a bit more about DOE in the next couple of columns. The needed discipline for a good design is similar when using rapid-cycle plan-do-study-act (PDSA…
Helena Lui
There’s an old saying that “if you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” Every project manager knows that she has to create a realistic project budget before the project begins. This step is not optional because when you’re midway through your project and realize you’ve run out of money, you’re in big…
Kevin Meyer
During the past few years I’ve been working hard on cultivating positive habits. New habits can be powerful. But habits can also create barriers that limit our perspective, which can hinder kaizen, creativity, and even our knowledge of ourselves. We’ve all found ourselves in the proverbial “rut”…
A self-made leader doesn’t make much. I first wrote that statement in my book, Leadership Gold (Thomas Nelson, 2008). Eight years later, I still believe it. After all, I’m not a self-made man; it took a lot of people investing in me to get me where I am today.
You may wonder who helped me. Well,…
Becky Blalock
When asked about the thing most managers dread about their job, the No. 1 response is giving constructive feedback. Yet this is the most important task for any leader.
As someone who came out of college and was leading a team at 22 years old, I wish I’d had some guidance on how to make feedback…
Taran March @ Quality Digest
For those awake enough to respond, please supply the Jeopardy question to this answer: “A computer system that won a million dollars in 2011 with access to 200 million pages of content, including the full text of Wikipedia.”
If you thought, “What is Watson?” you’d be correct as far as the…
Kevin Cundiff
Ask how you can help, always keep a smile, respond to requests promptly... the list goes on. You’ve probably been exposed to an abundance of tips and tricks about how to become more customer-friendly.
That kind of advice can definitely be valuable, but what you likely don’t hear—unless you’re a…
Jesse Lyn Stoner
When applied to people’s intelligence, the theory behind the bell curve says that most people will be average, with a small percent being top performers and a small percent being losers. But when it comes to performance, the truth is the bell curve only exists if you believe it does.
Robert…
Mary Ann Pacelli
In part one of this series, we discussed the importance of providing formal skills training and having open communication. Without further ado, here are two more workforce tips, one about cross-training, and the other about employee engagement.
Implement cross-training initiatives
Cross-training…
Quy Huy
I
t’s no longer a secret that most companies struggle with strategy execution. McKinsey research tells us, for example, that 70 percent of change efforts fall short of desired results. The financial losses implied by statistics like these are massive, and corporate leaders have taken notice.…
