Ever notice that most job descriptions list about 10 things that are known that the person will be required to do and then some line that says “projects as needed”. That’s the catch-all line because what we get hired for isn’t everything we do; in fact, the functional job someone is hired for is only [...]
Tag Archives | Culture
The Argument for Fighting
Ever have the flu but still have to go to the office? A functional culture is like that. It’s sufferable and not deadly; so, we plod on. A bad culture is one we run from; we can see or feel that something is missing either in direction, values, protocols or results. But functional cultures are ones [...]
Superheroes R Us
You have all the power you need for the task you have ahead of you! This talk takes you down the streets of Gotham in the batmobile exploring the stuff that made the dreams of Batman and Superman. Far-fetched? Not really. It is ideas that shape our journeys. And being brave enough to speak out [...]
Apple’s Startup Culture
At the recent All Things D conference, Steve Jobs described Apple’s (AAPL) culture as “that of a startup.” Why? Is it because he is nostalgic, yearning to rebuild the company he founded nearly 35 years ago? Is he reflecting a passion for the innovation and entrepreneurship so often inherent in startups? Or is he saying [...]
3 Ways: Know You’re A Start-Up
Culture has to be one of the most popular topics, yet analytically hard to quantify. It thus gets relegated to the “soft stuff” because there is little evidence-based research supporting how to create a viable culture, what a good culture is, etc. And perhaps a high-performance culture is a little like the often quote about [...]
Google as Your Culture?
Here in the valley, there’s a weird awe of Google. It reminds me of the awe that Apple once had when I was there — as a place where the best and brightest go to work. I’ve heard that Intel had that cachet before Apple and some people are now suggesting that Twitter is the [...]
Ingredients of Workplace Happiness
Inspired by reading the Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin, I asked a series of questions on Friday about workplace happiness. I used happiness as a shortcut word for a place where people can be fully alive and thrive. Too many organizations still do strategy in the corner offices and innovation in a specific department as [...]
The Missing Strategic Ingredient
Part of the difficulty in strategy creation is the temptation to direct rather than ask open-ended questions. When the C-suite sends a directive telling people to head in a certain direction, thinking isn’t involved. Teams start to align against that order and move to execute it. Middle-management becomes the scapegoat for failure to execute the [...]
Standing Apart: How a Blender Creates Affinity
The central goal of online marketing isn’t awareness, it’s engagement. And the five key tools to produce engagement are affinity, personality, community, co-creation, and advocacy. Engagement at the broadest level is getting the customer involved with your company, with your products and often, with your people. You want your customers to get to know your organization, its values and services. When customers like what they see and experience, the relationship deepens and it leads to affinity. Thus what was once a distant relationship becomes personal. Another way to same thing perhaps is to say that “Personality replaces traditional brand marketing”