More than once I have stood at the very edge of a precipice before a grand vista, and each time has given me an unforgettable experience. The Grand Canyon, Yosemite’s Half Dome and the top of the Eiffel Tower can all thrill me like nothing else. Or they can terrify me, setting my knees aquiver, [...]
Tag Archives | Personal
Defying Categorization
People often ask me the question, should I do have two twitter addresses — one for business, one for personal? And authors I know that are experts on innovation then want to write two different books: one for women giving themselves permission, and the other on innovation models. We keep these elements separate — [...]
Is My Work Important?
I’ve been helping someone. And helping. And helping. And now I seriously want to stop. You might think, Nilofer, girlfriend — this is easy: Say NO to the next request, and be done. But, you see, I’m in conflict. I like seeing myself as a generous, helpful, and kind person. There have been times [...]
Fearless Learning
By Nilofer Merchant on February 14, 2011 in Culture & Leadership, Entrepreneurship, The Personal Story
To learn, we must be willing to not yet know. And that means we need to stop silently criticizing ourselves and others for not already knowing the answer. When we think we “should” already know, then we spend energy eliminating seemingly conflicting data, information, opinions and stories. Only to never see what we need to [...]
Cherish The Toughie
“My start-up is creating a new market.” “The new market project is taking tons of cycles to get off the ground.” “I’ve gotta get a new job; my boss is psycho!” “My daughter just turned 13 — the teenage years!” Any of these sentences could be seen as a problem. Or they could be [...]
Living the Dream
An entrepreneur & CEO wrote me an email around the holidays that sounded just a bit desperate; enough for me to take time out of family time over the holidays to take a meeting. It took her nearly an hour to unveil her dilemma, slowly revealing what she no longer wanted and then, finally, sharing [...]
Never Gender, Rank, Title
My son is reading Harry Potter and is literally devouring it. Soon, I’m thinking, he’ll reach Book 4, which poses a little problem. Not to be a spoiler or anything in case you haven’t read it, bad things happen to good people in Book 4. So as a parent, I’m thinking about what to do [...]
Duality
Life is quite often about dualities. And the role of leaders is especially so. Do I pay attention to executing today’s strategy or envisioning the future? In the consulting world, do I focus my priorities on selling or delivering? With expenses, do I prioritize product investment over sales/marketing investment? And when it comes to leadership, [...]
The Critic Must Die
When product lines fail, product managers feel responsible. When children steal, parents often feel like they haven’t taught ethics and self-control well. When a business team doesn’t want to work together, isn’t the leader to blame? The line from GI Jane: “Remember, there are no bad teams, only bad leaders” reinforces this point. And as [...]
Difficulty is a Great Teacher
What I thought was torture when I worked at Apple – working with 23 different managers in seven years – I now see as an experience that refined by ability to work with many different kinds of leaders. It was a training ground that has paid big dividends – though I couldn’t see it that [...]