Responding to a previous post, a venture capitalist friend asks:I’m curious about the group you worked with. How many people? How closely do they work together? How well did you know them before? How many levels of management were involved? Were…
Monthly Archives: June 2008
Corporate Turnaround – Day 8 – Habits
The weaknesses of a small business are the weaknesses of the owner. Where the owner has a blind spot, problems accumulate. What the owner avoids, gets worse.My client is struggling to deal with some flaws – he gets lost in details easily, doesn’t pri…
Getting More Results
Following up on a prior post, a medical clinic owner is continuing to get great performance improvements by focusing on some basic activities. This chart shows patient counts at the clinic, from a crisis point onwards. The initial jump was expected – …
Corporate Turnaround – Day 1
Today we took the management team through a half-day workshop that takes the team through several psychological stages to prepare them for embracing significant change. The effects of the steps are:Increased willingness to take risksIncreased respect f…
The Problem with Big Ideas
This past Friday I listened to my state’s top education official talk about the education bureaucracy’s Next Big Idea. This one is to raise the requirements a student must meet to graduate with a high school diploma in Oregon.High standards are a good…
Landing a Sale with a Sample Procedure
I was recently hired because of a sample procedure. I was talking with a prospect about some of his issues, and suggested he would benefit from clearer documentation of how his people should perform key tasks. “Does your process for handling customer …
Steps towards a Turnaround
I’m deep in the run-up to a corporate turnaround effort. Some truisms that have flashed into my awareness these past few days include:It’s all about the top management – really good senior managers who can execute, who can get their teams to execute, …
Coaching and Mentoring
[Revised 6/5/08]As we see more people calling themselves “coaches” and offering their potentially nebulous services to the fully employed – and by “coaches” I must include those folks that a business associate refers to as “housewives with a certificat…
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