For some, life feels like an endless journey of excitement and accomplishment. They move from success to success, opportunity to opportunity, revelling in their ability to show up, face the challenges of the day and successfully apply their skills and talents. For others, life feels like an endless tunnel of dread and anxiety. The move…
Continue reading »

When I became a manager, I was incredibly naïve about what it meant ‘to manage’. I micro-managed everything. I had no sense of how to spend my time. I rushed from one task to another without any attempt to think about what I should be doing and ultimately, I failed in my new role. Not…
Continue reading »

The topic of facilitation is continuing to preoccupy us (and this webinar series). Mark’s final comment last month was that “success in facilitiating is abstract.” There is no way to directly measure it, except by whether or not you helped guide the group to where it needed to go. And a great question we didn’t…
Continue reading »

There are few greater challenges than facilitating a meeting well. There is process behind it, and there are guidelines. There are strategies you can employ in some situations, and yet those self same strategies will fail you utterly in others. And there is very little guidance around which situation will succeed, and which will epically…
Continue reading »

Managers must learn to delegate. If the mandate of a manager is to manage the activities of others, then the ability to delegate effectively is a necessary, even mandatory, skillset. To that end, we’ve glommed onto an effective methodology known as SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Reasonable and Time-bound). We learn to use it, once we…
Continue reading »

We talk about organizational culture a lot. We recognize that there are ways of working that are unique to individual organizations. That we need to learn those ways, and to understand “how things are done here.” We learn—sometimes the hard way—that we need to respect culture as we manage change. But what, exactly, is culture?…
Continue reading »

Ask virtually anyone in the field of project management about the role of project sponsor, and they’ll tell you the role is vital to project success. Ask them what that role actually does, however, and you’ll get an astonishing array of answers. Ask them for great examples of project sponsorship and—sadly—you’ll like come up empty-handed….
Continue reading »

As we become better at managing people, and especially when managing change, a question arises: Are we manipulating people? A simple, honest and immediate answer is “Yes! Management is about manipulating people to get the results we want.” If that answer raises hairs on the back of your neck, it’s because ‘being manipulated’ carries with…
Continue reading »

For those that have in any way spent time with me, they know that my favourite answer to most questions is, “It depends.” Particularly if you’ve seen my speak, attended a workshop or have experienced me in consulting mode, you’ll have quickly realized that I utter that phrase more than any other. What that quickly…
Continue reading »

This is our sixth annual ‘Book Review’ webinar as we begin the year. Peter and Mark are both presenting. As before, we will take a read on the year that has passed, discussing the best business books we have each read this year. These may live between the covers of our normal themes of project…
Continue reading »