Skip to content

{ Tag Archives } Organization

Richard Feynman On The Folly Of Crafting Precise Definitions

I’ve often struggled with the notion of definitions when working in organizations. On the one hand, too many of us hide our ignorance and uncertainty behind a wall of jargon and terminology. Terms fall in and out of favor and their relationship to the underlying real world is often less important than their value from a [...]

Also tagged

Truth in humor – xkcd on the Chain of Command

I continue to be impressed by the insight and subtlety of the folks who put together xkcd. If you fancy yourself an organizational designer or believe that you are at the top of a food chain, you might want to consider this cartoon:

Also tagged

Euan Semple on nurturing a knowledge ecology

This gem from Euan Semple made the rounds earlier this summer. I was too busy then to do more than note it. Ten ways to create a knowledge ecology TUESDAY, JUNE 28, 2011 AT 7:08AM A tweet yesterday prompted me to remember sage advice from Dave Snowden which I took to heart in my work with social [...]

Also tagged

Focusing on mission – why asking why is where to start

Morry Fiddler is a friend and one of my personal trusted advisors. During one of our recent breakfasts, he recommended the following TED talk by Simon Sinek on how leaders inspire action.   Since then, I’ve found myself weaving Sinek’s thinking into my own work and recommending it to others. I also made a point [...]

Also tagged

One deeply informed view of IT as a transformational tool

Blind Spot: A Leader’s Guide To IT-Enabled Business Transformation, Feld, Charlie In the 1980s a handful of organizations established that the right combination of strategic and technology insights and execution could lead to results worth the attention of CEOs and Boards of Directors. One of those successes was a major transformation in the sales and [...]

Also tagged ,

What evolutionary biology has to tell us about organizational behavior

Driven: How Human Nature Shapes Our Choices, Lawrence, Paul R. and Nitin Nohria What happens when you combine what we are learning about evolutionary biology with what we have learned about how organizations work? One of the wellsprings of thinking about organization and organization design has been the Organizational Behavior group at the Harvard Business [...]

Also tagged

Gary Hamel and innovations in management

The Future of Management, Hamel, Gary   Gary Hamel has been an astute observer of organizations and management for several decades now. For all the reasons that seemed to make sense at the time, this book sat on my shelf for a while before I got to it. Based on the current state of the [...]

Also tagged ,