Weekly Download 15.4
Posted: March 5, 2015 Filed under: Leadership, Weekly Download | Tags: 80/20 Rule, emotional intelligence, Joseph Juran, Pareto Principle, Vilfredo Pareto 1 Comment
Here’s a recap of news and notes from around the Web that caught my attention over the past week or so.
How the 80/20 Rule Helps Us be More Effective. I always thought full credit for the concept of the 80/20 Rule (a.k.a. the Pareto Principle) was due to economist Vilfredo Pareto. Clearly, attribution must also be given to Joseph Juran, one of the key thought leaders in the Quality movement. “The vital few and trivial many” is a common way Juran referenced this principle.
How We Trick our Brains into Feeling Productive delves into the many ways we attempt to rationalize our decisions and actions. “Structured procrastination” is what my prioritized task list is all about. Forcing myself to do the most important item is the intent, but sometimes I substitute something that is further down the list. Now I know why.
The headline Signs That You Lack Emotional Intelligence is sure an attention-grabber. This topic has been around since the 1980s, but was popularized by Goleman’s book of this title in 1995. One section in the article that resonated with describes gaps that occur in the communications process between “Intent” (what the speaker means) and “Impact” (what the receiver hears). Here are a few examples:
What you say: “At the end of the day, it’s all about getting the work done.”
What others hear: “All I care about is the results and if some are offended along the way, so be it.”
What you say: “If I can understand it, anyone can.”
What others hear: “You’re not smart enough to get this.”
What you say: “I don’t see what the big deal is.”
What others hear: “I don’t really care how you feel.”
Recently I have been in conversations where I felt a very different impact than what I believe the speaker intended. Later, I mentally replayed the conversations to see if I could discover what was going on and why I felt that way. Now I have an explanation and can be mindful of this gap in the future. What are gaps are you creating?
Mobile is Simply More
Posted: February 20, 2015 Filed under: Technology | Tags: Microsoft Lync, text-to-voice Leave a commentIt is easy to fall into the pattern of thinking that our mobile devices are interchangeable with other electronics. But is your iPhone really the same as your PC or MacBook Pro or even your iPad? Just yesterday, a co-worker mentioned that they had purchased laptops for their for grandchildren for Christmas. When visiting after the holiday, the grandchildren brought the laptops to show their proud grandparents they were using them. In a subsequent visit, the laptops weren’t to be found. Why? Their mobile phones could do it all. Our world is becoming mobile first.
In another conversation, this question came up: What would you give up first—your television (and cable) or your mobile device? Most people present said television. Those who said mobile device often had to think long and hard before answering.
Other than the obvious reasons of convenience and form factor, what else contributes to these devices being so indispensable? One answer is that there are combinations of features that just don’t exist on other platforms. First there are attributes of the device itself:
- All-in-one functionality. Calendar, notes, camera, recorder, weather, contacts, maps, music player, web access, etc.—it’s all there.
- Easy to use, maintain and support. The App Store makes it a breeze to obtain new tools or content.
Most importantly, these features are combined into applications in new and unique ways. The user experience is unlike that you can get on any other platform. Here’s a recent example.
I was away from the office and forgot that I should have approved time and expense reports before heading out. Using the Microsoft Lync application on my phone, I was able to see that a colleague, Tom, was online and available. Using the voice-to-text function, I asked him to approve the expenses for me. Tom did so and then reminded me that I would still need to approve his. Darn, now what? Well, I saw that our controller was online, so I messaged him asking if he could approve Tom’s reports. Poof! In less than a minute, I no longer had to worry about the negative impact of my forgetfulness.
This combination of mobility, convenience, integration of corporate tools and the text-to-voice feature (not available on the desktop version of Lync) was and is a winner. Clearly, a good mobile platform is so much more than a replacement for something else.
Weekly Download 15.3
Posted: February 18, 2015 Filed under: Weekly Download | Tags: cynicism, HCL Technologies, Morning Star, net neutrality, optimism 1 CommentHere’s a recap of news and notes from around the Web that caught my attention over the past week or so.
Explaining Net Neutrality to My Dad. Revisiting this important concept to remember why it matters.
Seven Habits of Optimistic People. Optimism can be mastered like any other habit, yielding significant improvements in quality of life.
Some Thoughts on Hope, Cynicism, and the Stories We Tell Ourselves. This story resonated from the beginning. It went down a slightly different path than expected but then came back together. I feel that I’ve been overly cynical lately and focusing too much on dysfunction. Having read this article, I will take the suggestion to better balance critical thinking with hope. In a nutshell:
“Critical thinking without hope is cynicism. Hope without critical thinking is naïveté.”
I have heard stories of the reinvention of India’s HCL Technologies. Here is the CEO telling the story. Consider the Value Zone, where “Value is created at the interface of our employees and our clients.” If this is true, what is the business of management?
Morning Star throws out the traditional org chart with its structure that has replaced manager-management with peer- and self-management. See The End of Bureaucracy: When Nobody (and Everybody) is the Boss.
ZMAB15 