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Very happy to find a word — insights of which I resonate with. Every company wants leaders. Is it possible to look for a particular type of leadership, called “emergent leadership?” This is a form of leadership that ignores formal designations — Senior VP or Executive Sponsor. Where a role on any project was the same as…

I have begun to start looking at “Radical Transparency” almost as a silver bullet for many problems: corruption, fear of authority, economic imbalance. The book WORK RULES by Laszlo Bock touched this subject as it is one of Google’s THREE values. Some excerpts follow. IF YOU BELIEVE PEOPLE ARE GOOD, YOU MUST BE UNAFRAID TO…

Here are my notes on creating better conditions for good management, from Laszlo Bock’s Work Rules, former HR Manager at Google. Status Symbols and Managers Cannot agree more with the author when he suggests eliminating all kinds of status symbols can do a load of good both to the Team and to the Manager herself (eventually).…

Here are my notes on performance management insights from Google, from Laszlo Bock’s Work Rules, former HR Manager at Google. Lisa, a kid from the Simpsons Episode: Look at me! Evaluate and rank me! I’m good, good, good, and oh so smart! Grade me! There’s a little bit of Lisa Simpson in all of us. As…

Here are my notes from Laszlo Bock’s Work Rules, former HR Manager at Google. Expect a lot when you give up command-and-control management. Isn’t that the best reward! Some will argue that mass empowerment leads to anarchy, or to a situation where, since everyone’s opinion is valued, anyone can object and derail an effort. The reality…

Here are my notes on building better learning organizations, from Laszlo Bock’s Work Rules, former HR Manager at Google. Learning Organizations From the moment we are born, human beings are designed to learn. But we rarely think about how to learn most effectively. As a pragmatic matter, you can accelerate the rate of learning in your…

If the Leader’s most important operational responsibility is designing and implementing the communication architecture for her company, one-on-one’s provide an excellent mechanism for information and ideas to flow up the organization and should be part of the communication design. While I have always relied on them to understand my teams, their expectations and needs, and…

Richard Sheridan (Cofounder and CEO, Menlo Innovations) wrote Joy Inc to share insight into practices that worked for his Org. Here he urges leaders to embrace change, create a “being safe” culture and make mistakes faster. Fear is one of the biggest killer of joy. Freedom from fear requires feeling safe. If you feel safe, you…

Richard Sheridan (Cofounder and CEO, Menlo Innovations) wrote Joy Inc to share insight into all XP practices that worked for his Org. Here he shares his views on leadership. A leader is best when people barely know he exists. When his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say we did ourselves.Lao Tzu Leadership…

Many Orgs are experimenting with flexible schedules, part-time work, job sharing, compressed workweeks, sabbaticals, mater/paternity leaves, etc. But this often conflicts with the cultural values of what constitutes “doing good work” and “being a good worker.”  By being constantly connected to work, teams seemed to be reinforcing — and worse, amplifying — the very pressures…