We don’t know who to trust anymore! Many political and some business leaders keep letting us down. In fact, they deliberately manipulate circumstances (tenders, the system, etc.) to suit their own selfish desires. Money that should have been directed to infrastructure development and other worthy projects that uplift communities is diverted into the pockets of…
In the movie, Office Space – a comedy about work life in a typical 1990’s software company – the protagonist, Peter Gibbons, has eight different bosses. All of them, seemingly unaware of each other, make requests of his energy and time as they pass his desk. While the movie is most certainly a satire,…
The Information Technology project team seemed to be upbeat, certainly if one analysed the tenor of their weekly project reports mailed to everyone in the company. Their “Win of the Week” e-mail was a status update of progress being made with the intended implementation of a new IT platform for the company – a much-needed…
“Nothing kills ‘one team one goal’ thinking like silos” (John G Miller, author of QBQ: The Question Behind the Question) A CEO of a large business recently shared some of his frustrations with me – he complained that he needed to mediate conflict frequently between his senior managers and asked: “Why do people responsible for…
Emotional expression is part of being human – emotions need to be communicated, shared and debriefed whether they are positive or negative in their origin. All emotions need resolution – joyous news needs to be celebrated together with others; sadness needs empathy and closeness within meaningful relationships. The work environment is no exception as it,…
I was told by my parents never to point my finger, particularly not at people. Pointing out a passing ship or a whale frolicking offshore was fine, but finger-pointing for me was limited to natural wonders and animals. As I have grown older, I have understood the wisdom exhibited by my parents as I have…
The expression ‘in the same boat’ is typically construed as a negative idiom – “you say that you have run out of money – well, I am in the same boat”, meaning that I have run out of money too. It implies that you find yourself in a similar situation or in the same position…
I love photography and particularly as it relates to three important concepts – perspective, point of view and opinion. Imagine standing on a road lined by trees on either side. You will notice, as you look at the horizon, that the road and the trees appear to get smaller and smaller the further away they…
From time to time, on account of market or other global business requirements and in order to achieve internal production and financial efficiencies, businesses implement strategic large-scale change initiatives for growth and sustainability. I currently have the privilege of consulting for a large multi-national company who is undergoing such a change. The company, in a…
Much has been documented with respect to team success or failure. High-performance teams, upon evaluation of performance characteristics, seem to have that “special something” that drives their achievements. Their reputation grows and every success seems to inspire further greatness. They “win” nine times out of ten and use any failure as a springboard to learn,…
For the most part, anger is a part of everyone’s lives. Handled positively, anger can act as a “red flag”, as a warning that something is wrong or as a catalyst for change. Not dealing with anger, however, gives rise to health and relational problems and results in hurt people – negatively impacting yourself and…
I sometimes get mildly irritated, no, maybe seriously aggravated, by the following: mobile phone conversations held at full volume on public transport; 20km/h speed limits outside junior schools still applying at midnight, sometimes with a speed camera to enforce it; public toilets that don’t have toilet paper or people that don’t flush public toilets; clothes…
