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productivity

Maximize business execution and your personal productivity

April 11, 2010 by StephenLynch with 96 views

How do you achieve business success whilst making quality time for your personal life?  The higher you climb; it seems the greater the sacrifices you need to make.  Many high achievers burn themselves out thinking they have to get everything done.   People are busier these days, but not necessarily more productive.... [read more]

Productivity, Like Building a Thriving Workplace Culture, is a Journey

April 9, 2010 by Mark Harbeke with 221 views

Wally Bock, whom I've cited many times before, has another great post on his Three Star Leadership blog this week.  Questioning the validity of the perennial stock of studies finding that employees waste "several bazillion dollars" each year during time they should be working, he urges business leaders to Just throw away your... [read more]

Motivation and Ways to Wake Up Early

January 29, 2010 by Jim Estill with 841 views

One of my readers sent me the following email in response to my 6 Reasons to Wake up Early article: Feeling the annual winter-lack-of-motivation-I-don't-want-to-get-up blues... Why do I want to get up early? Because by the end of the work day I'm exhausted, and have no interest in doing anything except lying on the couch and... [read more]

Creating Accountability in Cross-Functional Teams

January 20, 2010 by Elizabeth Houck with 919 views

The 4th of the 5 Keys to Successful Cross-functional Team Leadership Over the years, I have brow-beat, begged, babied, and over-rewarded just to get team members to be accountable - the fact of the matter is you can't force accountability. Team members must make themselves accountable, not just to themselves but to the team.  The... [read more]

Everyone’s Favorite Excuse

January 7, 2010 by Brett Duncan with 194 views

The roads are icy in Dallas today. Given that we Texans go a little haywire when the temperature reaches the 30s, let alone when there’s precipitation at that temp, the daily routine isn’t exactly following suit today. Schools have been cancelled. My office isn’t officially opening its doors until 10 a.m. The parking lot is near empty.... [read more]

Small Biz Tech Trends in 2010: Ten Minutes with Ramon Ray

January 3, 2010 by Brent Leary with 169 views

I had to talk to Ramon Ray before the end of this year. That's because I wanted to know what to look out for at the beginning of next year. Ramon, for the very few of you who do not know, is one of the leading voices in small business technology. He's the publisher of SmallBizTechnology.com, and is the co-organizer of one of the best... [read more]

How many hats do you wear? Team Leadership: Roles and Responsibilities

December 23, 2009 by Elizabeth Houck with 960 views

In my first post on cross-functional teams, 5 Keys to Successful Cross-Functional Team Management, I outlined the 5 keys needed for successful cross-functional team management: Goals, Roles, Responsibilities, Accountability, and Reward. My second post addressed the first of those keys: Cross-functional Team Leadership in Startups and... [read more]

Cross-functional Team Leadership in Startups and SME's: The First of 5 Keys - Goal Setting For Success

December 2, 2009 by Elizabeth Houck with 372 views

Goal Setting For Success I could talk about the perils of virtual cross-functional teams; and spout percentages on how most go over schedule, budget, or fail to meet company, customer, and personal expectations. But if goals are not clearly defined, how are the ever to be tracked and met? The first of five keys in this series on cross-... [read more]

5 Keys to Successful Cross-Functional Team Management

November 12, 2009 by Elizabeth Houck with 1,171 views

It's increasingly rare in business today to lead a go-to-market, product-specific development team where all the team members are direct reports. More the norm is that only a percentage of any team member's time is devoted to new product development. Over the next few posts, I will go into greater depth on five key strategies needed to... [read more]

Brain Freeze. How to thaw an overwhelmed mind.

April 2, 2009 by karenpost with 191 views

The past few days I’ve suffered from a less than productive head. I absolutely could not get anything finished or even put a dent in a project. The more I tried, the less I achieved. It was like my brain was at a stop sign and then I ran out of gas. I could not think, create or solve any problems. After a couple hours of useless work,... [read more]

Side Stepping Economies of Scale

March 20, 2008 by Steve King with 154 views

A recent book from Harvard Business Press called 5 Future Strategies You Need to Know Right Now covers five business strategies that the author - a Boston Consulting Group consultant - believes will become important over the next 3-5 years.  One of the strategies is "sidestepping economies of scale".  Key quote on this... [read more]

FREE DOWNLOAD: How Hard Do You Work?

January 28, 2008 by Rick Telberg with 116 views

EXECUTIVE PREVIEW: Managing the Workload (PDF, 12 pages) Download free with registration KEY FINDINGS 1. The problem of overwork is pervasive. 57% of CPAs report “frequent” or “crisis”-like stress issues. It’s bad: 58% of CPAs work 50 or more hours a week. It’s getting worse: 43% are more stressed than a year ago. Busy season is... [read more]

Multiplying your equity – water regularly with management attention

December 27, 2007 by Wayne Wilson with 40 views

Management attention in a business is like water to a garden: it is essential for healthy growth. [1] All areas of your business require regular attention if you are to sustain revenue growth and flourishing profit margins. Owner/CEOs of companies in need of a transition too often focus on the functional areas they know best while... [read more]

Best Work Not in the Office?

December 20, 2007 by Lisa Haneberg with 54 views

I like this article from the New York Times (found it via my Kindle) called, You Won’t Find Me in My Office, I’m Working. Here is a snippet: The term “white space” implies a place set apart, physically and mentally. It is not only used by graphic artists to describe the empty space in a layout, but also by time managers to explain the... [read more]

Inc. Magazine Showcases Six Disciplines Client

November 28, 2007 by Skip Reardon with 30 views

The December 2007 issue of Inc. Magazine includes an article by Scott Westcott on the challenges of performance appraisals, entitled "Putting an End to End-of-Year Reviews."The article highlights two companies and their innovative approaches toward year-end reviews and pay for performance. A Six Disciplines client, TRUFAST Corporation,... [read more]

Bring Finance into the Inner Circle

October 21, 2007 by Jon Paul with 58 views

What’s one way to get more productivity out of your finance department? Make the finance department part of your inner circle. The better they know what’s going on in the different parts of the company, the better job they can do working with the numbers, working with your capital to make sure you have adequate funds, doing the... [read more]

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