As a manager, Angela advocated that “it’s easier to ask forgiveness than to get permission.” Her team loved the mindset of acting first instead of working through a bureaucracy to get approval to move. Effective business leaders find ways to move through or around risks that might stop others. But that penchant to act shouldn’t exclude consulting God for his ...
In the competitive work world, maybe it’s inevitable that workers are always monitoring colleagues to see who is moving up the ladder faster than they are. I can recall many times when I was disappointed to see a colleague advance when I felt my career was stalled. Yet, with hindsight, I saw how I was still growing in experiences and ...
In its annual State of the Global Workplace, Gallup reported the global percentage of engaged employees fell from 23% to 21% in 2024, nearing the recent low levels of engagement experienced during the pandemic. Digging deeper, the data revealed that manager engagement drove the decline, falling three points from the prior year. Engagement of managers under age 35 fell by ...
A Harvard Business Review article entitled, “How Salespeople Game the System” provided some wisdom on developing incentive and compensation programs for salespeople. Although incentive compensation plans can bear a lot of fruit, these researchers concluded that salespeople will try to find ways to game the system to increase their compensation. These researchers discovered eight common schemes that salespeople use to ...
It was my first day starting work for a national CPA firm. I was anxious and excited for my post-college journey. That first morning, we had a massive snowstorm, and I had never driven in rush hour traffic. I arrived two hours late. The audit team I was assigned to had already left. In addition, as the day progressed, I ...
Years ago, Michael Gerber wrote a popular book called E-Myth. The primary premise behind the book is that many entrepreneurs work hard at their craft, but they’re not always adept at developing systems and processes. This results in many entrepreneurs working harder, but not smarter. Which is often why franchises succeed more frequently than independent businesses. Franchises provide entrepreneurs ...
As a young employee in my first corporate job, I quickly learned that executives were powerful people to be feared and followed. One executive in particular, a former Navy officer, commanded authority. He knew his stuff and expected respect. But that image completely fell away when I walked into a classroom one evening to take a class on boating safety. ...
Equipping Others to Do Work Differently
