Posts tagged as:

Weinberg

What is Leadership?

by Steven M. Smith

How do I define leadership?
Leadership is the ability to adapt the setting so everyone feels empowered to contribute creatively to solving the problems.
Leadership is an ability, meaning a leader has a capacity to do something through talent and skill. Talent is natural ability and skill is proficiency gained through training and experience. Talent certainly  helps, [...]

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Trade-off: Go For Quality

by Steven M. Smith

What typically happens when product development decides to create a superior product? The most likely result is 1. slower delivery or 2. costlier development or 3. both slower delivery and costlier development. Why?

You don’t get something for nothing.
Producing a higher quality product takes more development time, which delays delivery to the customer and drives up [...]

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Trade-off: Go For Speed

by Steven M. Smith

The people whose opinion counts the most choose to go for faster delivery speed. Their thinking may be sound; in this case, they want to beat their competitors to market.
Choosing faster product delivery visibly sacrifices product quality and, in my experience, it often invisibly sacrifices the economy of product support. In this post, I answer [...]

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A Riddle about Projects

by Steven M. Smith

All of us have experience with projects.
In my experience, complex project never work exactly as planned.
What is the first thing about a project that must be adapted when things aren’t working as planned?
Answer, the story about the project.
For instance, when a software project is about to miss a milestone, you may hear a story about [...]

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Short-Circuit Chaos?

by Steven M. Smith

Managers who like to be in control have a predictable reaction to their organization grappling with a change which creates chaos — they want it to stop. When? Now, right now.
What happens if management decides to short-circuit chaos with a magical solution? What happens if management accepts chaos as a necessary but uncomfortable period of [...]

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Jerry Weinberg

by Steven M. Smith

www.geraldmweinberg.com
Jerry (Gerald M.) Weinberg, Software Pioneer, restores individuals, improves teamwork, and transforms organizations. His website is the mother ship for consultants, managers, and individuals who seek information about how to improve themselves, their team, and their organization.
I highly recommend reading books written by Jerry. His books are timeless. I [...]

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Safety Check

by Steven M. Smith

You have heard repeatedly that an agenda is a vital ingredient to a successful meeting. But little is ever heard about safety in meetings—the environmental variable that determines whether people participate or merely observe. How do you measure safety? What actions are available to leaders for creating a safe meeting environment?
First published in the Jan [...]

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Coping with a Double Bind

by Steven M. Smith

In my last post , I posed the question, “What coping strategies are better than ambivalence and apathy (in a double bind situation)?”
There is nothing wrong with being ambivalent or apathetic about an environment that constantly puts you in a double bind. These coping strategies are reasonable and always available. My question was intended to [...]

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The Satir Change Model

by Steven M. Smith

Every organization must deal with change. Virginia Satir, a pioneering family therapist, created a change model to help families process change. Her model fits organizations equally well. This article explains Satir’s model and offers insights into how to more effectively manage the change process.

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