For nearly two decades, management gurus have been heralding the death of the “command and control” mentality in Corporate America. Personally, I think it’s very much alive. Over a year ago, I wrote that the so-called “death” of command and control management is nothing but an urban legend. Now, a recent article on the Forbes.com…
Management
Don’t Kill Productive Meetings by Dragging Them Out
My friend Sally works for a company that holds monthly small-group “open forum” type meetings for cross-sections of various company departments. The purpose of these meetings is to promote cross-departmental communication. Each month, leaders from different functions in the company moderate the discussion. In general, Sally enjoys the meetings, except for one aspect: they are…
Book Review: Leadership Caffeine
I’ll be right up front on this book review: I know the author. Art Petty and I are professionally acquainted; we’re fellow leadership bloggers and our paths sometime cross on consulting projects. I’m a huge fan of Art’s writing about leadership—he’s extremely pragmatic, yet self-effacing. You won’t find bombastic pontificating on his blog. What you…
3 Keys to Keeping a Virtual Open Door Policy
Recently I wrote a post about what happens to employees’ brains when they cross the threshold of their workplace door. In a happy coincidence, at about the same time, I was connected to Kyle Lagunas, who wrote an excellent post on his blog about doors and workplaces: how to maintain an “open door policy” when…
What Do Office Doorways Say About Leadership?
What do your organization’s workplace doorways signal to employees? Whether it’s the front door, the employee entrance, or the boss’s cubicle doorway, have you ever considered what happens in employees’ minds when they pass over their work threshold? As a leader, you probably haven’t given it much thought, but consider this recently reported brain research*…