Interview #5 – Matthias Mölleney – How to increase trust and collaboration in leadership teams

Matthias Mölleney is a highly experienced HR professional and author of “Beyond Leadership”. Before founding is own company, PeopleXpert, Matthias held senior HR positions in Lufthansa, Swissair, Centerpulse and Unaxis. [...]

Interview #4 – Curt Blattner – A novel approach to achieve sustainable team performance

Curt Blattner is a former Nestlé exectutive and author of the book “The HEARTBEAT of EXCELLENCE – The Design of Changing Sustainably, the Swiss Way” In this interview you will [...]

Is now the time to stop planning?

“We can’t plan right now. Things are too uncertain.” If this is what you think right now, think again. But before you do, have a look at this 2-minute video [...]

How to conduct a remote strategy session

Normally we do our strategy workshop as highly interactive sessions with all participants in one room. For the workshops and training we had planed next week, we needed to find [...]

Interview #3 – The human side of business – Insights from an entrepreneur in Vietnam

Mastering the human side of business – In this interview with Thomas Himmelrich, my entrepreneurial sparring partner based in Vietnam, you will hear things that are also relevant for entrepreneurs [...]

Recognising Good and Bad Strategies – Part 5

Coherent action is the third and maybe most important element of a good strategy. Unfortunately, many leadership teams, when then engage in a strategy process, call the strategic objectives [...]

Interview #2 – Giuseppe Conti – How to transition from corporate to independent

In this interview with Giuseppe Conti, founder and managing partner of Conti Advanced Business Learning (CABL).Giuseppe has successfully managed to transition from corporate to entrepreneur. In this video you will [...]

Interview #1 – Alain Depuydt – How to grow a business in a shrinking industry

This interview is first in a series of conversations we plan to have with business builders. The purpose of these interviews is to learn from successful entrepreneurs about their experiences [...]

Recognising Good and Bad Strategies – Part 4

The second element of a good strategy: The Guiding Policy This is the fourth article on our five-part series on Richard Rumelt’s book “Good Strategy/Bad Strategy” –> Hier clicken für [...]

Recognising Good and Bad Strategies – Part 3

The first element of a good strategy: The Diagnosis This is the third article on our five part series on Richard Rumel’s book “Good Strategy/Bad Strategy” –> Hier clicken für [...]

Recognising Good and Bad Strategies – Part 2

A bad strategy is not simply the absence of a good strategy, but rather a result of misconceptions and management deficits. The four characteristics of bad strategies are (1) Fluff [...]

Recognising Good and Bad Strategies – Part 1

A good strategy contains at least three elements: 1) diagnosis, 2) guiding policy and 3) coherent action. This is this the KERNEL of a good strategy. Just formulating revenue, profit [...]

Networking across countries

In this post written by Janet Shaner, you learn how to adapt your network for the country where you live / work Certain vs. uncertain business environments Did you know [...]

A Saturday morning habit that helps me be less stupid

Story I recently started a new habit. Every Saturday, I go for a 90-minute walk. The trigger to this was reading a book that a friend recommended to me:  “The Road [...]

Downwards disloyalty: An insidious threat

Collaboration is the glue that every team or organisation employs to achieve sustainable high performance. Collaboration exists in many forms and guises, some of which are stronger and more effective [...]

Public reprimanding is not a valid leadership tool

Human error and poor judgement are commonplace in business. When someone makes a mistake, it is often tempting to admonish them on the spot. Doing so can give a manager [...]

“Men are not disturbed by things, but by their view of things” (Epictetus)

One could also say that people are not disturbed by things, but that they disturb themselves by holding rigid and extreme beliefs about things. Psychologist Albert Ellis said that rigid [...]

Caught in a monkey trap?

Apparently, people in India use a simple trick to capture monkeys. The trapper fastens a piece of cord to a tree. On the other end he attaches a coconut. The [...]

Why do so many leaders fail to delegate effectively

Video:  In this video, I look into the question Why so many people who want to delegate fail to do so effectively? Before I answer this question, let’s look at [...]

Team Contract – Building the foundations for constructive interaction

As coaches, we have a suitcase full of tools and are constantly developing new ones. However, if we were to talk about minimalism in team coaching, I’m convinced that one [...]

Intuition and decision making

  Use your intuition for better decisions in uncertain situations Have you recently had to make a big decision such as taking a new job, hiring a new employee, starting or [...]

Make sure your conversations pay off with “Value-COIN”

You might already be familiar with the COIN acronym, which provides an easy-to-remember, four-step process to plan and structure constructive feedback conversations: CONNECTION – OBSERVATION – IMPACT – NEXT STEPS [...]

Managing in Meltdown

Multiple challenges arising at the same time can threaten the very existence of a start-up. Here are some tips for surviving a meltdown. For new organisations, survival is the first prerequisite [...]

Why Koalas are stupid and trees don’t need a brain

“Use your brain”, said one of the workshop participants when I asked about the kind of behaviour they would like to see in their company. “What do you mean?” I [...]

Choices and Decisions – Don’t confuse the two

October is a great time to review your choices and decision. But don’t confuse the two, because the two words mean different things. “We are our Choices”  – Jean Paul Sartre [...]

Wondering what to do next

  STORY I wrote this memo after a great family vacation, travelling down the North-West Coast of the US, and managed to completely disconnect. But back home, I found myself [...]