QAspire

MARCH 6, 2011

The true test of a leader is when things don’t go as planned. Worst yet, when things fail. In an organizational context, I have seen so many leaders who drive the project/initiative right from the beginning – yet when the project fails, they blame others. The blame senior management, the organization culture, their own team members and sometimes even the customers.

Bottom-up 164

Bottom-up Reputation Project Team 164

QAspire

MARCH 16, 2011

In organizations, I have seen people who are “designated” as leaders. I have seen many such designated leaders, who raised their game to meet the expectations that come along with leadership. They make an effort to learn about leadership, read books, blogs and consciously put those lessons in action. On the other hand, I have also seen designated leaders who create a shield of air around themselves.

Charisma 163

Charisma Leadership Report Blog 163

QAspire

MARCH 9, 2011

We live in times where more and more work is executed by teams that are geographically distributed. Leading a virtual team, fostering collaboration and binding them to common set of objectives is one of the key challenges for business leaders. In most of the troubled projects I have seen, the real challenges were not technical/engineering ones but communication/collaboration ones.

Team 156

Team Project System Engineering 156

QAspire

MARCH 2, 2011

People deliver their best work when they are fully engaged with the purpose of their work. In an organizational setting, people only deliver their best when they are engaged with the purpose, vision and values of the organization they work with. They look at their work as a part of a larger whole – and not just a discrete component. How do we engage our people?

Resources 155

Resources eBook Storytelling CEO 155

QAspire

MARCH 13, 2011

When leaders undertake process improvement/change initiative, they walk on a tight rope. On one hand, they have to improve the processes to deliver positive business outcomes. On the other, they have to ensure that improvement/change initiative does not slow down the current work and bring the overall efficiencies down. Both are crucial and striking the right balance between improvement and business efficiency, between standardization and evolution is a big leadership challenge.

Efficiency 140

Efficiency Process Resistance Training 140

QAspire

MARCH 22, 2011

Last year, Seth Godin showed us a way to become a Linchpin. This year, he urges us to “ Poke the Box ” – to act, to start, to initiate, to experiment, to try (and fail and learn from it) and most importantly to finish and deliver. Poking the box is about taking initiatives, not just waiting for someone to delegate them to us. Seth has packed a lot of punch into this book, so much that the passion and force in his writing almost instigates us to start/act.

Godin 139

Godin Review Delegation Learning-by-Doing 139

QAspire

MARCH 27, 2011

Across the web, I have recently read articles/posts that underline an important thing – technology is taking a toll on our productivity and is keeping us from doing work that really matters – that is, if we allow. I have seen both sides of the coin. I often get into a state when my work seemed to be just flowing and I never realized that I was doing the “work”.

Competitive Advantage 135

Competitive Advantage Godin Bottom-up Advertising 135