We're a finalist in the SA Blog Awards for a second year in a row. We're chuffed as we've been nominated in the Best Business Blogand Best Group Blog. To those who nominated us, thanks. To those who might be tempted to vote for us ... mosey on over to the blog awards widget on the right of this page, click and enter your vote for us (and other amazing local blogs). Voting closes on 1st April 2009.
Someone sent me this funny anecdote about the consequences of assuming the person you're communicating with understands what you mean ... Employee; "Yello Bakery, how I can help you?" Customer; "I would like to order a cake for Friday." Employee; "What you want on cake?" Customer; "Best wishes Suzanne." and underneath that, "We will miss you." The result ...
Dave is having some trouble with editors of the HBR who want him to "dumb" down the content of his next article for their more"astute" business readers. This is how he likens the process: "In both cases it's rather like a conclave of dinosaurs sitting down in the wreckage of their world post impact, demanding more simple articles on dental hygiene to cope with the fur of these strange new things, the early mammals. Or if you want another illustration, playing that old familiar fiddle while [...]
You might have seen that the slogan we have up on our website is this: "The common ground between complex problems and simple solutions." In explaining what this means we often refer to the use of an efficiency rudder used to improve the turning circle of ships (read about it here). In a similar light, I've discovered the story of John Snow as an example of how a simple solution can solve a complex problem ... In 1854, cholera broke out in [...]
TGIF is an informal gathering of like-minded people who meets every Friday to discuss interesting topics. The invitation they sent out this week really got me thinking. Here it is (emphasis added)... Is it possible to "hold" values without owning them? Ask 10 people in the street whether they think honesty (for example) is a great value, and 9.5 of them will say yes. Ask the same 10 people whether they are always honest, and there will be fewer affirmations - [...]
I came across this little story in a book byMax Lucado. I thought it was quite applicable to the way many people approach business ... Let's imagine that you want to learn to dance. Being the rational, cerebral person you are, you go to a bookstore and buy a book on dancing. You take the book home and get to work. Finally, you think you’ve got it, and you invite your wife to come in and watch. You hold the [...]
After way too long, we are now finally launching a newsletter this month. At this stage it will be a quarterly edition that advertisesprojects and events, promotes new product lines and points torecent blog posts you should read. You can start subscribing by giving us your email address in the Newsletter block on the right menu bar, but we'd also like your suggestions on what to call the newsletter. At this stage we're looking at calling it "Dialogue". What say you?
This post is an extension of the thinking in yesterday's post on theevangelism of mine safety (read it here). It strikes me that, in South Africa especially, we have managed toexternalise the role of safety. If we had to deconstruct whatquality work, or mining, is we would find that operating safely is a core component of that work. In recognizing this, and the critical nature of safety, we have successfully extracted safety from quality work, and put it on a pedestal [...]
We attended an interesting public workshop on Mine Health and Safety today. One of the speakers said the following: Zero harm should be a value, not a slogan. This made me wonder, how many supposed "values" are nothing more than slogans? ... We often find that people (especially leaders) pay lip service to the latest hot topic by coming up with a catchy phrase, but there's no real substance or commitment behind it. A case in point is the seemingly [...]
In our recent research collaboration with Deloitte into the state of mine safety (available here) we exposed a metaphor that was prevalent in the industry: that of policing. That is, almost the entire industry is being governed by the dynamics associated with policing behaviour, risk, attitudes and impact. While attending a seminar today, where we presented the results of our recent study, Sonja and I uncovered another prevalent metaphor: that of religious evangelism. We noticed how almost every presentation or comment was [...]
