I always find it challenging and fruitful to try and describe a tough topic in concise ways. It forces you to prioritize your thoughts, weed out the noise, and reinforce the signal. Here is my first exercise of the year.
Posts Tagged ‘trust’
Leadership (in 50 words or less)
Friday, January 4th, 2013Agile HR
Monday, November 19th, 2012Here is a stark view of old-fashioned, waterfall HR practice and modern, agile HR practices. I used the words waterfall and agile purposefully because a software savvy audience should see the parallels of moving from big-bang integration to continuous delivery of coaching and performance feedback.
2012 Election prediction
Tuesday, November 6th, 2012I am a political junkie. It is the one sport I follow closely. Privately, among my virtual Facebook friends, as well as my real friends and family, I have been making an election prediction for months. My forecast is that Governor Romney will win and by a pretty healthy margin. A forecast isn’t worth much unless you stand behind it. So posting this blog is my way of putting my forecast on the record.
The Final Debate
Tuesday, October 23rd, 2012Last night’s final debate was a back-breaker. Predictably, supporters of both parties are saying their guy won. If you ignore the content specifics and just examine the communication styles, it is very clear to me that there was a big winner, and he will win the election. Here is what I saw.
Persuasion
Friday, October 19th, 2012Persuasive communications are communications whose specific purpose is to gain agreement on something. The 2012 US election is certainly a great laboratory for observing how politicians approach persuasion in requesting your vote. Here are some other examples of communication situations where persuasion is the crux. (more…)
Selling Is Not About Winning
Tuesday, June 26th, 2012Dysfunctional selling practices are rampant throughout the world today, especially where people are selling stuff with intangible, or difficult to quantify, value.
One on one trust
Tuesday, June 19th, 2012When people define trust, they usually relate it to integrity. However, the more complete meaning of trust gets lost. (more…)
Distrust translates into overhead
Thursday, June 14th, 2012Trust is the recurring theme for successful selling, successful communicating and efficient organizations. This topic is well covered in Stephen M. R. Covey’s classic, The Speed of Trust. His essential point is that trust speeds up everything and reduces the cost of everything. Conversely, distrust slows things down and increases the cost of everything. If you look at your life, you will see that these assertions hold up well. In cases where you detest some process that wastes your time, you can usually find distrust as the root cause of your dissatisfaction. (more…)
Seven attributes of a high-trust environment
Tuesday, June 12th, 2012Over the course of the last 20 years, we have seen many organizations strive to build a high-trust environment. We know this is one of the critical assets that attracts and retains great people. But, what exactly is a high-trust environment? Here is a short description that we compiled back in the 90s as we educated the field management team at Rational Software Corporation. This is the most memorable and meaningful description that I have encountered. (more…)
Trusted advisors
Sunday, April 29th, 2012One of the objectives in many endeavors, including personal friendships and business relationships, is to become a trusted adviser. Whether your company is a trusted advisor to your client, or you are a trusted advisor to another person, this is a powerful label. What does it really mean? Here is my version (derived from the words of David Maister) of the characteristics of a trusted advisor: (more…)
