There are 200 bad drawings inside every comic book artist. Just as there are an estimated 1,000 bad words/turns of phrase inside of every writer. And there are a certain number of below quality (or poor quality) teaching or training experiences inside of every teacher and trainer. There are 1,500 Read more…
Organizational inertia is exacerbated when leaders succumb to the strong forces of temptations. Temptations for organizational leaders include (but are not limited to) maintaining the status quo, keeping the bureaucracy in place, and making sure that the can gets kicked far enough down the road that any consequences from that Read more…
The thing that’s on offer—the thing that’s being negotiated—is rarely the thing that we are fighting over. Our conflicts rarely get close to the core truth of the issues needing to be resolved, which is why management of a recurring conflict situation is a better posture toward conflict than one Read more…
Human beings built many (if not all) of the systems we are surrounded by every day. Flawed, replaceable, myopic, visionary, human beings. Language systems. Monetary systems. Housing systems. Legal systems. Travel systems. Resource allocation systems. Organizational systems. Cultural systems. Religious systems. There’s nothing inherent in our DNA that drives us Read more…
Value is a loaded term. What do you value? Why do you value it? What does the person next to you value? Why do they value what they value? When we aren’t curious about the answers to those questions, we stymie (and in some cases, block totally) our efforts to Read more…
When faced with a project there are three places to thrash: Early—before the project begins. Middle—as the project is proceeding. Late—as the project ends. When you (or your team) thrashes early, brainstorming becomes a way to develop new ideas. Speed and immediacy become the primary goals of early thrashing: Speed Read more…
When someone asks you for validation about their approach to managing a conflict, what they are really asking for is reassurance that they are doing the right thing. But since validation can only come from gatekeepers, and since gatekeepers have significantly less power in the world now than they ever Read more…
Playing poker with another party who holds the keys to nuclear weapons (literal, metaphorical, or figurative), and has given indications based on experience that they will be willing to deploy them, is a dangerous game. The stakes are high, but not for the obvious reasons of total physical, emotional, spiritual, Read more…
It’s hard to place a dollar value on human-to-human interactions in the current (and growing) connection economy, because connection is about engaging in acts of caring. And whoever put a dollar value on acts of caring? But here are a few challenge questions if that’s your attitude: Whoever put a Read more…
Most negotiations don’t happen because many people lack the curiosity to ask for what else might be on offer. When you have the courage to ask the other party—and open a negotiation—you gain the power to get more. You also grow the opportunity to move beyond mere transaction to something Read more…