Even though my mantra is “Words Matter”, I’m constantly learning new things about language. Last week I received an email which contained the phrase “for all intensive purposes”. Of course, the correct phrase is the similar-sounding “for all intents and purposes.” The mistake struck me as both amusing and intriguing, so I tweeted that it…
Archive | December, 2016
Life According to Seuss
All I really need to know I learned from Dr. Seuss. With apologies to Robert Fulghum, Dr. Seuss has more life-long lessons than kindergarten. Here are some of my favorites: The best way to learn and expand your horizons is to try new things. I do not like green eggs and ham! I do not…
Good Managers Must Be Digitally Fluent
Over the weekend, a senior manager at another company challenged me as to whether he really had to be digitally proficient. He went on to explain he had hired an intern for his social media presence and a personal online shopper for his clothes. He had an IT person to keep his smart phone up-to-date…
How Much of Leadership Is About Theater?
For reasons not worth getting into, this past week I was reminded of a decade-old HBS discussion entitled “How Much of Leadership Is About Control, Delegation, or Theater?” The original discussion was prompted by a claim from Stanford Professor Jeffrey Pfeffer that leaders only explain 10% of a company’s performance. Instead, a company’s current performance…