Ian Ferguson
CEO Rants and Raves
CEO Perspective: Finding “A” List candidates
I have succeeded and I have failed .. you have too unless you have the most boring life on the planet. ‘A’ list actors tend to try to hide their failures but that’s not easy given today’s accessible video libraries. The same is true in business. Looking into this further, I have witnessed hundreds if not thousands of employees succeed and fail. The real winners are the ones who turn lemons into lemonade.
Robert Hebert
The Talent Jungle
Why Recruiting from the Best Companies is Perilous
If you long to be taken to Shangri-la, that fictional, mystical, utopian oasis of harmony and love, what kind of person do you hire to help you get there? Do you recruit a lifelong resident, intimate with the ways of the land, or someone trained in navigating the treacherous jungles to the western end of the Kunlun Mountains where it is said to be located?
Guest Blog
Guest Blog
The Importance of Planning - Ross Findlay
Many years ago a friend taught me the “Principle of the 7 P’s – Poor Prior Planning Precedes Piss-Poor Performance”. Many would agree with the statement but few are good at following through. Planning is not only a business skill it’s a life skill that can be used in everything from managing a huge project to putting together a church picnic.
Robert Hebert
The Talent Jungle
Creativity: Hardwired or A Skill We Can All Develop ?
This week the Globe and Mail published an article titled “How to Shine Again After A Year of Gloom” in which employees as well as candidates looking for jobs are urged to emphasize their creativity as a means of differentiating themselves in the marketplace. This appealed to me as great advice, provided you are one of the few people who actually are creative. For everyone else it is a waste of time.
Pierre Robitaille
2.0 Leaders
Executive Carriage and Limousine Rentals
More often than not, executive carriage is the centerpiece of my coaching assignments. Typically someone is being groomed for a more senior role or has just been promoted to a higher level. Leaders realize quickly that commanding leadership respect is half the battle in getting things done.
Don’t be surprised though if your search engine entry for Executive Carriage brings you to limousine rental companies, not enough has been written about this important subject.
Guest Blog
Guest Blog
Renewable Energy Technologies and Growth Opportunities - Hari Venkatacharya
The need for cleaner energy has now been accepted, after much debate. Billions of dollars in fundamental research have been invested in Canadian technologies to increase the capabilities in the solar, wind, bio-mass and bio-fuel sectors; yet, how much market penetration has actually occurred in North America?
Robert Hebert
The Talent Jungle
Why Best Practices Can Be So Dangerous
I recently dusted off Jim Collins’ book Good to Great. For those who have forgotten, the book compiles a list of companies that have achieved ‘greatness’ over a period of 15 years and then analyzes them in order to “discover the essential and distinguishing factors at work”. The resulting best practices of these best companies has been a bestseller since 2001.
‘Best practices’ is itself a bestseller, a management technique/tool kit that has become a staple in disciplines such as leadership, education, quality, change management, government, project management and scores of others. Its popularity lies in its promise to take the processes, systems, and approaches that have worked for the successful and distil them into guidelines, rules or dare I say ‘universal truths’ for the benefit of successful wannabes. And given our unquenchable thirst for quick, easy answers to complex questions we gobble it up. Amazon lists over 2500 books alone on ‘best practices’.
Unfortunately like most man-made attempts at unearthing universal truths, the truths embedded in best practices struggle with universality. A few examples illustrate the problems and risks.
Guest Blog
Guest Blog
Outsourcing, Innovation and the Economy - Philip Neukom
For the past 10+ years we Canadians have been following the outsourcing herd and moving manufacturing offshore. In doing so we have significantly reduced our ability to innovate, grow our economy and increase our wealth.
Pierre Robitaille
2.0 Leaders
Investing in academic talent
Faced with a shrinking pool of top R&D talent, a growing number of companies are recruiting academics and top researchers for senior management roles. But many of these appointments are unsuccessful, with failure rates as high as 75%, because candidates from academic backgrounds lack the managerial skills required to complement their scientific expertise.
