EPM Channel | Management

Why Flexible Hours Inspire Performance

“What time do you want me to start work?” That’s the question a new hire recently asked me. She looked a little startled by my reply.

“I don’t care.”

But it was the truth. I didn’t care—and I never have—what hours are kept by the people who work for me. You could say I’m the opposite of a control freak, in the sense that I have always resisted rules, for myself and for others. Why? Because once you have rules, you have to enforce them—and there’s no more tedious task in life.

February 14, 2012 Leave a commentManagementBy susangallagher

Does Culture Eat Strategy for Lunch?

In Culture Eats Strategy for Lunch, Shawn Parr at Fast Company makes an extremely seductive argument. Though he doesn’t mention it, this type of analysis goes back to Alfred Thayer Mahan’s The Influence of Sea Power Upon History. Except that Mahan does not fall into this trap of concluding that culture matters more than strategy.

I don’t mean to pick on Parr’s article in particular, but it is representative of a lot of very well-intentioned, feel-good writing about strategy that seems to be appearing these days. Parr’s is one of the more solid ones. Here’s an excerpt.

February 14, 2012 Leave a commentManagementBy admin

Going Green Could Be a $100 Billion Business by 2017

Bringing greater energy efficiency to commercial buildings promises to be big business. Pike Research estimates the market will increase to $100 billion by 2017.

February 14, 2012 Leave a commentManagementBy admin

Does the Team Approach Work?

So often we hear about the importance of collaboration, working together in a team to come up with new ideas.

You can’t graduate from a top business school today without having participated in dozens of group presentations and team discussions.

But does this approach work when trying to come up with new ideas? I actually don’t think so.

February 13, 2012 Leave a commentManagementBy susangallagher

Users Should Apply ERP To Manage End-to-End Processes

ERP systems not only collect information about transactions, they also automate processes. The latter includes managing the handoffs between roles and enabling electronic document creation and management associated with that. Indeed, it was the promise of improving process management and process execution that spurred companies to adopt ERP in the 1990s.

February 13, 2012 1 CommentManagementBy admin

America’s Next Top Engineer: She Needs Your Role Models

Imagine the world in 2030, more resource-constrained than ever—but then suddenly benefitting from a breakthrough approach to harnessing wind energy. What if the person capable of hatching that innovation is, today, a middle-school girl in a village in Ecuador? Will it happen? Or think closer to home: If the cure for cystic fibrosis is just waiting in the mind of a girl in your community, will it ever see the light of day?

February 11, 2012 Leave a commentFYI, ManagementBy susangallagher

How Do You Get Things Done?

Why is it that so many people can’t get things done? (The key is…the same old organization and prioritization)

Across the board, we’re inundated with information – emails, vmails, RSS feeds we have to get to, Facebook posts we have to “like,” LinkedIn requests we have to respond to.

Not to mention meetings, voice conferences and everything else. So, who has the time to just plain work?

February 9, 2012 Leave a commentFYI, ManagementBy susangallagher

7 Things Your Employees Never Want to Hear

Sometimes, what you say can and will work against you. Sure, actions speak louder than words, but where your employees are concerned, words can still be motivation and morale killers—especially when you use the wrong words.

February 9, 2012 Leave a commentManagementBy admin

Growing Human Capital Gap Between Highest and Lowest Performing Companies

There is a gap in the human capital management practices of the highest and lowest performing companies that only promises to grow over time. This is one of the key findings of “The Best Get Better: Critical Human Capital Issues of 2012,” a study conducted by Institute for Corporate Productivity (I4CP).

February 9, 2012 Leave a commentManagementBy admin

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