Related Articles

The Changing Boss-Secretary Relationship
THE CHANGING BOSS-SECRETARY RELATIONSHIP: Imagine a partnership at work. One member is outlining the agenda for the annual stockholders' meeting, the other is managing the logistics.

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Tales from the Corporate Frontlines: The Role of Character in Leadership
This article relates to the Senior /Top Level Management competency, designed to measure satisfaction levels regarding top-level management at your organization. AlphaMeasure defines senior management as the team of individuals at the highest level of management who have the day-to-day responsibilities of operating the organization.

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Performance Appraisal - Ten Stupid Things Managers Do To Screw It Up
Performance appraisals aren't fun. But a lot of the time they are agonizing because managers do really dumb things, ending up destroying a process that is important to everyone (or should be).

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Tales from the Corporate Frontlines: Coworker and Caretaker
This article relates to the Coworkers competency, commonly evaluated in employee satisfaction surveys. It tells the story of a coworker whose performance consistently facilitated effective cooperation, collaboration, and communication between the employees within one organization.

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You Didnt Use Brainstorming to Select Your Measures, Did You?
IntroductionWhen Alex Osborn invented the creativity technique called brainstorming, I wonder if he had any idea just how extensively business would apply it. Almost every meeting employs some kind of brainstorming event, but there's one meeting that really should leave it off the agenda: the performance measure selection meeting.

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Growing Profits is Easy!
Everyone involved in running a business from the smallest start-up to a major corporate dreams about how to achieve sustained profitable growth. I'm a great believer that business is simple - it's only us human beings that make it complex.

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Seven Cs to Avoid Procedure Writing Errors
You do your best to make sure your organization is operating as effectively as possible. But if your policies and procedures are incomplete, outdated, or inconsistent, then they are not driving the performance improvement they should.

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Top 10 Things NOT To Tell Angel and VC Investors
I am not writing this to create a list of things not to say so people can hide the facts or in any way mislead potential investors. On the contrary I personally believe you must be 100% upfront with any potential investors, and even volunteer some weaknesses to be credible.

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The Paradox of Job Enrichment
Ellen was a clerk working for a large insurance company. One day, she spotted a glaring discrepancy in a form she was typing.

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Recruitment - Pick People Who Think
Old style management doesn't encourage personal mind control, employees aren't encouraged to think. That was certainly the case when I started work back in the bad old days however it's still prevalent in many businesses today.

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Looking through the Glass Ceiling - Women in Management
Women have made tremendous contributions to society at every level; consider Joan of Arc, Golda Meier, Indira Gandi, Condalezza Rice.In writing this article my attention is to open the eyes of small business and no way patronise female mangement or give offence.

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To Thine Own Self Be True--Its Better for Business: What Arthur Andersen Would Say to His Company
As a child, you probably heard, "to thine own self be true." But what does that really mean? When the newspapers are full of cheating and lying business owners, politicians, and academics, does it really make sense to maintain your integrity?To me, the answer is a clear, unwaffling YES! Without your integrity, you really don't have a business or a career--just a waiting game until you world comes crashing down around you.

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Problem Solving the Problem Solving Meeting
We go to meetings to share information, to report on project status, to make decisions, to get the free lunch, and because we were invited. (Sorry that I digressed).

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25 Super-Practical Steps to Build Your Business!
For the past several weeks, we have focused on some wonderful but (to my way of thinking) rather fancy ideas about life. I wrote about motivation (I don't believe in it).

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Creativity Management and Behaviour
What behaviour maximises the chances of thinking of great ideas? What behaviour maximises the ability to nurture ideas until they begin to reveal their potential?To begin answering the above questions we will briefly explore five areas:a) Creativity versus innovation. It is correct that the above questions are separated, as they refer to two distinct disciplines - defining problems and generating ideas (creativity) and selecting those ideas, developing and then commercialising them (innovation).

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How to Meet Quality Standards with ISO 9001
In today's hectic business environment, it is vital that we are all on the same page, right? But how do we know if we meet those standards? Business owners and executives can avoid the uncertainty, and that's where ISO 9001 certification comes in.Standardizing Quality SystemsThe ISO, or International Organization for Standardization, was established in 1947 to develop international standards for everything from electronics to management systems.

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Too Much Time Treating Symptoms
A man drives down the highway each day on his way to work. On Monday he gets a flat tire.

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The Best Way to Keep Track of Meetings
How should you keep track of meetings?Have you ever wanted to run away from a meeting? I worked for one of the top five companies in the US and they seemed to hold meetings to plan meetings. It absolutely drove me around the bend! I would try and multi-task like all the other participants and secretly hoped they would not call on me for any information.

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When Being A Facilitator DOESNT Help
I talked with a group of internal consultants last week - they felt they had to wear too many hats in their work. They had to be consultants, facilitators, coaches and trainers - sometimes in the same one-hour session.

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Managing Employees Is A Little Like Herding Cats
Q: I started my small business about a year ago and it's grown steadily. I like having my own business, but I'm having a tough time managing people.

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