Boomers and Millennials: Can’t We Just Get Along?

Businesses are just now beginning to wrestle with harmonizing between generations of workers and managers that may be as different as any combinations that have preceded them: the post WWII Boomers and Millennials. Can they get along and how do you create a culture of strategic execution with them?

There continue to be many Boomers still in the work force, partly due to their need to delay retirement in hopes of rebuilding wealth lost during the recent downturn. Millennials, generally viewed as having been born between about 1980 and 2001, are beginning to establish themselves professionally in the throes (more…)

In business, there are four key elements: equipment and technology, processes and systems, information, and people…but people are the active ingredient and coaching and development are critical to success. The most important work an effective leader can do is to get the most out of his/her people, helping them perform at highest levels today and grow to contribute more tomorrow. The leader who can coax “growth spurts” out of the people in the organization adds the most lasting value to the business, a value that multiplies as others take up the mantle of effective coaching and development. Yet, giving feedback to employees, particularly formal “review” feedback, is often one of the least-liked tasks for many managers. It can be uncomfortable, particularly if there are disagreements about areas for improvement. But, good coaching should be somewhat uncomfortable, at least for the person being coached. You don’t learn when you are comfortable, but when you are uncomfortable…and coaching is all about (more…)

In this age of the entrepreneur and “self-made businessperson,” it can be easy to forget that all professional careers eventually come to an end. More than once I have seen a successful, visionary leader without a succession plan: a family successor or business plan for post-retirement have to shut down their business, or have it shut down, because they did not have a plan or process to sustain the business after they move on. This situation is a shame- to see all of that value created over years of commitment and hard work evaporate due to the lack of a plan.

Exit and Transition planning is an important part of their responsibility. They owe it to their family, their employees and themselves. Many owners are “battle weary” in this continuing, tough economy, but it’s tough to retire or “semi-retire” absent confidence in the next wave of company leadership. (more…)

To gain a competitive edge, every project needs to take a holistic approach to new channel development. Changes in one process or program will weave its way throughout an organization and its markets. When making changes to the marketing and sales channels, some work needs to be done early in the project to assess the implications of change. Failure to consider this may cause irreparable damage to the company’s sales, clients and reputation in the marketplace. In new channel development, the company knows current markets well and has setup programs and processes to support the existing channels. When a new channel is contemplated, there are many interrelated issues that must be dealt with. They include: (more…)

When I was a general manager of a leading consumer business in the mid-90’s, one of my managers came to me one day and challenged me with the statement: “We are over-emphasizing leadership and under-emphasizing management.” I pondered that, not understanding his point initially, and subsequently concluded that he was right and went about changing my leadership approach to bring management and leadership into right balance. Since that time, however, whether in my role as a business executive or presently as a consultant, I continue to see the “over-led and under-managed syndrome” regularly, even in (more…)

Great companies don’t hire skilled people and motivate them, they hire already motivated people and inspire them

When it comes to strategy, ponder less and do more

Vision is perhaps our greatest strength… it has kept us alive to the power and continuity of thought through the centuries, it makes us peer into the future and lends shape to the unknown

It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change

If you don’t know where you are going, you wind up someplace else<