Allegiance to the Status Quo

Ever been stopped in your tracks by someone who’s “sworn allegiance to the status quo?”  We’ve all run into them.  Old guard remnants of a previous time, committed to keeping things running the way “we’ve always done it”.  What’d you do?  Give up?  Head fake them and then attempt an end-around?  Try to go right [...]

Questions Leaders Ought to Be Asking…Themselves

Are you still running after the goals that once drove you?  Do you have the same passion for it?  Or have you settled?  I like to think I’m somewhere around halftime…maybe not quite there, but close…and I’m finding that there are times when it’s tempting to do what’s needed…tomorrow.  At the same time, there are [...]

News from the Patio

Sunday evening.  5:55 pm.  77°F with 41% humidity.  Normally I’m cheering for low humidity…with last week’s fires any little bit is a good thing.  Got Jimmy’s Take the Weather with You keepin’ me company out here.  The regular noise from the tanker planes still working the Santiago Canyon fire in the background.  Not the DC [...]

Is Your Organization Serious About Innovation?

How serious is your organization about innovation?  Maybe it depends on how you define serious.  Gary Hamel is saying that "innovation is truly everyone’s responsibility" in organizations that are serious about innovation.  Think you’re there?  In a recent interview over at The McKinsey Quarterly Hamel suggests going to first level employees and asking these four [...]

Skeletor Seems to Like It

There were a lot of great moments on Lost last year.  Few topped this one with Sawyer and Hurley:

The Challenge of Learning to Innovate

Why is it so difficult for many organizations to learn to innovate?  It’s definitely a hot button.  We all want to do it.  But at the end of lots of days…it just doesn’t stick.  Why?  Maybe Gary Hamel has it right.  It’s just not in the DNA of some organizations.  And to begin to do [...]

Prophet of Innovation

One of the most influential voices in the development of the concept of innovation was Joseph Schumpeter.  In fact, when you read the work of Clayton Christensen, The Innovator’s Dilemma (and others), you’re following in the trail that Schumpeter blazed.  Prophet of Innovation: Joseph Schumpeter and Creative Destruction is a fascinating look at Schumpeter’s [...]

At World’s End…in Houston

I don’t know if you can see it or not, but when As the World Turns is on the airport TV you know it’s just about over!

At World’s End in the OC

Nothing like a little wildfire to bring a new perspective to life.  Here’s a scene from the tollway that leads to John Wayne International Airport.  Good times in the OC on a blustery day.

What Are You Becoming?

I love this question!  It really is right at the heart of things not only for each of us, but for the organizations we’re involved in.  In the same way that we’re each moving toward something better (a new competency for example), our organizations need to be becoming better at what they do.  They don’t [...]