A supervisor who attended a workshop that I was facilitating for a plastics company, in an exercise which examined personal vision and passion, admitted that he had always wanted to become a fireman – to be in a position, if possible, to prevent fires from starting or, if not possible, to be able to save…
The Year 2000 Problem (or Y2K) was a crisis for both digital (computer-related) and non-digital documentation and data storage situations which resulted from the practice of abbreviating a four-digit year to two digits. This practice became problematic with logical errors possibly arising upon roll-over from x99 to x00, causing date-related processes to operate incorrectly for…
David Thomas was born in 1932 to an unmarried mother that he never got to know – he was given up for adoption at 6 week’s old to Rex and Auleva Thomas. Auleva died when Dave was just 5 years old and he moved with his father (a distant man) around the United States of…
“The most important, and indeed the truly unique, contribution of management in the 20th Century was the fifty-fold increase in the productivity of the manual worker in manufacturing. The most important contribution management needs to make in the 21st Century is similarly to increase the productivity of knowledge work and the knowledge worker” (Peter Drucker,…
There have only been a few of them – country leaders who have managed to impart vision to the people to bring changes to attitudes and behaviour and thus create a better life for all citizens. Maybe selfishness, power and greed have stood in the way of most of the others attaining lofty impact. In…
Pain is part of everyone’s experience of life – sometimes caused by external factors (retrenchment, death of a loved one, frustrating circumstances, etc.) or occasionally caused by internal factors (bad decisions, inability to make changes, feelings of disempowerment, unhealthy self-image, etc.). Many people find themselves “stuck” – in bad relationships, in a work context that…
I love stories and especially mythology. Myths may be seen as a compilation of well-chosen, but contrived characters, weaved into a story to tell of a foundational and even an eternal truth. The phrase “mythic reality” sounds at first like a contradiction of terms – “mythic” meaning by popular belief “not true” and “reality” meaning…
Employee engagement is essential to keep staff motivated, increase business results and enhance staff retention. When I worked for a banking corporation many years ago, I attempted to spend time with each of the individuals who reported to me, primarily to get to know them better and discover their passions, giftedness and unique characteristics. I…
