Productivity

Which group has a higher success rate in collaborative work: B-school grads, kindergartners, or CEOs?

Watch the video to find out. “Build a tower, build a team,” declares Tom Wujec in this fascinating explanation of why multiple iterations are one key to successful collaboration efforts. Unfortunately, most of our training in strategic planning has taught us to plan-plan-plan, assess options, choose the “best” alternative, and execute on that one idea. Annual budgets are then set, personnel reassigned, and we forge ahead while hoping for the best.

In a dynamic networked world, we don’t have to lock ourselves in to such linear plan/produce models. Rapid try/fail/learn/try again cycles are winning the day. This rapid learning approach seems less forced and more organic to leaders in many cultures.

I’m going to try this Marshmallow Challenge with my teams the next time we have some development time. I wonder what we’ll learn.

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For You: Top 5 Popular Posts

by Ken Leadership

Enjoy these if you haven’t already. Please retweet, share or forward any favorites. Thank you! Why Leaders Use Social Media What Is Shared Leadership? Steve Jobs’ Legacy: Real Artists Ship Guest post: Bring it! What’s Your Failure Tolerance?  

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Why Leaders Use Social Media

by Ken Leadership

Leaders speak. It’s our job. We use words … to create and express a compelling vision of the future to inspire and encourage people around us to speak God’s Word to various audiences to engage others with questions and observations to “write the vision and make it plain … so that he may run who [...]

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What’s Your Failure Tolerance?

by Ken Leadership

Success, said Thomas Alva Edison, is 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration. This week at MinistryNet 2011 in Bangkok is making me more aware of this axiom. Yesterday nearly 200 participants broke into workgroups of 5-8 people. Each group was tasked with working a specific problem from an innovation or collaboration angle. It’s not easy. I [...]

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Tools Can Make the Difference

by Ken Leadership

The longer I live the more I appreciate the value of having the right tool for the job at hand. This morning Omar is tiling our master bathroom. In less than 90 minutes he removed our old toilet, stripped off two ancient layers of linoleum, pulled up all the baseboards and cleared away all the [...]

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Steve Jobs’ Legacy: Real Artists Ship

by Ken Leadership

“Real artists ship.” — Steve Jobs (1955-2011) That was one of Steve Jobs’ early mantras for his team of geniuses. What did he mean? Jobs meant that it doesn’t really matter how beautiful your dreams are, how simple your lines are, or how ergonomic your next product is in your mind’s eye. Real artists ship. [...]

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Act Now!

by Ken Leadership

This paper is not going to write itself. October arrived four days ago. With a November 1 deadline looming for the first three chapters of my 150-page dissertation, I reached the sobering conclusion that: This paper is not going to write itself. For the next few weeks (27 days to be exact) my early mornings, [...]

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