Be a humble leader and accept criticism

Environment must be safe for dissent and as a leader you must be accepting, even welcoming of criticism and different ideas. As long as these ideas are presented professionally and courteously, you need to accept them with humbleness and give them serious thought and consideration. After all, be mindful that people on your team and other teams may know a …

One conversation at a time, no side chatter & respect the calendar

Communication is an essential pillar in building successful teams, but at times, it needs to be managed. While in meetings it is essential for everyone to be on the same page and focused on the topic at hand. People must be both physically and mentally present and engaged into what the team is working on. This is something that I …

Excuses don’t matter, your work does

Excuses are frequently irrelevant, cheap and everyone has at least a few. While it is important to learn from previous decisions and actions, it is equally as important not to spend too much time stuck in the past. Learn from the past, assess your current state, communicate present outcomes, but spend all of your time, effort and energy on moving …

No bad apples allowed

One bad apple can spoil the rest so please remove them from the basket. As a leader you must establish, promote and support an inviting, comfortable and respectful working environment and as such you can’t allow any single individual to jeopardize your workplace. No matter how good and valuable they may be from a functional perspective if they can’t cooperate …

Say yes to opportunity

Opportunities are frequently unexpected and very commonly show up unannounced. How we react to them is what makes the ultimate difference in how valuable they become to us. I have already emphasized the importance of embracing opportunities and have shared a few examples last year which support the fact that opportunities and new clients don’t come announced which was, once …

Don’t chase perfection, chase progress

Perfection is elusive and frequently unattainable. This is why it is important to focus on making daily incremental advancements towards the ultimate goal. Rome wasn’t built over night and neither will most of your projects or strategic and operational services. Collaborate, communicate and work together with your colleagues to advance your current state into what you all believe it can …

Information security is everyone’s responsibility

Security of data and information across organizations is everyone’s responsibility. While content management, security, access and backup is generally led by Information technology (IT), they shouldn’t not be the only team involved in managing and securing data across organizations. Proper security training should be an integral part of the hiring process; should be communicated during student orientations and most importantly …