Reading Time: 4 minutesSomehow, time slipped by with no monthly updates. Here are two month’s worth:
On the workplace culture
There is no doubt that the movement characterised as the Great Resignation will settle back into the corporate yoke of work as life. But how much we backslide is up to us.
The word Agile with a capital A is being mis-applied beyond its intended purpose to build software.
No they don’t.
Have you ever noticed how many e.g LinkedIn articles are about attracting more customers, increasing profits, and growing the business? As if that’s all anybody cares about, as if it’s all that matters.
Let’s talk about why it is hard to fill job positions .
Having trouble “finding the right people”? This stuff isn’t hard.
I wrote a post about why it is hard to find staff. The corollary is what we should do to make it easy to find people. Logically, we just invert my earlier post.
Who said “success and failure happen in the same way”? No I don’t know either. But it is a profound insight. Combine it with survivor bias, and we have a formula for false expectations.
The analogy of elite sports competition is damaging in the workplace.
HBR wrote about how women need to be more confident and assertive to get equal treatment It’s what women have to do, not what they should have to do.
On how work is different now
I boggled at the risk taken in launching the James Webb Space Telescope today, Christmas Day. But, on reflection, the launch is only one small piece of the gamble.
To succeed at changing how you work, it must be done iteratively, incrementally, experimentally, in many smaller lower-risk changes.
Work exists on a spectrum from familiar to exploratory. I wrote a book, Standard+Case, about it. In recent years, I’ve absorbed the principles of complexity, and I’m rewriting that book.<
There are ideas that, when we first meet them, they “do our head in”: they mess with our head, they are a mindfuck.
Set crazy goals.
We need to defend how we came to a decision, not what the decision was.
Whenever we break down work, here’s my rule of thumb for measuring success; for each iteration, half is OK, two thirds is good, three quarters is great.
How should we best distribute the rewards for the production of value in order to maximize future value output?
No idealised model is ever “being done” anywhere.
On the year 2021
We wrote an article about Cherry’s work in Vietnam in the Business Agility institute’s journal, Emergence.
I was asked about our work-life balance at Teal Unicorn. I’m not sure we do keep a healthy balance, but for us it is fine. Work is life for Dr. Cherry Vu and I.
Looking back, I can say 2021 was an excellent year. Business boomed, health was great, family was peaceful and prospering. Didn’t expect that reflection, did you?
Finally…
Merry Christmas* and a Happy New Year
to all our friends, followers, supporters, partners, and clients.
In the season of seasons greetings I offer you seasons greetings from Teal Unicorn.