Back to work (nº 12)

Dear Friends,

After some months of silence on my blog due to other important and very demanding tasks I've already closed, I return back refreshed and eager to continue exploring more innovative Organizational Models (and human behaviours) that are successfully applied in different types of organizations.

I shall soon publish the next post, I already have some running ideas and some broken promises coming from older posts I want to fulfill too.

We keep in contact.

jma

In memory of Steve Jobs (nº 11)

It is only one year gone since Steve Jobs passed away but it seems ages to me.

He was loved and hated with the same passion and fervor, and he still is.

I don't want to spend today time analyzing his success and defeate, his genious and darkness; I just want to remember one of his most famous sentences, which in my opinion should be leitmotif for the next generations in order to improve the world they are going to inherit.

"Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish"

Introduction to another vision about servant leadership and organizational health (nº 10)

Introduction

I found another wonderful vision about what a servant leadership is and how to measure organizational health (this is the first time I talk about this second topic) in OLAGroup website.

This group is working towards creating more healthy Organizations, and this is what they write about it:

"The Healthy Organization is an organization in which the characteristics of servant leadership are displayed through the organizational culture and are valued and practice by the leadership and workforce. This is a healthy, servant organization. One that puts the needs of others first and through that gains incredible strength and power throughout the Organization".

They define in their website six key areas to work in order the get more healthy Organizations, as well as six different levels of organizational health.

Social intelligence as key factor to improve cohesion (nº 9)

Introduction

I read some days ago the post "Claves para el uso de la inteligencia social en el trabajo" (in Spanish) by Pablo Herreros. 

The post is an interesting analysis on social intelligence and its use in the Organizations.  

I want to focus in what he wrote in the first part of the post because they are the same issues I talked about in my previous posts; team work, cooperation, individualism, collectivism etc.

I am not going to transcrip the full post here, I just want to share with you some of the ideas introduced there and I believe are key to improve relationships at work.

In memory of Stephen R. Covey (nº 8)

I saw today, 6th of September 2012, Mr. Stephen R. Covey has passed away. My condolences to his family and friends.

We owe him helping us improve our efficiency with his great book "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People".

I was already thinking to write a post with a summary of it before I knew about his death. I hope I can do it soon and share it with you all.

Introduction to the characteristics of a Servant Leader (nº 7)

Introduction

I read some days ago a report called "Character and Servant Leadership: Ten Characteristics of Effective, Caring Leaders" by Larry C. Spears, where the author talks about the 10 characteristics of a servant leader.

This is what he says:

Individualism VS Collectivism (nº 6)

Introduction

One of the problems I've seen so far in my career affecting relationship and cohesion in Organizations lies in the extreme individualism of some people, who only seek their personal glory and aggrandizement even above the Project itself.

Reading a post on the blog "1+" by my friend Gurutz Echaniz (called "Los Iluminados Occidentales"), I started thinking deeper about this matter. After we interchanged some messages, Gurutz gave me a couple of interesting ideas related to individualism VS collectivism.

First he told me the following sentence when we discussed about the existence of people who think only of themselves, people who do not have a collective vision of work (at least they do not show it by their actions)

"individual's happiness based in making the difference with the others instead of being different with the others";

Secondly he talked to me about the concept Danah Zohar is promoting right now, the one that says spiritually intelligent people are servant leaders. 

I liked the union between these two words; "leader" + "servant". Strange, isn't it? I decided to go forward in the knowledge about this concept, so this is what it means.

Changing obsolete mental models (nº 5)

Introduction

After writing my second post, "Key factors to build group cohesiveness", related to cohesion and its relationship with the performance of the teams, I made the conclusion there are still some old fashioned mental models in our environment affecting the evolution of the Organizations. I think we should work on how to change them.

I have focused this post on that matter. I wanted to discern about which can be a good method so people can change the obsolete models, updating them to better adapt our Organizations to the reality we live in the markets right now.

I want to start with some of the different definitions given to mental models, the ones I like most.

Introduction to "Design Thinking" innovation method (nº 4)

Introduction

I recently had the great fortune to know the innovation method called design thinking, which is beginning to be implemented in our environment thanks to people like Amalio Rey (lecturer of the master class in which I participated). 

We could say that this method was designed by Rolf Faste at Stanford University in the decades of the 80s and 90s, but its basis were forged some decades before with the work of people like Herbert A. Simon or Robert McKim. 

David Kelley was a pioneer of its use on a practical level, with his brother Tom Kelley and the founding of IDEO at the end of the 70s. 

TED2012

 

How to build your creative confidence

The use of this tool in the business world has become famous thanks to companies like IDEO and of course, the Design School at Stanford University, which remains pioneer teaching this method to new generations of entrepreneurs and people involved with design management. 

Why some people are so resistant to change? (nº 3)

Introduction 

In this frenzy of information I'm reading and analysing to write on issues related to the improvement of Organizations, I found some interesting data about resistance to change.

This subject interests me since late last year, when I had the chance to meet Pedro Pablo Ramos and I read his book "Network Models for Organizations".