I've been in India for a week talking about a number of issues, including skills development.  India is making a big investment in Sector Skills Councils to try to work with industry to identify and

The UK has had severe flooding this spring – especially in the South West of the country. The reasons are not fully clear – but the weather conditions have been remarkable and relentless. Over the

Paradigm changes are rare - and when they occur, they can be very disruptive and threatening to those with a significant (financial or emotional) investment in the status quo. They are also unexpected - almost

How many people in this world do you trust? My answer is 'All of them' until they suggest to me that they cannot be trusted.  If we start from a position of trust, we normally

Our office is quite small - a few desks ... and computers of course.  One of our members of staff is a graphic designer (amongst other things, for of course we cannot afford single-specialism staff)

Last week I talked about the need to cross organisational boundaries - to avoid creating 'silo management' where each department takes decisions on its own information to suit its own ends - resulting in sub-optimal

Many of us are defined by our academic qualification or professional status - as engineers, managers or whatever. But most of us have learned that we need to be able to talk to those in

Sugar gives you an 'energy rush' - very useful when you have a demanding task to perform.  That is why we like sugary snacks throughout the day when we're at work or taking physical exercise.

We went through the 'quality revolution in the 70s/80s - now everyone (well all the big guys) has ISO 9000 and some have been through TQM programmes. Why is it then that it is so

I want a new guitar. I admit I don't need one (I have 4)... but I want one. The problems is that my wife says we don't have the space.  She has initiated a new

Marks & Spencer, the large UK retailer has an environmental strategy branded 'Plan A' .... "because there is no Plan B.  They are trying to get over the message that we HAVE to look after

If you Google the word 'productivity', you get lots of results. Many of them relate to 'personal productivity', some of them to organisational productivity and a few to national productivity. So, which is the most

Christmas has gone. We now turn to celebrating the coming of a new year.  This is traditionally the time to make resolutions to affirm values, to set out our new path. We can, of course,

Christmas is coming (sounds like the cue for a song!)  Whether or not you are Christian, I am sure you can appreciate the overall Christmas message of 'peace and goodwill'. It is, however, a little

I have seen reports recently that relate to the literacy levels of young people in some of the most developed nations. .. like the UK and Australia.  These reports suggests that these countries are moving

I'm in Mauritius - working! This is a beautiful place, of course.  But when we look at such island paradises, we sometimes forget they too have to build an economy to look after their citizens.

We want our staff to participate ... to take part in improvement projects and initiatives - even to initiate them. But we have to first engage them - we have to make them see why

On the LinkedIn group which I moderate (Productivity Futures) we have recently had a discussion about which come first - motivation or productivity. One side of the argument (conventional wisdom) suggests that we motivate staff

In the measurement field.there seems to be an assumption that, if you set targets, people will - by default - be motivated to achieve them. However, clearly you need also to have a plan ...

We often see statements that such and such an issue cost so many millions of money.  The latest case was the US government 'shutdown'.  I have seen various estimates of the cost to the economy.

This week I have been at an event organised by RKW in Germany and involving representatives of the European Association of National Productivity Centres (EANPC) and the European Management Association (EMA). We have been discussing

MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) are becoming fashionable. The World Confederation of Productivity Science can put an online course on our website and make it available to all free of charge. (and perhaps we should!)

U.K. labour productivity rose for the first time in two years in the second quarter, led by manufacturing industry. Productivity measured by output per hour increased 0.5 percent from the first quarter according to the