I  am a soccer fan.  I watch it (mainly on TV) regularly and have my favourite teams.  I also take an interest in football management - especially in the ‘management merry-go-round’ where managers are sacked by one club

Technology has changed the role of a manager - by creating a situation where many managers do their own typing, their own diary management, their own meeting arrangements and so on - tasks which were

Holding employees accountable for their behaviour and their work outcomes is important.  But it needs to exist in a supportive and trusting culture so that those employees are performing whilst being, and feeling, supported.  They need to

How many organisations that adopt one of these tools have done so on the basis of a rigorous, systematic evaluation or assessment?  How do they know they have selected an appropriate tool? Firstly, of course, you

There is increasing evidence that high performonce and productivity comes from workers who are engaged with the organisation …. aware of, and preferably sharing, its value set; aware of, and preferably invested in, its longer-term

We all know that to.be successful in our career, we have to plan ahead, in our job, we have to plan ahead' in our life, we have to plan ahead. Although we know this is

We have all seen examples of business leaders focusing exclusively on productivity growth - and failing to develop the business. Elon Musk - and his (‘hard-nosed’) approach to managing Twitter (now ‘X’) is just one

Yes, you should. We all need a break from work occasionally to rid ourselves of accumulated stress, to refresh ourselves. But I've learned that there are things you can do to help maintain productivity whilst

Your personal productivity depends on how well you know yourself. What interests you? What are you good at? What don't you like doing? In the past, when have you performed well - and what were

The answer to the question is obvious. Yes, you should. We all need a break from work occasionally to rid ourselves of accumulated stress, to refresh ourselves. But I've learned that there are things you

Most of us have done some form of study that involves a section on improving communications. We learn about the importance of making any message appropriate to the target audience - using the right language,

Sometimes keeping things simple yields the best results. This is particularly true for start-ups and small businesses. Don’t get sucked into complex (and expensive) systems of control or ‘improvement’.Stick to the basics. Set realistic goals (consistent

Of course it does! However, concentrating on squeeing every last drop of productive output from each day and multi-tasking to get more done can lead to burnout, to stress and anxiety and to a drop

Doug Conant was the CEO of Campbell Soups in 2001 when the company’s business was at  rock bottom due to several organisational issues including a toxic culture. Among the many leadership strategies, Doug adopted, one of

I have talked previously about the need to balance the pursuit of efficiency with a need for resilience - we need to be able to cope with supply chain, labour or other problems. We have

Over the last couple of decades (before the pandemic) lots of middle income countries and middle-performing companies were integrated into global supply chains. Advanced nations and advanced companies had no choice as they needed new

One of the ironies of modern business life is that whenever anyone uses the term ‘industrial relations’ they are almost certainly referring to poor relationships.  Similarly, the ‘industrial relations industry’ is about handling (and dealing

Productivity equals efficiency.  Yes?   Well, yes - by and large. But sometimes we need something else … something more. The recent problems with supply chains (after both the COVID pandemic and the Russian invasion of Ukraine)

If they see employees laughing, some managers make negative comments which can be summarised as ‘You are here to work, not to have fun’. However, humour has positive benefits form an organisation. It promotes and