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2 min read

Strike while the iron is hot.

I went to a blacksmiths festival recently. A bit out of the ordinary for my general weekend entertainment, to be honest, but talk about impressive....

2 min read

Strike while the iron is hot

I went to a blacksmiths festival recently. It's a bit out of the ordinary for my general weekend entertainment, but talk about impressive! It’s...

2 min read

Let go of the good

Are you a hoarder? A minimalist? Or something in between?

2 min read

Let go of the good

Are you a hoarder? A minimalist? Or something in between?

2 min read

All change is people change

I have a theory about change: All change is people change.

3 min read

Only that which can change can continue

Remember Pokemon Go? What a sensation! Blowing up from what felt like nowhere, Pokemon Go was the third most popular app download in 2016, behind...

2 min read

Internal functions are the strategy engine room

Have you ever heard that cliché about the janitor at NASA? You know, the guy who knew his job was putting astronauts on the moon? Like most...

2 min read

Put your money where your mouth is

It’s budget time again – how’s yours going? Do your budget conversations sound at all like your strategy conversations? In my experience, they don’t....

1 min read

Embrace awkwardness for better decisions

Good decisions need diversity. And I mean real diversity - age, background, gender, the whole lot. This is bad news for those who use the "diversity...

1 min read

Strategy is everyone’s job

Have you ever heard of Not My Job (NMJ) syndrome? There are some particularly hilarious examples on the internet. I like this one:

2 min read

True freedom is making your own rules

Have you ever opened your calendar, only to see nothing but other people’s priorities staring back at you? Take a look at it now and see what the...

2 min read

Strategy is simple

If I met anyone from your senior leadership team in the lift, and asked what your strategy is – how many different answers would I get? It’s hard to...

2 min read

The future of work

ATMs and Strategy When ATMs were first rolled out, economists, politicians, and the media panicked. Automation was to rob bank tellers of their jobs!...

2 min read

Public sector strategy: community, not competition

There’s a common cliché about working parents—we’re expected to perform our jobs as though we don’t have children and parent as though we don’t have...

2 min read

Public Sector Strategy: Community, not competition

There’s a common cliché about working parents – we’re expected to perform our job as though we don’t have children, and parent as though we don’t...

1 min read

Earn Trust: Engaging for change

Imagine proposing at the first introduction. At the Magiq Conference dinner on Monday night, I had attendees do exactly that, by proposing marriage...

1 min read

Make better decisions by anticipating disaster

People are stupid when it comes to risk. For one thing, we don’t understand risk in our personal lives. We grossly overestimate our chances of...

2 min read

All change is people change

I have a theory about change: All change is people change.

2 min read

First things first: prioritise progress

I’ve been a productivity nerd since day one. So much so, that I spent the summer between my first and second year at university reading books about...

2 min read

Move on from project failures

I ran a Strategic Focus workshop with a group last month, and one of the participants alerted me to the most beautiful quote: “The past is a foreign...

2 min read

Playing the long game

With parenting, it’s what we do that counts, not what we say. When my two eldest girls reached 7 and 11, I decided to institute a more formal...

2 min read

Ask better questions, get better answers

Last week, I wrote about the time and place for a more directive leadership style. In the last decade or two, the leadership pendulum has swung...

2 min read

Ask better questions, get better answers.

Last week, I wrote about the time and place for a more directive leadership style. In the last decade or two, the leadership pendulum has swung...

2 min read

Time to tell: when to be a more directive leader

How we understand strong leadership has undergone a fundamental transformation over the last decade or two. Traditional ideas about a military-like...