Kent Blumberg

Please throw out your performance review system

My opinion:  annual performance reviews are hammers looking for nails to pound, and hurting employee engagement, productivity and health in the process.  If you have any say in the matter, please throw out your performance review process.

Here's why I believe that, and some alternatives you might want to try.

Should you hire specific experience, or the ability to learn and lead?

[Updated March 2, 2008 with notes from Time Magazine's March 10th edition.  Updates are marked with "*"]

Two blog postings last week got me thinking about hiring decisions.  Eric Brown asserted that we ought to "...hire the best person you can regardless of the number of years of experience..."  On the same day, Growing Business Link carried a brief piece extolling the virtues of the generalist.

So the question is, should you hire for very specific experience, or should you hire a generalist who has proven her ability to lead and to learn?

I say the latter - usually.

David Maister's upcoming book on strategy and execution

David Maister's upcoming book, Strategy and the Fat Smoker, will be well worth the read.  If you are a leader or manager trying to develop and execute strategy, I'd plan on picking this book up as soon as its January 2008 release.

Embracing Failure at Work

Want to understand an organization's culture and leadership with one question?  Jeffery Pfeffer and Robert Sutton, in their classic book Hard Facts, Dangerous Half-Truths And Total Nonsense: Profiting From Evidence-Based Management (Harvard Business School Press, 2006) propose asking,

"What happens when people fail?"

So you wanna be a General Manager?

You have slaved long and hard in a functional role, rising to "manager of accounting" or "maintenance manager" or "HR manager" or any number of other management roles.  Now you want to move up a step to General Manager*. 

What do you need to do now to prove that you are ready for the move up?  Here's what I look for in a potential General Manager.

Two models for coaching your direct reports

In recent reading about coaching I've come across two models that you might find useful in developing the folks on your team.  Both models represent personal change and growth as occurring at a number of levels, each one deeper than the last.  In both cases, you ask at which level you are hoping to see an employee grow, and then intervene appropriately.

"Microtrends" - book review

Microtrends: The Small Forces Behind Tomorrow's Big Changes (Mark J. Penn with E. Kinney Zalesne, Twelve, 2007, 448 pages) is a collection of 75 microtrends Penn claims to have discerned from poll research.  Penn defines a microtrend as an intense identity group that makes up one percent or more of the population and is growing.  Without offering any evidence, Penn claims that such a group can have significant impact on society.

Although I have two problems with the premise of this book, I do think it can be useful to business leaders and to marketers.  First, my problems, and then a few ways you might use this book.

Listening for leaders

In my opinion, a good leader spends much of her time listening to those around her.  Work by the Gallup Organization seems to back that up.  Gallup says that employee engagement is higher when people feel their opinions count, when they have the materials and equipment they need to do their jobs right, when their jobs are matched to their strengths and when someone pays attention to their development.  All of those require careful listening.

Think you are a great listener?  Have a look at this Active Listening Quiz (MSWord2003, 38 kb).  If you didn't score as high as you wanted to, read on.

Ten ways to build your personal brand

A brand is a promise - buy what the brand represents and you expect to get a certain experience.  People have brands, too.  Your personal brand is what people think of when they hear your name.  For example, when folks hear your name they might think, "The gal who gets things done," or "That guy who speaks in riddles," or any number of other things.

What is your personal brand?  What do people think of when they hear your name?  Is your brand telling folks what you want it to?

Here's a list of ten things you can do to build the brand you want to have.

The Selfish Servant Leader

A servant leader gets results and serves those she leads.  In military parlance, a servant leader is responsible for accomplishing his mission and for the welfare of his soldiers.  I aspire to servant leadership, and I admire greatly those who succeed as servant leaders.

But I have come to believe that a great servant leader must also be a bit selfish.

Here's why.