THE MANAGER'S CREED?

"It is a pleasure to give advice, humiliating to need it, normal to ignore it."

Unknown

Were I to be cynical I'd say this applies to a lot of managers, possibly a small majority.

Were I to be.

SELF IMPOSED BLINDNESS

"We are least open to precise knowledge concerning the things we are most vehement about."

Eric Hoffer (1902-1983) American philosopher/author

And we are often most ignorant about things we are most vehement about.

Easy to fix.

Simply train your knee-jerk reaction to be "what else might be true?" rather than "what I think is true is true."

Do that and you'll be surprised how much more you learn.

THE ANSWER IS OFTEN NEAR, NOT IN YOU

"Who is so deaf or so blind as he that willfully will neither hear nor see?"

English proverb

Unfortunately, way too many with a wide range of consequences the result.

And this is particularly bad if you are a manager; the one who supposedly knows what to do.

No doubt you sometimes do but often enough?

As yesterday's post suggested, there is much more to be learned from others assuming you take the time to hear what they have to say.

BEFORE IT IS YOU VOTED OFF THE ISLAND . . .

"Coalitions though successful have always found this, that their triumph has been brief."

Benjamin Disraeli

19th century British politician/author

At work we might call these "clicks".

Avoid them by any name choosing instead to align only with those who work to advance the company mission rather than their own.

WHAT IF YOU'RE WRONG?

"Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world."

Arthur Schopenhauer

19th century German philosopher

Not sure that everyone does this or that those who do always do.

But even occasionally is too often.

Start by assuming what you believe to be true may not be.

Shoot To Kill

"If you shoot a king you must kill him."

Ralph Waldo Emerson

19th century American essayist/poet

Not only true of kings but of CEOs and other managers as well.

If the challenge really matters to you, by all means go ahead with it.

However be prepared to leave, you may not survive.

Management: One Trick Pony?

"The graduate with a science degree asks, "Why does it work?"

The graduate with an engineering degree asks, "How does it work?"

The graduate with an accounting degree asks, "How much will it cost?"

The graduate with a liberal arts degree asks, "Do you want fries with that?""

Anonymous

I see the attempted humor in this, a version of the old hippy joke, "I majored in basket weaving." But I would bet my two business undergraduate and MBA degrees, this did not come from anyone with a liberal arts education.

In retrospect, my college was too business oriented and to the extent I am more well rounded today, it is only because I pursued other interests after college, on my own.

Anyone entering business should have as much business training as they can get; however, not at the expense of all the other critical subjects in our lives. In fact, the fact that so many employed in business know only business, is a big part of the current problem.

My advice? Skip the latest tritest on management theory, this blog included, and read some history.