The puzzle of motivation

"If I kick my dog (from the front or the back), he will move. And when I want him to move again what must I do? I must kick him again… but that kind of management produces movement, not motivation.” - Frederick Herzberg              In many organisations there is unwritten rule- All people related …

Creativity, J.K.Rowling and How to succeed

Does J.K Rowling have very high IQ? Did she come from family of writers? Is she a gifted writer like Jane Austin or Charles Dickens? Answer to all is NO. Yet she is successful. Harry Potter series has sold millions of copies all over world. During time of publishing first book of series J.K. Rowling …

Tips on how to kill creativity

“Of all the things managers can do to stimulate creativity, perhaps the most efficacious is the deceptively simple task of matching people with the right assignments. Managers can match people with jobs that play to their expertise and their skills in creative thinking, and ignite intrinsic motivation.” -          Teresa Amabile Teresa Amabile is expert in …

How to handle Commoditization- Fight or Flight?

“Zara is possibly the most innovative and devastating retailer in the world.” - Daniel Piette , Fashion Director, Louis Vuitton Fashion business was initially controlled by French and Italian haute couture houses like Georgio Armani, Versace, Prada etc. Their clients were upper class segment of society; slowly they started catering to upper middle class segment. …

Organisational Politics and Career Growth

Will you work for organisation that encourages politics? Will you work for a boss encourages politics? Do you encourage politics? Do you like subordinates who play politics? I am sure answer will be NO. Organisational politics is a dirty word, nobody wants to be associated with it, but at the same time it is fact that …

Transient advantage, confirmation bias and Innovation

“If you think of competitive advantage as something that is transient, you’ll organize your company in a very different way. You’re going to be very careful about having your organizational system settle down too much, because too much stability can be dangerous.” -          Rita McGarth Rita McGarth is expert in area of strategy. She is …

Wisdom of crowd & crowdsourcing performance appraisal

Francis Galton, a psychologist and statistician, once visited a fair. At one stall there was contest on guessing weight of ox, which was slaughtered and dressed. Person who would correctly guess the weight got prize. Francis made everyone write their guess on piece of paper, he got estimate from 800 people, and did statistical analysis …

Middle age and Madogiwazoku

Middle age is when many managers experience career plateau. The career plateau is the point in a career where the likelihood of additional hierarchical promotion is very low. It could be due to many reasons, some who were stars earlier cannot keep pace with demands of higher level jobs and decide to slow down, some …

Cognitive dissonance and why you never quit job you hate.

Have you met a person, who constantly kept complaining about his job and wanted to change it, yet never changed his job and after some time tells you that he stayed back because he was learning a lot in his job (when in fact job remains same with no learning)? Or Met a recruitment manager …

The Dark Triad and how to climb corporate ladder faster.

The bartender asks, ‘who has the darkest personality out of you three?’ The Narcissist says ‘me’, the Antisocial says, ‘I don’t care’ and the Machiavellian says ‘it’s whoever I want it to be’. -Anon Are you hardworking, intelligent, honest, sincere, team player, humble? Do you always share credit with others? Do you believe that your …