Author: pwpadmin

Greetings From China

17 September 2008 I am writing you from China where I am conducting workshops on Leadership and Change for emerging leaders at the Civil Aviation Management Institute. It is incredible to see the transformation underway. It is a different city than when I was here 14 years ago. The whole […]

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CASH FLOW is COOL

ISSUE #1 A commonly heard term is CASH FLOW. Here is what I know: ask the person using the term to define what they mean by describing the formula they are using. There are at least 9 variations on the theme of cash flow. Let’s look at the tree to […]

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Competitive? Me?

Topic: Simple EthicsIndustry: AerospaceLocation: East Coast Ann and Fran are both executives at this very large company and Ann has issues with Fran. Each year during the United Way fundraisers a “Breakfast with the Boss” is hosted and served by the executives. People tip their favorite executive and the results […]

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An Inviting Place to Work

Title: Thank you Jack WelchTopic: An Abusive Performance Management ProcessIndustry: AerospaceLocation: Heartland, USA “Get your pound of flesh.” This was told a manager at a prominent company as they went into their annual performance appraisal time. Interpretation: Make sure you have 10% of your people identified as low performers and […]

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Today’s Quotable Quotes

By a senior financial executive in a Fortune 50 Company Said to a staff member… “I know I should say ‘thank you,’ but what I really want to say is “what took you so f***ing long?” -or- said after a presentation was completed with others in the room… “How can […]

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Tailgate Inspection at Hilton

Topic: Customer Service Industry: Hospitality Location: Nashville, TN “I have a job that was created by Conrad Hilton himself,” bragged the Customer Service rep to guests checking in; “I am here to ensure that any issues you have are resolved quickly and to your satisfaction.” My experience at check-out proved […]

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"Go tell him off!"

Topic: On the Job Training for Supervisors Industry: Equipment manufacturer Location: Texas As a new supervisor, direction from the manager is taken seriously. Standing out on the assembly line in front of all the people the manager upbraids the supervisor, yelling at him with all sorts of profanity, instructing him […]

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Quote of the Month!

Topic: What Executives will sayIndustry: ConglomerateLocation: Northeast “Ideas…ideas are so distracting.” Said to a group of employees by an executive after asking them what they were thinking about.

Today’s Quotable Quote

Topic: Say what you mean Industry: Facility maintenance Location: Northeast US “The company president wants to visit with our group next week. I want this to be informal, no presentations and ‘off the cuff.’ Let’s get together Friday for a dry-run.”

The Executive Blow-off

Topic: Appearing to care Industry: Aerospace Location: Northeast USA This is a brilliant move, demonstrated by a senior VP of HR in a $9B company. At the VP’s direction, a long-standing employee was told they were too highly paid, they were not executive material and they had “no runway” left…but […]

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