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| Volume 6, Issue 5 |
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In This Issue:
 Taming the Alpha Exec
Is your boss a psychopath?
The network unbound
 A crash course for marketers on Google’s new Trend Tool
Wired for winning loyalty
 Recruiting and selection tips to ensure successful hiring
Play well with others: Develop successful work relationships
Big Brother is watching
 Why dream teams fail
How to build a great team
RAZR’s edge
How I make decisions
 The soft skills of global managers
Feature bloat: The Product Managers dilemma
 Why your boss is overpaid
Most common resume lies
Why do the rich keep working?
The two-hour work-life balance solution
The price of a perfect smile
 Top ten desktop diversions, 2006
 When society gets in the way of sexuality
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Taming the Alpha Exec
Alpha Phyla
Alpha males and females come in four high-achieving flavors,
each with dangerous weaknesses that can overpower its strengths.
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Ambition, self-confidence, even a little bloodlust--all can be part of a great
biz leader. They can also wreak havoc on an organization. Now, for the executive
from hell, help is on the way. His name is George.
He's a vice president at Cleveland's Eaton Corp. And he's a recovering alpha exec.
It took him three years at Eaton to admit that he had a problem. It took another
year for him to commit to doing something about it. Months of professional probing
and coaching later, George T. Nguyen is learning how big a jerk he
has been--autocratically dispensing orders through his administrative assistant,
for example--and how little loyalty he has inspired. That psychic hurdle cleared,
he's starting down the path to becoming a guy you'd actually want to hang out
with--and a more effective executive. Says Nguyen now: "I have to work at this
every day, every week, every month, because it's not a natural tendency for me.
I'm 45 years old. If I don't make the change now, I won't have the incentive
to change." You may be wondering when being an alpha exec became enough to warrant
an intervention. For generations, after all, alpha characteristics have pretty
much been prerequisites for success in American business--and most other endeavors.
Are ambition, self-confidence, and competitiveness really so bad, especially when
there are billions of dollars and thousands of careers at stake? The trouble
is, there's a dark side to those traits we revere in bosses, a side that many
just can't resist...
Read the article. Back to top
Is Your Boss a Psychopath?
Odds are you've run across one of these characters in your career. They're
glib, charming, manipulative, deceitful, ruthless -- and very, very destructive.
And there may be lots of them in America's corner offices.
The Factor 1 psychopathic traits seem like the playbook of many corporate power
brokers through the decades. Manipulative? Louis B. Mayer was said to be a better
actor than any of the stars he employed at MGM, able to turn on the tears at will
to evoke sympathy during salary negotiations with his actors. Callous? Henry Ford
hired thugs to crush union organizers, deployed machine guns at his plants,
and stockpiled tear gas. He cheated on his wife with his teenage personal assistant
and then had the younger woman marry his chauffeur as a cover. Lacking empathy?
Hotel magnate Leona Helmsley shouted profanities at and summarily fired hundreds
of employees allegedly for trivialities, like a maid missing a piece of lint.
Remorseless? Soon after Martin Davis ascended to the top position at Gulf & Western,
a visitor asked why half the offices were empty on the top floor of the
company's Manhattan skyscraper. "Those were my enemies," Davis said. "I got rid
of them." Deceitful? Oil baron Armand Hammer laundered money to pay for
Soviet espionage. Grandiosity? Thy name is Trump...
Read the article. Back to top
The Network Unbound
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"New ideas generated on social networks may be worth a hell of a lot more than advertising." |
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How TagWorld and other next-generation social networks could feed your business--and maybe even change the world.
The spring of 2006 will go down as a curious moment in the annals of buzz.
The mainstream-media steamroller caught up with a bona fide cultural phenomenon,
then flattened it into a cliché before the average person knew what all the fuss
was about. That's ironic, because the fuss was about the average person--that is,
his or her participation in what's known variously as "social media,"
"social networking," "user-generated content," the "live Web" or the dreaded
"Web 2.0." But don't worry, this isn't yet another story getting all up in
MySpace or metaprofiling Friendster profiles. This is about how those sites,
and their successors, are growing up--and about their impact on how business
gets done. Companies, whether they sell software, movies, or dog food, are
changing the way they communicate, make decisions, and develop and market products,
all because of the exponential rise of new tools that allow people to
express themselves more easily online--and on the streets....
Read the article. Back to top
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A Crash Course for Marketers on Google's New Trend Tool
Google recently launched Google Trends, a tool that allows you to view
keyword search trends by year and month.
You can also view trends by news mentions and by region/country of searchers
performing searches. Here are some real-world ways you could use the data in
Google Trends to help you get a jump on your competitors and assess their
search penetration. Each of the methods gives an example of how to get the most
from this truly useful tool...
Read the article. Back to top
Wired for Winning Loyalty
Do you hear the "call of the wired"? You should. In the US alone, a whopping
70% of the population (adults 18+) now uses the Internet.
What's more, reports the Pew Internet Project, on a typical day 38% of wired
adults use a search engine and 30% go online just for fun or to pass the time.
Bottom line: The wired world is brimming with purchase potential and it's high
time to answer the call. Are you...
- Harnessing wired (and wireless) innovations to woo prospective buyers?
- Tapping into the ever-evolving treasure chest of wired capabilities to transform one-time purchasers into staunch advocates?
Consider the following five firms and how each is using wired solutions to address
the multi-stage challenges of growing loyal customers...
Read the article. Back to top
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Recruiting and Selection Tips to Ensure Successful Hiring
New Spotlight Article: We're still recruiting six people in one company and seventeen in another.
As the need for new recruits goes up, so does the need for quality selection
processes. This will ensure that we maintain staff quality. We never want to be
in a position where the quality of our hiring is compromised by the number of people
we need to hire.
These nine tips
will help you in recruiting and hiring a candidate
who will become a successful, contributing superior employee...
Read the article. Back to top
Play Well With Others: Develop Effective Work Relationships
New Spotlight Article: You can submarine your career and work relationships by the actions you take at work.
No matter your education, your experience, or your title, if you can't play well
with others, you will never accomplish your work mission. Effective work
relationships form the cornerstone for success and satisfaction with your job
and your career. They form the basis for promotion, pay increases, goal
accomplishment, and job satisfaction...
Read the article. Back to top
Big Brother Is Watching
Too few employees seem to understand that your company owns and has access to any communication you make from the company premises with the outside world.
Recently, several employees gave me a heads up that another employee was spending
most of her day surfing online job hunting, banking, and playing games. I asked
the Network Administrator to monitor her Internet use. Ultimately, the
employee received a disciplinary action as a result of her expenditure of work
time on non-work surfing.
I believe that the company's access to her computer records never entered her
mind. A recent study shows that up to a third of all large employers in the
United States and the United Kingdom are
monitoring employee email
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a big surprise given my experiences in a small company in which I have even had
to fire an employee recently for watching pornographic movies at work. You need
an effective
email and Internet policy...
Read the article. Back to top
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Why dream teams fail
It may be tempting to recruit all-stars and let 'em rip. Don't do it. Dream
teams often become nightmares of dysfunction.
In what universe is it even conceivable that the United States could fail to
reach the semifinals of something called the World Baseball Classic? Not only
fail to win, but could field a team that included Roger Clemens, Derek Jeter,
Alex Rodriguez, and Johnny Damon and then lose games to Mexico, South Korea,
and - wait for it - Canada? Yet it happened this year. How could a movie starring
Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and Julia Roberts, directed by
Steven Soderbergh, get tepid reviews and gross less worldwide than the star-free
My Big Fat Greek Wedding? That movie was Ocean's Twelve. And how could a
FORTUNE 500 company run by a brilliant former McKinsey consultant, paying fat
salaries to graduates of America's elite business schools, dissolve into fraud
and bankruptcy? It happened at Enron...
If someone tells you you're being recruited onto a dream team, maybe you should run.
In our team-obsessed age, the concept of the dream team has become irresistible.
But it's brutally clear that they often blow up. Why?...
Read the article. Back to top
How to build a great team
Harmony. Cooperation. Synchronized effort. It's difficult, but it can be
learned. Watch the great teams very closely - and then join one of your own.
FORTUNE Magazine) - In 1972, a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a
military court for a crime they didn't commit. These four men promptly escaped
from a maximum-security stockade to the Los Angeles underground. Today, still
wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a
problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire
the A-Team. The A-Team went off the air in 1987 - still wanted by the
government - but television has never produced a better blueprint for team
building. The key elements of its effectiveness: a cigar-chomping master of
disguise, an ace pilot, a devilishly handsome con man, a mechanic with a mohawk
and an amazingly sweet van. Those particulars might not translate to all
business settings. But clear definition of roles is a hallmark of
effective collaboration. So is small team size - though four is slightly below
the optimal number [of]...
Read the article. Back to top
RAZR'S edge
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How a team of engineers and designers defied Motorola's own rules to create
the cellphone that revived their company.
Hundreds of Motorolans jammed into a company auditorium in Schaumburg, Ill.,
last December to mourn the sudden death of their storyteller-in-chief.
It was a bittersweet moment for Motorola. Geoffrey Frost, the
56-year-old marketing genius responsible for the company's snappy "Hello Moto"
ad campaign, had died in his sleep of a heart attack two weeks earlier. Thanks
in no small part to Frost's dramatic flair, the proud but humbled company was
on the upswing for the first time in years. CEO Ed Zander, who eulogized Frost
that day, had promoted him to executive vice president only hours before he
died. Frost, you see, had become a symbol of Motorola's resurgence as an
unexpectedly stylish technology powerhouse.For a few engineers and industrial
designers attending the memorial service, though, Frost represented something more.
The celebration of his life drew attention to their greatest accomplishment,
the creation just two years earlier of the ultrathin, superhip RAZR V3, the
hottest Motorola phone in nearly a decade. Frost had been the phone's cheerleader;
he'd come up with its catchy four-letter name. He also had spun an appealing
narrative about how Motorola was cool again, and a myth about the slick
downtown Chicago design studio where the phone had taken shape.
The story behind the RAZR's creation. What the unsung team of heroes knew,
however, was that the actual story of how the RAZR came to be is even more
compelling than, if not quite as glamorous as, the version Frost had peddled...
Read the article. Back to top
How I make decisions
FORTUNE asked eight bold, creative people - from the next chairman of the Joint Chiefs, to the man who found Harry Potter, to the woman who picks next year's hip colors - to describe what guides their decision-making. Here is what they said...
Read the article. Back to top
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The Soft Skills of Global Managers
| While top performance usually is what gets global managers
their international assignments, soft skills may be
more important. An excerpt from Harvard Management Update. | |
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Among the rarest of traits is the ability to balance the need for consistent corporate practices
with the need for regional uniqueness.
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Despite nearly two decades of corporate globalization efforts, many
organizations still struggle to find managers who are comfortable and effective
in the increasingly global economy.
Most suffer both from a lack of cultural awareness when dealing with employees
and partners overseas and from a lack of experience managing increasingly
complex processes over long distances. Though a few insightful corporate giants
such as General Electric, Cisco Systems, and Intel have made strides in
developing successful global managers, many human resources leaders and
senior executives continue to be frustrated with the available skills and
resources. But why is it so difficult to develop effective global managers?
The answers are...
Read the article. Back to top
Feature Bloat: The Product Manager's Dilemma
| Consumers think they want all
the bells and whistles—until they actually use what
turns out to be a very complicated product. What's
a product manager to do? An excerpt from
Harvard Business Review. | |
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A company looking for repeat business should hesitate to pit its features against its future.
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Editor's Note: As anyone who has bought a cell phone over the last couple of
years can tell you, manufacturers love to cram as many capabilities into a product
as possible—cell phones are now also cameras, music players, and game platforms.
Why the rush toward "feature bloat"? Because consumers perceive value in
this Swiss-Army-Knife approach and will pay for the added utility. The problem
comes when the buyer actually starts to use the product. The increased complexity
makes for a very unhappy consumer, who will look to return the product or look
for another vendor in the future. This scenario was supported in a recent study
of consumers funded by the Marketing Science Institute. So what is a project manager
to do when faced with this paradox? The full results of the survey and implications
for companies were detailed in a recent Harvard Business Review article, part of
which is excerpted here. If you are a manager in a consumer products company,
our research presents you with a dilemma. Adding features improves the
initial attractiveness of a product but ultimately decreases customers'
satisfaction with it. So, what should you do? If you give people what they want,
they will suffer for it later, and that has three follow-on effects...
Read the article. Back to top
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Special Report
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Why Your Boss Is Overpaid
It is a typical "Dilbert" strip. The boss announces, "Our CEO has voluntarily
slashed his pay from $6 million per year to $4 million.
In a written statement, he said he wants to 'share the pain.' Do you feel better
now?" A downtrodden intern replies, "I make my underpants from sandwich bags."
But that's office life, is it not? Bosses make obscene sums of money, while
downtrodden cubicle slaves toil almost without reward. It might seem insane,
but economists have a surprise for us: The insanity reflects nothing more than
cool economic logic. There is method in the madness. The ugly truth is that your
boss is probably overpaid--and it's for your benefit, not his. Why? It might be
because he isn't being paid for the work he does but, rather, to inspire you. In
other words, we work our socks off in underpaying jobs in the hope that one day
we'll win the rat race and become overpaid fat cats ourselves. Economists call
this "tournament theory." After all, managers find it hard to spot an
excellent performance. It is a rare job where workers can be fairly paid according
to some objective criteria...
Read the article. Back to top
Most Common Resume Lies
From foolish fibs to full-on fraud, lying on your résumé is one of the most common ways that people stretch the truth.
But think twice before you ship off your next half-baked job application. Even
if your moral compass doesn't keep you from deceit, the fact that human resources
is on to the game should.The percentage of people who lie to potential employers
is substantial, says Sunny Bates, CEO of New York-based executive recruitment
firm Sunny Bates Associates. She estimates that 40% of all résumés aren't
altogether aboveboard. And this game of employment Russian roulette is getting
riskier and riskier. Almost 40% of human resources professionals surveyed last year
by the Society for Human Resource Management reported they've increased the amount
of time they spend checking references over the past three years...
Read the article. Back to top
Why Do The Rich Keep Working?
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Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote: "Don't waste life in doubts and fears; spend yourself
on the work before you, well assured that the right performance of this hour's
duties will be the best preparation for the hours and ages that will follow it."
Peter followed that advice for much of his career, but today he might beg to differ
with Emerson. ("Peter" is a pseudonym, but his story--and that of other
wealthy workaholics--is very real.) The son of a modest Texas farmer, Peter wanted
a bigger, grander life than his father led, and he worked hard to get it. By age 30,
he was running a regional bank and had a wife and two kids. Over the next two
decades, he moved his family 12 times--twice overseas. At 50, he was president of
a large financial services firm in New York City. He owned a restored Georgian in
a leafy suburb, a ski chalet in Telluride and a small compound in the Caribbean.
He traveled for work incessantly, with limousines and Gulfstreams at his beck and
call. His board connections led to bids at the most exclusive golf clubs. Peter
had become a bona-fide world beater. Then, one day, his wife of 30 years declared:
"I don't love you anymore. I need a new life." His kids piled on, saying he'd
never "been there" for them. After logging three-quarters of each year on the
road, Peter realized he had no real friends to confide in. He got divorced,
drank heavily and eventually left his job. Peter's net worth had crossed
the eight-figure mark years before his life unraveled. He could have hopped off
the hamster wheel with plenty of time and riches to spare. And yet he kept
running. "[That behavior] is rampant," says psychologist Robert Mintz, founder
of New Executive Strategies...
Read the article. Back to top
The Two-Hour Work-Life Balance Solution
In my book, Life 2.0, I wrote about professional refugees from the
urban coasts--places such as Manhattan and Silicon Valley, with their
obscenely high costs of living. I wrote about a couple from Silicon Valley,
two engineers working at Cisco Systems.
They traded their 800-square-foot Palo Alto, Calif., condo for two acres and
a 5,200-square-foot farmhouse in Iowa. She had a baby and stopped working. He
kept working, for Cisco, implausibly out there in the Iowa boonies, thanks
to high-speed Internet and teleconferencing. Take this job and ... move it. That
was my message. To the farm, the mountains, the beach--yes, even the beach. One
of my favorite stories in the book was of a couple who moved their high-tech
public relations business from San Francisco to...
Read the article. Back to top
The Price Of A Perfect Smile
Have a sneaking suspicion people aren't looking you in the eye when they talk
to you? You may be right--their gazes could be pointed downward. At your teeth.
In recent years, Americans have become more focused on the appearance of their
teeth, and it is less common to see someone's "natural" ivories. Consumers,
perhaps inspired by sparkling celebrity smiles in magazines and on television,
have become less tolerant of chipped choppers, wayward bicuspids and seemingly
any degree of dental discoloration. Dentists have also become savvier about
selling their cosmetic services--they are no longer doctors with drills and a
six-month bounty on your mouth, but consultants who can help you improve your smile...
Read the article. Back to top
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Top Ten Desktop Diversions, 2006
Take a break from the daily grind by scoping out your house in satellite view or sending a friend a monkey message or...
This time last year, we shared with readers a set of 10 amusing or instructive
online diversions, and we've been hearing about it ever since (as copies of our
Top Ten Time-Wasters list get passed from office drone to office drone). So this
year, we've come up with a new list of 10 ways (all free) to take a mental
break -- notice we didn't say goof off -- and recharge your batteries.
Supervisors, take note: Recharging one's batteries is a good thing. In the long
run, it makes employees more productive...
Read the article. Back to top
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When society gets in the way of sexuality
Culture clashes with human nature in the strangest of ways.
Nobody doubts that our culture influences our sexuality and sexual expression.
Germany seems to be a hotbed of pantyhose fetish Web sites, Japan has raised
the schoolgirl uniform to high art, and male parliamentarians getting spanked
can sometimes seem as British as high tea at Harrods. But our cultural influences
are not always good for us. That’s part of the “moral values” debate we’ve been
having in this country for 20 years or so. The question is, what can we do to keep
the culture from harming us? How can we resist the worst bits of it, and embrace
the best? While reading through some research on sex recently, one of the studies
I encountered popped out at me. It raised the question “What is the problem with
sex?” Sex is one of the most basic and fulfilling things we do. At least it should
be. Assuming we’re not suffering from biological or health trouble, sex is a
problem only when it clashes with the culture we’re in. Sometimes these clashes
can be personally dramatic. Last fall, in a psychiatric journal, British researcher
and clinician Nilamadhab Kar described the cases of two men...
Read the article. Back to top
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