Scouting, Reconnaisance, and the Avant-garde

Seth Kahan — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 00:24:29 -0400

Maps are a good thing. They help you avoid difficult areas, or prepare for them. They make it possible to weigh the advantages of the long route vs the short one. And when you are faced with unplanned interruptions, they can get you where you need to go in short order.

Mapping the territory of change is easier said than done. An adequate representation must take into account varieties of intelligence: individual and collective, logistical and political, cultural and technical.

8 Ways to Juice Your Meetings

Seth Kahan — Sat, 30 May 2009 08:27:07 -0400

Meetings are a core ritual in today's work world. Everyone is trying to figure out how to do them better. There is this temptation to think, 'if only I follow this easy-to-understand guide, my meetings will once again become useful, under control, relevant, well-organized.'

7 Lessons for Getting Change Right

Seth Kahan — Fri, 22 May 2009 06:31:39 -0400

Between 1995 and 1997 I participated in two distinctly different change initiatives at the World Bank, both called Knowledge Management. The first one never took off. The second one changed the organization, and the world, in two short years, demonstrating how a bureaucratic, geographically distributed, multi-national, public sector organization can reinvent itself faster than anyone could have planned.

Shine Bright in Dark Times

Seth Kahan — Mon, 18 May 2009 08:12:02 -0400

This column is called Leading Change and is written for people taking the reins in their hands, whether by choice or not. In organizations today it is often the latter.

Circumstances are not what we would like them to be. Profits are down. People are being laid off. Leadership is forever asking us to do more with less. We are in the process of systematically and persistently discovering what can be dispensed with and what is critical.

There are days when simply making it through without a catastrophe feels like an accomplishment.

In a Tight Spot? Destroy Sacred Zombie Cows!

Seth Kahan — Tue, 12 May 2009 19:27:40 -0400

At this point in our economic distress cycle, most have trimmed so much fat they are in danger of cutting muscle. Yet, the challenges continue. A good friend who works at the Fed reminded me yesterday at our sons' soccer game that the Great Depression was a multi-dip experience. Jeez, I thought, what's a guy to do?

Getting Change Right thru High Performance Teams

Seth Kahan — Sun, 10 May 2009 15:20:15 -0400

I am excited about working with Steve Denning. So excited that I will be engaging him in a free teleseminar this Monday at noon to talk more about it. If others feel like I do, there'll soon be more.

In Pursuit of Elegance

Seth Kahan — Fri, 01 May 2009 21:24:11 -0400

Do you ever get the feeling something is missing? In the best instances, it often is.

"Grand elegance comes not out of control, but from chaos," said Matthew May when I spoke to him about his amazing new book, In Pursuit of Elegance: Why the Best Ideas Have Something Missing.

The World is in a Crucible, 4 Skills for Rising from the Ashes

Seth Kahan — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 17:36:28 -0400

When the world is in a crucible, new forms are birthed. The previous order is reshuffled. Some at the top disappear. Visionaries emerge from the periphery. America has long looked to the business world for its visionaries, but some come from other sources.

The Big Three Big-Top

Seth Kahan — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 19:22:47 -0400

With so many jobs in the balance and their fingers in so many pies I don't want any of the top three automakers, Chrysler, GM, or Ford, to fold up their tents. One way or another I want them get their acts together and turn themselves into viable businesses, contributing to America's economic engine.

An American Evolution

Seth Kahan — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 08:24:28 -0400

Many of us wish we could just go back in time, before all this turmoil started. Before the mortgages went bad, before the stock market tanked, before the massive layoffs. But, there is no going back, only forward. Whatever happens we will not be returning to the naiveté (or complicit denial) in which this arose.

This is a Phoenix and Ashes scenario.