By Heather Campbell >> Does your organisation aim to have open, honest communication? I’ll bet it does. It would be a rare – and somewhat foolhardy – leadership team whose stated preference was for dishonest, cloak-and-dagger interactions instead. So, given the prevalence of good intention, how come so many businesses are far closer to the latter than the former? What gets in the way? Open, honest communication is not just a nice-to-have, it’s a business essential. Without it, leaders make decisions based ...

By Heather Campbell >> Although I’m not a close follower of Australian politics, I was intrigued to watch Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s impassioned speech about misogynist behaviour on the part of Opposition Leader Tony Abbott (http://youtu.be/nRKpa37cOPk). As the first female Australian PM, it seems that Gillard was ready to share some home truths in this powerful speech. And from the expression on the Opposition Leader’s face, I think he was caught on the back foot. What struck me most about this speech ...

Today, in companies all around the world, time, money and energy are being wasted. Lots of things cause this – breakdowns in IT systems; procedural errors; production mistakes that necessitate remanufacture (to name but a few). But one of the things that costs businesses far too much – and that is within each and every person’s control to do something about – is the fragile human ego. How can the ego lead to waste in organisations? Very easily and very ...

By Heather Campbell >> If you’re a good manager, you let your team members implement ideas and try out new things without micromanaging them. You delegate tasks that create interesting opportunities and develop people. You know this means sometimes things aren’t going to be done the way you want, and that occasionally things will go wrong. But you wholeheartedly believe wise words such as “the person who never made a mistake never learned anything.” And most of the time everything is fine; ...

By Heather Campbell >> Want to be a clear, concise communicator? Here’s a simple tip that guarantees you will take a step towards that goal: cut out unnecessary adjectives and adverbs – usually words like very, really, absolutely and extremely, although not limited to these. But even if you are addicted to jazzing-up your communication with a few extra words that don’t add much value, there are certain combinations that should be banned. These are the ones that are nonsensical, rather than just ...

By Heather Campbell >> Who’s the David Brent in your company? And, if you’re completely honest with yourself, which of his particular management foibles do you secretly recognise as having been guilty of demonstrating on occasion? It’s ten years since David Brent hit our screens in The Office, one of the most successful comedy series the BBC has screened. Most of us cringed in embarrassment as much as laughed, as we recognised so much of the truth in his antics. And it’s ...