Stuck between mediocrity and excellence

Why is taking the high road so hard?   It's because we are ruled by emotion.  Everyone demands a certain level of respect and professionalism.  When we feel that trust has been broken, that we've been disrespected, or the level of professionalism is just plain amateurish, our natural instincts to say, "Hold my stuff, I'm about to bust someone..."  Other triggers that make us want to take the jacket off and put on the brass knuckles include--  playing office politics in a self-interested manner, not communicating the whole story- only the part that is self-promoting, and taking credit for other people's work.  For once, just once, take a day and be real. Be direct. Be transparent. Be authentic. Show some vulnerability.  There would be a lot less drama and a lot more productivity in the workplace. 

You know that consulting services have become more of a commodity when every local, boutique, and big professional services firm has a template for everything .  Software selection? Have template.  Requirements gathering? Have template.  Merger and acquisition due diligence? Have templates.  Strategic growth initiative? Repurposed a couple of templates.  For once, let's not try to fit a business problem into a predetermined template.  Try some original thinking. Try to diagnose the problem. Try to simplify how you get to something valuable without driving yourself through a bunch of non-value added steps just because you have to fill the template out. It will be cathartic. Trust me.

Today was the first time I've heard the term, "leadership bandwidth." Leadership bandwidth is when your company is growing rapidly and there aren't enough leaders within the organization to keep up with the growth. In order to manage the growth, as a founder of a company with this problem, you have two choices: Hire from the outside Develop leaders from within If you are part of a professional services company with an up or out model, leadership bandwidth is not really a problem.  You either become a leader or not. It's because the model forces apprenticeship and mentoring (as best that it can), lays out clearly what the criteria for progression is, and weeds out the perpetual operators from the future Partners in the Firm.  I think the root cause of a leadership bandwidth problem is that you can't turn operators and really, really good managers into entrepreneurs - in the context of professional services.  After all, the end game ...

A Pole In management consulting, the clients that you actually  work with are not the ones that agreed to your services. A typical scenario is that a senior leader has made the decision to conduct a "study," and then that leader tells the consulting firm to talk to all of his/her direct reports and others to gather all of the information required to conduct the study.  Unfortunately, the common reaction by all of the direct reports (and others) is one of fight or fight - because flight isn't really an option.  What I've discovered in working for multiple professional services firms is that there is a market in working for clients that nobody wants to work for.  If you are a consultant with values and are doing it because you genuinely want to  help your client get something accomplished, working for these types of clients becomes an opportunity or challenge -- like in a climbing Mt. Everest sense of accomplishment kind of way.  More often t...