Rodger Dean Duncan's Blog, page 13
August 4, 2020
We Really Are ‘In This Together”
Let’s face it. We’re living in a moment of earth-shaking turmoil.
Global pandemic. Economic anxiety. Concerns for social justice being drowned out by rioters, looters and fire-bombers. Politicians opting for sound bites over honest dialogue. A “cancel culture” determined to shame and intimidate people into silence. Fragile trust everywhere.
Not a good recipe for teamwork.
If there were ever a time for collaboration, this is it. In fact, without collaboration—as my grandfather would say—our goose...
July 25, 2020
Compliance Or Commitment? Good Leaders Inspire Both
A really smart guy once said that the secret of change is to focus all of your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new.
That was Socrates, the Greek philosopher who knew a thing or two about learning to adapt to emerging circumstances.
In a world disrupted by a pandemic, an economic downturn, and social unrest, “adapting” is required of us all.
Shawn Murphy is uniquely qualified to give us some answers to questions that—until recently—we may not have even thought to ask. He has n...
July 18, 2020
How Will Social Distancing Affect Our Need To Belong?
The marketplace disruption caused by Covid-19 has implications beyond mere numbers. After spending many months in the work from home mode, millions of people are recalibrating their futures.
So are many companies. Facebook, for example, will permanently shift tens of thousands of jobs to remote work. Hundreds of other organizations around the globe are considering similar moves.
Sure, this means that a lot of people will now work in their pajamas and rely on teleconferencing to interact with the...
June 26, 2020
Struggling With Change? Try Leading From the Future
“I look to the future because that’s where I’m going to spend the rest of my life.”
George Burns offered that insight as a comedy line. But it applies to strategic planning more than he likely ever imagined.
Business people everywhere are struggling to recover from disruptions and tensions caused by a perfect storm of pandemic and social unrest. For most, life will never be the same as it once was.
That reality holds opportunity as well as risk. Now, perhaps more than ever, could be a good time ...
June 23, 2020
Why ‘Outsourcing’ Your Decisions Can Be Risky
Decisions. Decisions. Decisions.
We make hundreds of them every day. Most are relatively fleeting and inconsequential. What difference does it really make whether you poach some eggs or opt for a bowl of oatmeal for breakfast?
Some people seem to struggle with even the most simple decisions. From the movie You’ve Got Mail you may recall the Tom Hanks line: “The whole purpose of places like Starbucks is for people with no decision-making ability whatsoever to make six decisions to buy one cup of ...
June 15, 2020
What Will the Post-COVID ‘New Normal’ Look Like?
Steve Jobs, the genius behind much of Apple’s ramp-up to become one of the world’s most profitable companies, said innovation is the ability to see change as an opportunity, not as a threat.
Another really smart guy named Steve has plenty to say on the subject. He’s Steve Brown, the author of The Innovation Ultimatum: How Six Strategic Technologies Will Reshape Every Business in the 2020s.
This Steve is the former futurist (an interesting combination of words) at Intel Corporation. Today he run...
June 8, 2020
7 Habits: A Classic Somehow Gets Even Better With Age
There’s a lot of talk nowadays about “uncertain times.” It’s a phrase often denoting the harsh and burdensome changes wrought by a global pandemic.
But “uncertain times” seems to imply a lack of control. I prefer the term “unscripted times.” To me, that conjures up images of the people we see in business, science, medicine, education, and other fields who are knuckling down to make the most of a really rotten situation. Rather than succumb to victimhood, they take charge. They work with what the...
May 26, 2020
You Can’t Do It All, And That’s Perfectly Okay
“Put first things first” is one of those self-improvement prescriptions with a very high “Oh, duh!” factor. As in “Oh, duh! Everybody knows that.”
Trouble is, almost everybody ignores the prescription.
Sure, most people know that family is (or at least should be) more important than work. Sure, most people know that physical exercise, good sleep, and a sensible diet are crucial for good health. Sure, most people know that the best relationships are built on real conversation and interaction, not...
May 19, 2020
Want To Innovate? Get Comfortable With Discomfort
What do you do if you feel you’re getting ripped off by a service that’s crucial to your business? And what if you’re sure a lot of other people are equally disadvantaged and disgusted?
If you’re Jim McKelvey, you start a new company that not only solves the problem but blossoms into an industry-changing phenomenon.
A short version of this story started in McKelvey’s St. Louis glassblowing studio. A lady came in to buy a piece of artwork that had been gathering dust on the shelf. When it came t...
May 11, 2020
An Upside To Hard Times: Innovation Blooms
MacGyver, you probably thought, was a television show from 30 years ago. And it was. But MacGyver is also a verb, now officially recognized as such by the Oxford English Dictionary.
The title character from the TV series was a secret agent who always managed to improvise his way out of critical situations. MacGyver’s extraordinary knack for unconventional problem solving made for good entertainment.
It also affected the colloquial American English lexicon. Today, to “MacGyver” a solution to a pr...
