Cost / price and value are not the same thing. There is an old phrase “he understands the price of everything and the value of nothing” and that’s why effective people understand value. Reducing cost is easy, reduce headcount, outsource, use cheaper materials the options are endless. Anyone can do…
Men don’t multitask they say and that’s a good thing but so many people don’t understand why multitasking is not effective. For the avoidance of doubt evidence shows that women don’t either. Writing in the Harvard Business Review Paul Atchley Associate Professor Of Cognitive Psychology at the University Of Kansas…
Every time we take a decision to do something we automatically reject the opportunity to do something else. That’s why in order to be effective you need to understand opportunity cost. The opportunity cost of going to that meeting you don’t want to attend is getting some work completed. The…
Accounts were never designed for decision making. They are for recording and reporting upon historical transactions and that’s why effective leaders don’t use accounts to make decisions. Accounts are valuable for what they are designed to do and that is report past income and sunk costs. We have already discussed…
It is generally agreed that two of the largest wasters of time in modern life are email and meetings. Email will be the subject of another blog but first we need to know how to hold an effective meeting. Before we contemplate the meeting we need to stand back and…
Earnings Before Interest, Tax, Depreciation & Amortisation has been a popular method of judging a business for many, many years. It is a measure that is used by people who can’t be bothered to understand the business properly and want a quick answer. At a conference Warren Buffet and Charlie…
Increasingly we have choice. Choice in where we go on holiday, choice of what we eat, choice of what colour and spec of car we drive, choice of a gazillion tv channels but choice is the enemy of effectiveness. Having an objective and a priority defeats the enemy of choice…
No matter how open minded we are we can easily get into the habit of looking at things from one perspective, namely ours. that’s why we all need a regular brain and eye transplant. For the avoidance of doubt here I am speaking metaphorically not physically but in order to…
Joshua Becker the writer and presenter of minimalism ideas defines minimalism as “The intentional promotion of the things we most value in life by removing anything that distracts us from it”. In this respect there is a great deal of similarity between minimalism and effectiveness. The Ivy Lee Method https://www.wellsassoc.co.uk/the-ivy-lee-method-how-to-have-an-effective-day/which we…
It’s an old joke. How many psychologists does it take to change a light bulb? Answer, only one but the bulb really has to want to change. This sums up the life of those of us in the effectiveness consultancy game and indeed any other form of consultancy. It is…