Risk and risk perception are rarely equivalent, but if you lead an organization, yours must be one and the same.
I write this as worldwide cases of coronavirus surpass 10,000, most of which are in China, and are certain to rise. While a frightening pathogen to be sure, the fears that coronavirus has provoked in people in other countries are beyond rational, as are the changes in their behavior.
Artificial intelligence and expert systems in business can increase organizational capability, but at the same time, despite hype and promise, they are no silver bullet and can also dumb your organization down.
There is no percentage in tentativeness. Success in strategic change belongs only to those who step into the fray. My recent visit to Hanoi reminded me of this, and below I explain why.
There is nothing wrong with risk aversion.
It is only aversion to reasonable business risk that is a problem. When a business leader complains of excessive risk aversion in his staff, the underlying concerns are frequently personal. Continue reading
Saving pennies should never justify forgoing dollars of income.
The most successful business people I know never consider cost, and only consider ROI, particularly when hiring people and engaging services.
There is no path to excellence through paying market price. A consistent ROI focus results in rapid growth and success.
Fairness is not about equity of treatment. It is about equity of opportunity to exercise one’s talents. You can play favorites and there is nothing wrong with doing so, as long as it is the excellent that you favor.
Recently, when traveling first class on the Shinkansen (the Green Car), I noticed that conductors no longer check passengers tickets. It used to be that uniformed conductor, often female, would first distribute complimentary disposable wet towels to new passengers who had just boarded, noting their seat numbers, and then some minutes later return to the same seats to inspect tickets. Now they just distribute towels. No one checks the tickets. Continue reading
Many business executives are fretting about the weakening, and a lot of them were present at a yen forecast briefing I attended yesterday. Lots of charts and graphs, elaborate assumptions, and caveats. In the end, it boils down to the yen could up, or then again it could go down. Continue reading
