Thursday, December 20, 2007

HBR Again...

Went back to this month's HBR for some insights and thought-provoking stuff. The article on storytelling was not as enchanting as I'd hoped it would be. The core message is that a story needs to be true (from both the teller's and audience's perspectives), and true to the moment and mission.

Read another article on Simplicity-Minded Management and came across something that appealed to me. ConAgra's CEO apparently announced a particular year's goals to be simplicity, accountability and collaboration and made these three constitute 50% of the criteria for managerial performance. Maybe my experience is limited but I've rarely seen or heard of such aspects being given importance. And even if there are some such parameters, the number-targets normally override those. Finally, even in organizations where there is an effort to focus on softer aspects, subjectivity (largely unfair in today's Dilbert world) never deserts the performance appraisal scene. Wonder how ConAgra handled it....the article, unfortunately, doesn't go into the details....

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