Tools, techniques and approaches that help get things done
I’ve been doing some work. Just a little consulting, and I’m enjoying it. Not because I am chasing the work, but because it’s good to be helpful. Good advice unfettered by the need to find the next job or grow a business. It’s probably what I always really wanted to do but life and other…
As published in The Mandarin December 3, 2024 by Kiah MD John Glenn If I had realised this when I first started out my life would have been much easier – everywhere! I would have got more of what I wanted to achieve with much less angst. At home, at school, at work – did…
As published in The Mandarin November 1, 2024 by Kiah MD John Glenn Most of us have to get stuff done – at least at work! For some, it’s simply done by managing a process. Start at the beginning, work through the process, end up with an outcome. For most who read this, life is…
As published in The Mandarin October 29, 2024 by Kiah MD John Glenn It’s de rigueur to run performance-based contracts. Deliver the agreed performance, get paid. Don’t meet the performance standard, get paid less. Should make sense, but does it? Do the job, get paid In a business-to-business (B2B) relationship, if a company delivers faster,…
As published in The Mandarin, 28 May 2024 by Kiah Managing Director John Glenn I ran a short course recently for a client on how to engage consultants and contractors. Feedback asked that I expand on how to better manage them once they had been engaged. A good question. Preparation is always key to success….
As published in The Mandarin, 26 February 2024 by Kiah MD John Glenn The public and private sectors are different, and not everything translates well, but some things do if adapted. We know – we do a lot of work at the intersection of the two and many of us have worked inside both public…
Negotiation is the process of trading something of value for something you value more. Deadlock is where there is no movement. It happens when creating a contract, during delivery, around change proposals. It happens within organisations – particularly where groups must work together but have different agendas or outcomes. Sometimes deadlock is real – there…
Some years ago I did a Harvard program called “strategic deal-making for business”. I followed on with a master’s unit in strategy at Edinburgh Business School that focused on strategic deals. I started to talk about it with our, mostly, public sector clients. Almost all of them said they “don’t do deals” because they are…
We are seeing a plethora of “Program Offices” being established – if you haven’t got a “Program” you’re not in the game. But a Program is not without cost. You only want one if it adds real value, and if you do want one you had better know what it is that you want. Caveat…
Throughout our work we engage a variety of management consulting and legal services, either directly or through our client. Regularly we are handed the results of previous engagements, too often accompanied with statements like: ‘this is OK but not as useful as we had hoped’, or ‘doesn’t quite answer the question’. We confine our observations…
