Archives / September, 2010

Managing by Checklist

Managing by Checklist The Checklist Manifesto:  How to Get Things Right, started as an article in The New Yorker a few years ago by Atul Gawande and then turned into a book as well (book, Kindle).  I haven’t read the book; the story in the article is about life-and-death issues and how Intensive Care Units in hospitals work most successfully when they “manage by checklist” — they keep thousands of small steps performed by different people in order. The story is very telling for business as well and reminiscent of David Allen’s productivity books, Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity and Ready for Anything: 52 Productivity Principles for Work and Life. The reality as far as I’m concerned…

New URL for OnlyOnce

New URL for OnlyOnce A final reminder before I shut down the old Typepad site…this blog’s new URL is https://onlyonceblog.wpengine.com.

What Does a CEO Do, Anyway?

What Does a CEO Do, Anyway? Fred has a great post up last week in his MBA Mondays series caled “What a CEO Does.”  His three things (worth reading his whole post anyway) are set vision/strategy and communicate broadly, recruit/hire/retain top talent, and make sure there’s enough cash in the bank. It’s great advice.  These three are core job responsibilities of any CEO, probably of any company, any size.  I’d like to build on that premise by adding two other dimensions to the list.  Fred was kind enough to offer me a “guest blogger” spot, so this post also appears today on his blog as well. First, three corollaries – one for each of the three responsibilities Fred outlines. Setting…