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In-Depth Book Reviews

Absurd!: We Want Not What We are Missing, but More of What We Already Have

by Ron Potter February 6, 2017

Feedback. That word alone strikes fear in some and appreciation in others. The word was originally coined during the early days of rocketry. When the rocket scientist pioneers were trying to figure out how to design, build and fly rockets, they quickly found that they could generate enough thrust to make the rockets fly. What they couldn’t do was hit a target. They had to spend more time and brain power developing what they termed “feedback systems” so they could adjust the thrusters to hit the desired target.

If you look around any corporate team, thrust is not usually the problem. There is enough education, experience and drive to accomplish almost any goal. The problem is aligning all of that thrust to hit the desired target. Feedback is needed.

So why do we resist or ignore feedback? Farson tells us “One study shows that people wanted for themselves not something that was missing in them and that others might think important to them to have – but more of what was already their special attribute. When people described what they wanted for themselves, they seldom mentioned qualities that others would later suggest were missing from their personality or performance.”

Leadership teams are filled with people who have been good at what they do. It’s their expertise, knowledge, and productivity that has rewarded them through the years and brought them to a leadership role. The problem is that leadership requires trust, influence, and alignment of goals. Farson puts it this way “The difficulty for all of us is that our absorption with what we do well may blind us to what will enable us to do even better. The particular challenge for managers is to remain mindful that organizations can set themselves up for trouble when they rely solely on the things they are already doing well and fail to see what they really need to do.”

We seldom need feedback on our technical skills or expertise. We need feedback to get better at leadership which includes building trust, aligning goals and creating a commitment to the overall good of the team and company.

Feedback is required to hit a target. What’s your target? Are you soliciting the needed feedback?

I’m continuing my series on an in-depth look at a wonderful little book that’s twenty years old this year. The title is Management of the Absurd by Richard Farson. You may want to consider dropping back and reading the previous blog posts about ABSURD! I think it will put each new one in great context.

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Absurd!Blog In-Depth Book Reviews

Absurd!: We Think We Want Creativity or Change, but We Really Don’t

by Ron Potter January 30, 2017

Clients often ask me to come in and help them with their creativity. The market place is changing, new more nimble competitors are popping up. Their clients are asking for a more creative approach (although that is usually a code word for reducing prices). The leaders are asking every team to think and act more creatively.

However, my first words to the team under the creative pressure is that your leaders are using the word “creative” but they don’t really want that. They’ll resist your ideas every time. What they are really asking is to be more innovative. I’ll go into the difference of those words in a minute but it needs to be said here that the real need may indeed be creativity, it’s just that the leaders will still resist anything beyond innovation.

Creativity and Innovation: What’s the Difference?

I first learned about the difference between these words from Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan in their book Execution. Creativity is blue sky, it’s outside the normal boundaries, it’s breaking the rules. Innovation is executing what you do well faster than the competition. Regardless of the words used, corporate leaders are usually (not always) looking for better, faster execution, not untried, unproven, rule-breaking creativity.

The “Problem” with Creativity

Our author Farson says “Creative ideas are relatively easy to elicit. To implement an idea is a tougher task. The fundamental problem with creativity is that every new idea requires the manager and the workforce to undergo significant change. Real creativity always violates the rules. That is why it is so unmanageable and that is why, in most organizations, when we say we desire creativity we really mean manageable creativity. We don’t mean raw, dramatic, radical creativity that requires us to change.”

I think manageable creativity is what Bossidy and Charan were talking about when they defined innovation. The challenge for all corporate leaders is to be clear about what is needed and what the team is being asked to accomplish. If it’s innovation, then clearly define what part of the system you’re trying to simplify and execute faster. If it’s true creativity, then the leaders must start thinking more creatively themselves. And creativity always requires letting go of control. That’s a tough one for corporate leaders.

History has shown us that true creativity usually happens in small autonomous groups. Think skunk works. Farson says “When a company wants to stimulate creativity, it may need to organize quite differently. Companies have learned that scale is the enemy of creativity and are finding ways to break into smaller more flexible units.”

Skunkworks require a great deal of risk tolerance. But the alternative may be fatal. If you truly need creativity to survive, take the risk.

This post is a continuation of my series on an in-depth look at a wonderful little book that’s twenty years old this year. The title is Management of the Absurd by Richard Farson. You may want to consider dropping back and reading the previous blog posts about ABSURD! I think it will put each new one in great context.

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Absurd!Blog In-Depth Book Reviews

Absurd!: Big Changes are Easier to Make Than Small Ones

by Ron Potter January 16, 2017

I’m continuing my series on an in-depth look at a wonderful little book that’s twenty years old this year. The title is Management of the Absurd by Richard Farson. You may want to consider dropping back and reading the previous blog posts about ABSURD! I think it will put each new one in great context.

Farson starts this section by identifying C. Northcote Parkinson, author of the famed Parkinson’s law, as the godfather to the idea of management of the absurd! I guess if you were going to be the godfather of something, this would be a fun one. A couple of Parkinson’s famous quotes include:

Work expands to fill the time available.
The time a committee takes to discuss an item on the agenda is inversely proportional to the amount of money involved.

Good humor works because it contains a grain or foundation of truth.

He also includes one of my favorite quotes from Henry Kissinger, “The reason university faculty discussions and disputes are so time-consuming and acrimonious is that the stakes are so low.”

Big changes are easier to make than small ones. I’ve seen this at play a few times in my career. Farson is careful to point out that making a big change doesn’t necessarily make it appropriate to the strategy. It’s not just big but it’s big in the right direction. But, given a prudent decision process, it’s often easier to jump right into the big change than move forward with incremental changes.

A couple of places where I’ve observed this working well included the move of a corporate headquarters. There was a reasonable argument for moving to one of the corporations existing facilities and expanding as a cost saving argument. But, part of the reason (a big part) for moving the headquarters was to kick-start a new corporate culture. This had a better chance of happening with a move for everyone to an entirely new environment. Big cost but big impact.

People changes is another place where big changes can create change better than smaller changes. Sometimes it’s a complete reorganization. Sometimes it’s promoting someone who has consistently shown great promise or leadership but may be down the ladder on the org chart or in a completely different role. Probable the best HR professional I have worked with had been the Chief Operations Officer but was called on to fill the void of the HR role when health issues required a change. Bold and unexpected move.

Another people change is dealing with what Robert Quinn in his book Deep Change calls the Tyranny of Competence. This is when an individual is seen to have such a high level of competence in a certain role that no changes are made even when there seem to be numerous character or leadership deficiencies. In the few cases where I’ve worked with managers who made changes (usually asking the person to leave the company) it’s amazing how much competence and creativity came out of the organization that was no longer suppressed by the tyranny.

If a change is needed and has been well deliberated, consider making a bold move rather than incremental. Bold moves often have a better chance of success.

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Absurd!Blog In-Depth Book Reviews

Absurd!: The Better Things Are, the Worse They Feel

by Ron Potter January 9, 2017

I’m continuing my series on an in-depth look at a wonderful little book that’s twenty years old this year. The title is Management of the Absurd by Richard Farson. You may want to consider dropping back and reading the previous posts about ABSURD! I think it will put each new one in great context.

Most of us know Abraham Maslow from his Hierarchy of Needs. However, I’ve enjoyed his work called Eupsychian Management: The attitude of self-actualizing people to duty, work, mission, etc. This was written when he was working as a management consultant.

Farson has also picked up on this work as he devotes much of this chapter to Maslow’s concepts around the meaning of complaining. Here’s what Farson learned from Maslow:

Abraham Maslow advised managers to listen not for the presence or absence of complaints, but rather to what people were complaining about. Here he unpacks a hierarchy of needs, of sorts, in an organization:

Least healthy organizations

You can expect to hear low-order grumbles – complaints about working conditions, about what he called “deficiency needs.” (“It’s too hot in here.”, “I don’t get paid enough.”, etc.)

Healthier organizations

Healthier organizations would have high-order grumbles – complaints that extend beyond the self to more altruistic concerns: “Did you hear what happened to the people over in Plant Two? They really got cheated.” Or “We need better safety standard around here.”

Very healthy organization

A healthy organization would have “metagrumples” – complaints having to do with needs for self-actualization: “I don’t feel that my talents are being utilized.” Or, “I don’t feel that I’m in on things enough around here.”

There is the absurdity. Only in an organization where people are in on things and where their talents are being utilized would it occur to someone to complain about those issues.

Absurd as it seems, the way to judge your effectiveness is to assess the quality of the discontent you engender, the ability to produce movement from low-order to high-order discontent.

The paradox is that improvement in human affairs leads not to satisfaction but to discontent, albeit a higher-order discontent than might have existed before. Why is this phenomenon important to understand? Because the motivation for continuing change and growth comes from the development of higher-quality discontent, then moving on to the solution of more important issues.

This observation by Maslow and Farson has served me well many times in my consulting career. Many times, the leaders I work with just don’t seem to understand why people are still complaining after periods of great success for both the individuals and the company. When I ask them the question “What are they complaining about?” We begin to see tremendous growth taking place because people are now complaining about much higher-level needs.

People will always find something to complain about. They’re on a journey and they haven’t arrived yet. It starts at a very young age when you kids start asking “Are we there yet?” twenty minutes after your journey began.

I like Farson’s closing remark, “Pity the poor manager who can’t imagine how a well-intended action led to such grousing.” What are they grousing about? That’s the question that will clue you in on your leadership journey’s progress.

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Absurd!Blog In-Depth Book Reviews

Absurd!: Individuals are Almost Indestructible, but Organizations are Very Fragile

by Ron Potter November 3, 2016

I’m continuing my series on an in-depth look at a wonderful little book that’s twenty years old this year. The title is Management of the Absurd by Richard Farson. You may want to consider dropping back and reading the previous blogs about ABSURD! I think it will put each new one in great context.

The paragraph in this chapter that rang true for me says, “Individuals are very strong, but organizations are not. Part of the reason why we don’t recognize the vulnerability of organization is that we have a hard time believing that the relationships which make them work are real. Even psychologists sometimes think of organizations as simply collections of individuals. But relationships – the bonds between people – are very real, and they have a life of their own. To a great extent they determine the behavior of an organization and the people within it.”

In my leadership book, Trust Me I talk about a couple of leaders:

These two leaders developed a very tight and trusting relationship with each member of their teams. Everyone talked of them as “great” leaders and the kind of bosses for whom employees would do anything. However, these two leaders would send one or more of their direct-reports off on a mission that was bound to conflict with a similar mission of another direct-report. The leaders, however, would never make any effort to help the direct-reports reconcile the conflicts. They would just let them bang against one another until one was victorious—Newton’s Cradle.

These leaders assumed the people who worked for them were strong and resilient, which indeed they were, but they had no sense that the relationship between the people was what actually created the company and culture. Their effort often destroyed relationships.

This issue also speaks to the concept of developing and growing teams. There is a model of team development that says teams move from Centralized to Transitional to Partnering and finally Highly Empowered: Self-Directed teams. The very first step from Centralized to Transitional speaks of this issue. Centralized teams can be viewed in the traditional hub and spoke model. The leader is the hub in the middle with a spoke extending out to each of the direct reports. However, there is no connection between the direct reports. As teams get better and better the connection between the team members becomes stronger, more reliable and more trusted until finally the team is functioning well as a single unit.

Trusting relationships are the key. If you’re not building TEAM, you’re not being a great leader.

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Absurd!Blog In-Depth Book Reviews

Absurd!: Organizations That Need Help Most Will Benefit from it Least

by Ron Potter October 17, 2016

I’m continuing my series on an in-depth look at a wonderful little book that’s twenty years old this year. Management of the Absurd by Richard Farson. You may want to consider dropping back and reading the previous blogs about ABSURD! I think it will put each new one in great context.

One tag line that I’ve always lived by since I started my consulting business is “I only work with companies that want to be helped.” I guess I learned early that I can’t teach anyone anything, I can only help them learn. If they’re not interested in learning, I will never be effective at teaching them anything. In fact, it’s always amazed me that the companies and individual leaders that look like they need very little help are always the ones that will dig the deepest into the learning in order to improve in any way they can.

Our author really clarifies this with a couple of statements. “Deeply troubled companies don’t usually seek help. And when they do, they have a hard time benefiting from it. The situation parallels one in psychotherapy. Psychotherapy is usually ineffective for severely mentally ill people; it works better for well people. The healthier you are psychologically, or the less you may seem to need to change, the more you can change.”

This statement reflects exactly what I’ve seen consistently over decades of consulting work. The healthiest leaders with the greatest self-esteem (comfortable with who they are) are the ones that want to learn and improve the most.

Farson goes on to state “The consultant’s essential role is to hold up a mirror to the organization, reflecting the processes that may be limiting its growth. As might be expected, the most critical issues center around leadership, not performance down the line. Small wonder, then, that leaders of troubled companies tend to shy away from calling in consultants. They know that they will have to do some serious self-examination.”

Daniel Goleman wrote his Emotional Intelligence many years ago. While there’s never been any correlation found between IQ and success, there is almost complete correlation between EQ (Emotional Quotient) and success. At the base of your Emotional Intelligence or Emotional Quotient is self-awareness. And more interesting is that self-awareness can’t be fully understand simply from within yourself. Self-awareness requires feedback. Are you open to feedback? Without it you’re not even going to be self-aware enough to even know you need help or to seek out the help you need.

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Absurd!Blog In-Depth Book Reviews

Absurd!: The Person or Group that Presents the Problem

by Ron Potter October 10, 2016

I’m continuing my series on an in-depth look at a wonderful little book that’s twenty years old this year. The title is Management of the Absurd by Richard Farson. You may want to consider dropping back and reading the previous posts about ABSURD! I think it will put each new one in great context.

I’ve had the opportunity to work with one of the better known “Turn Around” companies. A Turn Around company is not even invited to the table until things are in dire straits. The hiring company, in spite of their best efforts is facing bankruptcy or takeover in a relative short period of time. The Turn Around company is paid very well to turn things around is a relative short period of time to avoid the tragedy.

I asked the consultant to explain their process to me to see what they do differently than what the management has already tried. Here is the outline presented:

Start with the bottom of the organization, the people who are closest to the problem.

They ask the people who are closest to the problem to come up with the proposal to fix the problem and them give them the authority and accountability to fix it.

Teach the Leaders of the Organization how to say “yes”

While the people closest to the problem are preparing the proposal the consultant is teaching the leaders of the organization to nod their heads in affirmation and say yes to the proposal. They’re teaching them to grant authority and accountability to those who will accomplish the work

All of that made sense to me but then I asked what they did with middle management. His response was “We ignore them.” They felt that middle managers just got in the way of a quick turn around and they didn’t have the time or energy to deal with them, overcome their loss of control or educate them in good management practices. They simply ignored them.

Our author makes another profound observation in this section of the book when he says “Participative management depends on trusting the group. Most managers simply don’t have that confidence and can’t take the time to develop the trust.” To me, this was the key. If the leaders and managers of the company had taken the time and made the effort to develop trust in their groups, they would have avoided the need for a Turn Around company to save them.

Leaders that build trust and have trust in their organizations are very different from the top-down, management and control types of leaders. Which are you? Will you need that Turn Around company someday? I trust not.

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Absurd!Blog In-Depth Book Reviews

Absurd!: Every Act is a Political Act

by Ron Potter September 26, 2016

I’m continuing my series on an in-depth look at a wonderful little book that’s twenty years old this year. The title is Management of the Absurd by Richard Farson. You may want to consider dropping back and reading the previous posts about ABSURD! I think it will put each new one in great context.

Reading this one again was like receiving a body blow. Not so much for the leadership and management perspective but because of the headlines of our newspapers almost every day. Remember, this was written twenty years ago. These statements are not prompted by today’s headlines but look closely at what our author is saying.

“Fighting for the rights of special groups has contributed to an erosion of civility that none of us anticipated. When people are treated as representatives of special groups, society is fragmented.”

“It may even be that progress on rights has been made at the expense of the common welfare. Enmity grows between groups at they compete for rights. “

“Rather than looking after community, each group looks after itself. The common welfare suffers.”

From a business perspective I think we deal with this issue (sometimes well and sometimes not) by emphasizing the team. Many leaders try to optimize each aspect of the business but in so doing set up (and sometimes even encourage) competition between divisions. In the end this never works well. The concept of systems thinking and optimizing the whole rather than the individual parts always works better. To quote Bo Shembechler, the football coach at Michigan when I was in school, “The Team, The Team, The Team.” The name of my business is Team Leadership Culture which puts building team at the forefront of any good organization.

I always keep my comments directed at the business world but this one has so many implications related to the community issues of our day. Farson simply says “It may even be that progress on rights has been made at the expense of the common welfare.” I do worry that all of our labels that start with (fill in the blank) “________ American” lead us down this path.

The issue in the business world seems so simple and trivial by comparison, just take off your functional hat and put on your company hat. The Team, The Team, The Team. Team first.

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Absurd!Blog In-Depth Book Reviews

Absurd!: PRAISE WILL GET YOU NOWHERE!

by Ron Potter August 18, 2016

I’m continuing my series on an in-depth look at a wonderful little book that’s twenty years old this year. The title is Management of the Absurd by Richard Farson. You may want to consider dropping back and reading the previous posts about ABSURD! I think it will put each new one in great context.

Praising People Does Not Motivate Them

Praise is very useful indeed as a lubricant to help keep our human relations in good working order. For one thing, people expect it. This is the one area where our author praises praise. People do enjoy being appreciated and it does improve relationships. But as a motivator, not so much.

One area in which we can really see and almost feel this principle at work is when the work of a high- status person is praised by a low-status person; it is often seen as presumptuous or even insulting. We’ve all been there and cringed at the moment, thinking of the person providing the praise as really sucking up or being completely unaware of how inappropriate their praise is coming across.

In the opposite direction giving praise establishes the fact that the giver is in a position to sit in judgment of the receiver. Receiving praise in this circumstance can feel very threatening or at a minimum very uncomfortable even if the praise is positive. We get uncomfortable when we’re being judged; good or bad.

So how do we motivate if praise doesn’t work? We take the time to get engaged. We learn, listen, understand, ask useful or sometimes naïve questions to stimulate our thinking. Our author says, “What really does release creativity and promote achievement is when a manager takes the time to get involved in the employee’s work – learning what direction the work is taking, the problems and possibilities it presents, the way the employee is dealing with the task. But involvement is demanding and time-consuming, which probably explains why many manager resort to praise as a substitute, hoping that it will accomplish the same results.”

Learning, listening and sharing. Dealing with the other person as a smart, whole, capable human being. Now that’s motivating. When someone cares enough to take the time to listen, learn and understand it really engages people.

Too many leaders are focused on “doing” rather than growing. If you only use praise and criticism, you’ll find yourself falling farther and farther behind because you’ve not taken the time to connect with your people on a real human level by getting engaged with them and their work. Don’t just praise, motivate!

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Absurd!Blog In-Depth Book Reviews

Absurd!: Active Listening Doesn’t Work

by Ron Potter July 15, 2016

Here’s what does work

I’m continuing my series on an in-depth look at a wonderful little book that’s twenty years old this year. The title is Management of the Absurd by Richard Farson. You may want to consider dropping back and reading the previous blogs about ABSURD! I think it will put each new one in great context.

Listening is More Difficult than Talking

I’ve never liked the concept of “Active Listening.” It seemed to me that people who were taught the technique simply repeated what they heard so that the speaker knew they had been understood. However, when you repeat back what you heard you sound like a parrot and aren’t really explaining how or what you heard based on what the speaker was trying to express.

One of Farson’s statements in this chapter really hit a cord with me: “Carl Rogers and I introduced the phrase “active listening” in 1955. I would not write such a piece today. The main reason is that I no longer believe that genuine listening should be reduced to a technique.” (Emphasis is mine)

I’ve always asked my clients (and myself): Are you listening with the intent to respond or are you listening with the intent to understand? If we’ll admit it, most of us listen with the intent to respond. I know I’m doing this most of the time. While the other person is speaking I’m creating my checklist:

I agree with that, I’ll reinforce it.
I don’t agree with that and here’s how I’ll counter it.
I can think of at least three points they haven’t even considered yet that I’ll point out as soon as they take a breath.
etc.

Rather than truly listening in an attempt to understand what the other person is trying to deeply express, we’re getting ready to either reinforce or counter in our own words, knowing that as soon as the other person hears our point of view, they’ll understand and agree with us.

Author Farson quickly counters that belief with “Research tells us that people are more likely to change when we reverse the flow of communication, that is, when people are not talked at but when they themselves have a chance to talk.” People are more likely to change when they have a chance to talk! Wow, there’s a paradigm shift for most of us. We don’t really convince other people, they convince themselves when we help them talk through the issue by listening and asking questions that demonstrate that we’re trying to understand!

Farson also points out that “Good listening is inordinately difficult, even for experienced listeners.” Listening takes a lot of energy. I don’t have the energy to stay in that mode all of the time, but when I do shift into my “listening to understand” mode it’s amazing how much people respond to that experience. I often spend several hours talking/listening one-on-one with my clients. If I’ve been in the right listening mode, many of them have said to me “You now know more about me than anyone.” That statement in itself is absurd but it’s amazing how different people feel when you actually listen to them.

While Farson makes many great points in this chapter, I want to close this blog on one particular thought that he put forth, “Listening to others means having to be alert to one’s own defensiveness, to one’s impulse to want to change others. That requires a level of self-awareness, even self-criticism that is often not easy to endure.” Listening requires humility. When we really listen we have to question our own understand and perspective on an issue. We may even begin to change our own mind. So while research says that people change when you give them a chance to talk, be aware that you yourself may change by being a better listener. Win-win.

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Absurd!Blog In-Depth Book Reviews

Absurd!: The One thing you can do that helps solve most difficult issues!

by Ron Potter June 24, 2016

I’m continuing my series on an in-depth look at a wonderful little book that’s twenty years old this year. The title is Management of the Absurd by Richard Farson. You may want to consider dropping back and reading the previous posts about ABSURD! I think it will put each new one in great context.

In Communication, Form is More Important Then Content

I often find myself working with teams on difficult issues.

There may be conflict or unresolved issues.
Someone is not performing and it’s impacting the performance of the entire team.
The leader just isn’t listening to the concern or even opportunity that the team is seeing.
The leader isn’t dealing with a person who’s in over their head.
The list goes on…..

Our author of Management of the Absurd makes a couple of key observations:

When we witness a red-faced executive shouting, “Who’s excited? I’m not excited!” we realize that the feeling is much more important than the words. That’s why in all communication it’s crucial to listen to the music as well as the lyrics, the feeling behind the words as well as the words themselves.

And

In all of life, the metamessage tends to be more powerful than the message itself.

I think we all know that on an intellectual basis. But what do we do about it? I’ve found one simple adjustment that makes a profound difference…. remove the table!

Yup, that’s the one thing that I have experienced that helps me deal with difficult issues, remove the table. As soon as I set a team down in a circle with nothing but chairs, the mood immediately changes. I often get those nervous comments like “Boy, are we in trouble now.” Or “This certainly makes me feel a little vulnerable (or naked).” People seem to immediately know that this is different. The table offers us a shield. Position at the table has connotations. I can slip my phone over the edge of the table and no one will know I’m checking email (Ha!). Sitting in open chairs levels the playing field. It exposes all of our body language. We can’t hide. We need to be REAL with each other.

I’ve experienced some of the deepest sharing and resolution of many deep issues when we work without the net of a table between us. All of a sudden people are listening more with an intent to understand rather than respond. I will often hear comments like “Now I understand”, “I never knew that” or “I can see why you would believe that.”

Our author closes this section with the statement “All of this teaches us that we may be so concerned about the content of what we say or write that we often forget the form. When they are taken into account, it is possible to send metamessages that are consonant with the intended message and reinforce rather than undermine it.”

The metamessage counts more than the content. Take the table away. Even in a figuratively sense. When you’re dealing with difficult issues and send that email or leave that voicemail, leave the metamessage, not just the content.

So, how do you remove the table when the team meeting is being conducted via a phone or video conference? Sorry, that one will have to wait for a future blog.

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Absurd!Blog In-Depth Book Reviews

Absurd!: The More We Communicate, The Less We Communicate

by Ron Potter May 19, 2016

I’m continuing my series on an in-depth look at a wonderful little book that’s twenty years old this year. The title is “Management of the Absurd” by Richard Farson. You may want to consider dropping back and reading the previous blogs about ABSURD! I think it will put each new one in great context.

“The notion that people need to communicate more is perhaps the most widely accepted idea in management, indeed in all human relationships. Whether it’s called counseling, team building, conflict resolution, or negotiating, it boils down to one idea – that if we talk it over, things will get better.”

I just finished another Culture Survey’s with a client. (Actually I dealt with three client surveys over the last six weeks.) There are a couple of items that always get low scores on every company’s survey and one of them is the need for more communication.

Unfortunately, most corporate leaders respond to the noted lack of communication with more information. Seldom do people want more information. Every organization and person I know, including myself is overrun with information. We carry around the knowledge (and information) of man in our hand in a device we ludicrously call a phone when it uses about 0.001% of its capability to provide phone service. What we don’t carry around with us is the wisdom of man.

People don’t want more information; they want more meaning. What does this mean? How should we interpret these numbers? Give us meaning. Tell us stories. Help us understand.

Our author says:

“Almost all of this information is quantitative rather than qualitative and is of little use to top managers, who are dealing with predicaments that seldom yield to logical analysis. What these executives require is more likely to come from the advice of their colleagues than from comprehensive displays of data.”

Simon Sinek notes that great leaders inspire action by starting with Why! If you haven’t seen his video check out YouTube for “Why, How, What” or Simon Sinek below. Why starts with meaning. People are seldom interested in what you do but they are often interested in why you’re doing it.

The more we communicate, the less we communicate. The more with inspire with meaning and helping people understand why, the more we communicate.

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