2MERRILL

BOGUS THEORIES

The Management Myth - Why Experts Keeping Getting it Wrong by Matthew Stewart (Norton, 343 pages, $27.95) will be a good read and a good education for most staff at UNICEF.  Just like flawed jargon, there is also the management myth that everything in management theory really manages the organization to prosperity.  Bogus management theory are counterproductive in that it creates a whole lot of work and if the end result is that there is no increase in performance, it can be a counterproductive effort (extra effort that achieves nothing).

Like looking at a beautiful car and purchasing it without a test drive, it is the same as embarking on a big management task just because someone called it reengineering.  Similarly don't get carried away with beautiful charts and diagrams.  In striving for excellence, I would rather think of the way the Japanese work: thinking ahead, getting more with less effort (and this must be proved on a pilot basis first), and selecting the right people for the right jobs.

UNICEF staff in active status will not regret reading this book.

ASK SIMPLE QUESTIONS?

When you use computers and you can just use the computer, period. But if  you think further then you can take an interest in computer technology like the power of the computer for communication, the good, bad and ugly of the Internet. How does the Internet affect the social fabric of human beings, an endless list can be produced. You just got to expand your horizon of thinking and go after the issues to avoid one-dimensional thought. 

Leadership taboos

Leadership taboos reminds me of some of our leaders in the UN system, leaders meaning not necessarily the Executive Director and his or her deputies. A organization as large as UNICEF, has hundreds to thousands of leaders, from head of office to head of division or department.

What is it to be a leader?

Some of the best leadership I have learned was by watching some movies of tribal warfare by either African tribes or American Indian tribes.

LORDS OF LOGISTICS

Lords of Logistics is a great example how innovative folks in the poor developing world can be. They run PC's using sewing machine technology and transport goods on two wheels without any expensive trucks used in the Western world.

LISTING MORE THAN DOING - ARE THERE MORE PROS THAN CONS

How many of us keep writing do-lists and spend so much time updating the TO-DO than really spending that time on DOING.

MONITORING YOUR WAY

On a recent bicycle ride on a very tough course, it set me thinking about monitoring progress.  How can my riding compare with knowing your position in a business situation?

REFORM THE REGULATORS

Red tape is a big cost burden to many governments and not-for-profit organizations. Each time a person makes a rule or a regulation they are imposing a social cost on society in terms of logistical delays, an extra step in a process, and cost of regulators.