by Brandi Olson | Leadership, Teams
The Collaborative Worker is the Most Valuable Asset of the 21st Century Company: Why Knowledge Was Never Enough “This will never work!” That is what the executive sponsor told me when I suggested creating dedicated cross-disciplinary teams that spanned across...
by Brandi Olson | Leadership, Planning & Strategy, Teams
Best practices are dead. Long live better practices. I used to be in love with the idea that there is a best way to do something. Perhaps you love that idea too? I’ll be honest, I find deep comfort in the concept of best — the best deal, the right answer, the perfect...
by Brandi Olson | Leadership, Productivity, Teams
Reframing Your Midday Lull in Productivity Is Actually the Key to a Better Work Day It’s the middle of the day and you’ve already been in a few meetings and crushed the first part of your to-do list. You feel a yawn coming on and immediately leap from your desk. Up...
by Brandi Olson | Leadership, Planning & Strategy, Productivity
Modern Management’s Fetish That’s Getting in the Way of Your Success As a Western society, we are steeped in the belief that being a high-performer means doing more, all at once. We’ve been conditioned to attach enormous value to being endlessly busy, and we conflate...
by Brandi Olson | Leadership, Productivity
The Actual Reason Everyone Is Exhausted at Work and the Problem with Juggling Water I’d like you to imagine something. As your manager, I’ve just given you a pitcher of water and tasked you with taking it from one side of the room to another. Accomplishing the goal is...
by Brandi Olson | Leadership, Teams
4 Ways to Cultivate Human-Centered Accountability in Your Organization When I teach organizations how to build self-managing, high-performing agile teams, one question ALWAYS comes up. It’s always a variation on: but how will we hold people accountable? Accountability...