Throughout my career working with people in technical roles, I’ve seen that many folks really struggle with asking for a payrise. Technical roles typically pay higher salaries than average, but it’s common for technical workers to have problems in engaging with their managers and paymasters to ask for an increase. I attribute this to the …
A couple of days late getting this out whilst I compiled the stats, but here is the report on the survey I conducted in Dec 2007 of 200 IT professionals, actuaries, data analysts and other technical professionals. The survey aimed to find out the top 10 concerns of our sector of the workforce. Each respondent …
Results of survey of Current Concerns of Technical Professionals Read More »
I recently surveyed over 200 technical professionals where I found that over 60% of respondents are worried about the consequences of the ‘credit crunch’ on their jobs. The effect of the current crisis in world markets has created nervousness in technical sectors, particularly that projects could be pulled or whole departments laid off. Full results of the survey will …
Survey: What technical professionals are most worried about Read More »
The Helicopter Mind is a concept of thinking and questioning that allows managers to interweve abstract and specific thoughts, and to have the ability to switch between the two modes of thought appropriately and skilfully. An extensive study has shown that managers who have these abilities are more successful and perform better in their roles …
Developing a Helicopter Mind – how technical managers can improve their success Read More »
Once again I am pointing you to an article on the Leader to Leader Institute website, and this time it covers being ‘prepared to start over – again and again’. I like this article because it talks of personal resilience and learning from personal experiences. I doubt if anyone has had setbacks in their career …
Personal Resilience in your quest for personal excellence Read More »
Below is a link to a great article that discusses No Excuse Leadership, which I think you should read. Why? Well I think it discusses an important aspect of leadership (and I stress leadership and not management) – creating a vision that inspires an organization to break down resistance to change and to set behavioral …
This is a debate I often see in technical circles, mostly between technicians and their less technical managers or stakeholders. It’s a debate that often leads to conflict or a reduction in morale or motivation in each party. It has career implications too; as technical leaders aiming to build a career, its something we need …
Perfectionism vs Pragmastism: Career Implications Read More »
Despite Pride being one of the Seven Deadly Sins, it is a powerful if not underused means of getting things done in the workplace. Pride is an emotion of self-respect. It is an emotion that, if tapped into, you can use to motivate others, particularly in technical job areas. I use pride as a trigger …
Using the Power of Pride in an organization to generate motivation Read More »
Dear Diary I did the following things this month. Met fourteen different IT vendors who gave an impressive high impact presentation on how their products and services can guarantee cost effective, cutting edge, optimized, and seamless, business value in tune with our strategic goals. Rejected three vendors as their presentations were not in line with …
Question: Does completing an MBA give you a ticket to success as a business leader? Answer: No, it doesn’t. The virtues of an MBA are often hyped and rarely understated. So why is it such a big deal? Well the average MBA will cost a student 25K UKP/50K USD, so the universities have a good …
