Marshall Goldsmith on The Cranky Middle Manager- Who’s Next?

Posted on 18. Dec, 2006 by Wayne in General

Folks, I’ve just stopped screaming like a little girl long enough to book Marshall Goldsmith as a guest on the Cranky Middle Manager Show. His interview will appear in mid-January.

What’s cool is that his people approached me to be on the show, which I think says a lot about the power of blogs and podcasts, and the quality of our audience- he wants YOU. Of course, he has a new book coming out which we’ll discuss. You just heard Jack Covert talk on our last episode about “What Got You Here Won’t Get You There”. He called it the  most anticipated book of 2007.
Goldsmith’s the first CMM guest to have a Business School named after him, and is one of the names that appeared on my “wish list” when I was putting the show together. A list of people I’d love to talk to but would never talk to a schmuck like me- who knew?
Here’s the question- who else would YOU like to hear from? Obviously nothing is impossible (although Tom Peters continues to elude us, but a man’s grasp should exceed his reach or what’s a heaven for?). Drop a line, post to the blog. Especially those of you overseas….who are the important people in your market- Africa, India, China, Australia- the rest of us should hear about?

More importantly, who are the people you’d make sure your friends tuned in to hear? This show is gaining a reputation for quality conversations with important people. I’m amazed to be along on this ride….so WHO DO YOU WANT TO HEAR FROM?

 

Ouch, I’ve Been Tagged

Posted on 13. Dec, 2006 by Wayne in General

I am not one to succumb to chain letters, pass on goofy emails or respond to Christmas brag letters. Just ain’t my style. Still I’ve been holding my breath because there’s a trend afoot in the blogosphere towards playing “Tag”. Someone posts about 5 things their audience probably didn’t know about them, then reaches out to five other people to respond and encourage them to post and reach out to five more people… it’s a blog link version of a Ponzi scheme, essentially.

Some of the postings have been funny, some poignant, and more than a few in that murky area in between that reeks more of embarassing admission than art.

I was prepared to just close my eyes and hope it went away, but no…. I’ve been tagged by Rosa Say. Now, Rosa being Rosa, I can’t refuse. The darned woman is cynicism proof and it would just be mean and churlish to refuse. So, against my better judgement here it goes…

Things CMM Listeners Don’t Know About Me…

1) The Duchess ( my bride) is not the first Mrs. Cranky. That dubious honor goes to a lady in Canada. Yes, i was married before, and to a cop no less. The marriage didn’t last long- a fact i’m not proud of. The first anniversary they say is the “paper anniversary”. Appropriately, I got a summons.  I’m not bitter- we parted ways, she got custody of Canada, I moved to the US and here I am today. Two things I did learn about being married to a female police officer:

• Never use regulation hand cuffs
• Never trust a woman with a pet name for her billy club

2) In 1994 I fulfilled a lifelong nerd’s dream by appearing on the game show Jeopardy. Halfway through double Jeopardy I was in the lead. My money total at the end- $0.00. To this day I can’t hear the name Rachel Carson without breaking into a rash.

3) I am a male of average height, slightly above average weight…. and horrifyingly small feet.  My parents may have tied them off when I was little in hopes of marrying me to someone rich, I don’t know. I dread visiting people in the winter in case I have to take my shoes off at the door and leave them in a pile with the other shoes. Someone’s 12 year old daughter will inevitably shriek “Whose are these, i can fit into them”? In  what I’m sure is a completely unrelated factoid, I have never been hit on by a woman whose house I’ve visited in the winter time.

4) My first name is Warren. Wayne is my middle name and to this day I can’t get a satisfying answer as to why I have been a Wayne my whole life. Only customs agents and police officers call me Warren. I have noticed, however, that there has not been a boy named Wayne since 1973. I considered naming my first born Wayne, but she would have been teased mercilessly and I relented.

5) There are only 3 movies a  red-blooded North American man can cry at without his manhood being questioned: Old Yeller, Brian’s Song and Field of Dreams. Look it up. It’s a fact. The list of country songs a man can cry at numbers in the hundreds and expands exponentially with each shot of tequila.

Okay, so now I tag the following people:  Patrick Williams, Katy Whitton, Quiller, Dr. Ellen Webber and Cameron Reilly.  My social obligation is complete.

The Cranky Middle Manager #74 Best Business Books 2006- Jack Covert

Posted on 11. Dec, 2006 by Wayne in General, Podcast

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The Cranky Middle Manager Show #074

Welcome to our end of the year book wrap up. We’re talking today with Jack Covert, the CEO of, well, 800 CEO Read. We’re gonna strip down and just roll around in books for a half hour or so. (Try eliminating THAT visual from your brain). Sit back, grab a pen and no matter what your management challenge, we’ll talk about a book you should care about. Some of these authors have been on our show, others are classics and some you’ll want to rush right out and read. You can bet a couple have already received invitations from yours truly to come talk to us.

By the way, don’t forget to check out the Mindtools.com special offer for listeners of the show. 25% off for just being part of our dysfunctional little family ain’t a bad deal.

Of course while we’re talking books, you can check out my books, “A Philistine’s Journal- an Average Guy Tackles the Classics” ( a real book with paper and everything) and “Meet Like You Mean it- A Cranky Middle Manager’s Guide to Painless and Productive Meetings”. (an e-book but you can print it if you really need paper). They make good Christmas presents….or at least would help me buy Christmas presents…..
Show Notes

0:00 Welcome aboard episode 74. Today we’re talking business books. What makes a good one and what should we be reading? We start with a salute to business book pioneer and the first person to document Double Entry Accounting (so now you know who to blame) Fra Luca Pacioli.

Pacioli took something that had been around since the Sumerians and documented it, thus becoming a famous author. That’s how it’s done all you app-loving, good-to-great workin’, cheese moving managers.

4:51 The quote of the week is from Horace Mann. Just a little bit every day…. and we’re happy to help.

6:35 Welcome Jack Covert, founder and head blogger at www.800ceoread.com. i stumbled over him when he wrote about Nikos Mourkogiannis’ book Purpose- The Starting Point of Great Companies. Nikos spoke to us back on episode 72. check it out here…

We start with why that book worked for us both and take it from there.

8:42 We talk about Rosa Say and Managing with Aloha. You can hear her conversation (and you should if you haven’t) here. It helped turn the show into what it is today, just don’t blame her. What makes a good business book?

10:35 What does Jack look for in a business book? give him the big picture. He likes all five books awarded the Goldman Sacks prize this year. Mostly he likes Fables.

5 temptations of the CEO by Patrick Lenioni

Radical Leap and Radical Edge by Steve Farber

12:30 We talk about Who Moved my Cheese and have a philosophical discussion about it. You’ve heard me rant about it before. We also dish on Malcolm Gladwell’s Tipping Point and Blink.

Other Fables: The Goal by Elihu Goldratt and Dave Mosby and Michael Weissman of The Paradox of Excellence (Episode 37)

Jeff Cox Zap, the Power of Empowerment

18:00 Now on to Business Biographies. Start with Andy Grove’s biography There’s also books on Thomas Paine, Andrew Carnegie and Walt Disney. We talk about Disney in some depth.
There’s also Steve Wozniak’s book, iWoz

25:30 We talk about The Wal-Mart Effect and Wal-mart in general and segue into books written by journalists.

27:30 International books include Blue Ocean Strategy. International rights to books are dropping but English versions of books overseas are rising dramatically. More people around the world are reading and working in English than ever before.

30:05 New books to consider: Chip and Dan Heath: Made to Stick

What Got You Here, Won’t Get You There by Marshall Goldsmith

Don’t let the weasels get you down.

The Cranky Middle Manager Show #73 More “Slow Leadership”- Adrian Savage

Posted on 06. Dec, 2006 by Wayne in Podcast

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The Cranky Middle Manager Show #73

Today we celebrate two things:

1) The return of Adrian Savage, who was with us on show #54 . He’s back to talk about his new book, Slow Leadership.

2) Our first sponsor, Mind Tools. You’ll remember their founder, James Manktelow was with us on Show # 25.

Well, they have a special offer for listeners of this show. Save 25% on membership their Career Excellence Club, and the first month is only $1 US. Check it out here.

Show Notes

0:00 Welcome to the show. Today we talk Slow Leadership with the passionate and (dare I say) somewhat cranky Adrian Savage. The show is dedicated to Brasidas, the Spartan general who understood that taking your time shows big returns, when you can battle the weasels to a standstill and do it.

3:29 More from my boy Cicero, who’s leading the pack in quotes of the week…he knows it takes time to make good calls….so why aren’t we allowed to do it?

4:44 Welcome back Adrian Savage (or Carmine Coyote, depending on which blog you read). He’s more than a little ticked off about the lack of Slow Leadership. We take a step back…what does he even mean by Slow Leadership?

9:18 If I apply the “gun to the head test”, no one really thinks we should be working this frenetically, but it happens- so why? Adrian (and me too, for the record) blames the changing marketplace. Long term investment is almost an oxymoron and they aren’t around for the true long term.

12:11 Is this really practical, or is this written from the safety of retirement? It’s all about the choices we make and our definition of career success.

16:14 One of Adrian’s blog postings really raised some hackles- Check it out- what gets people going about the modern workplace? (Check out his blog for November 20th)

23:00 Adrian doesn’t like bad meetings any more than I do. (Quick plug for my e-book, Meet Like You Mean It) Don’t let them steal your time. Stand up to the time thieves. Let’s face it most meetings are unnecessary, they’re badly run and the few that do matter MUST have a clear purpose that can’t be met any other way. Covering your butt is NOT a valid reason.

26:00 Some of the takeaways from the book:

• Give yourself thinking time
• Trust your people- really
• The major source of creativity in any organization comes from the Middle Managers (we love this guy)

30:40 Bob Sutton’s book “The No Asshole Rule”. I will try to get Dr Sutton on the show, but after the Management Issues article I wrote about him, I ain’t promising anything.