The Cranky Middle Manager Show #312 The Future of the MBA Ken Starkey
The Cranky Middle Manager Show #104 Executive Intelligence with Justin Menkes
Posted on 25. Jul, 2007 by Wayne in Podcast
The Cranky Middle Manager Show #104
Welcome to our show, gang. 104 conversations wtih people way smarter than me about the things that matter most to managers. If you like what you hear, subscribe to the newsletter. Just drop me an email and put Subscribe in the subject line.
Also, if you’re interested in doing better web meetings, take a listen to a stealth project i’m working on. You can hear them here. Let me know what you think and check out the other articles in my expert page…..
Now, if you ever wondered if you have the stuff to escape middle management and shoot to the top, check out our conversation wtih our guest Justin Menkes, about his book, Executive Intelligence.
Show Notes
0:00 Welcome to the show… today’s episode is #104…. is Executive Prowess more DNA than MBA???? I’m not talking just leadership Lord knows we’ve beaten that topic into the ground.
Today’s show is dedicated to Catherine the Great. I wander into some politically incorrect territory here but here’s a rule..judge the power a woman has by the vehemence of the gossip about her. Okay, nothing you can use in your next job interview but much to ponder….
3:13 The quote of the week is from Baltasar Gracian. You don’t want to be overconfident, but you don’t want to freak out either. That’s what separates the executives from the bitter middle managers…..
4:51 Welcome to Justin Menkes…. before tape rolled he asked if I could call him a supergenius… seems I over did the joke just a bit, but he’s a smart guy. What is Executive Intelligence and how do we find it?
7:47 EI is a mix of talents and traits….. you have to develop, train and work at it…..and you have to have the goods to start with. We talk about Jim Kilts from Gillette, because frankly Jack Welch doesnt’ need the press. Justin profiles a number of them in the book and it’s not about their personality as it shows in this discussion…..a red handle can fend off disaster…who knew?
11:50 I confess to being a bit bitter today. Been a bad week….. anyway…. what do all these folks have in common and can you bottle it? Justin tells the story of his wife using good executive judgement and his veterinarian not….. she’s the super genius in the family as it turns out. So what else is new?
15:40 How do you spot these folks in a job interview? Justin uses PBI…Past Behavioral Interviewing. Here’s the process and what it means….
22:00Â Beware the cult of the CEO….. and the Jabberwock…but we’re only talking about the CEO today.
24:28Â Justin Menkes resources:
Creativity by Mihaliy Csikszentmihalyi
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Message In a Bottle from Fast Company
Posted on 18. Jul, 2007 by Wayne in General
Okay, I have spared you most of my bizarre politics and social outrages and kept my ranting more or less focused on the workplace. That having been said, though, I have to draw your attention to this article from Fast Company magazine.
Basically it says what I’ve been muttering under my breath for the last couple of years- that this whole bottled water craze makes no sense economically, ecologically or healthwise. Every week my recycling bin (because I have one) is full to the brim with my wife and daughter’s water bottles even though we have some of the safest tap drinking water in the world. And the fact that people will pay for water from Fiji, while 1/3 of the Fijian population doesn’t have a clean well for their own people to drink from is simply an outrage and is just one more reason so much of the rest of the world is shooting at us.
Arise my brothers and sisters…. reduce, reuse, recycle and REFUSE to buy the hype- or the h2o when the tap or fountain works just fine.
I now return you to my usual blather.
The Cranky Middle Manager Show #103 Women in a Multicultural Workplace Deepika Bajaj
Posted on 17. Jul, 2007 by Wayne in Podcast
The Cranky Middle Manager Show #103
Welcome everyone. Yes, Karma is an interesting thing. A while back we had Rajesh Setty on the show (way back on Episode 44…check it out) and I’ve stayed in touch with him ever since. He is backing a new web venture called Invincibelle.com with our guest, Deepika Bajaj.
Being a WASP (well technically Celtic, but WCP doesn’t scan) and having women as my direct boss is nothing new for me, so maybe I”m not quite so sensitive to the multicultural challenges faced by women managers, particularly immigrants. I learned a lot today.
Show Notes
0:00 Welcome to the show. Today’s episode is dedicated to a woman who knew a bit about crossing international and cultural boundaries, although it’s to be hoped that if she’d had resources like Invincibelle she’d have handled it with a little more grace and a little less bloodshed. Eleanor of Acquitaine was quite the woman.
1:40 The quote of the week is from Michel de Montaigne (along with a shameless plug for my book, A Philistine’s Journal-an Average Guy Tackles the Classics. You can buy it from me if you have a paypal account, or at amazon.com.) Regardless of age or gender… is your mind spirited, aspiring and going beyond its strength?
2:46 Our guest is Deepika Bajaj, who runs the website www.invincibelle.com. It’s a multicultural world, and for women that poses some unique challenges. Why does the world need a site like this?
7:46 What are some of the unique changes that women face when moving from country to country or up the ladder? Integration, finding mentors and just being visible (ironic when so often you are part of a “visible minority”).
11:46 How much of that sense of isolation is self-imposed? What are the things people do to add layers of complexity to the workplace dynamic?
13:46 Deepika tells her own story of struggle and overcoming some pretty big hurdles by building networks.
22:45 What are the practical things managers can do to offer opportunities and distinguish the incompetent from the isolated?
24:58 Why is the listenership of this show overwhelmingly male? Is it something we’re doing here or do women utilize new media differently than men?
28:00 Deepika’s resources include:
Rajesh Setty’s “Life Beyond Code” blog
Our friend Lisa Haneberg at Managementcraft
and other friend of the show Liz Strauss at Successful-blog.com
If you’re new to the show, check out our newsletter (just put subscribe in the subject line) , our frappr map, and heck I’ll even join your Linkedin network.
Don’t let the weasels get you down.
CMM Gets Newspaper Lovin’- Thanks Anita
Posted on 16. Jul, 2007 by Wayne in General
Looky here! Episode 101 guest Anita Bruzzese is a workplace columnist who’s “On the Job” is syndicated in dozens of Gannet-run US newspapers and sometimes USAToday.com. Here’s an article that came out in a bunch of papers this week, this one is from the Salt Lake City Tribune.
Seems the show is getting a little main stream press love.
Thanks Anita, for helping to spread the word.