A critique on schools

Nikhil Goyal, a 17-year-old high school student, has written a book "One Size Does Not Fit All, A Student's Assessment of School."

 

Student voices about their school is important.  Read this interview - http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/living-in-dialogue/2012/10/nikhil_goyal.html

 

 

 

 

Future of work

This presentation from Innovation Excellence explores the new ways we are working and the implications for business and for workers. I can't wait to have a treadmill workstation. :)

The Future of Work from Innovation Excellence

Innovation and Entreprenurship: a book for entrepreneurs

Distinguish innovation (a world of ideas) from entrepreneurship (a world of action).

Three greatest drivers of innovation and sources of ideas:
 ■existing problems
 ■dissatisfaction with what is
 ■market opportunities
 
Here are the 7 Big Ideas from the book.
 
I. There are three types of innovation:
 1.Oriented towards the consumer- changing the experience of the healthcare user. This is especially relevant for patients with chronic disease who need complex care coordinated.
One example of this kind of innovation example might be the elimination of the waiting room at the Virginia Mason Kirkland Clinic in suburban Seattle.
 2.Based on technology - new therapeutic agents, medical devices, or information technology tools. Examples would include novel monoclonal antibody drugs, knee prostheses or error-reducing software.
 3.Based on a business model - integrating hospitals into a chain or a hospital and its clinics into a system.
 
II. Nobody invests in an idea. Instead they invest in its execution.
 
III. Despite the chaos and creativity that typify a startup, there are identifiable phases to starting a business, accompanied by questions that are essential to be asking. This is succinctly illustrated on pages 30, 31 and 32.
 
For example, in the earliest phase, the question to ask is "Is my idea a good one or just an opportunity?"
 
Later, you might ask what your options are for making your efforts profitable, once you have developed a business plan - Should you sell or license your patent? Should you be seeking an alliance? Can you do this by yourself?
 
IV. It's vital to understand and position yourself within the healthcare value chain. Dr Pareras describes this important business concept in a blog post.
 
V. The purpose of a business plan is to explain the story of the opportunity your  project or business poses. It also provides a road map to making the idea happen. It is above all a communication tool -- to ourself, to outsiders and to insiders who will work with and for you.
 
VI. The most important asset of any business or idea is the people behind it -- the team that will execute the idea. This will demand leadership and management skills.
 
VII. Financing your business is a challenge that takes planning and awareness of the multiple ways a healthcare start-up and business can be financed. Whether you are using your own money, R and D development subsidies, grants, debt or investment -- you will need to know what is out there to help you raise the money you need to start your venture.
 
So there you have it - the seven big ideas from the book.
 
This is a book for entrepreneurial physicians but is useful to anyone who has an urge to start a business of whatever size.

Book is here. 

A compelling vision for Health IT

Health information stored in one IT system must be retrievable by others, including doctors and hospitals that are a part of other health systems. This is particularly important in emergency situations.

Patients should have ready access to their electronic health information, much as consumers now have access to their bank accounts. Patients should be able to view their own records and share them with health care providers of their choice.

Health information technology systems must be engineered to aid the work of clinicians, not hinder it. Systems should be intuitive, so they can be used by busy health care providers without extensive training. Doctors and other health care providers should be able to easily use systems across different health care settings, much as consumers easily drive various makes and models of automobiles.

More here

To employees

Three things that we exactly want all our employees to do,

1. Realize that our customers have expectations.
2. Exceed those expectations.
3. Do better at it every day.

Found it at Seth's blog. Thanks Seth.

Glossary

Action Learning: Type of learning that builds opportunities for learning around real problems brought to the workplace by employees.

Cause Analysis: The process of determining the root cause of past, present and future performance gaps.

Ergonomics: The study of how physical laws of nature affect the worker and his environment.

Ethics: Defines good and bad standards of conduct.

Feedback: Information provided by others designed to help people adjust their behavior, continue successful performance or establish goals.

Gap Analysis: Type of analysis that describes the difference between current results and consequences and desired results and consequences. The last step in the performance analysis process.

Incentives: Linking pay with a standard for performance.

Interventions: Conscious, deliberate, and planned activities designed to improve human performance and solve workplace problems.

Job Aids: Used during the performance of a task to facilitate efficiency and effectiveness.
Organizational Analysis: Examines the organizational mission, vision, values, goals and strategies
Performance Analysis: Identifies and clarifies the problem or performance gap by focusing on three areas: desired performance, actual performance and the gap between the two.

Training: Instructional experiences provided by employers to employees.

Work Design: A blueprint of job tasks structured to improve organizational efficiency and employee satisfaction.

Awareness

1. Think Like A Child
Children are like miniature reporters, constantly asking who, what, when, where, and particularly why. They also have very few preconceived notions, so they are open to taking in new information without being constrained by biases and judgments.

2. Look Beyond the Obvious
The obvious can mask information that may be vital to learning the truth of a situation. The next time you catch yourself thinking, writing, or saying, "Obviously..." make a note of your assumption. Then invest a few hours in looking beyond what appears to be true. Keep searching until you find at least three pieces of information or sources that conflict with what you classified as "obvious."

3. Fire Your Inner Critic
Remember that someone had every great idea in history. Why not you? We can be so critical of ourselves. Fire that inner critic. Give your ideas time to develop. Respect your intuition. Let ideas percolate for a time prior to applying a critical eye.

4. Vary Your Daily Routine
Take different routes to work, or school, or the market. Use your curiosity to see how many ways you can get there from here. Ask directions of a number of people and evaluate how many variations you hear in these directions. Try them all and evaluate the differences.

5. Identify the Most Impossible Solutions
When faced with a challenge, try to identify the most absurd solutions possible. This can be a fun exercise and may unmask a solution. This process tends to expose the boundary lines in your thinking.

6. Work Like a Detective
Good detectives follow all potential leads, often gathering a huge amount of possibly relevant information, much of which turns out to be useless. However, your attention to detail can eventually pan out when you find the one thread that leads you to a solution.

7. Try New Things
Take a class. Try a new mini-hobby. Taste a food that is new to you. See a movie that you normally wouldn't be attracted to. Read a book on a topic that is unfamiliar. The more you put yourself in learning and questioning mode, the more you develop curiosity as a habit.

Thanks Jim Canterucci for sharing this wisdom.

Expanding Focus

Expanding your focus is one of the most valuable aspects of developing your personal brilliance. When what you are doing is the same as what you are thinking, you are present and focused. In this state of mind, you have a feeling of mental smoothness, even when there's a lot happening.
1. Broaden Your View
Consider the big picture with all of its components and possibilities.
2. Look Beneath the Surface
Appearances can be deceiving. Take a closer look.
3. Practice Being Present
When your mind wanders into the past or future, gently bring it back to "now."
4. Observe with Flexible Intent
Be clear about what you are looking for in each situation and simultaneously be open to learning something entirely different.
Thanks Jim Canterucci for sharing this.

Initiative

Intensifying Your Initiative: 5 Tips
Without harnessing the power of initiative, the wheel of innovation comes to a screeching halt. We all have a desire to "make a difference" or to make improvements in our lives, but for a variety of reasons, many people face challenges in regard to taking initiative in one form or another. Fortunately, there are many things you can do to enhance your power of initiative, and the payoffs are huge.
1. Give Yourself Permission to Decide for Yourself
Waiting for others to join you in your initiative can slow the wheels of innovation and drag out the process.
2. Make Choices and Act on Them
Keep in mind that you don't have to come up with the best possible decision, you just have to come up with one way that will work.
3. Don't Wait to Be Inspired; Get Inspired!
Take responsibility for feeding positive input into your mental process.
4. Increase Your Accountability
Practice increasing your initiative by stepping up to the plate and volunteering to lead projects.
5. Live By Your Word
Make a firm commitment to yourself that you will keep your promises, no matter what.

Thanks Jim Canterucci for sharing this.

Life is short

Be passionate - Yes, strategies and processes are important. But personal passion, perseverance, risk taking, informed intuition and vision always trump process and conventional wisdom
Broaden your horizons - Avoid routine at all cost, push yourself to explore outside of your comfort zone.
Make connections - Innovation is all about seeing and exploiting connections and intersections of opportunities. See what's there, not just what you're looking for.
Work with people you like - Life is too short to put up with bullshit. The politics and backstabbing of my last corporate role challenged my values, but I chose to change my work rather than change my values. Work with people and clients you genuinely enjoy -- You'll be more creative and productive than you ever thought possible. I am.
Repeat... life is short. Thanks for sharing this - Mike Docherty.

The Kaizen Way

"The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step" - Tao Te Ching -

Wisdom from the book One Small Step Can Change Your Life - The Kaizen Way, an old concept but excellently portrayed by the author Robert Maurer. Kaizen is a Japanese term that roughly translated, means “improvement”.

Kaizen is the conjunction of two words “kai” meaning change and “zen” meaning better (or “for the better”). Incorporating as it does, aspects of Buddhist thinking, kaizen is more philosophy than mere methodology or management technique. “Kaizen means continuous improvement in personal life, home life, social life and working life” - Kaizen Institute, 2004 -

Kaizen is the art of making great and lasting change through small, steady increments. Kaizen is the tortoise versus the hare. Kaizen is the eleven Fortune 500 companies that significantly outperformed the market through moderate, step-by-step actions. Kaizen is losing weight not by a crash diet (which more often than not crashes) but by eating one bite less at each meal--then, a month later, eating two bites less. Kaizen is starting a life-changing exercise program by standing--just standing--on a treadmill for one minute a day. How to think small thoughts?, take small actions, solve small problems, small rewards motivate better than big rewards, paying attention to little details most of us overlook, and more.

Top 10 Reasons Your Staff Wants to Quit

From an employee's perspective, management often conducts itself in ways that make no sense. When the economy is slow, jobs are few and far in between or people are fearful, staff will tolerate management behaviors and policies that are nonsensical (in their eyes) or they judge are harmful. But when staff gets together for lunch and they start critiquing management, these are the Top 10 Reasons Why Staff Quit.

10. "My boss is arrogant and believes his own press clippings." As a result, staff feels taken advantage of..
9. "My manager micromanages rather than trusting staff to perform." Staff hates the boss and looks for ways to resist being over controlled.
8. "My manager is crushing my drive and desire." Hired because they were smart and energetic, the manager is afraid that she will not be seen as the shining light (the reason for success) and crushes the very qualities that made the new employee attractive to hire (and desirous of joining).
7. "My boss guesses what is needed without resorting to data or facts." Maybe he has the facts, but they sure aren't being communicated leaving the impression of "It's my way or the highway." There are a lot of new roads being built in this country and staff will leave rather than be abused.
6. "I'm treated like a child." Look, there are often generational differences between how managers and employees work. Younger workers may have "know-it-all" attitudes and unfamiliar techniques using technology to accomplish tasks. Staff feels misunderstood and resent their boss.
5. "Manager promotes someone from a different function who does understand the job and how to be successful." Staff does not believe they can learn from this person, judges her to be an anchor around their department and resents that they were passed over for promotion.
4. "My boss is extremely critical." The only way they interpret their boss is pleased is in the absence of nit picking.
3. "I get ideas lobbed at me with little clarity and I have to figure out what is really wanted." Staff is caught between a rock and a hard place and doesn't know the target of the task or have a clear idea of what needs to get done.
2. "I don't have sufficient resources to get the job done." Fitting 10 pounds of stuff into a five pound bag is pretty tough. Imagine you're the ten pounds and have to get squeezed in there! Staff often believes they have inadequate resources to get a job done.
1. And the number one reason your staff wants to quit: "My company is grossly underpaying me." Show me the money! Staff can read job ads online and learn what their real value is. As much as they may love you and their work, eventually people realize they need to pay their bills and start to think of leaving. Your staff, the ones you are mistreating or taking for granted are your competition's staffing solution (just as theirs is for you). Rather than taking their continued employment for granted, motivate them, excite them, coach and encourage them and they will go do anything for you (at almost any price).

Thanks Jeff Altman. Concepts in Staffing, jeffaltman@cisny.com (c) 2004, all rights reserved

Who moved my cheese!

"If you don't like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less.” - General Eric Shinseki, Chief of Staff. U. S. Army -

Lessons learned from the book Who Moved My Cheese. Author - Spencer Johnson, 1998; M.D. from Royal College of Surgeons; known for simplicity; One Minute Manager, The Precioius Present. No doubt that it is still continuing as a bestseller, a self-help book providing a simple, powerful message to the people confronted with unwelcome CHANGE.

A story of two mice (Sniff and Scurry) and two “little people” (Hem and Haw) living in a maze (labyrinth). Cheese is a metaphor for whatever you want in your life (food, success, happiness, financial security). Cheese found in Cheese Station C was a symbol of stability. One day, the cheese disappeared ………

Wisdom in a nutshell from the book:
Leadership attitudes towards change,
•The compulsive changer: Enjoys making changes even when not needed
•The transforming leader: Changes what needs to be changed, fixes what needs to be mended, and preserves what needs to remain unchanged
•The resilient leader: Learns to adapt in times when change can lead to something better
•The resistant leader: Denies and resists change with the belief that change will lead to something dreadful (active resistance or passive resistance)
•Having cheese makes you happy (status quo).
•The more important your cheese is to you, the more you want to hold onto it (status quo preservation).
•If you don’t change, you may become extinct.
•What would you do if you weren’t afraid (of trying something new).
•Smell the cheese often so you know when it is getting old (review, evaluate, review).
•Movement in a new direction helps you find new cheese (research and renew).
•The quicker you let go of old cheese, the sooner you will find new cheese (quick adaptation).
•Noticing small changes early helps you adapt to the bigger changes that are to come (scanning)

Happy reading/rereading!