Better Manager 7th prelims:Better Manager 7th edition

and leaving him free to consider the broader lines of policy and to study the character and fitness of the important men under h ...

How to be creative Walter Bagehot wrote: ‘It is often said that men are ruled by their imagination; but it would be truer to say ...

converge on the only possible solution. It is sometimes called ‘convergent’ thinking; de Bono refers to it as ‘vertical thinking ...

Barriers to creative thinking The main barriers to creative thinking are: ■ Allowing your mind to be conditioned into following ...

Breaking away To break away from the constraints on your ability to generate new ideas you should: ■ Identify the dominant ideas ...

might give you a different insight, even though it might not be immediately relevant; switching yourself or other people from p ...

In vertical thinking one has to be right at every step. So, no matter how many steps are taken, the end point (idea, solution, c ...

The chairman states the problem, avoiding the trap of defining it too narrowly. The chairman opens the session by a phrase such ...

INNOVATION Innovation is the lifeblood of an organization. There is nothing so stultifying to a company – or the people in it – ...

■ To elicit support not only from your boss but also from your colleagues and subordinates – you need to build a coalition in wh ...

How to be decisive Good managers are decisive. They can quickly size up a situation and reach the right conclusion on what shoul ...

choice between two courses of action neither of which is probably more nearly right than the other. You should not expect or eve ...

conclusions about the nature of the situation and what should be done about it. Be careful about assumptions– we have a tendenc ...

How to delegate You can’t do everything yourself, so you have to delegate. At first sight delegation looks simple. Just tell peo ...

ADVANTAGES OF DELEGATION ■ It relieves you of routine and less critical tasks. ■ It frees you for more important work – planning ...

WHEN TO DELEGATE You should delegate when: ■ You have more work than you can effectively carry out your- self. ■ You cannot allo ...

Choosing who does the work Ideally, the person you choose to do the work should have the knowledge, skills, motivation and time ...

do the job without breaking the law, exceeding the budget, embarrassing you or seriously upsetting people, let them get on with ...

Don’t allow your subordinates to become careless about meeting deadlines. Without being oppressive, you should ensure that progr ...

Franklin D Roosevelt used a particularly ruthless technique based on competition, when he requested his aides to find some infor ...