Obama's first speech to the Congress

An excellent speech - true to his repuation of being a great orator.

The speech had all the ingredients of a historic communication that will be remembered for a long time to come. There was that attempt to inject unifying force where eleced representatives from across the political boundaries can find a common ground to debate on.

The speech had the elements of inspiration when he remembered subtle and yet extraordinary efforts of common people, in the face of adversity and their indomitable spirit of "we are not quitters".

I can simply go on and on about this speech. Why don't you check this out yourself here

You can never over-communicate

You can never over-communicate, more so if it concerns with building a cultural infrastructure to propel the organization towards its future goals.

Here is a small piece of communication by a leader to emphasize the importance of desired cultural changes in his organization. The communication underlines and clarifies desired cultural undertones, which will help transform the unit.

Thanks to a close friend who worked in this reputed firm, who enriched my collection of great “leadership communications” in business organizations, with this wonderful piece, which I have always wanted to share with others. Next follows the text of the communication:

Some of you must have noticed fresh set of posters in the reception area and must be wondering -- why do we need them and what is it that they are trying to communicate? If you have not noticed them – don’t worry for they will be everywhere; Very soon they are going to become a way of our life.

For us to be positioned successfully for the future, we need to undergo a cultural transformation for we are in crisis. The biggest challenge(s) that we face today are “What do we want to be known for?” and “What is our future roadmap?” All of us need to step up to the challenge and be a part of the cultural transformation that will help us find answers to the above questions. The poster campaign is going to remind each of you every single day on what needs to be done, how can we reach there and who can take us there.

These posters communicate the following:

• Building our Identity
• Moving up the value chain
• Identifying the leader in you
• Creating a culture of Excellence through Focus Demonstrating CLR: Creativity, Leadership and solid relationships with our partners, peers and customers.

We need to make sure that we are focused on what ever we do; be it technology, processes, business knowledge and/or project. It is only through focus can we achieve excellence and excellence is what we require to move up to the next level.

Creativity: It is a process of developing and expressing novel ideas for solving problems or satisfying needs.

• Ask yourself how flexibly and imaginatively did you approach problems?
• Did your solution challenge the status quo?
• Ask yourself what could you have done better?

If you have an inner passion to solve the problem at hand then creativity will automatically get reflected in proposed solutions. Also, to be creative you have to be an expert – be it technical, procedural or intellectual knowledge.

Leadership: Leadership is not just about leading people, it is about:

• Being focused on getting short term results and at the same time not losing sight of long term needs
• Understanding the specifics of how things work
• Respecting the limits of what are the available resources
• Being compassionate and responsive to other’s needs and feelings
• Listening to other’s opinions and ideas
• Thinking broadly on how can we move up the value chain Making tough calls, taking stands and articulating reasons for taking stands clearly

Relationship: Last but not the least, any success that is achieved at the cost of relationships is not truly success. Make sure that your relationships with partners, peers and customer are stellar for then only will we be truly successful.

Go, take a lead in building a culture of excellence through focus and demonstrate CLR every single day to reach new heights!

How did you like it? Any comments please?

Vague strategy statements

Ever wondered what these strategy taglines are all about? First thought that comes to us is the statement so pompously delivered by the top executive and displayed at all vantage points in the company, which any way does not carry any meaning for the employees.

We are talking about the vague strategy statements such as:

• To be a world class organization!
• Unleashing creative potential of people!
• To be an excellent enterprise!

Rest assured there are no takers for these vague statements. With these generalized and sweeping statements leaders simply are not able to put the message across.

The first job of the leader is not to translate strategy into result, though it is what he does ultimately, the first step in fact is to translate strategy into clear and understandable language - a simple statement that tells people what is expected of them.