Tag Archives: Psychology

Helping Employees Improve

One aspect of managing people is to provide positive feedback and show appreciation. Doing so is important. People benefit from encouragement and reinforcement. In addition to just telling them, take action to show your appreciation. The Dilbert workplace is alive … Continue reading

Posted in Deming, Fun, Management Articles, Popular, Respect, Software Development, Statistics, Toyota Production System (TPS) | Tagged , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Negativity

Don’t be negative. Most people agree with that statement. We see being negative as bad. If you don’t have something good to say, don’t say anything. Well, I don’t agree. While presenting your ideas in a constructive way is helpful, … Continue reading

Posted in Management, Psychology | Tagged , , | 6 Comments

Checklists Save Lives

Checklists are a simple quality tool that have been used widely for decades. Pilots use them, without fail, to save lives. Some surgeons have been using them and the evidence is mounting that checklists can save many more lives if … Continue reading

Posted in Deming, Health care, Management, Process improvement, Psychology, Quality tools, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

A Programmer’s View of the Universe

A few weeks ago I wrote about integrating information technology and business process management. This post from Steve Yegge is interesting and discusses one reason I find that a good strategy. Programmers, by and large, are good, practical systems thinkers … Continue reading

Posted in Creativity, Management, Respect, Software Development | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

Managing Passionate Employees

Passion vs. Productive There are actually few organizations that can support passionate employees – even if they say they want them. That’s because the original industrial revolution was designed to support productivity. Productivity means you produce. That’s how you’re measured. … Continue reading

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Creating Customers For Life

Shopping at Trader Joe’s is odd. The workers actually seem like they like that they have customers. Continue reading

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What’s the Value of a Big Bonus?

What’s the Value of a Big Bonus? by Dan Ariely To look at this question, three colleagues and I conducted an experiment. We presented 87 participants with an array of tasks that demanded attention, memory, concentration and creativity. We asked … Continue reading

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The Manager FAQ

This is a great set of answers for programmers on the behavior of managers, that can also be of interest to some non-programmers. The Manager FAQ by Peter Seebach The following list is an attempt to cover some of the … Continue reading

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Appropriate Management

Thinking about why appropriate technology is so effective, but underutilized (though things are much better now than they were several decades ago) can help anyone improve the solutions they adopt. I would especially encourage people to stop looking for the newest management book and actually read and adopt and re-read adopt… the excellent management books from the last 50 years Continue reading

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Flaws in Understanding Psychology Lead to Flawed Management

I people are self interested and somewhat rational. However, self interest, is complex. People want to be liked, people want to be part of something good, people want to feel they are appreciated… Continue reading

Posted in Management, Psychology, Respect | Tagged , , , , , , | 5 Comments