Author Archives: Max

July 23

What you can learn from ‘Agile project management for Dummies’ by Mark Layton (2012, 306 pages)

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Being agile is now seen as a requirement for many companies.  Start-ups are agile, innovators are agile, cool companies are agile.  But what does agile mean?  What are the benefits of agile? And, how do you ‘do’ agile? There is a lot of writing about the ‘digital’ way of working, where companies are trying to […]

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July 16

What you can learn from ‘Kanban’ by David Anderson (2010, 240 pages)

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The kanban board (above) could often be found in many start-ups and incubators.  Now kanban boards are becoming more and more common in medium and large companies. Why are more and more companies adopting kanban methodologies, and is there more to Kanban than kanban boards? Dave Anderson’s book ‘Kanban’ answers all these questions and more.  The main […]

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July 16

Leadership hack 001 – understanding skill and will

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Much leadership advice is generic.  In this series of posts, I aim to explore tactical tips for leaders to use when facing a specific problem. How do you turn around a poor performing follower? Understanding whether the follower has a lack of skill or lack of will (or even both) is essential to understanding how you […]

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July 08

What you can learn from ‘Sprint’ by Jake Knapp, John Zeratsky & Braden Kowitz (2016, 220 pages)

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How do you deliver a product or service that customers want?  How do you make progress in a short time on a critical project? Agile methodology (see the last book I reviewed here) suggests that work should be approached in short bursts of intense activity or ‘sprints’.  In these sprints, you can bring the right people […]

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July 08

Can leadership be defined? Part 6 – The answer

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Over the last four posts, we have explored the four common definitions of leadership – person, process, results and position.  By analysing each of these, it is possible to show that each type of definition has both strengths and weakness. Leadership definitions which rely on a leader’s position while evident, are unhelpful.  By defining a leader […]

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July 01

Can leadership be defined? Part 5 – What do process based definitions of leadership tell us? By Max Eskell

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Leaders provide vision, priorities and alignment. Robert Kaplan Process definitions of leadership attempt to define leaders by what they do and how they behave.  A quick trawl of Flipboard, LinkedIn or even military valour citations (the photo shows the Battle of Rorke’s Drift), shows that leaders are expected to do certain things or behave in a certain […]

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July 01

What you can learn from ‘Scrum – The art of doing twice the work in half the time’ by Jeff Sutherland (2014, 231 pages)

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There any many who believe that the way we work in the modern world is broken.  Some people argue that modern work fails to allow workers to self-actualize (see Barry Schwartz TED talk) and others who argue that the processes we have in place are corrosive (see Huffington post article).  While there have been many suggestions of how […]

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June 24

CAN LEADERSHIP BE DEFINED? PART 4 – WHAT DO RESULT BASED DEFINITIONS OF LEADERSHIP TELL US? BY MAX ESKELL

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“Leaders are right a lot” Amazon principle of leadership Results based definitions of leadership are very compelling.  Increasing profits, successful product launches or double-digit growth in revenues growth, are all easily verifiable examples of success, which many people ascribe to leadership.  However, others are more cautious, and ask “can you attribute to success to one person?“. […]

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June 24

What could you learn from ‘No Ordinary Disruption’ by Richard Dobbs, James Manyika & Jonathan Woetzel (2015, 207 pages)

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The world is changing. This platitude often trotted out by politicians, media pundits and people in business, is both tautologist and useless.  The world has always changed, but change creates both challenges and opportunities.  By understanding and anticipating change, you can reduce the risk of disruption and position yourself to grasp opportunities. In ‘No Ordinary Disruption’ […]

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June 15

Can leadership be defined? Part 3 – What do person based definitions of leadership tell us? By Max Eskell

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Even under the increased scrutiny of the modern world, there are still leaders who are able to command attention and who engender followership.  While Barak Obama and Christine Lagarde are great examples of charismatic leaders in positions of power, there are also examples of leaders who do not occupy formal leadership positions.  Take for example Malala Yousafzai, […]

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June 12

What you could learn from ‘Think like a Freak’ by Stephen Dubner and Steven Levitt (2015, 211 pages)

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Questioning perceived wisdom is a high stakes game.  If you are wrong, then you can be laughed at or vilified.  If you are right, then people may not listen.  If you are very lucky and enough people accept that you are right, you can transform the world. Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner now have a reputation […]

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June 09

Can leadership be defined? Part 2 – What do position based definitions of leadership tell us? by Max Eskell

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In my last blog post, I argued that defining leadership was challenging.  The potentially limitless combinations of leader, follower and situation are too numerous to analyse, let alone distill to an extent that a single definition of leadership is universally useful.  For example, leading a platoon in combat is very different to leading a golf club. […]

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