Business Practices for Managers

goodpracticeI recently discovered the site of Good Practice, an Edinburgh-based company that specializes in creating very easy to use material for middle managers. When the CEO Peter Casebow gave me access to the management section of the site, I found it quite easy to use, and with several options to make the material accessible in any way that would work for me. The material was crisp, easy to read and understand, and covered every aspect of management – from simple decision making ideas, to managing people, to learning how to effectively manage your resources – financials, sustainability, process management. It’s kind of a simplified How-To/Hands-On MBA.

The only thing I found lacking was a Reading List that would have offered me recommendations on books to read to catch me up in the areas I wanted to persue more deeply. But maybe they will get to that. There is also a section for HR professionals, and one for Leaders. Clearly this group has a corner on the market for business tool kits, and they do it with great passion and professionalism.

If you have some new Managers, or want your folks to learn some new skills for Leadership, this is an easy-to-use guide to Mangement/Leadership With Integrity.

For more senior managers, I’d like to recommend two books that I use as ‘thought provokers’ when I sit down to write about decision making:
Organizational Culture and Leadership (second edition)
by Edgar H. Schein (Jossey Bass) and On Being Certain: Believing You Are Right Even When You Are Not by Robert A. Burton MD (St Martin’s Press). Both of these books offer insight into human behavior and how groups and people work together to make the decisions necessary for excellence. More skills based, these books will help your managers learn how to understand and monitor their own behaviors first.

Here is a site to go to that will introduce you to definitions for ‘corporate culture’ and ‘systems’ – both major themes in my new book coming out soon (The Dirty Little Secret: why buyers don’t buy and sellers don’t sell and what to do about it), as without a buyer navigating the elements of their system in a way to make change a viable choice, no purchasing will happen. Having a good understanding of culture and systems is vital for any sales person as well as managers and leaders. Check it out. http://managementhelp.org/org_thry/culture/culture.htm

http://www.goodpractice.com

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