I love how things, especially ideas can join up.
I’m reading Now, Discover your Strengths(NDYS) by Marcus Buckingham. (After a less than subtle hint Owl was gracious enough to give us a copy for Christmas). I’m also gradually working through Getting Things Done (GTD), a self-help book by David Allen promising to guide us to ‘Stress-free Productivity’ with Je’anna. After our daily check-in time with each other once the little one is down, we typically cover a couple of pages every evening. Me reading the text out loud and Je’anna providing critical yet objective running commentary.
Both books are great. From the very first page I was struck by the extent to which NDYS’s central tenets resonate with the Salutogenesis theoretical perspective of which I still am a devout fan.
GTD has many interesting quotes and tidbits in little callouts alongside the main text. One of these really grabbed my imagination tonight. It was a quotation of Peter F. Drucker (1909-2005), the dude who brought us the notion and term ‘knowledge worker’ (1959).
The knowledge that we consider knowledge proves itself in action. What we now mean by knowledge is information in action, information focused on results.
As sound-bites go I think this one is worth reading more than once, carefully and attentive.
This is has very specific bearing on some of the stuff I’m involved with, and intending to get a whole lot more involved with at Forge Business and my future career in general. Active – live – information chasing results. That’s a phrase I find extremely exciting, resonating big-time with what’s happening online at the moment and I want it high up in my job description.
Anyway, it prompted some browsing and I found it interesting to see how Druckers reasoning kind of reconciled the realms of these two books for me.
Managing Knowledge Means Managing Oneself (2000)
In this short piece he opens with observations about the cultural implications of the proliferation of the abilities and opportunities of individuals to exercise choice. This leads into the general topic of knowledge forming a context for a subtle argument for the import of knowledge of one-self, the role of recording – and reviewing – decisions and their outcomes.
From there he launches prophesy regarding the increasing importance for building on strengths as a critical criteria for improving productivity. He also outlines four avenues through which organizations ca develop and motivate knowledge workers and yields an argument that has been popping up increasingly wherever productivity and business performance management is seriously considered:
Knowledge workers don’t believe they are paid to work 9 to 5; they believe they’re paid to be effective. Organizations that understand this — and strip away everything that gets in their knowledge workers’ way — will be able to attract, hold, and motivate the best performers.
Its obviously a lot harder to negotiate a relationship around efficiency than good old empirically measurable work-hours but makes so much more sense in the long run, both for the employer and the employee.
I think the same dynamic is starting to play out in mercant-consumer relationships as well, simply because technology is shrinking feedback loops.
What I’m reading, Drucker’s knowledge work, discover your strengths and getting things done
I love how things, especially ideas can join up.
I’m reading Now, Discover your Strengths(NDYS) by Marcus Buckingham. (After a less than subtle hint Owl was gracious enough to give us a copy for Christmas). I’m also gradually working through Getting Things Done (GTD), a self-help book by David Allen promising to guide us to ‘Stress-free Productivity’ with Je’anna. After our daily check-in time with each other once the little one is down, we typically cover a couple of pages every evening. Me reading the text out loud and Je’anna providing critical yet objective running commentary.
Both books are great. From the very first page I was struck by the extent to which NDYS’s central tenets resonate with the Salutogenesis theoretical perspective of which I still am a devout fan.
GTD has many interesting quotes and tidbits in little callouts alongside the main text. One of these really grabbed my imagination tonight. It was a quotation of Peter F. Drucker (1909-2005), the dude who brought us the notion and term ‘knowledge worker’ (1959).
As sound-bites go I think this one is worth reading more than once, carefully and attentive.
This is has very specific bearing on some of the stuff I’m involved with, and intending to get a whole lot more involved with at Forge Business and my future career in general. Active – live – information chasing results. That’s a phrase I find extremely exciting, resonating big-time with what’s happening online at the moment and I want it high up in my job description.
Anyway, it prompted some browsing and I found it interesting to see how Druckers reasoning kind of reconciled the realms of these two books for me.
Managing Knowledge Means Managing Oneself (2000)
In this short piece he opens with observations about the cultural implications of the proliferation of the abilities and opportunities of individuals to exercise choice. This leads into the general topic of knowledge forming a context for a subtle argument for the import of knowledge of one-self, the role of recording – and reviewing – decisions and their outcomes.
From there he launches prophesy regarding the increasing importance for building on strengths as a critical criteria for improving productivity. He also outlines four avenues through which organizations ca develop and motivate knowledge workers and yields an argument that has been popping up increasingly wherever productivity and business performance management is seriously considered:
Its obviously a lot harder to negotiate a relationship around efficiency than good old empirically measurable work-hours but makes so much more sense in the long run, both for the employer and the employee.
I think the same dynamic is starting to play out in mercant-consumer relationships as well, simply because technology is shrinking feedback loops.