Presentation Slides

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Complexity: The New Corporate Challenge

A presentation to the Bay Area Human Resource Executive Council in November 2007.

Distinguishes between confusion (in the mind of the beholder) and genuine complexity (in the world). Suggests that our normal tendency to try and simplify things is the exact opposite of an effective response in the face of true systemic complexity. Explores the implications of a complexity mindset for decision making, strategy execution, and leadership.

Decision Making in Organizations

A presentation for San Mateo County employees enrolled in a Masters of Public Administration program through USF.

Outlines the key issues in quality decision-making in organizational settings. Presentation covers decision distortion, decision challenges, decomposing the content of a decision, 5 different decision forums, and finishes with a checklist for quality decisions.

Why Companies Can't Seem to Solve Problems

A presentation at the BAODN Best in the West Conference in April 2006. This is an expanded version of the presentation originally delivered to the SBODN "Seed the Future" conference on 13 May 2005 at Sun Microsystems. 

Organizations are poor at solving problems because of (1) an obsessive focus on results (rather than understanding), (2) a pallid model of problem solving, and (3) a poor understanding of the role of leadership in problem solving.

Creating the Conscious Company

A presentation in August 2006 to the South Bay Organizational Development Network. This talk uses an exercise which has its own file to download.

Despite all the value in developing people, sometimes we need to look to developing the corporate entity, creating a minimal level of perception, memory, modeling, and learning.  This "corporate consciousness" should be robust even in the face of substantial turnover.

Problem Solving 2.0: The 8 Executive tools for solving your toughest problems.

A presentation to several Renaissance Forum CEO groups in May 2005. 

We face tougher problems than ever before in business, yet our understanding of problem solving in general is still built around a model that is decades old and surprisingly simplistic. A more powerful model acknowledges the 8 types of problems, and re-defines leadership to ensure support for a more robust problem-solving culture.

Organizational Assessment . . . without tears

While organizations frequently turn to surveys as a strategy for self-improvement, they seldom get the full benefit of their effort. This presentation outlines the requirements for decision-readiness, which goes beyond simply collecting data. There is also a handout to download separately.