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Richard Lepsinger Articles

Guest post by: Richard Lepsinger

The Hall of Shame: Six Organizations That Couldn’t “Get It Done” in 2011 - Click To Read Article
It’s that time of year when business owners and senior executives take stock of the past twelve months. What did 2011 look like for you and your company? The questions you could ask during your year-end review are endless. But, there’s only one that really matters: Did your company effectively execute its business goals? To learn from the “living laboratory” of real-world companies, here are six of this year’s headline makers and the lessons we can take away from their struggle.

Get What You Need From Your Matrix Partners: Five Guidelines for Influencing in a Matrix Structure - Click To Read Article
In a matrix organization-where people rely on getting work done through others over whom they have no direct authority-maintaining high levels of cooperation and coordination can be a challenge. What can leaders do to encourage and sustain cooperation?

The 2011 Execution Round-Up: Six Organizations That Couldn’t “Get It Done” This Year - Click To Read Article
It’s that time of year when business owners and senior executives take stock of the past twelve months. What did 2011 look like for you and your company? The questions you could ask during your year-end assessment are endless. But, there’s only one that really matters: Did your company effectively execute its plans and initiatives?

The Path to Success: What the Most Effective Leaders Do to Gain Support and Commitment - Click To Read Article
It is a reality in today’s organizations that in order to be successful, leaders must engage people, build relationships with key stakeholders, and gain their commitment. To find out how the most effective leaders do this, OnPoint Consulting used their Influence With Impact 360° survey to collect data on the influencing skills of 223 leaders (116 men and 107 women) across several organizations and industries.

Is Your Organization Prepared to Support Virtual Work? - Click To Read Article
Whether your virtual teams are in the formation stage or have been operating for a few months – it is critical to ensure that they are set up for success and get off to a good start. Organizations that proactively plan how to structure their virtual teams to set them up for success will see a better return on their investment than those that do not.

Criteria for Success: Characteristics of Top Virtual Leaders and Team Members - Click To Read Article
The most effective virtual team leaders balance both the execution-oriented practices and the interpersonal, communication, and cultural factors that define virtual teams. Therefore, organizations should select leaders who possess those key characteristics.

What’s On the Minds of Leaders Today? - Click To Read Article
In today’s economic climate, executives are focused on regaining their post-recession footing, keeping employees engaged, and enhancing customer relationships. Although all of these issues are critical, in order to address them, there is really only one question that warrants attention: Did the company effectively execute its plans and initiatives?

Bridging the Virtual Gap: It’s All About Developing New Habits - Click To Read Article
In a study conducted by our company, OnPoint Consulting, we found that many companies that had made significant investments in technology and virtual teams were not performing to their full potential. In fact, the study found that more than 25 percent of the virtual teams were not fully performing. The cause, we believe, is that organizations are approaching working on and leading virtual teams as if the dynamics are the same as those of team members who are working in the same location.

Virtual Collaboration is Not For Everyone: The Characteristics of Top Performing Virtual Leaders and Team Members - Click To Read Article
Many organizations have migrated toward telecommuting and virtual work due to rising travel costs, a global customer base, and the dispersion of talent. While numerous organizations have made significant investments in virtual teams and the technology to support them, a surprising number of virtual teams are not successful.

The Profile of Success: Building High Performing Virtual Teams - Click To Read Article
Although many companies have made significant investments in virtual teams and the technology to support them, a surprising number of these teams do not reach their full potential. A recent study conducted by OnPoint Consulting, and described in more detail in Virtual Team Success: A Practical Guide to Working and Leading From a Distance, surveyed 48 virtual teams across industries to identify specific practices associated with the most successful teams.

Five Ingredients For Virtual Success - Click To Read Article
Rising travel costs, coupled with the global dispersion of talent, are just some of the reasons that organizations have migrated toward telecommuting and virtual work. While numerous organizations have made significant investments in virtual teams and the technology to support them, a surprising number of virtual teams are not reaching their full potential. OnPoint Consulting surveyed 48 virtual teams across industries and found that there are specific practices associated with successful virtual teams.

How Great Leaders and Their Companies Get Results Every Time - Click To Read Article
If an organization cannot effectively execute, nothing else matters. Despite the importance of execution to business success, OnPoint Consulting’s Annual Pulse Survey found that 37% of leaders believe there is a gap between their organization’s ability to develop a strategy and its ability to execute that strategy. And, even more surprising, 62% lack confidence that the gap can be closed.

No Trust, No Team: Building Trust in a Virtual Setting - Click To Read Article
Although trust is a key factor in a virtual team’s success, interpersonal trust is more difficult to achieve in a virtual setting.

Hello, Is Anybody Out There? Facilitating High Impact Virtual Meetings - Click To Read Article
OnPoint’s global research study on virtual collaboration identified the factors that differentiate high performing virtual teams, or a success profile of “what good looks like”. One important differentiator was effective virtual meeting management, such that top performing teams have high-quality virtual meetings (v-meetings) and lower performing teams struggle with this.

Working Effectively in a Matrix: Tips for Building and Sustaining Cooperation - Click To Read Article
How do the best leaders coordinate decisions and actions across organizational boundaries and gain the support of people who often have competing priorities?

People Are Not the Problem: Eight Tips to Effectively Manage Change - Click To Read Article
OnPoint’s annual Execution Gap Survey indicates that while managing change is still a challenge for many leaders, some leaders have discovered how to do it right

Developing Talent on a Shoestring: Five Strategies to Cultivate Future Leaders In Tough Times - Click To Read Article
OnPoint’s 2011 Execution Gap Survey found that although succession management and leadership development programs are strongly correlated with key predictors of organizational success, many companies have pulled the plug on these mission critical activities. How do the best companies avoid this potentially fatal mistake?

The 2010 Execution Round-Up: Six Companies That Couldn’t “Get It Done” This Year (and Two That Did) - Click To Read Article
No doubt about it: 2010 saw its share of losers (and the occasional winner) in the business arena. Here are a few of this year’s headline makers and the lessons that can be learned from each of them.

Leading From a Distance: Five Lessons For Success - Click To Read Article
Not just anyone can lead virtually. It takes someone with the right mix of technical, interpersonal, and communication skills to successfully lead a virtual team.

Virtual Team Failure: Six Common Reasons Why Virtual Teams Do Not Succeed - Click To Read Article
The popularity of virtual teams in today’s business world keeps growing. Mostly because new and emerging technologies have made it easier than ever and the potential cost-savings of virtual teams is perfect for companies trying to reduce their budgets. Unfortunately, too many companies fail to take the steps necessary to ensue their virtual teams are successful.

Leading From a Distance: Five Best Practices for Virtual Team Leaders - Click To Read Article
It shouldn’t surprise you to hear that quality leadership is essential for a virtual team’s success. Unfortunately, leading virtually is not an easy job and it can be hard to find leaders who have both the technical and interpersonal skills necessary to get the job done right. We studied 48 virtual teams and their leaders to find out which behaviors differentiate the best from the worst.

A Bridge Builders “Cheat Sheet”: Tips & Tricks to Help You Traverse the Execution Gap - Click To Read Article
My research has found “Five Bridges” that enable a company to execute well. But how do you go about building them? First, you get comfortable with the fact that it’s a never-ending process. Then, you put certain time-tested tools and techniques in place and implement them relentlessly. Here, excerpted from Closing the Execution Gap, are some of my favorite tricks of the trade for getting these bridges underway.

The Execution Solution: Five Trade Secrets of Leaders and Companies That Consistently Get Things Done - Click To Read Article
What differentiates the results-getters from the can’t-get-it-done-ers? It’s not strategy or vision or quality or any of the other usual suspects. It is five research-based “bridges” that set companies up for success.

Execution All-Stars: Five Famous Companies That Bridged the Execution Gap (and How They Did It) - Click To Read Article
Ever wonder why some companies consistently meet their goals and others don’t? So did I. And when my consulting firm conducted a study of 400 companies, we found some answers. We discovered that there are five factors that set apart the organizations with the best performance results and those more effective at execution. I think of them as ‘The Five Bridges’ because they help companies close the gap between strategy and execution.” To see what the bridges look like in action, let’s look at a handful of well-known companies that execute exceptionally well.

Execution Meltdown: Four Key Failures that Sank BP - Click To Read Article
Though the worst oil spill in history resulted from many contributing factors, they can all be summed up in one big problem for BP-lack of execution. What exactly went wrong and what can other companies learn from BP’s failures.

Using Influence to Gain Commitment: Are Men and Women Really That Different? - Click To Read Article
Do men and women lead differently in the workplace? Based on much of the research, the short answer is “yes.” Although the differences often align with the stereotype that women lead with a more interpersonal style and men with a more task-oriented style, it appears that gender does play a role in leadership style and preferences.

Start an Execution Revolution: Five Ways Leaders Get Results - Click To Read Article
Leaders need more than vision and strategy to get results. If an organization can’t execute, nothing else matters. A recent survey found that companies and leaders that consistently deliver results use five actions to close the execution gap.

SIX LESSONS FOR EFFECTIVE VIRTUAL TEAMS: A RECIPE FOR SUCCESS - Click To Read Article
Virtual teams are more prevalent than ever. But the fact that virtual teams continue to grow in popularity doesn’t mean they’re always being used and managed properly. Quite the contrary. To help organizations maximize their investment in virtual collaboration, we conducted a study of 48 virtual teams to understand the success factors of top performing virtual teams. We identified six lessons for effective virtual teamwork.

ENCOURAGING AND SUSTAINING COOPERATION - Click To Read Article
Organizations are complex structures with many interdependencies. We must rely on others to help get things done and meet our objectives, and that means cooperation and collaboration are often the key to our success. While there is evidence that human beings base our actions on self-interest in an effort to maximize personal benefit, ample evidence also supports the proposition that our natural inclination is toward cooperation. The challenge you face in the workplace is to ensure the conditions that create and sustain cooperation and collaboration are in place.

THREE FACTORS MAKE PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT A SUCCESS - Click To Read Article
Over 50% of HR professionals and line managers do not believe their performance management systems support strategy execution.

Three Competencies Have the Greatest Impact on Leadership Effectiveness - Click To Read Article
The role of the leader has never been as important or demanding as it is today. Leaders at all levels must deliver consistent, sustainable results in leaner organizations and get things done day to day with fewer resources. And organizations must ensure that the right people with the right skills are in the right roles.

WHAT IMPACTS LEADERSHIP EFFECTIVENESS IN THE PHARMACEUTICAL INDUSTRY? - Click To Read Article
The role of the leader has never been as important or demanding as it is today in the pharmaceutical/biotech industry. Many companies have begun to re-engineer R&D and commercialization strategies in response the threat of fewer viable molecules and drained sales from generic erosion, and leaders at all levels are faced with the challenge of delivering consistent, sustainable results in leaner organizations. To succeed, leaders must ensure that the right people with the right skills are in the right roles.

Seven Success Factors Impact Leader Effectiveness in Manufacturing - Click To Read Article
Manufacturing companies have fewer resources to execute business objectives. OnPoint's study reveals the success factors that impact leader effectiveness to help prioritize leadership development initiatives and ensure ROI.

Influence With Impact: Gain the Support and Commitment of Others - Click To Read Article
A leader's success often depends on the ability to gain the support and cooperation of people who have competing priorities and/or conflicting goals. The effective use of influence is the primary tool a leader has to create alignment in these situations.

WHY WE SHOULD HOLD PEOPLE ACCOUNTABLE--AND WHY WE DON’T - Click To Read Article
When we fail to hold others accountable, we reap the consequences-some obvious, some not so obvious. A lack of productivity is one of the more obvious negatives that come to mind. So if accountability is critical to execution and individual and team performance, then why don’t we consistently hold people accountable for results? There are seven assumptions and misunderstanding-let’s call them “Tickets to Slide”-that contribute to this phenomenon.

Accountability Boosters: Managing Accountability in Others - Click To Read Article
Maybe one of your top performer’s self-image is threatened when his idea does not produce the intended results and he gets defensive. Or you’ve heard someone complain that because she can’t control all the elements of a project she should not be held responsible if things don’t go right. Or it suddenly becomes clear that the ability to disappear into the group is allowing someone to avoid taking accountability for his lack of individual contribution. The following Accountability Boosters will help you accomplish two important objectives-1) minimize the need for people to make excuses and 2) increase their level of accountability when things go wrong.

Formula for Tough Times: Four Ideas to Maintain Morale and Productivity - Click To Read Article
It's easier to keep employees motivated when times are good. Exceptional leaders and organizations use a combination of traditional and innovative ideas to maintain high levels of morale and productivity in a challenging business environment.

FOUR WAYS TO ENSURE LEADERSHIP RESPONSIBILITY - Click To Read Article
Leadership responsibility is the foundation of effective strategy execution; its management 101. Why do some organizations maintain high levels of leadership accountability and others fall short?

Identifying Future Leaders: Creative Leadership Development Strategies in Tough Times - Click To Read Article
Despite the challenging economy, firms with a long-term view continue to invest in their leaders. Traditionally, when budgets are tight, leadership development and succession planning are cut.





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