Five Unicorn Scaleup Strategies

Unicorns are privately held companies valued at $1 billion or more. Here’s the secret to Unicorn innovation. I had the chance to connect with a longtime friend and colleague, Matt May. He’s the author of numerous books and an expert on how lean principles can be used to drive innovation. His latest book, What a…

Agility is the 2023 Success Factor

Agility, the ability to think fast and move quickly, is an imperative for every team this year. That’s because there’s never been more uncertainty – around technology, the economy, global-political turmoil, and just about everything else. I’ve led teams in both big companies and startups. I’ve built new teams. And I’ve helped fix dysfunctional ones.…

6 Simple Growth Hacks for Startups

  Building a new business is tough. These strategies will help your startup succeed without a big investment.   As many of my readers know, I usually write about strategy, innovation, and leadership. But recently I’ve been asked a lot about how I helped establish Praxie.com as a destination website for hundreds of best practice…

Don’t Lose Your Best People. Use the 9-Box Grid to Grow Your Future Talent.

  Keep and develop your best people to create a high-performance culture and competitive advantage.   Hiring good people is tough. Retaining your best talent can be equally challenging. In today’s disruptive world, competitive advantage relies as much on people as it does technology. So, how do you objectively know which people are your all-stars, especially in a bigger…

Empathy: The Currency of Human Connection—and Innovation.

  Having worked with innovation teams from global companies like Visa, Colgate-Palmolive, Kimberly-Clark, Disney, Medtronic and many others, there’s one consistent success factor when it comes to innovation, no matter what you’re doing: it all starts with the customer. Companies spend oodles of time and money trying to understand customers. They conduct surveys, hire market researchers,…