Entries by artkenya

Coaching vice-chancellors

Last October I was invited to be one of the facilitators at a British Council-sponsored induction workshop for the newly appointed vice-chancellors (VCs) and principals of public universities, and recently I was invited to play a similar role at a leadership training workshop for all the VCs and principals of the public universities. My topic […]

Overcoming the Iceberg of Ignorance

We hear a lot about the ‘Iceberg of Ignorance’, where those at the top of the organisational pyramid have little idea about what’s really going on among their staff at the lower levels —about how they feel and how they behave with each other as a result of how engaged they are. It’s why the […]

Going beyond an unhappy customer

We all have tales about feeling frustrated as unhappy customers, and the question for me is how to go beyond whining and moaning – and then defecting to another vendor – to offering advice to the offending supplier so they can restore our confidence and fix the issue. Hopefully not just on a one-off basis […]

Knowing when to say ‘No’

In my life these days the issue of having to say “No” is raising its head in many different contexts. The most recent one came about as I was interacting with the general manager of a company’s service department, where we got talking about how to deal with customers who are so difficult, so unreasonable, […]

Corruption rife in the West too

I was in London for a few days in December, and there I came across an article on corruption in the Sunday Times by Matthew Syed—a management consultant like me—about how it works in western liberal democracies. He reckons the cancer of corruption has been growing there for decades, resulting in such consequences as the […]

Why board voting comes last

A while ago I read an article about boards and voting by Roger Hitchcock, a senior partner at the Sirdar Global Group which guides boards to become more effective. I met Roger when I was a participant in his Sirdar Applied Directorship Programme some years ago, and as always in this article he was full […]

What graduates ought to do

At the beginning of this month, Strathmore University Business School held its Executive Education graduation ceremony, and I was invited to be their keynote speaker. It was a wonderful occasion, where more than 300 of the nearly 2,500 participants in the executive programmes that had been running this year were receiving their certificates, with many […]

Board hand in culture change

A while ago, I facilitated a session with the board of a major Kenyan organisation, where I had them reflect on what they were proud of as a board and as individuals, and what additional aspects they wished to be proud of later. The team is undergoing a review of its culture so as to […]

CFO’s day with board directors

I was recently invited by professional advisory firm Ronalds East Africa to be one of the keynote speakers at their training event for Chief Finance Officers (CFOs) and other leaders of the finance function. My session was about advising the participants on how to interact effectively at the board level. There was quite a spectrum […]