By: Michael Kanazawa

Sometimes the greatest and most expansive innovations come through projects with the greatest constraints. For some, there is a belief that brainstorming on breakthrough innovations must be done without boundaries. However, these exercises often result in unconstrained outputs that are scattered, unfocused, and impractical.

In contrast, putting significant constraints on an outcome forces more structured thinking and often a need for breakthrough ideas to achieve the results despite the constraints. This month Raj Setty shares in his ChangeThis manifesto a form called “mini sagas” as a way to force yourself to think more clearly. He challenges us to write a full story in exactly 50 words. It’s tough and it takes a creative mind to tell a full story that in that few words and in an exact number of words. Mainly these are fun examples of creative writing, but there is a very practical application to setting growth strategies and running effective strategic brainstorming work. (more…)

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By: Michael Kanazawa

In most of my experiences with our ACT process, we’ve been working to accelerate strategic change at corporations. We’ve also worked with our process with public educational institutions, which has always been enjoyable because the end “product” of developing future leaders is so rewarding. One area I haven’t spent a lot of time thinking about is how our process could be applied to social change or to quite literally, change the world.

Two things happened this week that are opening my eyes to the opportunity for our process to help change the world. One was an article about the breakdown between policy changes and real-world impact within our government and the other was a real surprise and practical interpretation of our work from a pet rescue non-profit founder who is looking to change the world.  (more…)

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By: Michael Kanazawa

Earlier this week my eBook “People Don’t Hate Change, They Hate How You’re Trying to Change Them” was posted on the Change This! site. Change This! is a site with free, downloadable essays and mini-books. It was conceived by Seth Godin and is now run by 800 CEO Read. If you haven’t been there yet, it is worth a good look.

This eBook is a great, and free, way to sample what we have to say if you haven’t read the book yet, and a fantastic way to share our message with others who would benefit from it. Anybody who is challenged with implementing a strategy or major initiative, looking to accelerate their results, and fully engage their organization would benefit from the ideas and tips. If the concepts make sense to you, please help us spread the word by forwarding or sharing the link to the eBook.

Michael Fitzgerald who writes for BNET, The New York Times and Fast Company and many other top publications calls the essay a “fun and mind-turning essay” that provides “an excellent synopsis of the book ‘Big Ideas to Big Results.’” Hope you enjoy and find value in this latest piece.

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By Michael Kanazawa

Frequently in working with large company executives looking to move into a new business sector and entrepreneurs looking for funding, I’m asked what should be in the business plan or strategy. A second question not always asked, but necessary to answer, is what makes for a successful business plan or strategy. One great resource is to look at Sequoia Capital’s tips for success and business plan outline. They certainly have some great proof points, having invested in the founders of Google, Apple, Oracle and Pay-Pal. Sequoia published two great lists that are fantastic resources to leverage and apply the best of what they’ve learned by launching these types of growth companies. (more…)

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By Michael Kanazawa

Very often you’ll see companies slip into a mode where they start growing by the averages, benchmarking expense ratios, setting “competitive” pricing, and “market-level” salaries. It’s not necessarily bad to play by the averages unless it leads to being an average company. Great companies are built and run by great people. How can you get there?

The Container Store is a story in corporate success. They have been consistently growing at double digit rates and have been listed as one Forbes’ Top 100 companies to work for, eight years in a row. In the tough business of retailing, especially with bigger rivals such as Target, Sears, and Walmart, The Container Store is setting it’s own standards for innovative products and great customer service.

One of the most innovative ideas at The Container Store is their formula for talent management. (more…)

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 Middle Manager Tips for Leading Breakthrough Strategies [32:03m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (55)

In this interview, Wayne Turmel and I talk about how to implement the best ideas in our book to the tough jobs middle managers face. We discussed how to tell people that their project isn’t a top priority, how to work through competing priorities when some of those are being presented by sales people as critical, and how to build organizational power by leveraging “The Power Curve” as you ascend the corporate ladder.

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 Doing More On Less [28:12m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (49)

Listen as Mike talks with Lisa Haneberg author of the Management Craft blog during one of her fireside chat sessions.

Lisa has a very unique perspective in the interview in that she focused on the challenges of middle managers and she has been a manager herself facing many of the challenges we talk about in the book. It was a fun and lively conversation and one of my favorite interviews to date. Hope you’ll enjoy it and find good value in it as well. This is a second post, but people had asked to have the MP3 file available here. My Podcast Alley feed! {pca-b720560dbb15c2bd3b4fc510cc1d2c27}

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 Avoid Corporate Change Sugar Highs [7:26m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (70)

In this podcast, we discuss how corporate change programs can feel like “sugar highs” to people where the energy spikes up for a short moment and then the program is quickly abandoned and is replaced or overshadowed by the next wave of change programs. In this mode, some leaders start to believe the old saying that, “people hate change.” We talk about how that actually isn’t true. The truth is that people don’t hate change, they hate corporate change programs. Our challenge as leaders is to break that cycle and approach strategic transformation and change in a way that engages people, creates ownership and produces breakthrough results. It can be done.

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 An Interview With Mike Kanazawa [16:17m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (50)

Podcasting has become a new form of personal expression as well as a very targeted media channel. Through the experience of launching the book, I’ve been diving head first into the world of podcasting.

The greatest surprise for me has been finding individuals who are passionate about some specific content. They are not focused on content that will support advertising business models, but rather content that is purely focused on what interests them and their listeners.

One of those people, Brian Oates, of Imprint at Daxle.net recently interviewed me for his series of author interviews. In preparing for the interview, I became curious about how he got into the “business” of podcasting and what he gets in return…as in profits. It was a bit forward to ask, but he had just finished interviewing me and I was curious. (more…)

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by: Michael Kanazawa (note: picture source from Lisa Haneberg’s Management Craft blog)

Just recently, Lisa Haneberg had me join her for a “Fireside Chat” podcast for her popular management blog, Management Craft. During the interview she started talking about her favorite sentence in the whole book, and I knew just what she was talking about. The sentence is, “Denial is the opium of losers.” In the podcast we talk about what that means and how to avoid the problems it can cause. She also pointed out several other real keys to the book with amazing accuracy. Although we don’t quite solve every business problem in the world, we do talk about a new mantra to live by that should replace the old and ineffective phrase, “do more with less.”

You can listen to the podcast and read her post about the podcast or just listen to the podcast here.

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