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Conversation is ActionTalk may be cheap, but it's also enormously valuable.
Conversation is often underrated and can even be seen as 'a waste of time' that prevents us from 'taking action'. |
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The Greater the Complexity, the Smaller the AudienceSo often, complexity is worn as a badge of honour, but the greater the complexity, the smaller the audience. Complex, technical language is OK when you're talking with other specialists in your own field, because you're all native speakers. If you want to get your message to a wider audience, you need to speak their language.
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Talking on Mute: Why Being Ignored Is Worse Than Being RejectedMost of us have been on a lot of video meetings lately and I'm sure, like me, you've had the experience of talking away about something only to discover that you're still on mute. You've tried to convey your message, but nobody heard you.
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The Messenger Is as Important as the MessageWhen you're trying to convey a message, it's not enough to have a beautifully conceived technical concept and robust data to back it up. Sometimes we spend so long getting the design 'right' that we forget about who's wearing it.
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Technical Brilliance is Not EnoughThere is a myth about the hero inventor - a lone genius and a Eureka moment. Reality, though, is rarely this way.
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What is the Most Common Qualification Among Board Members?I often hear technical specialists express their frustration that the board, in their view, does not understand the technical aspects of proposals presented to them. This can be seen as a lack of technical expertise on the part of the board and there is a concern that if technical advice is not heeded, it will increase specific and critical risks.
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Strategy Before AssetsWhen developing a Strategic Asset Management Plan (SAMP) it can be tempting to start with the assets. What assets do we have? How do we manage them? What can we learn from the story of London's historic watermen about the relationship between strategy and assets?
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Pivot Point: Making the Decisions that Matter in Business2011 was a momentous year: Brisbane suffered a catastrophic flood, my husband and I got married and spent a wonderful honeymoon in France, I won a scholarship to Harvard Business School and I wrote my first book, Pivot Point: making the decisions that matter in business. It was a time before the word 'pivot' was in vogue.
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Collective Decision MakingBoards make collective decisions. This is different to executive decision making, and it's an important nuance to understand if you're presenting a proposal to the board.
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Asset Management in the BoardroomIn the first of the Asset Management Council's AM webinars, we discussed asset management in the boardroom and the dynamics of board decision making that asset managers need to be aware of.
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Reducing the Risks of Innovation in Asset ManagementThe imperative for innovation in every sector has never been greater. Asset management is a risk-based discipline and often the imperative to manage risk can compete with the imperative for innovation.
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We Create Value Through Connection, Not in IsolationBack in September 2018, I wrote an article about how we create value through connection, not in isolation. Little did I know that 18 months later isolation would take on a whole new and literal meaning. However, I believe this statement remains true. Connection now is more important than ever.
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Resilience Means Self Care: Looking After YouThese thoughts are dedicated to the leaders, like you, who inspire and challenge me every day. I wrote these in 2012 after my experience at Harvard Business School, where one of the key lessons for me was that 'resilience means self-care'. I'd like to share them with you again today. Stay well.
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Apart, but Not AloneNow, more than ever, we need to draw on our human ingenuity and work together to create solutions. Since the start of 2020, each day I've been sharing a new idea to help spark creativity and empower innovation.
I'd like to share with you this selection of more than 50 of the 365 ideas. Those included are suitable to do at home and don't involve a crowd. Fun, laughter and togetherness are essential, even if we are working apart. |
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Bullfighting: There's No Bear on Wall StreetTwenty years ago, I took my first trip to Germany and visited the Deutsche Boerse, the German Stock Exchange, in Frankfurt. These were the days before the Euro currency was introduced and they still traded in Deutsche Marks. Outside the Exchange, on the Boersenplatz, there are two bronze statues: a bull and a bear. They represent the rising and the falling market respectively.
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Great Achievements Are Rarely Made by Individuals Acting AloneThere's a myth about the hero scientist - Newton being struck by an apple, Archimedes leaping from the bath exclaiming Eureka! While there may be grains of truth in these stories, great achievements are rarely made by individuals acting alone. In reality it takes a team and active collaboration to make significant breakthroughs.
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A Single Beat - Creating Seamless CollaborationMost drums are made with plies of wood that are inserted into a mold and joined together with glue. This creates layers in the drum shell, warping of the wood and seams of weakness in the drum's integrity and its sound quality.
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Creative Sparks: Keeping the Fire of Collaboration BurningA few years ago I was on a trip with my Mum in Switzerland. She is a Girl Guide leader and from a young age she taught me how to lay a fire and to ensure it would go all night with no more than two matches. We were staying at a Girl Guides Chalet and some Boy Scouts were visiting for a traditional campfire. The Scouts had tried unsuccessfully to get the fire started. So, naturally we stepped in.
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The Invisible Wall: Creating a Safe Space for CollaborationA few years ago I worked with a company that had built a fancy new open plan office to 'enhance collaboration'. When the teams moved to the new office, they no longer had walls between them but there were still barriers. It was amazing to see that those who didn't speak to each other before the move, still didn't speak to each other afterward. The physical walls had been replaced by 'invisible' walls, a bit like Get Smart's cone of silence.
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The Rhythm of Life: Maintaining Consistency in InnovationWhen Ernest Shackleton set off for Antarctica in 1915 it as billed as a grand adventure. In the days before GPS or modern thermal clothing such an adventure carried genuine risks.
After becoming stranded on the ice floes, their ship 'Endurance' eventually sank, broken up by the pressure of the ice. It would have been easy to give up hope, but Shackleton understood that maintaining the rhythm of daily life was essential for the survival of his crew. |
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The Baggy Green - How Rituals Build ConsistencyJohn Buchanan was coach of the Australian Cricket team during one of its most successful periods. In his book, 'If Better is Possible', he describes the ritual of presenting a new test player with their 'baggy green' cap as a 'sacred act': 'The cap is always given to a new player by a former player in a small team ceremony at the warm-up huddle on the day of the new player's debut.
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Consistency in Innovation: Routines for SuccessBarack Obama famously favoured blue or grey suits during his time as President. As he said to Vanity Fair, “I’m trying to pare down decisions. I don’t want to make decisions about what I’m eating or wearing. Because I have too many other decisions to make.”
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Committing to Innovation in 2020If you're looking to progress your innovation in 2020, download the series of three articles on what it means to be committed to innovation.
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365 Fun Ideas to Empower Innovation in 2020If you're making a commitment to be more innovative in 2020, it needn't be a chore.
Each day I'll be sharing a fun idea to empower innovation for you and your team. By the end of 2020 you'll have 365 ideas to try, but you can get started right now. |
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2020 Programs and EventsWhatever your goals in the year ahead, I'd love to support you to achieve them. Here's a taste of the programs and events I'll be running in 2020.
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Is Your Approach to Innovation a 'Crash Diet' or a Sustainable Healthy Choice?A crash diet can help you to lose weight quickly, but it's common for people to regain that weight, and more, when they go back to eating normally. Crash diets are extreme, and not sustainable. Instead, a sustainable approach to healthy eating requires a long-term commitment to make more healthy choices every day.
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Innovation Requires Commitment of TimeOn our honeymoon in France, my husband and I visited Monet's garden at Giverny. It's a beautiful French country house, every room in a different monotone palette. Monet loved colour and his studio looked out over the garden. He built a lake, complete with a bridge, and planted his famous gardens, just so that he could paint them.
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What We Learned at the BOLT HackathonThis year's BOLT Asset Management Hackathon brought together professionals from engineering, IT, operations and maintenance to tackle some of our most pressing asset management challenges.
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What Does It Mean to Be Committed to Innovation?It's easy to say that you're innovative. It's easy for companies to have an 'innovation' pillar in their strategic plan, to insert a paragraph on innovation in their annual report, or even to list innovation as one of their values, but what does true commitment to innovation look like?
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Pruning for GrowthWhen I was a young girl, my grandmother had a beautiful rose garden. It was formally laid out, right next to the house that sat in a clearing on a hilltop, surrounded by about five hundred acres of native forest.
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Jacaranda Blues: Why Self Imposed Deadlines Are the Most ImportantI've just seen the first jacaranda blossom of the season. These flowers have a distinctive purple blue hue. Right now in Brisbane their vibrant colour is starting to emerge as Spring unfolds across the city.
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The Board's Role in Asset ManagementOver the past five weeks I've written a series of articles on the Board's Role in Asset Management.
Board Directors are asset managers. Delivering value from the company’s assets is one of the key roles of the board. It’s important that board directors have a thorough understanding of asset management principles and how they apply to board decision making. |
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The Board's Compliance Role in Asset ManagementBoards need to consider a wide range of compliance obligations as part of their oversight role. These may be imposed by regulators, government or donor-funding regimes, federal, state or local legislation. Industry based standards may apply in the sectors in which the company operates. While meeting mandatory compliance requirements is not optional, board directors need to satisfy themselves that the company has systems in place to meet these and that they receive relevant and timely reports regarding any potential or actual non-compliance.
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The Boards Policy Role in Asset ManagementMy husband and I spent our honeymoon in France and we had the privilege to enjoy a wonderful lunch at the Ritz Hotel in Paris. Cesar Ritz was a passionate entrepreneur, with a single-minded vision: to have his hotels be the very definition of elegance and refinement. He wanted his hotel to be a place 'where a Prince would feel at home'.
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The Board's Risk Role in Asset ManagementNobody wants to think about risk when things are going well, but it only takes a moment for things to turn from very good to horrid. In my experience as a board director I've had CEOs say about a proposal that 'There's no risk.' My response: 'There is always risk.'
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The Board's Strategy Role in Asset ManagementLast week I had a day trip to Canberra and as I waited in the pre-dawn darkness for my cab to the airport, it only took a moment to swipe my phone and find out that it was currently -4.7 degrees in the capital (feels like -7.7!). However inconvenient for a Queenslander, I had no hesitation in carting my winter coat, gloves and scarf, because I knew I would need them.
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The Buck Stops Here - the Board's Leadership Role in Asset ManagementUnited States President Harry Truman had a sign on his desk that read 'The buck stops here.' He's quoted as saying, “It's easy for the Monday morning quarterback to say what the coach should have done, after the game is over. But when the decision is up before you — the decision has to be made.”
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Delegation Is Not IntegrationThe 'Oarsome Foursome' were an Australian Olympic and World Champion rowing team, competing most famously as a coxless four. Through the 1990s and into the early 2000s they were an unbeatable team and hugely popular in Australia.
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Better Business for a Better WorldWe create value through connections, not in isolation.
As a Certified BCorporation, it's been great to be a part of #BCorpmonth across Australia and New Zealand. It's fantastic to be involved in a community of business that is playing their part in creating a better world for our community and for our planet, now and into the future. |
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The Status Quo Doesn't Shift Because You're RightIn his book, This is Marketing, Seth Godin highlights that if all it took to upend the status quo was the truth, we would have changed a long time ago. The status quo only shifts when the culture changes.
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Have You Topped-Up Your Oil Lately?Do you remember the last time you bought a car? Did it come with oil already in the engine? Did you think that you'd never have to worry about oil again, because that had been 'done'? Probably not! Engine lubrication is not a one-off activity. We know we need to top-up the oil or the engine will seize up. |
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AMPEAK Wrap Up 2019AMPEAK is the premier annual conference for Asset Management professionals and this year was held in Fremantle, Western Australia. As a member of the board of the Asset Management Council, it was my privilege to be involved in this event. We had record numbers, a sold out conference, trade exhibition and gala dinner. These are all indicators of the growing awareness and interest in asset management across Australian and around the world.
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A Strategy Should Not Be an Unsolvable MysteryOutsold only by the Bible, Agatha Christie’s crime novels have sold over two billion copies. For fiction written in English, only Shakespeare comes close in total sales, but he has had a four hundred year head start. In more than eighty novels, Agatha Christie held readers in suspense as they tried to use their ‘little grey cells’ to deduce the villain in a series of nasty murders. Over the years, many theories have emerged that seek to explain the secret to Christie’s success.
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Every Industry Has an Imperative to InnovateHow is your company responding to this imperative?
In the 1990s the pharmaceutical industry was in the midst of a biotech boom. Recombinant DNA technologies and biological pharmaceuticals brought novel treatments to previously untreated conditions. For my PhD I researched the top 21 global pharmaceutical companies, who together represented a discrete strategic group. By the end of my four years of research there were 14 companies left. A flurry of merger activity between the dominant players in this industry was driven by the imperative for innovation. |
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Keys to Sustainable GrowthOne of the keys to sustainable growth through innovation is to divorce what you own from what you earn. Historically, wealth was linked to land ownership and he who had the most land had the most wealth and power. Kingdoms were built and wars were fought over the ownership of scarce land assets. While land still has value, it's no longer the only way to build wealth.
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Building Your Ark: Managing Unplanned ChangeAntediluvian is one of my favourite words. It has a quirky ring to it and it's unusual enough that if you drop it into a sentence you can really surprise people.
Its literal meaning is before the flood. Traditionally, this refers to the Biblical flood of Noah, and the term is generally used to describe thoughts, ideas or policies that are so ancient or archaic that they could have come off the Ark. |
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It Takes 20 Wickets to Win a Test MatchAs a kid my summers were filled with cricket. We watched it on the TV and then we'd play cricket at the beach or in the backyard with a transistor radio going so we didn't miss a ball. Some of my earliest memories are of Lillee and Thompson pounding the pitch against the Windies and Allan Border smashing it out in the Ashes.
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