Find some red tape and eliminate it

Working with a government agency recently, we spent time on a ‘Red Tape Reduction’ session.

Red tape: those needless, time consuming activities.

Ask your customers and they'll have likely been frustrated or annoyed with something about your systems or how they interact with your product, business or people.

'Red tape'? It's thought to be based on the old practice of binding government documents with... red tape.

Frustration with red tape also comes from within the organisation too, from complicated or broken systems, time wasting forms, clunky websites.

Agreeing to go through a Red Tape Reduction session is a great thing to do! For many organisations this isn’t easy:

1. To agree to do it

2. To commit to being there in the session, identifying red tape, and then

3. To actually change things to remove the problem points.

That's because it’s way more exciting (and more rewarded via KPIs & targets) to work on new things, make new stuff and create new services.

What if at your next team meeting you just identified something that’s riddled with red tape and decided to eliminate the messy complications? You’d make things better for your customers, your colleagues ... and you.

Stargazing, grounded - or a balance?

Everyone is on a board - even if you don't think you are...you are.

On a board in your organisation, in your family, in community groups and through recreational interests. You may not be an actual director, but you're sure to be contributing to decision making, a vision, implementation and leadership activities through everything you do. 

I think Lucy Marcus' work challenging conventional wisdom in and out of board rooms is brilliant. She has some wise advice for corporate governance, no matter the size of the organisation.

While I was listening to one of her presentations in Australia a little while ago, I visualized her key points:

Some of these messages are clear and common sense:

- strong boards build strong companies 

- have diversity around the table

- be up to speed 

- contribute or exit.

But others are less often talked about around the table:
- the need to balance 'star gazing' with being grounded
- the characters in the play are often the same (I think this applies to any type of committee, group or team we are a part of)
- many board members are a little bit "huh???" when it comes to social media and social strategy ... so they're (you're) not actually up to speed then!

So whatever 'board' you're on, work at it smarter and harder - without 'over boarding'... otherwise get off.

I'd love to hear about your recent board experiences or thoughts on board leadership.