Leaders spend (a lot of) time hiring people with potential.

My daily social feeds are chock-full of moans and laments about a lack of leadership or the gotchas while hiring people for jobs. Both can change everything. Here’s what I have to say about it. Leaders spend a lot of time on hiring. Don’t fly through the hiring process. Hiring decisions deserve time. I know

Audits of Communications or Marketing Units

I’m not going to mince words or bury the lede: You should periodically sponsor an audit of your communications or marketing unit. Despite the word “audit” creating fear in the hearts of most, the comprehensive review of an organizational unit is an excellent practice…for all the reasons you suspect, and more. Who can argue with

Determining what positions you need on your team.

So far, I haven’t visited a campus where resources were flush — where there were plenty of dollars for every position needed for a marketing or communications team. If you lead a team, you likely dream of adding to it. Yet, if given the opportunity to add one position in the coming fiscal year, how

Communications Audits: Let your cage be rattled.

Back before we called it disruption, I called it “rattling cages.” Originally defined as annoying behavior, rattling someone’s cage means getting their attention in order to get something accomplished. Maybe this seems less relevant to you because you are already doing exceptional work despite a high volume of meetings and to dos. The cage rattling

Ready to Roll: Expanding your team.

It’s 2014. If you have the chance to expand your team, what skill sets should you add? I address this question in Ready to Roll, a feature I wrote for CASE CURRENTS. In case you missed them, part one and part two also appeared on this blog. Expanding the team What one or two positions should you add,

Ready to Roll: Centralize wherever you can.

It’s 2014. Is your communications and marketing team prepared to succeed? I address this question in part two of Ready to Roll, a piece I wrote for CASE CURRENTS. In case you missed it, part one also appeared on my blog. Centralize wherever you can I understand that alumni relations is different from sports information, which

Are you ready to roll in 2014?

Last fall, I had a fascinating conversation with Theresa Walker, senior editor for CURRENTS magazine at CASE. The conversation led to an article entitled, Ready to Roll. Over the next couple of weeks, with the permission of CASE, I’ll publish the piece I wrote for CURRENTS here on my blog. Today’s higher education communications and

Passion (for the work) leads to incredible websites.

Many, many times, it’s a love fest between the consulting team and the campus teams that engage us. True passion for the educational mission combined with demonstrated passion for the website work we’re doing together are essential for incredible results. Why? Because large campus-wide initiatives are overwhelming and complex and mired in consensus decision making.

You know people don’t come out of a box that way, right?

Mentor is a real person, not a buzzword. Coach is a slam-dunk metaphor for manager. Managing people means you are responsible for helping them along. You know people don’t come out of a box as exceptional performers, don’t you? Yes, I know that individual (and team) performance is influenced by the knowledge, skills and abilities

In the category of not as easy as it looks: Being Boss.

Spoiler Alert: I’m not mincing words on this one. Steel yourself for stronger bolder language than usual from me and enjoy the post. Today is National Boss’s Day. Despite its Hallmark holiday status since 1979, I wouldn’t say that National Boss’s Day is part of popular culture. Instead, complaining about a boss, movies about hating your boss,