perspective – Nathan Magnuson

How to Be a Responsible “Idea Guy”

July 2, 2018 Personal Effectiveness perspective

Are you an idea person? Do you find yourself coming up with new business ideas, branding concepts or process improvements? Does careful project management sometimes stifle your creativity? Do people ever give you that look that implies you ought to focus on the task at hand instead of daydreaming? If…

Get Your Idea Off the Ground

November 7, 2016 Personal Effectiveness perspective

How do you get your big idea across in the age of information? A quick keyword search can provide anyone with much more data than they could ever hope to use. What’s the secret to getting your idea past all the clutter and into the land of reality? It’s been well…

Beware the Curse of Knowledge

October 3, 2016 Change Learning perspective

Acquiring knowledge and know-how is critical to any professional – both for knowledge and manual workers. But with it brings some new disadvantages as well. The “curse of knowledge” is recognized as a “cognitive bias” that essentially means it is difficult or impossible to unremember or disregard information you possess. It…

9 Leadership Themes for the New Year

January 4, 2016 Inspiration Personal Effectiveness perspective

I don’t know what last year brought your way, but as the saying goes: all new beginnings are hopeful. I believe that’s true when it comes to leadership effectiveness as well. Wouldn’t this be a great year for some meaningful strides? If you haven’t thought much about it, I’d like…

Make Better Decisions Using WRAP

August 3, 2015 decision-making Leadership perspective planning Strategic Thinking

How exciting is decision-making?? I’ve always enjoyed the logic that goes into navigating the personal and professional crossroads of life. Sometimes things work out. Other times it’s a disaster. Did we make the right call? How can we know for sure? I read a book a couple years ago that took…

Is Leadership Easy or Difficult?

November 3, 2014 Leadership Organizational Effectiveness perspective

One of the things that disappoints me the most is hearing someone tell me they don’t want to be a leader. It’s unfortunate because I believe that everyone not only has the ability to be leader but also the responsibility to make a leadership contribution in the role they are in. But…

How to Bounce Back from Adversity

January 20, 2014 Courage decision-making Inspiration Personal Effectiveness perspective planning Resilience

Adversity is no respecter of persons. Our experiences are usually different, but each of us gets our turn. Our organizations do too, for that matter. So what happens when adversity strikes? How can we climb our way our of it? This isn’t an exhaustive list, but here are some thinking…

Which Stage of Competence Are You?

August 26, 2013 Engagement Human Resources Learning Organizational Effectiveness Personal Effectiveness perspective

Everybody wants competence. We want it for ourselves. We expect it from others in our organizations. We demand it from the people and organizations we purchase from. But how do we figure out if we’ve got it? How well do we develop it in others? Where do we even start?…

What People Want: 8 Things Money Can’t Buy

January 14, 2013 Influence Inspiration Personal Effectiveness perspective

You may remember the Mastercard commercials that ran on television several years ago. Each one depicted a family having a wonderful (and expensive) excursion together. The punchline informed us, “there are some things money can’t buy. For everything else there’s Mastercard.” The subliminal message may have been that if you…