The Reward Trap

 

Issue No. 695 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting (Oct. 24 2026) warns that those bonuses, bribes, and rewards might be a big mistake at your office—and at home! Plus, click here for back issues posted at the new location for John Pearson’s Buckets Blog, including my review of Awakened by Grace: The Life Story of Chuck Swindoll. And check out these bite-sized book summaries (7- to 9-minute videos)—perfect for your weekly staff meeting.   The Reward Trap explains why offering rewards to employees (and your kids and grandkids) just might backfire! (Grandkid: "If there are no more reward stickers, do I still need to read these books?" LOL!)   Why Rewards Backfire! Occasionally when reading a new book, I’ll look for the most interesting chapter title and read that chapter first. If it’s unrewarding, I’ll set the book aside. So how ironic it would be if a chapter from the new book, The Reward Trap, was unrewarding. Trust me on this—you’ll change your thinking about rewards when you read Chapter 9, “How Do Rewards Affect Creativity?” I love this book!   The Reward Trap:  Why Rewards Backfire  and the Real Science of Motivating Kids by Özgür Bolat (Aug. 18, 2026)   In just eight pages, I found myself in the front row of a master class—learning how students (and your coworkers) approach achievement, motivation, and rewards (and maybe bribes!). Psychologists have identified two groups: those who are all about “performance orientation” and those who focus on “learning or mastery orientation.”  GROUP 1: PERFORMANCE ORIENTATION. The goals of these students “are to get high marks, to prove themselves, to outperform others, and to demonstrate their skill, ability, and intelligence. Success, for them, is about comparison, standing out, winning, or proving themselves.”  GROUP 2: MASTERING ORIENTATION. This group is “driven by something different. These students aim to understand the material deeply, stretch their thinking, and improve over time. They aren’t primarily concerned with how they rank compared to others. They’re more interested in how much they’ve grown compared to who they were yesterday.” And here…with all the books I’ve read (and workshops attended) I thought I knew a thing or two (or three) about motivating team members, volunteers, board members, donors, our son, our five grandchildren, and others. And…I thought I knew when reward systems work—and when they don’t. (Oops! Back to the drawing board—and this book!) MISTAKE-MAKING! According to the author, Dr. Özgür Bolat (Harvard Fulbright Scholar and Cambridge Ph.D.), the two groups approach mistake-making from different perspectives.    • The performance-oriented group believes “a mistake is a cause for concern. They tend to hide their mistakes.”    • The mastery-oriented group sees “any mistake as an opportunity to learn and to grow.” ASKING QUESTIONS. Did you know this?    • The performance-oriented group will generally ask a question to demonstrate their intelligence to the class and make judgments or ‘show off’ their knowledge.”    • The mastery-oriented group “will ask questions to learn.”  “Regardless of whether the first group learns or not, they are happy when they receive the approval of the teacher or get high marks, especially when those marks are higher than another student. The second group, on the other hand, is disappointed if they don’t learn anything.” Gut check! After that new info, Dr. Bolat then coaxed me into reading this entire book (fascinating!) with this question: “Which orientation serves our children best?” WAIT…WHAT? While much of the book’s research on the efficacy of rewards are from the classroom and from parenting (all ages through college), there’s a ton of practical information and insights applicable to your workplace. Example: THE BRIBE EFFECT! The author posits two workplace scenarios. “Your manager calls you with an offer.” Which one would you take?    • Scenario 1: “We have an important project on the horizon at work. I think you would be a great fit with your experience and skills. Are you interested?”    • Scenario 2: “We have an important project on the horizon at work. I plan to give a bonus to the one who agrees to work on the project and I think you would be a great fit. Are you interested?” Noting that Scenario 2 is a big mistake managers make, the author explains: “Most people would choose the first option. Why? The bonus offered in the second proposal gives the hidden message that the project is negative in some way and requires the extra financial incentive to compensate for its unattractiveness. It might even mean that the proposal the manager is offering brings more value to the company that it does to you.” Dr. Bolat explains with this classroom example: “…children are offered rewards for the books they read. Those rewards give the message that reading is not fun in and of itself. We see this same pattern not just in schools and offices, but also in entire societies. Even governments have unintentionally proven how offering rewards can backfire.” Hilarious! Dr. Bolat visited a classroom where a “well-meaning teacher” had created a reading incentive program. Each book read = one sticker. Ten stickers = a toy. Yet one boy starting gaming the system and “read” only picture books!  “Another stopped mid-novel when he realized he had already reached his sticker quota. Finally, one bold child asked, ‘If we’re not getting stickers anymore, do we still have to read?’” Dr. Bolat: “The reward had become a trap.” (Did I mention? This is a fascinating book.) FAVORITE CHAPTER: “How Do Rewards Affect Creativity?” (Chapter 9). The author believes that “Creativity is one of the most important twenty-first century skills. Most managers want employees in their organizations who are creative thinkers, and most teachers want creative students. What we see, however, is that although children may be encouraged to be creative in school, we do not generally raise creative children.” This reminded me of the statement from Sir Ken Robinson in the book, Little Bets: How Breakthrough Ideas Emerge From Small Discoveries (read my review): “We are educating people out of their creativity.” Yikes! Dr. Bolat’s research notes this: “Most teachers claim they want creative students in their classrooms, but it turns out those creative children are not their favorite students. On the contrary, the creative students are usually the least favorite students. They're the ones who get labeled as disruptive, hard to manage, or ‘too much.’” Really? “In an effort to preserve classroom order, many teachers, often unconsciously, reinforce compliance and obedience over creativity. One of their primary tools for this is reward. And get this: Harvard professor Teresa Amabile, “a leading expert on creativity,” has concluded that “children offered rewards tend to show less creativity in their work.” Reward Warnings! Prof Amabile also notes, “…children are more likely to describe a task as ‘work’ if they are offered reward, and more likely to label it as ‘play’ if no reward is offered.” (Attn: Parents, Teachers, and Managers: read this book!) THERE’S MORE:    • Performance-oriented children “are more likely to experience anxiety, avoid asking for help, rely on surface-level study strategies, and even engage in self-sabotaging behaviors.”    • “Their fear of failure can also lead to increased test anxiety and a higher risk of academic dishonesty.”    • But only mastery-orientation “supports both well-being and long-term success.” LOL! My unresearched suggestion: “Thanks for your interest in applying for our office accounting position. Here’s my first question: Did your second grade teacher offer you rewards for reading books?” DON’T SKIP:    • Why performance-oriented students pick the easy jobs.    • Why rewards contribute to “cognitive tunneling” or “inattentional blindness.”    • This metaphor: “Rewards act like a flashlight…” but “creativity needs a lantern…”    • The emotional side of creativity: “broadening” and “narrowing.”    • The research results with college students working on creative tasks—such as producing drawings or ad slogans. Per the expert judges, “…the non-rewarded group consistently outperformed the rewarded group.”    • How the theory of “cognitive dissonance” relates to a study called “the worm-eating experiment”—when rewards send the wrong message. I hope you’ll read this book and—NO—I’m not going to give you a reward sticker for reading it! This new book reminded me of some old friends (books) on creativity, including Little Bets, Creators, and Entrepreneurial StrengthsFinder. TO ORDER FROM AMAZON, click on the title for The Reward Trap: Why Rewards Backfire and the Real Science of Motivating Kids, by Özgür Bolat. And thanks to the publisher for sending me a review copy.   YOUR WEEKLY STAFF MEETING QUESTIONS: 1) Dr. Bolat says he wrote The Reward Trap “because I want children to grow up feeling loved without needing to earn it. I want parents to know there’s another way.” Yikes! Would it be prudent for our organization to review our bonuses, “bribes,” and other rewards and incentives currently in place? 2) "When Could Rewarding Be Appropriate?" In Chapter 16, the author mentions he suggested to a governor that instead of offering a computer or a tablet as prizes for a story-writing contest, they consider a shift. "Instead of gadgets, maybe you can offer all three winners access to different prestigious writing courses in the UK or the USA." Does that give us any ideas for our "rewards" system in our organization?          SECOND READS: Fresh Solutions From Classic Books You have changed—and your problems have changed—since you read this the first time! Book #62 of 99: Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us For your team meeting this week, inspire a team member to lead your “10 Minutes for Lifelong Learning” session by featuring Book #62 of 99 in our series, “Second Reads.” The big idea: REREAD TO LEAD! Discover how your favorite books (and articles) still have more to teach you and the people you’re coaching and mentoring. Tribes:  We Need You to Lead Us by Seth Godin (Oct. 16, 2008) Seth Godin, bestselling author of Poke the Box, This Is Marketing, and other books, says there are three steps in tribe work: motivating, connecting and leveraging. His real-life examples: adrenalin-starters! His pithy bursts of wisdom: memorable. “My friend Fred has a new book coming out and he was trolling around for marketing ideas. I think he’d be surprised at this one: Sell one.”    • Read my review (Issue No. 127, Feb. 16, 2009).    • Order from Amazon.    • Management Bucket #2 of 20: The Customer Bucket. Oh, my! One word, one paragraph, not even one page can adequately describe Seth Godin’s epistle on leadership—because it’s more about marketing. No, it’s about tribes. No it’s about the Internet and factories. No, it’s about how leaders build communities (tribes, again) and focus on true fans versus thousands. Well, actually it’s about heretics, nonprofits, faith, religion, Steve Jobs, unicorns, and the Printing Bucket—and how movements are looking for leaders—and how you can lead your tribe (I think). Aw…forget it. I can’t really explain this book, but I’m going to read it at least twice. You should too. CLICK HERE FOR BOOKS BY JOHN     View the video summary (9 minutes) of “Mistake #6: Prioritizing Convenience Over Generosity. I failed to inspire and give permission for the staff to call audibles.” See the workbook, Mastering Mistake Making: My 25 Memorable Mistakes—and What I Learned (10 Minutes for Lifelong Learning Workbook), by John Pearson with Jason Pearson. NOTICE! Issues No. 1 to 657 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting (2006 to 2025), previously archived on Typepad.com are slowly (!) being moved to this new blogsite: John Pearson's Buckets Blog. We remember 2016! Go Cubs! View the summary video (9 minutes) of John’s review of The Cubs Way: The Zen of Building the Best Team in Baseball and Breaking the Curse, by Tom Verducci. Read John’s review, “Recalibrate in 17 Minutes.”  BONUS! As of today, 43 video podcasts (7 to 9 minutes each) are posted here. Perfect lifelong-learning snippets for your weekly staff meeting. MORE RESOURCES: • BLOG: Pails in Comparison • SUBSCRIBE: Your Weekly Staff Meeting eNews • JOHN'S BOOK REVIEWS: on Amazon  • WEBSITE: Management Buckets • BLOG: Governance of Christ-Centered Organizations • PODCASTS: John Pearson's Buckets Podcasts  13 Books on Time Management! See my list of 13 books on time management (and more) at the Pails in Comparison Blog and consider starting with this one: The 10-Second Rule: Following Jesus Made Simple, by Clare De Graaf. (Read my review.) The author writes, “Just do the next thing you’re reasonably certain Jesus wants you to do—and do it within the next ten seconds.”

PastorPreneur

    

Issue No. 172 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting (Jan. 28, 2010) features a book for entrepreneurial pastors—and anyone else who has the entrepreneurial gift. And this reminder: check out my Management Buckets website with dozens of resources and downloadable worksheets for your staff meetings. (Note: This blog was updated on June 11, 2025, and Oct. 22, 2026.)

5 Entrepreneurial Strategies

Pastor Ray Johnston of Bayside Church (Calif.) says that "Volunteers are under-nourished, pastors are under-coached, churches lack vision, and small group leaders lack spiritual foundations." Oh…and “87 percent of the churches in America are stagnant or declining.”

Sounds like we need a rebirth of spiritual entrepreneurship—or a revival—or both. So this week, I found encouragement in John Jackson’s book, PastorPreneur. If these zingers and insights don’t move you, nothing will:
   • “What really attracts large numbers of the unchurched to a church are changed lives.” (Rick Warren)
   • “I believe people ask two inherent questions: ‘What’s in this for me?’ and, ‘Is there anybody here like me?’”
   • “A former Prime Minister of France once said, ‘If you are doing big things, you attract big people. If you are doing little things, you attract little people.’”
   • “But incrementalism leaves a legacy of small dreams, small faith, and stunted leaders.”

Jackson suggests churches need five key entrepreneurial strategies: 1) grab the community’s attention; 2) build strategic partnerships (no more holy huddles); 3) conduct faith-building events (because big events shape leaders); 4) help people identify their strengths (see below); and 5) multiply your impact. Here’s more:
   • “Everyone is a 10 somewhere. The task of a leader is to help people identify where they are a 10.” (Wayne Cordeiro)
   • “A fresh, dynamic vision isn’t accomplished by trying to stretch your existing budget a little farther. Instead, look for new resources—both people and funds.”
   • “Spend lots of time affirming your leadership team.”
   • "In virtually every meeting, every service, every small group, and every one-on-one mentoring meeting, [leaders] need to include three components: vision, relationships, and programs.”

The author (previously executive director of Thriving Churches International) is currently (in 2025) the president of Jessup University, quotes Ken Blanchard: “There are two parts to leadership…one is vision-casting and the other is implementation. You have to implement things that match your vision. And remember, the thinking that got you to where you are today will not get you where you need to go.”

John Maxwell (no slouch of an entrepreneur himself) wrote in the book’s foreword, “Strategic thinking is a different way of thinking.”  Entrepreneurs understand that. Many leaders do not. Many churches and organizations have a binder on the shelf labeled, “Our Bold Strategic Plan.” As I read Jackson’s book, I know he would agree that all four words on the binder are a misnomer: “Our” is not owned by the troops. “Bold” is far from it. “Strategic” is calibrated in modest, if any growth. And “Plan” is a wish-and-a-prayer.  As Elton Trueblood said, “Pious shoddy is still shoddy.” If you’ve painted yourself into the corner of mediocrity, this book will give you the vision and the strategy to break out.

PastorPreneur is visionary—yet practical. It will breathe life into a leader’s entrepreneurial gifts, but won’t get him or her in trouble. The take-aways are significant (for church leaders and all leaders) and I counted more than 50 quotes or paragraphs that grabbed me, like this warning for entrepreneurs: “Risk itself is not a goal of leadership. It is simply a reality for those who have a large vision.”

To order this book from Amazon, click on the title for Pastorpreneur: Creative Ideas for Birthing Spiritual Life in Your Community, by John Jackson.

Note: John Jackson is the author of 10 books, including Grace Ambassador (2023). (Read my review.)


YOUR WEEKLY STAFF MEETING QUESTIONS:
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1) When he was the founding pastor at Carson Valley Christian Center (Nevada), Jackson cancelled a standing rule: no refreshments in the worship center. He discovered that this was teaching people that only certain rooms were sacred. How would you explain this new insight (bring your coffee in) to those who clean the carpets?

2) Jackson writes, “Certainly numbers are a significant measure of growth, but I believe another one is much richer: changed lives. This measuring stick doesn’t produce guilt, and it doesn’t thrive on comparison.” What does your organization measure?

Delegate Your Reading
Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets: 20 Critical Competencies for Leading Your Business or Nonprofit

One of the big ideas in the Delegation Bucket, Chapter 16, in Mastering the Management Buckets is to delegate your reading. For example, if you have four direct reports—give a book to each team member each month and ask for mini-book reports once a week.  While each person will read just 12 books a year, you’ll be enriched with 48 book reports. (P.S. You should read a couple also!)

Ask reviewers to highlight niche chapters, key ideas and their five favorite paragraphs or quotations—and then leave the book on your team’s resource shelf.  For fun and appreciation, occasionally slip in a $5 Starbucks card into the monthly book distribution.

For more insights, resources and books on delegation, visit the Delegation Bucket webpage.

MORE RESOURCES:

• BLOG: Pails in Comparison
• SUBSCRIBE: Your Weekly Staff Meeting eNews
• JOHN'S BOOK REVIEWS: on Amazon 
• WEBSITE: Management Buckets
• BLOG: Governance of Christ-Centered Organizations
• PODCASTS: John Pearson's Buckets Podcasts 

NOTICE! Issues No. 1 to 657 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting (2006 to 2025), previously archived on Typepad.com are slowly (!) being moved to this blogsite you are on now (John Pearson's Buckets Blog).

Owning Up

    

Issue No. 170 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting (Jan. 11, 2010) features a book with 14 questions every board member needs to ask. (Ditto your staff members.)  The author says that “if you have no appetite for risk, you shouldn’t be on a board; it will inhibit the CEO from making bold and necessary moves and potentially company-saving bets.” And this reminder: check out my Management Buckets website with dozens of resources and downloadable worksheets for your staff meetings.

The 14 Questions Every Board Needs to Ask

The “go-to adviser” for corporate boards and CEOs, Ram Charan, says that boards must “own up” to its accountability for the performance of the organization and reinvent the content of their work and modus operandi.  He preaches, “Governance now means leadership.” 

Board governance often has fuzzy boundaries and is never easy—but this excellent author/authority has 14 cringe-type questions. If you’re a long-time reader of this eNews, you may recall my enthusiasm for two of Charan’s other books: the best-seller Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done, with Larry Bossidy, (Issue 29) and Leaders at All Levels: Deepening Your Talent Pool to Solve the Succession Crisis (Issue 73). His stuff is reliable, insightful, and best of all, highly practical.

Charan doesn’t waste words—firing this question onto the board table in the first paragraph of Chapter 1/Question 1: Is Our Board Composition Right for the Challenge? He writes, “The role of the board has unmistakably transitioned from passive governance to active leadership with a delicate balance of avoiding micromanaging. It’s leadership as a group, not leadership by an appointed person.” He adds, “With the right composition, a board can create value; with the wrong or inappropriate composition, it can easily destroy value.”

He recommends that every board member and board prospect complete a “skill assessment matrix” to assess the board’s overall strengths and weaknesses.  “The process is important because a board full of generalists is not good enough anymore,” he warns. Reference checking of board members (well beyond the basic level) is now an absolute necessity. The biggest red flag to avoid: a board nominee with a big ego.

The discussion of board member succession is worth the price of the book. Insights: 1) the process may take up to three years; 2) many CEOs are limiting their service on other boards to just two, or often just their own board; 3) to get the right mix of board members—for rapidly changing needs—many boards are encouraging incumbents to step down early. (Not easy—but critical.) Perhaps most critical: “Board service is always more attractive when the prospective director knows the board has its act together—that the board is thorough in covering its bases and functions well as a group.”

Effective boards will want to use this book at an annual board retreat—or address one or two questions per board meeting over the next year or more.  The book can also be read topically, based on your current hot issues. I started with Question 13: How Do We Stop From Micromanaging?  All 14 have zinger qualities to them. My favorites, based on my board consulting work, include:
   • Question 11: How Can Executive Sessions Help the Board Own Up?
   • Question 12: How Can Our Board Self-Evaluation Improve Our Functioning and Our Output?
   • Question 2: Are We Addressing the Risks That Could Send Our Company Over the Cliff?
   • Question 4: Are We Well Prepared to Name Our Next CEO?
   • Question 5: Does Our Board Really Own the Company’s Strategy?

The best practices for the strategy question are both brilliant and practical—but the CEO will need to dramatically increase face time with board members. But the pay-off could be huge. He notes, “Strategy should always be in the back of directors’ minds. It helps to have the strategy brief or a two-page sheet of bullet points in the binder for every meeting.”  Then Charan cautions us, “If the board and the CEO have lasting substantive differences, they have a choice: stay with the strategy or replace the CEO. Consider that management has a shelf life too, just like the strategy.”

To order this book from Amazon, click on the title for Owning Up: The 14 Questions Every Board Member Needs to Ask, by Ram Charan.

BONUS! Owning Up is one of "18 Best Board Books" I recommend. Click here for the list. Plus, click here for the index to 14 blogs I wrote on each of the 14 questions in Owning Up, on the blogsite for ECFA Governance of Christ-Centered Organizations.

YOUR WEEKLY STAFF MEETING QUESTIONS:
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1) Charan says that “the business landscape has changed. The game has changed. What boards do needs to change as well.” From your perspective, is our board keeping up with the change?

2) The authors adds, “The financial crisis of 2008 laid bare a long buried truth: that many boards do not really own the strategy of their company.”  Give our board a rating from 1 to 5 (5 is high). “How strongly does our board own our strategy?”

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The 20% Investment
Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets: 20 Critical Competencies for Leading Your Business or Nonprofit

One of the big ideas in the Board Bucket, Chapter 14, in Mastering the Management Buckets is to grow a great board.  A Chinese proverb says that if you want one year of prosperity, grow grain. If you want 10 years of prosperity, grow trees. If you want 100 years of prosperity, grow people.

A common rule of thumb for large organizations is that CEOs invest about 20 percent of their time on board-related work, including meeting face-to-face with individual board members. That’s one day a week.  If you’re the CEO, how are you doing on that best practice?

For more books, insights and resources, visit the Board Bucket webpage.

MORE RESOURCES:

• BLOG: Pails in Comparison
• SUBSCRIBE: Your Weekly Staff Meeting eNews
• JOHN'S BOOK REVIEWS: on Amazon 
• WEBSITE: Management Buckets
• BLOG: Governance of Christ-Centered Organizations
• PODCASTS: John Pearson's Buckets Podcasts 

NOTICE! Issues No. 1 to 657 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting (2006 to 2025), previously archived on Typepad.com are slowly (!) being moved to this blogsite you are on now (John Pearson's Buckets Blog).

Creators

    

Issue No. 189 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting (July 6, 2010) highlights a phenomenal book about the creative process—using world class creative people as the guinea pigs for this analysis. Delegate your reading. Pass the book around and ask for a Creativity Bio at each future staff meeting. And this reminder: check out my Management Buckets website with dozens of resources and downloadable worksheets for your staff meetings.

Gushing Creativity

Creativity is “the new leadership competency,” writes Gary Foster in his enewsletter, "The Foster Letter: Religious Market Update." He quotes the Monday Morning Memo: “According to an IBM Institute for Business Value survey, today’s CEOs identify ‘creativity’ as the most important leadership competency for the successful enterprise of the future. IBM Sr. VP Frank Kern says, ‘That’s creativity—not operational effectiveness, influence, or even dedication. Coming out of the worst economic downturn in their professional lifetimes, when managerial discipline and rigor ruled the day, this indicates a remarkable shift in attitude.’”

And Harvey Mackay, envelope baron, business author and newspaper columnist (“Lessons on Leadership”) recently wondered what it would be like “if you could turn on creativity like you start a car.”  Of his nine suggestions for revving up creativity, he challenged leaders to “read something totally different than usual.” He added, “Too often, we find ourselves looking at the same newspapers, trade publications, blogs and the like. Pick up a murder mystery, a gardening book, a volume of Shakespeare or anything that will teach you something you didn’t know anything about.”

So can creativity be taught or learned?  Read this week’s book and draw your own conclusions.  Author Paul Johnson explores the essence of creativity in his remarkable (stunning, actually) book, Creators. In 15 page-turning chapters (17 pages per chapter), he analyzes, slices and dices an extraordinary mix of the world’s most creative (and usually highly productive) people.  Buyer beware: the fruits of creativity apparently give license to immorality. But that’s also worth studying. Why is that and how do leaders foster the creative spirit in others?

I read chapter 14 first on Picasso and Walt Disney.  “Paris and Hollywood: no two places could be more unlike; yet no two are so similar in the mixture of eagerness and cynicism with which they nurtured creativity, both vulgar and sublime.” Disney died at 65 in 1966. Yikes…what have I done with my life so far? Time is getting short!

Creative people, I learned, are often workaholics. By 1900, Picasso “was turning out a painting every morning, and doing other things in the afternoon.” His total output on stone, canvas, paper, ceramics, metal and more: 30,000 pieces. He died at age 92 in 1973. 

Creative people also focus on excellence. “Like Durer and Rubens, Disney put excellence before any other consideration, and the studio barely made a profit despite its huge bookings, since the incoming cash instantly went for investment in new technology and better artists.”  At one time Disney employed over 1,000 animators, artists and draftsmen. Yikes again! Imagine writing an HR manual to deal with 1,000 artist-types!

The chapter on fashion designers contrasting Balenciaga and Dior was amazing—maybe because I’d never read 17 pages on fashion. The two fashion giants of the 20th century ran their sizeable shops (office and workrooms) two distinct ways: one like a monastery and the other like a party room (Dior). Absolutely fascinating. I read multiple paragraphs of that chapter to anyone who would listen.

There’s a lot more.  Chaucer, Shakespeare, J.S. Bach, Victor Hugo and others.  The chapter on Mark Twain is sub-titled, “How to Tell a Joke.”  Johnson writes, “He understood the economics of humor, and how, once you have a funny idea—a champion frog that cannot move because it is loaded with shot—you can use it, with suitable variation, again and again.”  Johnson himself does not lack in creative commentary: “A storyteller is a licensed liar, though he must never say so.”

On Bach, the author wonderfully describes “the continual warfare between those who play the organ and those who make the organ,” and adds, “operating an organ is, and always has been, a source of great anger.” 

Let me tempt you to read the book with this—a typical Johnson sum-up, this one of Bach. “There are probably about 1,200 works all told, out of—perhaps—1,600 or 1,700 composed; a few are short, but only a tiny number are slight. Considering the amount of time Bach had to spend playing, conducting, arguing with officials, teaching and copying, this output is astounding—the man was a copious, gushing, unceasing fountain of creativity.”

And…my special thanks to David Curry for recommending this incredible read.  I have another Paul Johnson book, per Curry’s suggestion, in the line-up.

To order this book from Amazon, click on the title for Creators: From Chaucer and Durer to Picasso and Disney, by Paul Johnson.

YOUR WEEKLY STAFF MEETING QUESTIONS:
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1) In his chapter on the German artist Durer (“A Strong Smell of Printer’s Ink”), the author says that Germans knew how to paint, but the Italians also knew why.  “They had theory.” Discuss both the how and the why of the creative process.

2) Who’s the most creative person you know?  What makes them uniquely different from others? Can you learn anything from them? Is creativity the new competency?

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Two-tiered and Too Tired
Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets: 20 Critical Competencies for Leading Your Business or Nonprofit

One of the big ideas in the Volunteer Bucket, Chapter 12, in Mastering the Management Buckets is to reject the notion of a two-tiered Kingdom workforce.  That is, treating your volunteers (your unpaid staff) differently than your paid staff.

While waxing eloquent on this core value in a “Mastering the Management Buckets Workshop Experience,” I noticed that the participants started to chuckle.  I didn’t see what was so funny until one kind person pointed out the typo in my PowerPoint.  It read, “We reject the notion of a two-tired Kingdom workforce.”

This prompted the suggestion that we needed another ball in the Volunteer Bucket. “We pledge not to work our volunteers incessantly, or inappropriately, so they are constantly too tired to enjoy the journey.” 

Whether two-tiered, or too tired—neither volunteer approach honors God or your unpaid staff. For more resources from the Volunteer Bucket, click on my website.

MORE RESOURCES:

• BLOG: Pails in Comparison
• SUBSCRIBE: Your Weekly Staff Meeting eNews
• JOHN'S BOOK REVIEWS: on Amazon 
• WEBSITE: Management Buckets
• BLOG: Governance of Christ-Centered Organizations
• PODCASTS: John Pearson's Buckets Podcasts 

NOTICE! Issues No. 1 to 657 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting (2006 to 2025), previously archived on Typepad.com are slowly (!) being moved to this blogsite you are on now (John Pearson's Buckets Blog).

Great by Choice

    

Issue No. 235 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting (Nov. 8, 2011) features a hot-off-the-press book by Jim Collins. It’s a no-brainer addition to your staff resource shelf. (You do have a resource shelf, right?) And this reminder: check out my Management Buckets website with dozens of resources and downloadable worksheets for your staff meetings.

Jim Collins Lexicon 2.0

True or false? An author’s first book is his or her best.  The second, third or (horrors) fourth book will aptly document the slippery slope into mediocrity.

Usually true.  But if the book is by Jim Collins, the myth is false. And all of us are grateful.

His latest, Great by Choice, keeps his reputation intact for high quality, fascinating, page-turning story/research/label/principle serious management thinking.  If you learned from Built to Last, Good to Great, Good to Great and the Social Sectors and How the Mighty Fall, your life-long learning will continue with what I’m calling the “Jim Collins Lexicon 2.0.”

Using his classic comparison company methodology, this book delivers memorable stories to answer the question, “Why do some companies thrive in uncertainty, even chaos, and others do not?”

“What’s coming next?” Collins asks, building the case for his “10X” companies (his first memorable label). “All we know is that no one knows.” He adds, “Yet some companies and leaders navigate this type of world exceptionally well.
   --They don’t merely react; they create.
   --They don’t merely survive; they prevail.
   --They don’t merely succeed, they thrive.

They build great enterprises that can endure.”

Here’s the new lexicon:
   --10Xers (comparison companies that beat its industry index by at least 10 times). “If you invested $10,000 in a portfolio of the 10X companies at the end of 1972…your investment would have grown to be worth more than $6 million by the end of our study era (through 2002), a performance 32 times better than the general stock market.”

   --10X leadership (the comparison story of the quest to reach the South Pole by two teams of adventurers in 1911). Roald Amundsen, the winner, and Robert Scott, the loser, had comparable opportunities, but it was Amundsen who demonstrated Collins’ triple hallmark of 10X leaders:
   --Fanatic Discipline
   --Empirical Creativity
   --Productive Paranoia

The stories are fabulous, often very funny. Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer had the moniker DOCTOR DOOM and Commissar of Concern, taught to him by the “Grand Master of Productive Paranoia himself, Bill Gates.”  Yet it was Gates who put his foot down when Ballmer wanted to boost the head count to—get this—17 people!”

   --20 Mile March (a self-imposed restraint to keep growth under control). “A good 20 Mile March has a Goldilocks time frame, not too short and not too long but just right.” 

   --First Bullets, Then Cannonballs (discipline and creativity will push you to test, test, test—with low risk bullets, then re-calibrate, another low risk bullet, more re-calibration—then when the empirical side of creativity has honed in on the target—let the cannonball rip!) One CEO’s mantra: Be “one fad behind,” never first to market, but never last.  Collins has six bullet points (sorry) on “The Dangerous Lure of Uncalibrated Cannonballs.” Brilliant.

There’s a lot more in the lexicon:
   --Leading Above the Death Line
   --SMaC (Specific, Methodical, and Consistent)
   --ROL (Return on Luck)

Each chapter has a helpful two-page summary of big ideas, plus discussion questions.  The bulk of the book runs 200 pages, plus a few more for FAQs, then another hundred pages of research notes for the unconvinced or Collins zealots.

This is a Top-10 book for 2011. 

To order this book from Amazon, click on the title for Great by Choice: Uncertainty, Chaos, and Luck—Why Some Thrive Despite Them All, by Jim Collins and Morten T. Hansen.

YOUR WEEKLY STAFF MEETING QUESTIONS:
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1) If we were to compare our organization’s work and results against a comparable company/organization. What might we learn? Should we launch a study?

2) Collins says that Fanatic Discipline, Empirical Creativity and Productive Paranoia separate 10Xers from the pack.  On a scale of one to five (five is high), how good are we at these three keys to thriving?

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Delegation Bucket Pop Quiz!
Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets: 20 Critical Competencies for Leading Your Business or Nonprofit

One of the big ideas in the Delegation Bucket, Chapter 16, in Mastering the Management Buckets is to conduct a self-assessment on your delegation diseases. 

The Delegation Bucket core competency reads: “We are experts at appropriate delegation. We invite team members to accept assignments based on their strengths. We value organized delegation and believe in the Point Person Principle. We track our to-do lists and we add to our don’t-do lists.”

So…what level are you at in the Delegation Bucket core competency?
   --Level 1: I don’t know what I don’t know.
   --Level 2: I know what I don’t know.
   --Level 3: I have an action plan to address what I know I don’t know.
   --Level 4: I am knowledgeable and effective in this core competency and can mentor others.

For more resources, visit the Delegation Bucket webpage and download Worksheet #16.1:  "Dysfunctional Delegation Diseases." Take this Delegation Gut-Check Assessment and diagnose the severity of your delegation diseases.  Are you a Code Green, Code Yellow or Code Red?

MORE RESOURCES:

• BLOG: Pails in Comparison
• SUBSCRIBE: Your Weekly Staff Meeting eNews
• JOHN'S BOOK REVIEWS: on Amazon 
• WEBSITE: Management Buckets
• BLOG: Governance of Christ-Centered Organizations
• PODCASTS: John Pearson's Buckets Podcasts 

NOTICE! Issues No. 1 to 657 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting (2006 to 2025), previously archived on Typepad.com are slowly (!) being moved to this blogsite you are on now (John Pearson's Buckets Blog).