management
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Kroger’s Panopticon: Making Criminals of Grocery Shoppers
I’ve been shopping at Kroger literally since I was a small child. My mom preferentially shopped at Kroger. I can still hum the “Let’s Go Krogering” jingle and remember Marty Brennaman and Joe Nuxhall on their commercials. I know many people at Kroger who I like and respect. But anymore, shopping at Kroger makes me feel like a criminal. I shop at Kroger every Monday to pick up my food staples. Since 2021, the loss prevention ‘features’ at my Kroger…
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Get a Hair Cut: Experiencing Generational Differences
I reflected recently on some of the unexpected challenges I’ve had in the workplace. I realized that some of them were due to generational differences between the baby boomers and the younger generations. I want to bring the care and concern that the baby boomer leaders I knew who influenced and counseled me, but also be more mindful of these generational differences as Generation Z enters the workforce.
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Gratitude at Work: Say Thank You For….
Many people routinely show gratitude by saying “thank you” or “good work” or “nice job” to a colleague or staff member who has completed a task. After all, it’s good to be polite. While that’s a good start, saying “Thanks” doesn’t go far enough.
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The Top 3 Problems with Business Books
I regularly read or listen to business books as assigned reading at work and for personal development. As my time has been limited recently, I’ve been reaching for the cheating method – reading an online abstract – more often. I considered why am I reading the short abstracts instead of the longer works – and my conclusion was that many business books suffer from one of three problems.
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Silicon Valley Bank: Analyzing their 2022 10-K to understand their failure
Silicon Valley Bank has entered into FDIC receivership and has for all intents and purposes failed. Here, I argue that SVB failed due to a failure to respond to rising interest rates that impacted both their customer deposits and their investment valuation; and this risk wasn’t well understood in the wider market due to the accounting treatment of their investments.
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How Basecamp Nearly Destroyed Itself in a Day with Terrible Communication
Basecamp’s policy changes around diversity, employee communications, and benefits provides a case study in how not to perform organizational change management after 30% of their employees quit. Jason Fried and David Hasson should have been careful to limit the scope of their changes; been thoughtful in their communication plans for major changes; and been realistic on employee response to those changes. This bungled change contrasts highly with that of Coinbase where the similar “No Politics” rule was applied with much less fallout.