Colin Gautrey

Belief in an Unlimited Capability

February 10, 2019 by Colin Gautrey

A truly fascinating discussion about success with a high-ranking military officer. He has a long track-record of incredible achievements. He was reading at 3 years old. Helping teacher to teach others to read at 4 ½. From a very early age he acquired the belief that there was no limit to what he could achieve. He has always achieved what he set out to achieve. Somewhere around his early teens, he caught the idea that he could master any topic within 6 weeks. That has become another core belief that has served him well. Nature or nurture? Tough one, jury still out. Family history Read More

Shift Your Focus: Dangerous Habits

February 7, 2019 by Colin Gautrey

It's really interesting to notice that when people have problems they can very easily get carried away with those problems. Worrying about them, obsessing about them, and getting very emotionally engaged with the feature of their current life or work that they don't actually want, that they don't like, that they would soon it wasn't there. What I notice happening is that those obsessive thoughts feed on themselves and they get bigger and worse, and that starts to dig people into not only a negative feeling, but the perpetuation of that phenomena, that event, that situation, in their working lives. Read More

Rolling with the Punches

February 5, 2019 by Colin Gautrey

Rolling with the Punches: Coping with and withstanding adversity by being flexible. The Urban Dictionary. Several years ago, I asked a client for some feedback. I had trained most of his senior team around the world and six months later, I wanted to know what had changed. His first reaction was to focus on how noticeable it was those of his team who had not done the training. “They are now looking distinctly wet behind the ears, naïve in the face of the usual cut and thrust of organisational life!” Read More

Cybernetics, Population Ecology and Corporate Geriatrics

February 3, 2019 by Colin Gautrey

Two branches of science have always fascinated me because of the way they can be related to organisations, and how they can help us to think creatively about how to make them more successful, and ourselves in the process. They also lead to a fundamental question you need to ask yourself about the way you behave at work, and my reason for sharing this with you. Cybernetics is the science of communication and control systems found in biological organisms and machines. It is usually regarded as one of the many methodologies within the field of systems thinking (yes, systems thinking doesn’t just mean Lean!). What I find most interesting in Cybernetics is what you can learn about how biological organisms survive and thrive in a changing environment, and the systems the successful species have developed to do that. All of this can be mapped to a corporate structure to determine if it is likely to survive. Read More

Why Your Boss Should Not Trust You

January 31, 2019 by Colin Gautrey

You may well have the feeling that your boss doesn’t quite trust you. Perhaps they:

Insist all communications go through them rather than direct.
Will not allow you to engage directly with her boss.
Do not delegate decisions, however small, to you.
Insist on constant updates from you – micro managing.
Do not allow you to attend meetings on their behalf.

Learning to Break the Rules

January 29, 2019 by Colin Gautrey

The large organisation environment is increasingly regulated and governed. Due process. Follow the rules. Obey, and all will be well. Discussing this with a senior IT professional in one of the big four consultancies, he observed that those who are performing at an exceptional level are those who are willing to break the rules, and later be judged as having done the right thing. He also noted that they Read More

Is This as Good as it Gets?

January 27, 2019 by Colin Gautrey

What if...

This is as good as it gets?

Serious point. Many people in middle years and middle levels, hit the buffers. They have been successful in a way, but not the way or to the extent that they intended. Underneath, there is still ambition. The belief that they cold do more, should do more... But they are stuck, doing what they've always done, and now, getting what they've always got. Breaking out of this is tough, but it has to be done, and can be done. Read More

Feedback Season: Fact, Fiction and independence

January 24, 2019 by Colin Gautrey

I've just realised that it's feedback season again. Annual appraisals, performance reviews and all of that feedback coming in to you about what you've done last year, how your performance is rated. So I thought I'd just stop by and suggest a few things to remember when you're getting all of this feedback. And I hope the person doing your performance appraisal, takes these on board too. The first thing is, feedback is really just an opinion. Yes, it could be a very credible opinion depending on who it is, but it does depend on who it is. So whenever you're getting feedback, try to regard it as input to your personal decision-making process about what you're going to do differently. Read More

A Project Manager’s Guide to Influence

January 23, 2019 by Colin Gautrey

"Project managers who think their job is simply to execute their plan are deluding themselves. Clients want people who can fit in and work out how to get it done. Nobody paves the way and project managers have to figure out how to influence." Diane Dromgold, RNC Global Projects, Sydney, Australia.

This is not a book about project management. It is a book that shows project managers how to become more influential. It will encourage you to look at your project from a completely different perspective – in fact, many perspectives. You will learn how to make sense of the powerful dynamics shaping life for you and your stakeholders. Then it will show you processes you can adopt to ensure that you influence what needs to be influenced. Based on the author's earlier work in Advocates and Enemies: How to Build Practical Strategies to Influence Your Stakeholders, this book offers you a practical way to make things happen. Large or small, internal or external, all project managers can benefit from learning how to become more influential. If you are managing a project, are facing significant challenges in delivery, and are determined to overcome these challenges and succeed, you need this book.

Here's what people are saying about it:

“Colin’s book takes stakeholder management from the abstract and peripheral role it has on most projects, to its rightful place as a powerful, structured discipline core to successful delivery. Full of practical approaches and real world experiences.” Richard Newton, Organizational Change specialist and award winning author of The Management Book and The Project Manager, Mastering the Art of Delivery. Read More

Reframe Your Expertise / Boost Your Confidence

January 22, 2019 by Colin Gautrey

Simple idea, that could boost your confidence and get you that next position. When you are going through a selection process, or indeed, pitching for an opportunity, there is a great temptation to do all that you can to present yourself as an expert. Read More

The Gautrey Influence Blog: Inspiring Action and Success Since 2008