Mark Gandy

More than twenty years ago, I first heard Captain Charlie Plumb’s story of six years of captivity in a Vietnam prison camp. I still get chills and goosebumps when I listen to his story of resilience, hope, and faith. If you have heard him speak, you still might find his nuggets on Admiral Stockdale, Louis Zamperini, and PTSD insightful and intriguing. His book is, I’m No Hero. Yet, I consider him one.

[Read more…] about Captain Charlie Plumb on Grit, Honor, and Gratitude

Sometimes, I perceive that KPIs are a religion. Everyone has a view of what they are and how they should be designed and presented. Definitions are hard to pin down because five business leaders might give you five different answers depending on their perspectives. What if we had a framework that eliminated KPI brainstorming while offering a template for including targets and incentives for these key numbers? That framework exists thanks to Bernie Smith.

[Read more…] about Why Do KPIs Have to Be So Hard?

Many years ago, my first accounting professor stated that accounting was the language of business. As a young student, who was I to disagree? About seven years later after working on several M&A projects, I formed my own opinion about the language of business. The financial model is the language of business. And there is no one better to articulate this idea than Ian Schnoor of the Financial Modeling Institute.

[Read more…] about Financial Modeling Insights with FMI’s Ian Schnoor

Only four people quickly come to mind when I think about performance improvement and measurement the right way: Donald Wheeler, Stacey Barr, Dean Spitzer, and Mark Graban. I view Mark’s book as the very best companion to Wheeler’s, Understanding Variation. His three core questions strike at the heart of any conversation around a transformational change in the organization.

[Read more…] about Measures of Success with Mark Graban