Clutter-free Learning and Leadership

Clearing my work bag off its clutter that had accumulated over a couple of months and reading this blog post, inspired me to think of Clutter-free Learning and Leadership.

Apart from cleaning our desk or training venues (:-)), here are some thoughts on how we can get the clutter out of Learning and Leadership:

1. KISS Design for e-Learning & Materials - A "Keep It Simple, Stupid!" Design that doesn't focus on bells & whistles reduces clutter, helping learners focus on the content rather than the design.

2. Clutter-free Communication - While communicating with team members / learners, building our communication around one or two ideas and not digressing often would help the listeners understand us better.

3. Human readable policies - The other day, while researching on a new HR policy on Google, I found tonnes of HR policies that even a Super Computer cannot decipher! I understand that we have compliance related requirements - however, can we have a clutter-free version please?

4. Focused Goals / Objectives - In the name of Multi-tasking and additional responsibilities, I have seen many leaders set Quarterly goals for themselves or their team that are so cluttered that they end up doing nothing or a little bit of everything. Marcus Buckingham, in his book "The one thing you need to know" speaks of having just one number that tells people whether they've achieved what they should be getting. I am not sure if this is inspired by Jill Collins' "Good to Great" - he shares the same thing about great leaders in this book.

5. Simple Customer Interfaces / tools - Our web site(s) & portals, client presentations, invoices, customer support Interactive Voice Response (IVR) system or any other interface needs to be clutter-free and easily understandable. This would help the customer connect with us better and understand as to what we are really doing for them. A good example on de-cluttering for the customer is the "Patient Friendly Billing" project spearheaded by the HFMA in the US. 

Clutter-free learning and leadership is the way to go to make Learning and Leadership effective!

(image from Martin Whitmore's stream on Flickr)