How to Avoid Thinking Strategically

(Humor, via The Hired Guns)

As a manager, you may occasionally be asked to “think strategically.” That means to consider issues that have a broad impact on the company, such as long-term revenue opportunities, more efficient competition in a changing marketplace, and securing job offers from other companies before everyone at your company realizes you’re clueless.

Unfortunately, “thinking strategically” requires time, effort, and precious brain power that could be better spent on fantasy baseball. Here are five ways to avoid it:

http://bit.ly/r4ZI91

Hiring 101: Resume Red Flags and How to Overlook Them

(Humor, via The Hired Guns)

In between the time that you become a manager and the time you get fired, you may be asked to replace a worker who has quit in disgust. This is an excellent opportunity to showcase your skills in hiring by disregarding resume-screening “best practices” and instead “thinking outside of the box.”

Although this frequently results in hiring serial killers, occasionally you will end up hiring unique, relatively harmless individuals who shake up the status quo and whose body odor is hardly even a distraction.

Consider these tips for going through resumes:

http://bit.ly/qWKORo

Hiring 101: How Not to Read a Cover Letter

(Humor, via The Hired Guns)

There is one key rule in management: never hire anyone desperate or stupid enough to work for someone like you. Unfortunately, at some point in your management career you may need to replace an employee who was smart enough to quit.

If and when this happens, you will probably come across something known as a “resume” and its useless cousin, the “cover letter.”

http://bit.ly/kXLxIz

5 Ways to Show Your Boss That You’re Smarter Than Him

(Humor, via The Hired Guns)

Most bosses suffer from the delusion that they are smart. Perhaps they feel that their years of industry experience and managing people somehow give them special “knowledge” that others don’t possess. As the hot new manager with the MBA, it’s your job to set him straight.

Here are five tips for doing it right:

http://bit.ly/laESKI

5 Ways to Make Work the #1 Thing in Your Life—and Everyone Else’s

(Humor, via The Hired Guns)

Whoever coined the phrase “work/life balance” probably understood that the key to long-term productivity is a positive work environment, a range of outside interests, and job satisfaction. You don’t want people like that working for you.

Instead, here are five ways to keep your workers focused on work 24/7:

http://bit.ly/iU3RuG

5 Ways to Make Sure Everyone Knows You Have an MBA

(Humor, via The Hired Guns)

Congratulations on getting your MBA! You are now extremely special. No one else on the planet has one, after all. The people at your new company who don’t have one, including your boss, will enjoy hearing all about it. But they’ll need frequent reminders, especially the part about how it makes you better than them.

Here are some tips to maximize your effectiveness:

http://bit.ly/mGC1Z3

How to Fail Upwards: 5 Secrets CEOs Don’t Want You to Know

(Humor, via The Hired Guns)

You could spend years trying to fail upwards, only to find that all the good promotions have already been claimed by more successful incompetent people. Here’s how to shave a few years off your timeline:

http://bit.ly/lHljfu

5 Ways to lead like a general, not a coach!

(Humor, via The Hired Guns)

Business is a battleground, not a junior-high girls’ badminton league. To succeed, you’ve got to crush your competitors, and what better way to instill that mindset than by crushing your own employees first?

Here are five great ways to do that:

http://bit.ly/f4MRBI

5 Tips for hiring a crappy team

(Humor, via The Hired Guns)

You’ve just been given oversight of a new product launch. Your first task is to hire a team. Here’s how to screw it up:

http://bit.ly/fLy1qe

5 Great Ways to Exasperate Your New Boss

(Humor, via The Hired Guns)

Congratulations on the new job! You’re a big, important manager now. But while you’re waiting for your imminent promotion to CEO, you still have to report to someone. On paper anyway! Here’s how to make the most of it:

http://bit.ly/f14vNo