Getting the project done successfully

To have a chance of achieving your performance goals on time and within budget, you must take the initiative and invest time in fully exploring it. Begin by outlining the expected performance targets, deadlines and budget. Next, identify all of the additional parties surrounding the problem. You may also consult trusted advisers within your network who can provide a customer or supplier perspective related to the problem at hand. Then schedule conversations with each stakeholder group to help you carefully consider the situation relative to its past, present, and future. You must understand what happened in the past if you are to improve upon what your predecessor did. You also need to gauge whether the new performance goals are realistic and what obstacles threaten their achievement. Finally, you need to soberly assess whether success is possible given the resources and stakeholder commitments available to you in the present.

(Adapted from “From Glass Ceilings to Glass Cliffs: A Guide to Jumping, Not Falling,” published on March 13, 2023, by Keith D. Dorsey, by MIT Sloan Management Review)

Investing in used luxury watches

One of the hottest collector’s items these days is a preowned luxury watch. Expensive secondhand watches from brands such as Rolex and Patek Philippe have become increasingly popular in recent years, particularly with younger buyers, according to a report published this month by Boston Consulting Group. Preowned luxury watches became more valuable as demand grew but supply remained tight, BCG said. Those watches have become so coveted that the market for them has outpaced the overall stock market, growing about 20pc annually from mid-2018 through this January, compared with the S&P 500 index’s yearly growth rate of 8pc during that period, BCG said. More collectors have seen watches as not just accessories but also as investment pieces that can hedge against inflation and diversify their holdings. Collectors often pay double or triple the price for a secondhand watch, even one that may have just left the store. New luxury watches have been harder to come by because earlier manufacturers slowed production.

(Adapted from “Used Rolexes Are Beating the Stock Market,” by Alyssa Lukpat, published on March 12, 2023, by The Wall Street Journal)

Being a good sponsee to your mentor

Sponsors are advocates who expend political capital to help their sponsees advance. But it’s not just a one-way relationship; what sponsees bring to the relationship is just as important. Here’s what the most successful sponsees do: 1) They are proactive and well-prepared. They do their homework, which might include reading their sponsor’s published material online. They reach out to schedule the meeting, and then show up with an agenda. 2) They give their sponsors concrete direction. The most effective sponsees give their sponsors clear direction on how to support them. For example, they spend time reflecting on a range of steps a sponsor might take on their behalf. And if they have a personal development plan, they share it. 3) They value what their sponsor is best equipped to contribute. The best sponsees manage their expectations, stay curious, and intuitively understand that what people offer them will be shaped by what they are open to receiving.

(Adapted from “Career Sponsorship Is a Two-Way Street,” by Rachel Simmons and Herminia Ibarra, published by the Harvard Business Review)

Historic devaluation in Lebanon

The Lebanese pound has sunk to a historic low against the US dollar on the country’s parallel market, the latest sombre milestone in an economic meltdown that has plunged much of the population into poverty. The Lebanese pound, officially pegged at 15,000 to the dollar, was trading at 100,000 against the greenback, dealers said last week — a dizzying plunge from 1,507 before the economic crisis hit in 2019. The currency’s market value was about 60,000 to the dollar in late January. Despite the gravity of the crisis, the political elite, which has been widely blamed for the country’s financial collapse, have failed to check the currency’s free fall.

(Adapted from Lebanon’s currency value plunges to 100,000 against US dollar, published on March 14 2023, by Al Jazeera)

Published in Dawn, The Business and Finance Weekly, March 20th, 2023