25. ASSET MANAGEMENT: MORE THAN EQUIPMENT

An asset, from an accounting perspective, is any resource owned by a business or an economic entity that has value and can be converted into cash. Assets are commonly classified according to their liquidity or their physical existence. For simplification, I adopt a blended classification approach combining both perspectives: 1) Current Assets: Can be converted into cash within one fiscal year (e.g. cash, accounts receivable, inventory). 2) Non-Current (Fixed) Assets: Not readily liquid and cannot be easily converted into cash (e.g. equipment, buildings, land). 3) Intangible Assets: Not physical in nature (e.g. goodwill, franchises, and intellectual property as patents, trademarks, and copyrights).

Asset management in financial organizations differs from that in industrial organizations according to the type of assets they manage. Asset management in financial organizations mainly focuses on managing financial assets such as cash, stocks, bonds, investment portfolios, funds, and other financial instruments. The primary objective is usually to maximize financial returns, optimize investment performance, manage financial risks, maintain liquidity, and achieve sustainable profitability. In contrast, asset management in industrial organizations focuses mainly on physical assets such as production equipment and infrastructure. In many industrial sectors, particularly in oil & gas and chemicals, the term "Asset Integrity" is commonly used to describe a technical discipline within asset management. It focuses on ensuring asset reliability, availability, safety, and operational efficiency throughout the asset lifecycle: 1) Acquire (Research, Design, and Engineering), 2) Build & Commission (Procurement, Construction, and Commissioning), 3) Operate & Maintain (O&M), and 4) Dispose (Decommissioning). 

Accordingly, while both financial and industrial organizations share the common objective of maximizing value from assets, industrial organizations intentionally use the term “Asset Management” as the term “Asset” emphasizes the business value generated from equipment, as they are viewed not just as physical equipment, but as a strategic resource that enables production continuity, operational sustainability, and profitability, which can be translated into financial value and cash flow for the organization. Another perspective in asset management literature that should be mentioned is the consideration of humans as organizational assets that should be properly managed, developed, and maintained to maximize their value and contribution to the organization. From this perspective, which appears reasonable, employees are viewed as valuable assets because their skills, experience, and performance directly influence organizational success and long-term sustainability.

 

 

Article By Dr. Eng. Amr H. Abayazeed - June 05, 2026.

24. DISCIPLINE

“I give you the map, are you willing to do that? It is the main point because everyone wants to be Cristiano. Discipline is the most difficult thing, not only in sport but in life.”

This is a part of Cristiano Ronaldo’s interview with WHOOP Podcast that really caught my attention, and I fell in love with it because it clearly shows how “Discipline” is the fundamental factor in the equation of success. Cristiano explained that everyone already knows the map and the recipe of what he does behind the scenes: his private training routines, the kind of food he eats, his recovery process, his sacrifices, and his strict lifestyle. The real question is not whether people know the ingredients and formula for success or not. The real question is: Do they have the discipline to consistently follow them?

The same idea applies in business ecosystems, including organizations, teams, and individuals, especially nowadays in the artificial intelligence (AI) era, where success ingredients and best practices are more available than ever before. Knowledge is also more accessible than ever before and can now be acquired easily and quickly, even through smartphones. Accordingly, the real challenge is whether people have the discipline to understand, learn, acquire, connect, and consistently apply them. In other words, success is not only about having the formula written on paper; success is mainly about the discipline required to execute this manifesto every single day, as discipline, from my point of view, is the number one, two, and three in the formula for success and the most common and necessary factor among almost all success formulas, if there are many.

Article By Dr. Eng. Amr H. Abayazeed - May 29, 2026.

23. AMR's LEADERSHIP STYLES MATRIX

As a researcher, based on my dissertation "The  Impact of Entrepreneurial Leadership on Project Management Success through Team Resilience: A Study in the Egyptian Petrochemical Sector" in 2025 (*), and by understanding the definitions of leadership styles in my prior article "Situational Leadership," this article summarized and categorized the eight key leadership styles that were discussed before (Autocratic, Democratic, Bureaucratic, Laissez-faire, Servant, Transactional, Transformational, and Charismatic). Neglecting Interactional Leadership that blended transactional, transformational, and charismatic leadership styles, and instead adding Entrepreneurial Leadership as an additional style (this inclusion addressed and matched one of the notable gaps in my dissertation).

To systematically organize these leadership styles, I developed a conceptual 3x3 Matrix in my dissertation, as shown in the next figure, with the X-axis representing “Task-Oriented” and the Y-axis representing “People-Oriented,” where both dimensions are graded as “High,” “Moderate,” and “Low.” This resulted in the division of leadership styles into nine distinct categories, each reflecting varying degrees of focus on tasks and people. The framework facilitated a structured exploration of how different leadership styles balance task-focused and people-focused dimensions, while illustrating how various leadership approaches prioritize operational performance and goal achievement versus employee relations, collaboration, and team engagement.

For example, at the highest point on both axes, Transformational Leadership was characterized by a strong emphasis on both task and people orientation. These leadership styles fostered collaboration, empowerment, and active engagement with teams, while also ensuring that tasks were completed effectively. Entrepreneurial Leadership, on the other hand, was positioned with high task orientation and moderate people orientation, as it balanced managing tasks at a high level with fostering team cohesion. It aligned with the values of risk-taking, creativity, and strategic foresight, while maintaining a strong focus on operational efficiency, and so on. Therefore, the 3x3 matrix not only categorizes leadership styles but also provides valuable insights into how these approaches could influence organizational performance, emphasizing the importance of selecting an appropriate leadership style depending on the situation, according to various organizational contexts.

 

(*) Paper:

Abayazeed, A. H., Sadik, M. A., Negm, E. M., & Ragheb, M. A. (2025). The Impact of Entrepreneurial Leadership on Project Management Success through Team Resilience. Business Ethics and Leadership, 9(4), 67-84. https://doi.org/10.61093/bel.9(4).67-84.2025.

Article By Dr. Eng. Amr H. Abayazeed - May 22, 2026.

22. SITUATIONAL LEADERSHIP

Leadership styles represent the different approaches and behavioral patterns that leaders use to influence, guide, motivate, and manage followers within organizations. Over time, researchers have developed various leadership styles to explain how leaders interact with employees and achieve organizational objectives under different conditions. Each leadership style reflects a unique combination of decision-making approach, communication pattern, authority distribution, and relationship with followers. The following paragraphs briefly review the most common and widely recognized leadership styles in leadership literature.

1) Autocratic Leadership is a style in which the leader makes decisions independently and expects followers to comply with instructions with limited participation. 2) Democratic Leadership, in contrast, encourages employee involvement in decision-making and values collaboration, participation, and shared responsibility. 3) Bureaucratic Leadership focuses on strict adherence to organizational rules, procedures, and hierarchy, making it suitable for highly regulated environments. 4) Laissez-faire Leadership gives employees significant freedom and autonomy with minimal direct supervision from the leader. 5) Servant Leadership emphasizes serving employees first by supporting their growth, well-being, and empowerment.

6) Transactional Leadership is based on exchanges between leaders and followers, where rewards or punishments are used to achieve performance and compliance. 7) Transformational Leadership focuses on inspiring and motivating followers through vision, innovation, and personal development to achieve higher levels of performance. 8) Charismatic Leadership depends heavily on the leader’s personality, charm, confidence, and ability to emotionally influence followers. 9) Interactional Leadership according to the Project Management Institute (PMI), blends elements of transactional, transformational, and charismatic leadership styles to create a balanced leadership approach. 10) Entrepreneurial Leadership combines the innovative and opportunity-seeking mindset of entrepreneurship with the strategic and interpersonal aspects of leadership.

Since organizations operate in diverse and changing environments, no single leadership style can be considered effective in all contexts. Instead, leaders needed to be flexible and adapt their approach based on the situation. For example, a leader may adopt autocratic approach during emergencies requiring quick decisions, while using democratic approach when teamwork participation is more important. This idea led to the development of “Situational Leadership,” which may be considered more of a strategic approach than a distinct leadership style, which emphasizes using different leadership styles according to the situation, culture, and dynamics that shaping individuals, teams, or organizations.

 

 

To be continued...

Article By Dr. Eng. Amr H. Abayazeed - May 19, 2026.

21. GENERATE IDEAS, NOT CREATE

Creativity and innovation are two expressions that may seem similar and are often used in the same context, but actually they are slightly different concepts. Creativity is about thinking of new ideas or seeing things from a different perspective. Innovation is the process of taking those ideas and turning them into something useful, practical, or valuable. In simple words, creativity creates ideas, while innovation applies and develops them. However, the main question of this article is not the difference between creativity and innovation. The real question is whether terms such as “new ideas” or “creates ideas” are fully accurate expressions.

In reality, ideas are rarely created completely from scratch, as they are usually developed gradually in a cumulative way from previous knowledge, experiences, interactions, and observations stored in both the conscious and subconscious mind. People continuously learn, observe, and interact with others. Over time, they develop their own way of thinking based on their background, education, values, culture, surrounding environment, and many other factors. The mind then connects these factors together, gradually shaping how people understand and interpret the world around them. For example, even when two individuals face the exact same situation or receive the same information, each one may interpret and analyze it differently. These accumulated experiences and mental inputs become part of the individual’s thinking process and influence how they view situations and generate ideas from their own unique perspective.

Another example from a different angle is when a novelist writes an original story. No matter how new or creative the story may appear, it is still influenced by the novelist’s cultural background, experiences, memories, and accumulated readings. Sometimes, the novelist may have previously read other stories that remain stored in the subconscious mind. Later, without consciously realizing it, those earlier stories may help generate similar ideas in a different form or style. The novelist then adds personal perspective, emotions, taste, and creative touch to develop something that feels new and original. In such cases, the novelist is not intentionally copying or imitating previous ideas. Rather, earlier stories unconsciously influence the creative thinking process and affect how the new story is developed and written, even without the novelist realizing it.

This is why, in stories, painting, music, film-making, and even business, ideas are rarely created from nothing. Instead, they emerge through a continuous process of improving, reshaping, and building upon previous knowledge and ideas to form something different and original. Albert Einstein would not have reached the Theory of Relativity without the earlier work of Isaac Newton. In the same way, Apple would not have developed smartphones without the earlier existence of wired telephones and companies such as Nokia and BlackBerry. Therefore, perhaps the more precise term in English vocabulary is the verb “generate” rather than “create.” Humans do not completely “create” ideas from nothing; rather, they “generate” ideas through accumulated knowledge, experiences, observations, and previous innovations.

Article By Dr. Eng. Amr H. Abayazeed - May 15, 2026.

20. IT IS A BUSINESS, NOT A CHARITY

“It is a business, not a charity.” Some people use this popular American phrase harshly, as if business has no heart. However, the deeper truth behind it is often logical and realistic. It follows a simple and fair universal principle: people gain based on the value they provide. If you work, you earn. If you create more value, you earn more. If you create less value, you earn less. This is how the real world naturally operates. Nothing is completely free; value is exchanged for value. This can simply be called the “Exchange Principle.”

By applying the exchange principle in business, mature organizations with fair systems and strong governance pay salaries, while employees provide performance and value in return. This is the fundamental contractual relationship between both parties. Once this balance is disrupted, the relationship between organizations and employees becomes unfair. For example, if employees work hard without receiving fair compensation, the organization is exploiting them. Likewise, if an organization pays salaries to employees who do not provide value or perform well, then the organization is losing value, and the business gradually turns into a charity rather than a profitable entity.

Following this logic, it is fair for organizations to terminate under-performing employees in order to restore the balance of the exchange principle, without hiding behind emotional slogans, false sympathy, or misunderstood concepts of employment rights. The same principle applies from the employee side, as a high-performing employees may leave their current organization for a higher salary, better opportunities, or greater recognition, also seeking a better balance in the exchange relationship.

Nevertheless, does this American phrase mean that business has no heart or ethics? Not necessarily. Supporting high-performing employees, appreciating and rewarding them, caring about their personal lives, and treating them ethically are all important and necessary. Valuable employees deserve attention, respect, and preferential treatment. However, even these actions are still connected to the same exchange principle. Organizations reward valuable employees not only for moral reasons — although morality is a major part of it — but also to encourage performance, increase loyalty, and retain talent. In the end, both organizations and employees continuously seek a fair exchange of value. That is how the universe — including business — naturally operates.

Article By Dr. Eng. Amr H. Abayazeed - May 08, 2026.

19. KNOWLEDGE IN A CONTEXT

Before the internet, obtaining and transferring knowledge was difficult because knowledge dissemination was limited and the transfer process was slow in some cases and restricted in others, especially in developing countries. These countries mainly depended on receiving knowledge from others rather than producing it themselves. As a result, access to accurate, complete, and up-to-date knowledge was limited. Today, with the internet era and the evolution of artificial intelligence (AI), the problem has changed. Trillions of data are available. While this creates new opportunities, it also creates confusion and distraction. As a result, although data is easier to access than before, transforming it into meaningful information and applicable knowledge has become more challenging. This idea is reflected in the long-standing mission of Google: “to organize the world’s information.” 

Nowadays, the competitive advantage of entities, organizations, and individuals no longer depends on who owns more data or who has access to it, and not only on who can classify data, organize it effectively, and transform it into information, then give that information meaning so that it becomes knowledge, as reflected in the DIKW model. What is increasingly important today is how to deal with knowledge rather than data, the ability to classify it properly by assigning appropriate titles, to contextualize it by identifying what is contextually relevant, actionable, and value-adding, and to integrate and connect it with other relevant knowledge to see the complete picture. This cannot be achieved without a deep understanding of knowledge and the ability to critically evaluate and apply it effectively, not just acquire it. The ability to structure and integrate knowledge in a holistic way is what leads to greater value and better decision-making.

 

Article By Dr. Eng. Amr H. Abayazeed - April 24, 2026.