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WHAT IS LEADERSHIP? Leadership is an interactive conversation that pulls people toward becoming comfortable with the language of personal responsibility and commitment.
LEADERSHIP TIPS “The crux of leadership development that works is self-directed learning: intentionally developing or strengthening an aspect of who you are or who you want to be, or both.” Primal Leadership by Daniel Goleman, Richard Boyatzis & Annie McKee (Harvard Business School Press)
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The Power of Collaborative Leadership by Bert Frydman, Iva Wilson and JoAnne Wyer has arisen from the spirit of partnership and mutual inquiry. It is a rare book, one that actually captures "thinking in the moment" from experienced practitioners. It reflects the complexity of feelings and multiplicity of interpretations that coexist in complex change efforts.
In short, the book is for those who are genuinely interested in expanding their capacity to learn from history. For those looking for easy answers and quick fixes, it would be better to look elsewhere.
Co-author Iva Wilson was always on the periphery of the mainstream. She was the first woman to earn a Ph.D. in engineering at a prestigious German university. In virtual all of her engineering managerial positions, she was the first woman. Eventually, she became the highest-ranking woman manager for a global electronics firm. Hers is an impressive CV, but it was not an easy journey, just as it is not easy for most women like her who have breached the walls surrounding previously male-dominated workplaces.
The Road to Transforming Management
The Power of Collaborative Leadership is written primarily as a conversation between two senior managers, Bert Frydman and Iva Wilson. It takes that form because the authors wanted to capture the spirit of exploration. The field of organizational learning is new, and the challenges to its proponents, especially to business people, are many. In the book, Bert represents our pragmatic side, and Iva our visionary tendencies. Of course, everyone has aspects of both. As they share experiences and reflections, you are invited to shape your own arguments, your own change strategy.
People involved in the delivery of coaching may also become ambassadors of coaching in their sphere of influence. However, it is the high-level management of coaching initiatives that sets the overall frame and direction of coaching within an organization and provides the central basis for successful coaching.
What qualifies you to be a manager responsible for coaching in your company?
What experience do you already have in the field?
What relevant training/education have you undertaken?
What coaching bodies and associations do you belong to?
What relevant characteristics/signature talents do you bring into the organization?
What are your key strengths and weaknesses in terms of implementing and improving coaching?
What is the breadth and depth of your coaching capability?
On a scale of 1 to 10 (10= very high), what degree of coaching implementation and improvement intelligence do you have?
How committed are you to enhancing your coaching intelligence further?
Find optimal ways to fill your identified gaps
Use external guidance and support to develop your coaching capability to the needed level: receive mentor coaching on being an effective manager responsible for coaching in a firm.
Employ one or more suitable coaching experts to raise your company's internal coaching implementation and intelligence.
Consider full outsourcing: Have an external coaching manager appointed to the role of managing coaching in your company.
Pick and start with only those areas where you already have suitable coaching capability.
Whatever choices you make, keep ownership of the process as a whole and find a suitable mix of external and internal coaching capability for your specific purposes.
In today's fast-paced and hyperconnected global economy, leaders are pressured to make multiple decisions and do so quickly.
In such an volatile environment, leaders tend not to take the time to reflect and use sound judgment; the result is hurried decisions that lead to poor outcomes for themselves and their organization.
In particular, some leaders tend to decide instinctively based primarily on their own experience, without paying enough attention to the changes in the larger context. Risk averse, they may either procrastinate when faced with difficult decisions or make decisions that may yield tactical benefits but be unviable in the long term.
Other leaders are more willing to make bold decisions that could generate strategic long-term benefits. But given their self-centered and emotional personality, they tend to rush into decisions without heeding their intuition, let alone getting input from others.
Wise leaders are more effective decision makers due to their unique decision logic--that is, the set of systems, processes, and reasoning principles they use in decision making--developed over time and tested in different scenarios. Context awareness and ethical clarity altogether form the cornerstone of a wise leader's decision logic. This clarity gives wise leaders discernment--the ability to judge well in crises and make ethically sound and yet pragmatic decisions using a combination of logic, instinct, intuition and emotion.
Also known as worldview, mental model or mind-set, our perspective of the world is based on the sum total of our knowledge and experiences. It defines us, shaping our thoughts and actions because it represents the way we see ourselves and situations, how we judge the relative importance of things, and how we establish a meaningful relationship with everything around us.
Shifting perspective means becoming sensitive to the context around us and being able to see the world without any filters. It allows us to broaden our worldview and empathize with people who think and act radically different from us. A perspective shift could yield different insights and actions.
When interpersonal conflicts arise within their team, wise leaders resolve them by framing the conflict in a larger context. They enjoy and excel at coaching and mentoring others in their process of shifting their perspective.
Albert Einstein once said: "One cannot solve a problem with the same mind-set that created it in the first place." As the global business environment, driven by diversity and interconnectivity, becomes increasingly complex, we all need a range of skills to deal with the challenges. Smart leaders need to identify and understand the limitations of their perspective and then learn to shift it.
In The Leadership Challenge, James Kouzes and Barry Posner point out how important honesty is in a leader and how it ranks first among employee expectations, surpassing even competence: "In every survey we conducted, honesty was selected more often than any other leadership characteristic."
Of 462 executives who were asked, "What characteristics are needed to be an effective leader today?" 56 percent ranked ethical behavior as an important characteristic, followed by sound judgment (51%) and being adaptable/flexible (47%). --American Management Association, New York, NY
It's one thing to understand that honesty and trust start at the top and quite another to develop the strategies and the philosophies that make the understanding a reality.
As deadly as lies are, they're especially poisonous in the workplace. They can destroy employee engagement and productivity, undermine teamwork, ruin people's livelihoods, and even bring down entire companies.
Lies need to be caught quickly in the workplace before they snowball into something catastrophic. Unfortunately, most of us have no clue about how to spot a liar, and the workplace setting adds another layer of complexity.
In The Truth About Lies in the Workplace, leading workplace body language expert Carol Kinsey Goman combines her own experiences with the latest research to provide a comprehensive guide to spotting, exposing, and minimizing workplace lies. Once you spot a lie, she provides tactical advice on how to respond, whether the liar is above, below or on the same level as you. Goman also explains what leaders can do to reduce lies and encourage candor.
Detecting Deception through Nonverbal Cues
Reading body language to detect deceit in a business interaction is similar to what a professional poker player does during a card game. The card player is looking for tells--nonverbal cues that indicate increased stress or are out of sync with what the opposing poker player is saying. The difference is that you are applying these skills in a workplace setting. There are 30 body language tells that will help hone your liar-spotting skills.
Detecting Deception through Verbal Cues
People's choice of words often reveals more about them than they realize. For example, because most people experience stress when lying, they often try to circumvent that by speaking the literal truth. So, if your boss says, "I'm thinking of recommending you for the position," that is exactly what she means. She has not told you she did recommend you. She has not told you she will recommend you. All she said is that she is thinking about doing so. In the same way, if your colleague states, "That's all I can tell you," believe him. He can't or won't tell you more. But remember: that doesn't mean this is all he knows.
A liar's choice of words, in contrast to a truthful person's, will frequently include several verbal cues. Dr. Goman's book provides 20 verbal cues to hone your liar-spotting skills.
On Tuesday afternoon (April 23), Robert Prechter, a famed market technician known for calling the roaring bull market of the '80s, the 1987 crash and the March 2009 stock market low, published an urgent new issue of his Elliott Wave Theorist.
This issue is so powerful -- and so urgent -- that EWI has unlocked the first two pages for you to read with no obligation to buy.
Every issue of the Theorist provides you with a unique look at tomorrow's news today. This issue meets that high standard and more. It's one of the most powerful and revealing issues of the Theorist subscribers will ever read. Now, Prechter is not always right. Unfortunately, no market analyst is. But there's one thing his readers know for certain: When Prechter revs up his urgency, he sees something big on the horizon.
Due to the timely nature of this issue, EWI cannot make the first two pages available indefinitely, so they've set a date of May 8 to end this special promotion -- at which time the first two pages will no longer be available for free.
Most of us have untapped talents that are tied to something unique in our makeup. Race, gender, physical factors, socioeconomic factors--anything that shapes us--all work together to define the talents that we either tap or fail to tap.
Extremely intelligent, well-educated men and women with master's degrees have a strong desire to succeed in their work but face unique organizational obstacles. For a variety of reasons, these professionals represent silent voices in their workplaces. They have come to be defined as "untapped talent"--professionals with relevant skills and abilities who aren't making the most of them.
Untapped talent comes in many different forms. Diversity, in other words, is quite diverse. Most people never hit their talent ceilings, and that reality isn't exclusive to any race or gender.
When a Person Lacks Access and Falls Far Shy of Potential
Access is one of the greatest nontangible levers to success. A single act of connecting with the right person who can provide you with the right information has changed many careers. Access raises the curtains to the rooms that are invisible to many but well-known by a select few--the power brokers in an organization.
Access Defined: Providing entry to an influential person(s) or being placed in a career situation that broadens your perspective and skill base.
One global leadership assessment conducted by a $35 billion corporation revealed that access, opportunity and development were the major factors that could increase the representation of women at its senior level. Like most global organizations, this one did well when it came to hiring and developing female professionals below the vice president level. Breaking through that wall where one became an officer of the company, however, was a very different story. Women represented 42 percent of the organization's workforce, but only 25 percent of its leaders who were a vice president or higher.
Navigating Untapped Talent
"The untapped mostly come from backgrounds that uniquely equip them with experiences that foster nontraditional thinking. When they draw on these experiences in a work environment, they offer fresh, innovative perspectives on organizational challenges. They become 'tapped talent,' and their passions and skills not only align but are applied to opportunities. Unlike the untapped, that are often invisible to many, the tapped are positioned to make an impact," says Dani Monroe, author of "Untapped Talent: Unleashing the Power of the Hidden Workforce."
Monroe's new book is organized in three sections. The first provides some foundation ideas about untapped talent and why it exists. The next section covers three specific areas where leaders can directly impact an organization by mining and refining talent. The third looks at three characteristics identified as essential in great leaders as it applies to untapped talent.
Great basketball players like Bill Russell have an intrinsic understanding of the principles, rules, strategies, and mechanics of their game, but their play is dictated by what is required in the moment, often without conscious thought on the part of the players. The Art of Insight is the same way.
A sports analogy for finding the "sweet spot:' "It is the championship game. Your team has the basketball with fifteen seconds left on the clock, and you are down by a point. Do you want to be wound up and tight or loose and confident?"
Great players always want the ball in these situations, and they are always loose and confident--present in the situation, open to whatever happens, and able to integrate many hours of practice into the immediate unfolding of the game. Lesser players get tight and try too hard to find the "right" action to take. Their breathing gets labored, and neither their brains nor their muscles move with the fluidity necessary to make the shot. They get so locked up in "over-thinking" that we use the term choke to characterize their efforts.
Bill Russell, star center for basketball's legendary Boston Celtics, describes a quiet mind in a very fast setting:
"Every so often, a Celtics game would heat up so that it became more than a physical, or even a mental, game and would be magical. That feeling is very difficult to describe, and I certainly never talked about it when I was playing. When it happened, I could feel my play rise to a new level. It came rarely, and would last anywhere from five minutes to a whole quarter or more. Three or four plays were not enough to get it going. It would surround not only me and the other Celtics, but also the players on the other team, even the referees.
At that special level, all sorts of odd things happened. The game would be in a white heat of competition, and yet somehow I wouldn't feel competitive--which is a miracle in itself. I'd be putting out the maximum effort, straining, coughing up parts of my lungs as we ran, and yet I never felt the pain. The game would move so quickly that every fake, cut, and pass would be surprising--and yet nothing could surprise me. It was almost as if we were playing in slow motion.
During those spells, I could almost sense how the next play would develop and where the next shot would be taken. Even before the other team brought the ball into bounds, I could feel it so keenly that I'd want to shout to my teammates, "It's coming there!"--except that I knew everything would change if I did.
My premonitions would be consistently correct, and I always felt than that I not only knew all of the Celtics by heart, but also all the opposing players, and that they all knew me. There have been many times in my career when I felt moved or joyful, but these were the moments when I had chills pulsing up and down my spine.
Sometimes the feeling would last all the way to the end of the game, and when that happened, I never cared who won. I can honestly say that those few times were the only ones when I did not care. I don't mean that I was a good sport about it--that I'd played my best and had nothing to be ashamed of. On the five or ten occasions when the game ended at the special level, I literally did not care who won. If we lost, I'd still be free and high as a sky hawk."
Obviously, a quiet mind does not necessarily mean that you are quiet. You might be mentally quiet but also very physically active, like Bill Russell operating "in the zone."
The Insight State of Mind doesn't include a lot of internal monologues. It is not a state where you stop thinking, but it is a state where you are not working hard on your thinking. Techniques aren't necessary to reach the Insight State of Mind. You simply pay attention to the presence or absence of the feeling you associate with your best state of mind. Although your proficiency may have fallen due to neglect, none of this is new. You must simply reacquaint yourself with this natural, inborn capacity.
An insight is a thought we've never had before. It's a fresh thought.
Insights are those "Aha! moments" when the clouds part and the solution to your problem arises right in front of you. They happen when fresh new light is spread on a subject you've considered for some time. We all have experienced these moments of deep understanding, even if we might not know what to call them or how to describe them.
An insight is a discovery or realization that goes beyond face value, beyond the obvious. It is a deeper, more universal understanding that is often very relevant to you. With insight, a new cognitive structure is formed that is different from the sum of its parts, and it usually calls for a different action.
While the circumstances in which people have their insights are as varied as the individuals, everyone has reported a common state of mind. It's an easy going, unpressured, open, and ungripped state. The more often you reside in this state of mind, the more often you will have insights.
Conversely, when you are agitated and bearing down with your thinking, insights become more elusive. While the Insight State of Mind is our natural, default state, we inadvertently think ourselves out of it.
A strategic insight is a simplifying "Aha! moment" that often radically redefines business and the competitive advantage. Once articulated, these strategic insights seemed like simple common sense to everyone. They are easily understood and acted upon. In fact, implementation usually occurs with far less effort than forced march that often characterizes strategy implementation.
The Art of Insight is a new book that teaches readers how to have more "Aha! moments" in life. Based on the authors' years of research, reflection, and experiences, The Art of Insight presents practical methods of recognizing and cultivating an Insight State of Mind. Charles Kiefer and Malcolm Constable describe these thinking methods that are designed to foster fresh thoughts and perspectives. But this is not a rigid set of rules--it's a creative pursuit.
"Cage-Busting Leadership" (Harvard Education Press) is of profound interest and value to school and district leaders, as well as everyone, with a stake in school improvement.
Author Frederick (Rick) M. Hess aptly describes his aims at the start of this provocative book: "I believe that two things are true. It is true, as would be reformers often argue, that statutes, polices, rules, regulations, contracts, and case law make it tougher than it should be for school and system leaders to drive improvement and lead. However, it is also the case that leaders have far more freedom to transform, reimagine, and invigorate teaching, learning, and schooling than is widely believed."
Own Your Beliefs
Cage-busting requires clarity on what you're trying to do and what you think a great school or school system looks like. Saying "Raise test scores" or "Make AYP" are bad responses here. They're bad because they're secondhand goals, defined for you by policy makers and test developers. A good response identifies the destination and lights a path forward. Knowing what you care about frees you to push back on the stuff that you don't think important.
Think Bang-for-the-Buck
Educators make a well-meaning mistake when they focus on academic outcomes without also focusing on cost-effectiveness of programs and personnel. The relationship of results to costs is sometimes referred to as ROI (return on investment), but it's fine to just think of it as the bang you're getting for each buck you spend.
Today, it's easy to find out how well a school or system is faring in terms of academic outcomes, but it's harder to gauge bang for the buck. Performance outcomes are generally discussed without much regard for whether they're achieved while spending 20 percent more or 20 percent less. Consequently, school and system leaders focus on boosting achievement but pay far less attention to cost-effectiveness.
Yet, getting the same achievement results for 10 percent less means a district is freeing up millions to add services or invest in programs, staff, and practices that can drive improvement.
