“Joshua Freedman: Emotional Intelligence and its relevance for Green Talent”
Interview by Bhavani Prakash, Founder of Green Collar Asia, Feb. 14, 2012
(http://www.greencollarasia.com/2012/02/14/joshua-freedman-emotional-intelligence-and-its-relevance-for-green-talent/)
Take a look at this example of leadership:
Interview with Jørgen Vig Knudstorp CEO, LEGO, by Adam Burns on Meet the Boss TV
(http://www.meettheboss.tv/Broadcast/Leadership/96/The-Man-Who-Rescued-Lego)
“How Leaders Kill Meaning at Work”
McKinsey Quarterly, January 2012, by Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer
(https://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/Governance/Leadership/How_leaders_kill_meaning_at_work_2910)
The above is an important read for senior executives that goes well together with the emphasis on “personal development” as an outstanding reason in getting an MBA in the following post by MBAChannel, “New Survey Challenges Some Accepted Truths” (http://www.mba-channel.com/channel/article/new-survey-challenges-some-accepted-truths):
“Professor Emmanuel Dion, of Audencia Business School explains: ‘The MBA is about creating leaders. Professional experience plus personality is what forms you as a leader and enables you to deliver results for your company.’ “
(Quote from the MBAChannel post)
I just read a Harvard Business Review article by David K. Hurst about an impressive real-life example of a turnaround in which Taoist concepts played an important inspirational role. The article makes me really look forward to David K. Hurst’s new book planned for publication by Columbia University press in spring 2012.
Though the article actually is from 1984, it has not lost any of its relevance! Here is the link to the article:
“Of Boxes, Bubbles, and Effective Management”
by David K. Hurst, Harvard Business Review, May-June 1984
(http://hbr.org/1984/05/of-boxes-bubbles-and-effective-management/ar/1)
In a nutshell, here is what it is all about:
“What Is Organizational Health?”
by Colin Price on MIXTV – Management Innovation eXchange
(http://www.youtube.com/user/mlabvideo#p/search/1/HIogbY-Ii78)
Then also go to
“http://www.managementexchange.com/users/colin-price”.
This is Colin Price’s page on the MIX. Or, watch and listen to Colin Price,
“Are You Creating a Healthy Organization?”
(http://www.youtube.com/user/mlabvideo#p/search/2/wxWHT5J5ajM) and
“What Do Healthy Companies Do?”
(http://www.youtube.com/user/mlabvideo#p/search/1/tbFQJ4A_nSQ)
on the MIX’s YouTube channel.
My latest article on the relevance of Daoist/Taoist concepts and strategies for management has just been published by the Journal of Management Development. The title is “Leadership and Organizational Patterns in the Daodejing”.
Journal of Management Development, Vol. 30 Issues: 7/8, pp.675 – 684
(http://www.emeraldinsight.com/fwd.htm?id=aob&ini=aob&doi=10.1108/02621711111150191)
Excellent YouTube clip: “Monkeys and Bananas or ‘That’s just the Way It Is’”
My take on this clip is that it is a perfect description of the framework that leaders with low EQs create for innovation, engagement and performance in any organization.
Right to the point and very persuasive:
“Gary Hamel: Reinventing the Technology of Human Accomplishment”
Video excerpt from University of Phoenix Distinguished Guest Video Lecture Series, 2011
(http://www.managementexchange.com/video/gary-hamel-reinventing-technology-human-accomplishment)
Very interesting one hour webcast with Knut Haanaes, global leader — sustainability initiative for The Boston Consulting Group; Peter Graf, chief sustainability officer at SAP; and Peter M. Senge, senior lecturer at MIT Sloan School of Management. The webcast was moderated by MIT Sloan Management Review editor-in-chief Michael S. Hopkins.
MIT Sloan Management Review, April 28, 2011
(http://sloanreview.mit.edu/improvisations/2011/05/05/watch-on-demand-42811-webcast-on-sustainability-and-innovation/?utm_source=Publicaster&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Sust%20Enews%20May%2012%202011&utm_term=Watch+the+video+)
Interesting viewpoints!
I just watched an interview with Ivy Ross uploaded by MIX (Management Innovation eXchange):
“Are You more Human than the Competition?”
(http://www.managementexchange.com/users/ivy-ross)
Then I watched this one with Tony Schwartz, also on MIX:
“Whole People, not Human Resources”
(http://www.managementexchange.com/users/tony-schwartz)
I just listened to an interesting interview with Edward de Bono about business and thinking that I want to share here:
“Edward de Bono on the A-Z of Creative Thinking in Business”
bvo – The Business Voice,
(http://bvo.com/programmes/edward-de-bono-on-the-a-z-of-creative-thinking-in-business)
… and there is a couple of articles on social entrepreneurs and their fascinating variety of business models and ways of doing business in Inc. Magazine I recommend reading:
“How a Business Can Change the World: A Special Report on the Innovative Business Models Social Entrepreneurs are inventing”
Cover story of the May 2011 issue of Inc. Magazine
(http://www.inc.com/magazine/20110501/how-a-business-can-change-the-world.html)
Interesting data on the gap between theory and real-life practice:
“Creating More Value with Corporate Strategy: McKinsey Global Survey Results”
By Michael Birshan, Renee Dye and Stephen Hall
McKinsey Quarterly, January 2011
Here a quote from the article:
“…Yet the results of a recent McKinsey survey show that just one executive out of five says his or her corporation fully addresses strategy in this way. What’s more, more than a quarter of executives at multibusiness companies say their corporations lack a consistent process for developing strategy.” [emphasis mine]
Very good article by Philipp M. Nattermann:
“Best Practice Does not Equal Best Strategy”
McKinsey Quarterly, May 2000
(https://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/Best_practice_does_not_equal_best_strategy_809)
Just read an article about research on learning and leadership I want to share:
“Exploring the Relationship between Learning and Leadership”
By Lillas M. Brown and Barry Z. Poser in Classic Readings in Organizational Behavior [Third Edition]. Beijing: Peking University Press, 2006, pp. 505-514.
The whole article very much resonates with what I write in The Tao of Business. A passage on p. 507 of the article for instance emphasizes the importance of leaders who are themselves actively and successfully on a path of personal growth and self-transformation for a learning organization. Such leaders are best equipped to set up a framework that inspires employees to actively engage in personal as well as organizational development and learning.
The article can also be accessed via the following website:
http://www.integrativeleadership.ca/resources/articles/article_1.pdf
Here are three surveys regarding sustainability I recently read that I find worth sharing:
Berns, Maurice, Andrew Townend, Zayna Khayat and others. “The Business of Sustainability: Imperatives, Advantages, and Actions.” Strategic Planning Publications. Boston, MA, USA: The Boston Consulting Group, September 2009. (http://www.bcg.com/expertise_impact/capabilities/strategy/strategic_planning/publicationdetails.aspx?id=tcm:12-29484)
Bonini, Sheila, Stephan Görner, Alissa Jones. “How Companies Manage Sustainability.” McKinsey Global Survey Results. McKinsey & Company, 2010. (https://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/How_companies_manage_sustainability_McKinsey_Global_Survey_results__2558)
Riddleberger, Eric and Jeffrey Hittner. “Leading a Sustainable Enterprise: Leveraging Insight and Information to Act.” IBM Institute for Business Value Study. Somers, NY, USA: IBM Global Services, June 2009. (http://www-935.ibm.com/services/us/gbs/bus/html/csr-study-2009.html)
“The Power and Potential of Social Networks: Experts tell what social connections could do for businesses if executives started to use them with intent”
By Jennifer Robison, Gallup Management Journal, October 13, 2010
Usually we are looking for the newest information, the latest up-dates on best practices to be on the forefront of dealing with current topics. Going along with this trend of permanent updating, there is a tendency to neglect that less recent information, especially if it is concerned with concepts and strategies, has not necessarily become less relevant with time.
A system of thought that definitely has not become less relevant with time – though it is more than 2400 years old – is the thought of the Tao Te Ching (Tao Te King / Daodejing). For a management context the Tao Te Ching is insofar interesting that for an important part it is concerned with concepts and strategies of how to lead and manage an organization most efficiently. Though the kind of organization the Tao Te Ching is concerned with is a political state, and though its whole context is the world of ancient China, the reason why it is so inspirational is relatively simple. The leadership strategies the Tao Te Ching advocates particularly focus on processes and patterns necessary to build robust and very adaptive systems.
“Connecting across the C-suite: Combined Insights from the IBM Global CEO, CFO and CIO Studies”
Here two quotes from the article that immediately stick out from the Tao of Business perspective:
„take advantage of global efficiencies while addressing local needs“
“It is about delivering a service through a simple process that can be repeated.”
(ftp://public.dhe.ibm.com/common/ssi/ecm/en/gbe03364usen/GBE03364USEN.PDF)
Fred Kofman’s Conscious Business: How to Build Value through Values is a great book.
I wholeheartedly recommend reading it – no matter your background. It beautifully links Western scientific research with philosophy and spirituality. What I especially like about Conscious Business is its giving various possible versions of the discussions it reviews – between “players” and “victims”, “learners” and “controllers” and so on. Fred Kofman very clearly shows how differently discussions can develop and how vastly different the results can be, depending on the modes of acting and reacting. The multitude of examples he gives in all their variations are incredibly informative and enlightening.
Fred Kofman. Conscious Business: How to Build Value through Values. Boulder, CO: Sounds True, 2006.
“Clouds, Big Data, and Smart Assets: Ten Tech-Enabled Business Trends to Watch”
By Jacques Bughin, Michael Chui, and James Manyika, McKinsey Global Institute, August 2010
