HBR: Review of October Issue

Harvard Business Review: This week, I’ll be reviewing the highlights of the October issue of the Harvard Business Review. Worth the read if you’re interested in managing risks in an uncertain economy. Suggest subscribing, especially for senior, strategic teams. Here’s THIRD the in a series of posts:

How GE is Disrupting Itself by Jeffrey Immelt, et al.

Reverse Innovation is GE’s new strategy. Instead of developing products in the US and then exporting them to, for example, China and India—GE is now doing the reverse. Using Local Growth Teams (LGT’s), GE now develops innovative and cost effective products in robust-market countries like China and India and then importing them into the US—reverse innovation. If not, Immelt feels that new global competitors will take away market share from GE. At the same time, low cost, effective solutions are rolled out for these countries and the US as well.

HBR: Spotlight on Risk

Harvard Business Review: This week, I’ll be reviewing the highlights of the October issue of the Harvard Business Review. Worth the read if you’re interested in managing risks in an uncertain economy. Suggest subscribing, especially for senior, strategic teams. Here’s the SECOND in a series of posts:

Spotlight on Risk

1. HBR Roundtable: Editor interviews 6 prominent experts in enterprise risk management answer a number of key questions like: Did new tools for assessing risk give us a false sense of security?

2. Mapping Your Fraud Risks by Bishop and Hydroski The authors argue that boards and senior management should request analysis of potential fraud/risk maps. The tool used has as a y axis = significance and x axis= likelihood.

3. The Six Mistakes Executives Make in Risk Management by Taleb, Goldstein, and Spitznagel Managers make six routine mistakes—they try to study the past, disregard advice about what not to do, use standard deviation to measure risk, fail to recognize that math equivalents can be psychologically different, think there’s no room redundancy if being efficient. Note: Taleb is the author of The Black Swan (about the unpredictability of major change events).

4. Making the Financial Market Safe (A conversation with Robert Merton) Merton won the 1997 Nobel Prize for economics by developing a new method to value derivatives—one of the assumed culprits of the 2009 recession. But Merton say “no.” He says that derivatives are not THE problem—only a tool for good or bad. In this recession, I’m thinking bad.

Harvard Business Review (October 2009): Spotlight on Risk

Harvard Business Review: Next week, I’ll be reviewing the highlights of the October issue of the Harvard Business Review. Worth the read if you’re interested in managing risks in an uncertain economy. Suggest subscribing, especially for senior, strategic teams. Here’s the FIRST of the coming week:
Spotlight on Risk:

This month in the Harvard Business Review (October 2009), the editor focused on risk in business as we climb out of a recession. Editor Adi Ignatius tells of a conversation with famed investor George Soros. In that discussion, Soros was asked to comment on whether or not sophisticated mathematical models mitigated risk. He said, “I don’t believe that—I don’t understand any of it, and I don’t think anyone else does.”

Risk and incentives can be an unwise union. For example, tying CEO incentives to quarterly returns can produce short-term gains but unwanted long-term consequences. Read the next post as the articles on risk are briefly summarized.

FINAL: Acton Mastery—Leading Through Coaching

Leadership from the Inside Out by Kevin Cashman remains one of my top picks for teaching leaders how tob become the best leader they can be...starting within themselves.

This is the FINAL of the series about Leadership from the Inside Out (second edition)

Acton Mastery—Leading Through Coaching

a. Leaders need to be flexible and adaptable and to be available. Teachers, leaders, coaches have existed since man asked the first question of another person. Action mastery steps are Awareness, Commitment and Practice.

b. Action Awareness: Become self aware—emotionally and socially intelligent. 360’s work. Also, ask people to give you feedback. You must be willing to hold a mirror up to your own face and not blink.

--Great book....buy it and share it with people you care about.

c. Building Commitment: Boldly stepping up to a challenge needs to become our default—not worrying about failure. Best quote of the book (and there are MANY great quotes in this book): “Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.” –Calvin Coolidge

d. Practice: If practice improves us, then coaching and follow-through perfects us.
i. Great study from Zenger, Folkman and Sherwin. Companies typically invest 10% of their resources in Phase I of development or Prework; they invest 85% in Phase II or Leaning/Teaching Events; and 5% in Phase III or Follow up and Coaching. However, learning events followed up by coaching culminated in a 73% improved result over training alone!
ii. No wonder that 60% of corporate leadership programs include coaching. Somebody’s starting to figure it out!

Being Mastery: Leading with Presence

Leadership from the Inside Out by Kevin Cashman remains one of my top picks for teaching leaders how tob become the best leader they can be...starting within themselves.

This is the TENTH of the series about Leadership from the Inside Out (second edition)

Being Mastery: Leading with Presence

a. I spent more time in this shortest chapter because I spend so little time thinking about being. I suspect that’s true for many of us.
--Great Quote from Albert Einstein: “The only two ways to live your life…As though nothing is a miracle…or as though everything is a miracle.” Profound insight by such a miraculous man in our history.

b. Being—just being helps us be who we are. The unscripted you is usually more interesting, responsive and playful than the button-down actor within.

c. Meditation and being alone help the subconscious work at its best. In a kind of hands-free environment, your mind is allowed to work om its most powerful state: the unconscious mind.

d. Inner calm makes outer interaction easier and more fluid, attracts others to us, solves tough problems, balances life and much more.

Resilience Mastery: Leading with Energy

Leadership from the Inside Out by Kevin Cashman remains one of my top picks for teaching leaders how tob become the best leader they can be...starting within themselves.

This is the NINTH of the series about Leadership from the Inside Out (second edition)

Resilience Mastery: Leading with Energy

a. Manage Your Energy, Not Time
i. HBR article: Time is finite…energy is infinite.
ii. We get energy from four sources: body, mind, emotions, and spirit

b. Time Management focuses on scarcity—limited resources, productivity, goals and outcomes. Thus, time management becomes an external, limited engine for energy.

c. Energy Leadership focuses on abundance--passion and purpose, engagement, synergy (multiplying energy), and leadership of others. Thus, energy leadership becomes an internal, unlimited font of energy.

d. Healthy 100-Year Olds: Research shows they have four common traits:
i. Optimism—more future than past orientation.
ii. Engagement—they dive into life.
iii.Mobility—they remain active.
iv. Adaptability—they like to learn and change to meet current needs.

e. Focus on activities that build the four sources: body, mind, emotions, and spirit—reading, a fitness regimen, a good friend to listen to you and meditation or just being alone to…to simply be alone. Some signs of having resilience (many more in the book): Smooth, abundant energy, optimism, creativity and innovation….

Change Mastery: Leading with Agility

Leadership from the Inside Out by Kevin Cashman remains one of my top picks for teaching leaders how tob become the best leader they can be...starting within themselves.

This is the EIGHTH of the series about Leadership from the Inside Out (second edition)

Change Mastery: Leading with Agility

a. Change is difficult but necessary.

i. Studies from the Center for Creative Leadership and Lomiger International demonstrate that leaders must deal with complex issues and tolerate ambiguity: Deal with change.
ii. Leaders must collaborate more, nurture relationships, allow others to participate in management and leadership, adapt to change, and take risks.
iii. “Things do not change; we change.” –Henry David Thoreau.

b. Change = Agility--takes place from the inside out.
i. Change causes resistance. Note that 50-75 organizational change fails. Same stats for personal change…smoke cessation—50-75% fail.
1. Outside-in approach does not work. Pushing down change meets with visceral resistance.
2. Inside-out approach works: focus on new idea and creating a personal map of what world will look like; create an open environment to talk about the change; give people time and space to adjust; leave the past behind and focus on the future.
ii. “Experience is not what happens to a man; it is what a man does with what happens to him.” –Aldous Huxley

Interpersonal Mastery—Leading Through Synergy and Service

Leadership from the Inside Out by Kevin Cashman remains one of my top picks for teaching leaders how tob become the best leader they can be...starting within themselves.

This is the SEVNTH of the series about Leadership from the Inside Out (second edition)

Interpersonal Mastery—Leading Through Synergy and Service

Service to Others

--Leaders serve others. I believe, and think Cashman would agree, that great leaders first serve the needs of others. Further, that great leadership is creating value for others…all the stakeholders.

--Martin Luther King, Jr. put it best in this quote: “Life’s most urgent question is, “What are you doing for others?”

Interpersonal Mastery—Leading Through Synergy and Service

Leadership from the Inside Out by Kevin Cashman remains one of my top picks for teaching leaders how tob become the best leader they can be...starting within themselves. Over the next week, I will post segments of my in-depth review of this book.

This is the SIXTH of the series about Leadership from the Inside Out (second edition)

Interpersonal Mastery—Leading Through Synergy and Service

SYNERGY

a. Research: Several studies show that the most competent leaders are often not the best leaders because competence at the expense of caring (my word) falls hollow on the ears of others. Cashman states the equation as follows: “Results competencies plus interpersonal competencies equals top leadership performance.”

b. Relationship—a bridge to creating value in an organization.

--Study: In a massive study of over 19,000 people who left organizations. The majority of bosses (85%) claimed they left for more money and opportunity. The majority of people who left (80%) said they left because of poor relationship, development or coaching from a boss!

--Trust: Leaders must give up control for trust. Trusting people to do the right thing remains one of the most difficult activities of even the most competent leader, and yet it is this leader-based trust that gives teams permission to do the right thing.

--Appreciation: Leaders who can appreciate others will develop strong, lasting bonds. In fact, one researcher, John Gottman (quoted often in Blink and other books), predicts marriages that fail found that when a 5:1 ratio of positive appreciative comment to criticism existed that marriages thrived. Further, he found that in a 1:1 ratio of the above criteria (positive to negative comments), marriages ended in failure. Learning to appreciate what people bring to the relationship, team or organization is critical to success.

Personal Master: Your Core Purpose

Leadership from the Inside Out remains one of my top picks for teaching leaders how to become the best leader they can be...starting within themselves. Over the next week, I will post segments of my in-depth review of this book.

This is the FIFTH of the series of my posts about Leadership from the Inside Out (second edition) by leadership guru, Kevin Cashman.

Purpose Mastery—Leading with Purpose that comes from the intersection of core talents and core values.

Core Purpose: When leaders discover their real purpose in life—the intersection of core talent and values, the world opens up to them.

--Core purpose boils down to this: How will I live to make a difference in others?

--What is your true north indicator? What is your call to service? What do you bring to the game above all else? For me that came to boiling it down to a single word: catalyst...inspiring people to be better at whatever they strive to be. What’s your word to describe your true north…your key purpose in the lives of others?

--If leaders truly do create value in the lives of others….then core purpose stands at the top of the priority list. Know your core purpose and the world opens up in magnificent ways. You will truly feel that you’re “in your own (authentic) skin.”

Purpose Mastery: Core Talents and Values

Leadership from the Inside Out remains one of my top picks for teaching leaders how tob become the best leader they can be...starting within themselves. Over the next week, I will post segments of my in-depth review of this book.

This is the FOURTH of the series about Leadership from the Inside Out (second edition)

Purpose Mastery—Leading with Purpose that comes from the intersection of core talents and core values.

--Core Talents: Our core talents are the activities that energize us. When you’re truly in the “flow” or whenever and wherever work seems to fly by and you feel as if you could do it non-stop…there you’ll find your core talent. When you’re “in the zone” enjoying the very activity itself—you’ll find your core talent. Ultimately, if you are ever lucky enough to discover a profession that you’d do for free, because you love it, you have discovered your core talents. It’s a wonderful place to live—happy, strong, fulfilled.

--Core Values: These are the underlying beliefs and values that we stand for as a leader. We have we been taught these values—either through success or failure—and they have endured and become part of our being. Discovering these is a soul-searching exercise, sometimes difficult to face.

Personal Mastery: Authenticity

Leadership from the Inside Out remains one of my top picks for teaching leaders how to become the best leader they can be...starting within themselves. Over the next week, I will post segments of my in-depth review of this book.

This is the THIRD of the series about Leadership from the Inside Out (second edition)

Personal Mastery—Leading with Awareness and Authenticity

Authenticity: To be authentic, leaders have what Daniel Goleman (author of Emotional Intelligence) calls self awareness and self regulation as well as awareness of others and mastery over interpersonal relationships. In short: Know self, first, then know others. For Cashman a couple of major points jump out:

--We lead both by character and coping and of the two, character is the more lasting and revealing. Leading with character we give off authenticity, trust, openness, courage and compassion. In a sense, we become vulnerable and ironically, more human.

--When we lead by coping—dealing with emergent issues that jump up at us—we lead out of a need for image, safety, security, comfort and control.

--While both have their place in a leader’s repertoire, character is the better place to begin any leadership relationship.

Personal Mastery: Awareness

Leadership from the Inside Out remains one of my top picks for teaching leaders how to become the best leader they can be...starting within themselves. Over the next week, I will post segments of my in-depth review of this book.

This is the SECOND of the series about Leadership from the Inside Out (second edition)

Personal Mastery—Leading with Awareness

Awareness: At all levels of leadership, if people don’t develop, they stop advancing. And the place to start is with awareness of who we are. “What we believe, we become.” So, reaching inside, in the middle of ourselves and asking, “Who am I?” is critical for any leader. While that sounds overly lofty, even philosophical, it makes a huge difference.

--Example: Take a leader who’s very competent and believes s/he knows what’s best.That belief propels such a leader to move forward on major initiatives without asking for input. The result is frequently frustration among followers and eventually a label of “arrogance” and eventually rejection from a team or an organization.

--Korn Ferry’s research found that the key career stoppers are: Arrogance, over reliance on a single skill, lack of composure….and a number of others mentioned in the book.

--Shadow Beliefs are often repressed, unresolved, even secret belief that lives deep in all of us—which can leap up at any time and topple our leadership authority. Sometimes it’s feeling inadequate that makes us work tirelessly to become successful—therefore, overworking and becoming compulsive. Or it might manifest itself as manipulation if we believe we need to continuously succeed regardless of the price, or if you need to be always seen as exceptional, such a shadow belief could erupt and present you as a narcissist and self absorbed leader. Great summary quote: “The idea is in thyself; the impediment, too, is in thyself.” –Thomas Carlyle.

Leadership from the Inside Out

Leadership from the Inside Out remains one of my top picks for teaching leaders how to become the best leader they can be...starting within themselves. Over the next week, I will post segments of my in-depth review of this book.

This is the FIRST of the series about Leadership from the Inside Out (second edition)

Are leaders born or can they be “made?” Kevin Cashman would say they’re made, self-made—from the inside out. Senior partner in Korn Ferry’s leadership and talent group and founder of his own renowned firm LeaderSource—later acquired by Korn Ferry—Cashman has earned the reputation of being a leadership guru. In my opinion, he deserves that reputation largely because of this book—especially this second edition.

Further, I recommend that all executives and leaders read this book. Buy it for the entire leadership structure and have regular conversations over the year about its content. It’s THAT important a book.

TED Presenation: On Lifelong Learning

In my opinion, Ted.com (www.ted.com ) is one of the best sites on the Web. The best speakers/thinkers in the country lecture for about 20 minutes on “ideas worth sharing.” This week, we will follow several speakers who have messages/ideas worth hearing and sharing on issues relating to leadership.

This is the FINAL of the series from Ted.com.

Ben Dunlop on Lifelong Learning
President of Wofford College in South Carolina, Ben Dunlop, talks about his relationship with Hungarian Sandor Teszler, Holocaust survivor, and how he integrated a textile factory in the heart of a racist South Carolina back in history. It was Teszler’s absolute craving to learn that kept his soul charged long into his later years of life. Dunlop opens us up to the passion for learning and its value to fulfilled life.

http://www.ted.com/talks/ben_dunlap_talks_about_a_passionate_life.html

TED Talk: Doris Kearns Goodwin on Presidential Leadership

In my opinion, Ted.com (www.ted.com ) is one of the best sites on the Web. The best speakers/thinkers in the country lecture for about 20 minutes on “ideas worth sharing.” This week, we will follow several speakers who have messages/ideas worth hearing and sharing on issues relating to leadership.

This is the FOURTH of the series from Ted.com.

Doris Kearns Goodwin on Presidential Leadership

Famed historian, Doris Kearns Goodwin contrasts two presidents, Abraham Lincoln and Lyndon Johnson. She evaluates their happiness based on a paradigm developed by a former professor of hers at Harvard, and famed psychologist, Erick Erickson. A giant of psychology and specifically personal identity, Erickson thought that a person had to live a balanced life of work, love and play and that overdoing and thus under doing any one of those would leave a person wanting in old age. Her proposition was that Lincoln followed this balance far better than Johnson. Listen to her explanation and how she came to become a historian through her love of the Boston Red Sox!

Click her for her wonderful talk.

TED Presentation: Robert Wright on Compassion

In my opinion, Ted.com (www.ted.com ) is one of the best sites on the Web. The best speakers/thinkers in the country lecture for about 20 minutes on “ideas worth sharing.” This week, we will follow several speakers who have messages/ideas worth hearing and sharing on issues relating to leadership.

This is the THIRD of the series from Ted.com.

Robert Wright on Compassion

Author Robert Wright explains "non-zero-sumness" and compassion and how our fortunes and others around the world are linked. He argues that cooperation has guided our evolution to this point -- and how we can use it to help save humanity today. When we care about others, they care about us. He argues that this is selfish—the intelligent use of self interest—but necessary. For example, if we buy a car in the US, we recognize that the parts are made around the globe, thus we’re linked to Japan, at…have an interest in their success and compassion for them, which in turn helps them think about and have compassion for us.

Click here: http://www.ted.com/talks/robert_wright_on_optimism.html

TED Presentation: Rick Warren on Purpose

In my opinion, Ted.com (www.ted.com ) is one of the best sites on the Web. The best speakers/thinkers in the country lecture for about 20 minutes on “ideas worth sharing.” This week, we will follow several speakers who have messages/ideas worth hearing and sharing on issues relating to leadership.

This is the SECOND of the series from Ted.com.

TED Presentation: Rick Warren on Purpose

Author of mega-hit book, The Purpose Driven Life, Rick Warren talks about purpose. He asks the biblical question that God asked Moses (in the Old Testament), “What’s in your hand.” Warren spends much of his time asking groups the same question: What’s in your hand—what’s your purpose in life. Where do you get three things: 1) Your identity; 2) Your income; 3) And, where can you use it to influence others. Understanding your core purpose is asking yourself: What’s in my hand?

Watch the vide of Rick Warren speaking on Purpose.

TED: About Motivation

In my opinion, Ted.com (www.ted.com ) is one of the best sites on the Web. The best speakers/thinkers in the country lecture for about 20 minutes on “ideas worth sharing.” This week, we will follow several speakers who have messages/ideas worth hearing and sharing on issues relating to leadership. This is the FIRST of the series from Ted.com.

Dan Pink on Motivation

Below find the link to Dan Pink—former speechwriter for Al Gore—speaking about motivation. I think you’ll find it amazing in that in business we use extrinsic incentives (carrots and sticks), not intrinsic incentives (autonomy, mastery and purpose), and the results are generally a failure. So, if you have a sales incentive program based on payouts, you will want to listen to this presentation on motivation. I think this is worth passing along to companies who might benefit from it.

Click here to see Dan Pink's lecture on motivation at TED.

Harvard Business Review September 2009--Final Comments

This the FINAL of several postings this week regarding the September 2009 issue of the Harvard Business Review, which I highly recommend you purchase for your executives.

Articles worth reading in this issue:

Inside Cisco’s Search for the Next Big Idea: Read about the I-Prize and how getting innovation by merely offering a reward on a Web site, doesn’t always work. It takes much more than “crowd-sourcing” to be effective.

Death by Information Overload: With the flood of e-mails companies and people need to take some actions. I like the sidebar list “10 Ways to Reduce E-mail Overload.” Helped me.

And a focus of articles on sustainability:
--Why Sustainability is Now the Key Driver of Innovation
--On the Horizon: Six Sources of Limitless Energy
--Using Gifts and Trees to Make Recyclers of Indian Consumers
--Creating Value in an Economic Crisis

HBR September 2009: The Female Economy

This the fifth of several postings this week regarding the September 2009 issue of the Harvard Business Review, which I highly recommend you purchase for your executives.

The Female Economy
By Michael Silverstein and Kate Sayre

As an economic force worldwide, women control more money than China and India combined! Off hand, I’d say that’s a significant target market! The authors surveyed a sample of 12,000 women from a wide geographic and socioeconomic backgrounds about a myriad of issues like education, jobs, hopes fears, relationship, etc. Obviously, the authors would direct companies to pay increasing attention to this behemoth market. They also point out six industries in particular: food, fitness, beauty, apparel, health care, and financial services. Very interesting and eye-opening article.