Wharton and Insead researchers found that group brainstorming produces fewer ideas than individual efforts, but about the same quality of ideas. The research suggests a different way to brainstorm.

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It's More Than Just Systems and Silos; Culture Will Be the Fulcrum Issue. Comcast’s executives have their hands full successfully integrating NBCU into the family. It’s a sophisticated and complicated leadership process.

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My premise is that leadership alone can enable certain companies to succeed where others have failed. Competent leaders create the direction for their businesses, manage the opportunities, and actively build the culture and capabilities required for strong performance. This kind of leadership will make Comcast successful in its absorption of NBC Universal

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Jim Fielding is my hero. He is the president of Disney Stores Worldwide. (You know, in Hollywood its imperative that you have “worldwide” in your title – really.) Brooks Barnes writes about the transformation of Disney stores in today’s New York Times. Fascinating piece. Front page. Above the crease. Disney is going against the flow. Disney is learning from Apple. That’s two for two.

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Credibility is at an all time low - I can’t prove it, I just feel it. Overpromising has become a way of speaking. It has swept the pendulum way past credibility. Overpromising by definition results in underdelivery at best, and maybe even brand implosion.

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Public company leaders need to carefully consider how to comply with recently expanded SEC disclosure rules concerning corporate governance. While meeting this year’s new requirements, directors and managers need to think broadly about how this publicly-available information will be received within and outside their organizations.

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Not since the late 1980’s have executives been presented with a marketplace so filled with opportunity, so ripe for growth. But few are looking at the opportunity. This is the time for business leaders to plant the seeds for a vibrant future of greater market share and greater earnings.

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Convention says that to transform the business culture, start with a spate of town hall meetings, dinners with staff, elaborate family outings, and a blitz of internal PR. There is a more realistic view. Business leaders who achieve dynamic growth never underestimate the power of culture on the business, or the ability of culture to derail the company’s ambitious plans. These leaders know that culture is greatly influenced by their own actions, words, strategies and programs.

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The economy is in the doldrums. The business media is focused on economic growth and why it hasn’t happened. Clearly, to add jobs, we need robust growth in businesses of all sizes, and dynamic growth starts with agile leaders who want to break away from BAU, business as usual. In this spirit, I went to Tempe, Arizona where it was 105 degrees, to learn how to be a Whale Hunter - a proven way to search and land the big deals that grow companies, their reputations and revenues.

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A wave of new entrants to the wine business are bringing sophisticated capabilities to the industry. Kathryn Jones of the New York Times writes about career changers who find that as wine owners, their unique skills and backgrounds are an advantage.

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It's time to get really serious about your career. If you want 2010 to be the year of the new job, here are some pointers. Or if you want to refocus your career or your current role, here's some important advice.

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Watch this short video if you are stuck in a career with no future, and find it hard to take action. FLOORED is a emotionally charged movie, a gripping look into the trading floor that few have ever seen.

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Are you suffering from the outsider complex, a chronic complaint of HR and other staff functions, such as IT, Finance or Marketing? Perhaps you are technically proficient, but relegated to a second-tier status in your business. You aim to be a business partner, but operate on the fringes of the business, marching in lock-step with those in power. So, what’s the magical ingredient that makes someone a trusted insider? And what can you do to transform your role?

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Gen Y will be invading the workforce for some time to come. I have personally discovered a few easy things that managers can do to effectively motivate and direct us.

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If you question whether government spending can promote jobs, this article posted on the Rasmussen site today is worth reading. Author Howard Rich cites the results of a study conducted by three Harvard professors - substantiating that government spending reduces corporate employment activities.

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Visionary leaders recognize the importance of investing for the future. They balance short-term results with actions that ensure future success. These leaders realize that a myopic focus on the immediate future will only lead so far. A longer time horizon is needed to achieve more than just immediate gains.

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Business people and investors will remember Thursday, May 6, 2010 for years to come. The Dow plummeted intraday nearly 1000 points amid fears that Greece would default on its debt. The sudden free-fall sparked chaos in the markets for currencies, commodities and Treasury bonds. Initially thought to be a human error at a large bank – fat fingers, a trading mishap, the cause is still elusive. Getting to the truth is harder than ever these days.

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Public company leaders need to carefully consider how to comply with recently expanded SEC disclosure rules concerning corporate governance. While meeting this year’s new requirements, directors and managers need to think broadly about how this publicly-available information will be received within and outside their organizations.

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A strong leader recognizes when he has done something wrong or made a mistake. He is willing to accept responsibility, acknowledge the wrong to the people he wronged, take all appropriate measures to fix it and ensure that it doesn’t happen again. Clean and simple.

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A critical issue in leadership today is substance versus style. I addressed the distinction in a blog titled Leadership: Beyond Style and Emotion, the Devil's in the Detail. Michael Barone uses style vs. substance to compare the Obama enthusiasts to the tea partiers. There's an important message in both commentaries. Substance can lead to real change while style alone has its limits.

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The public has a solid record of making "the right calls" when it comes to assessing a variety of policy issues. In contrast, conclusions from Washington are often very different, heavily influenced by political trade-offs or myopic thinking. The $75 billion program to protect homeowners is a great example.

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It's More Than Just Systems and Silos; Culture Will Be the Fulcrum Issue. Comcast’s executives have their hands full successfully integrating NBCU into the family. It’s a sophisticated and complicated leadership process.

Continue reading...

Convention says that to transform the business culture, start with a spate of town hall meetings, dinners with staff, elaborate family outings, and a blitz of internal PR. There is a more realistic view. Business leaders who achieve dynamic growth never underestimate the power of culture on the business, or the ability of culture to derail the company’s ambitious plans. These leaders know that culture is greatly influenced by their own actions, words, strategies and programs.

Continue reading...

For a take-charge optimist like me, the financial crisis was a brutal experience. Although it's hard to know exactly what's ahead, for certain, we are close to a recovery. What we have yet to grasp is how different the future will be.

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Powerful results come from unlikely sources. How about looking at the potential and the contributions of the youngest generation to enter the workforce, Gen Y, also known as the Millennials.

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Since 2000, large media companies have written down $200 billion in value. How did this happen, and what are the few things that need fixing?

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Managers today are increasingly finding that “Doing what you always did will no longer get you what you always got.” Customers, business partners, and others are demanding better, faster, cheaper. Working harder will not suffice; change is needed. Yet, the requisite resources to undertake large-scale initiatives to produce these results do not exist.

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There’s strong agreement that innovation will drive success in modern business, yet a growing concern that companies are not taking the steps to innovate. The business press asserts that innovation is hard to measure, expensive and often compromised for short-term gains. CEOs don’t understand innovation, we're told - they do little more than talk about new ideas. I feel compelled to set the record straight, based on my research and personal business experience.

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“Recovery demands a clear-out of the old-guard,” says Luke Johnson in the Financial Times, March 17. If the big ideas of this decade are reinvention, we need leaders who can innovate.

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Vizibility is new and cool. It's a brilliant idea. The service allows you to create the Optimal search results for yourself so you can control what people see first.

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Successful leaders engage their colleagues, professional relationships and networks to drive innovation, growth, and extraordinary careers. Although engagement is a measure of an organization's capacity to deliver and a leading indicator of financial performance, most companies ignore it or feel it's the job of the digital marketers. Certainly digital presents new, more effective ways to engage consumers and build brands. The engagement revolution, however, has much broader opportunities for business.

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CNN host Jack Cafferty asked his audience, “Do you feel as patriotic as you used to.” The reactions reflect the frustrations of a nation that loves America and demands effective leadership. In a crisis environment, the rough edges of our system gnaw at the public's sensibilities. At the heart of this unrest is a simple fact: we want strong leaders; instead, we have politicians.

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My premise is that leadership alone can enable certain companies to succeed where others have failed. Competent leaders create the direction for their businesses, manage the opportunities, and actively build the culture and capabilities required for strong performance. This kind of leadership will make Comcast successful in its absorption of NBC Universal

Continue reading...

Expectations for public company management teams are changing. External constituents are demanding more than just quarterly financial results that meet or slightly beat analysts’ expectations. They are starting to ask more strategic questions that get at the organization’s long term future and even viability.

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At the time I interviewed Dave Checkets, founder of SCP Worldwide, the economy was not looking good. People were gloomy and felt, just like Charles Schultz' "Pig-Pen," that they couldn't change their destiny. Yet Checketts was excited by the gloom and doom sweeping the business community. This is a time when exciting things can happen.

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Powerful results come from unlikely sources. How about looking at the potential and the contributions of the youngest generation to enter the workforce, Gen Y, also known as the Millennials.

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Political pundits have focused much attention lately on the divergent opinions of the Obama Afghanistan policy-setting team. For business leaders, this debate highlights a management challenge. While there are factual differences between this foreign policy situation and those that corporate executives confront, the fundamental question remains the same: how to harness divergent points of view to create a coherent, executable strategy.

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Creative ideas do not emerge in organizations where only a few senior people have all the ideas and everyone else just executes them. Honing diverse opinions into a coherent, executable strategy takes a supportive culture, employees with a specific set of skills, and leaders who inspire the best from people.

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Drew Gilpin Faust, president of Harvard University, is an inclusive leader who is constantly reaching out to all of her constituents in her mission to advance the institution.

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There’s strong agreement that innovation will drive success in modern business, yet a growing concern that companies are not taking the steps to innovate. The business press asserts that innovation is hard to measure, expensive and often compromised for short-term gains. CEOs don’t understand innovation, we're told - they do little more than talk about new ideas. I feel compelled to set the record straight, based on my research and personal business experience.

Continue reading...

A post on BNET by Jo Owens, July 26 lays out the 7 qualities you don’t learn from the leadership gurus. At and near the top of the list are sleeping on planes, working in vehicles, dieting, and working the politics. Yet there are other things that are far more important to success. Let me propose an alternative list, starting with being creative. 1. Teach yourself to be creative. Perhaps creativity is in a person’s DNA, but I truly believe this is something that is learned and nurtured.

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Reinventing Leadership and Management is a paper in the Ivey Journal that caught my eye. Author Mitch McCrimmon argues that “leadership hogs the lion’s share of the responsibility and credit for driving organizational success,” leaving management with little to do. [Really?]

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There is a huge gap between talking about leadership in the abstract and putting the ideas into action. Leadership is a powerful idea, crucial to success, yet squishy. What are the essential elements of leadership that transform aspirations and dreams into tangible results?

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Managers in the middle are a critical, but unreliable link between business strategy and strong results. They are the “working leaders,” the vital glue that holds the organization together and makes it hum. These managers are capable of driving change at the front line where it counts. Senior leaders need to engage them and give them the accountability they need to excel. Middle managers are capable of doing more.

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Bob Kreek blogs about leadership and business on Leadership Pundit. Kreek was the founding president and CEO of Comedy Central - where he quickly transformed two disparate organizations and cultures into an extraordinary media success. Last Tuesday evening, Bob engaged the MBA students at Long Island University in a discussion about Comedy Central: The Management of Chaos. Here's the thrust of his story.

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Yesterday I formally announced the results of our survey on leadership and careers in a business world that is radically changing. A wake-up call for executives, these findings show that only those companies focusing on great performance and the best use of talent will thrive in the current environment.

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There is no substitute for superior leadership. Great leaders articulate meaningful goals and create a culture capable of achieves these goals. With this in mind, let's examine Ogilvy's quest to recreate the art of selling.

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Taking risk is core to any organization’s raison d’être – regardless of its mission. However, in light of the events of the last two years, visionary leaders are taking a hard look at how their organization manages these risks.

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Steve Jobs built an extraordinary business and brand called Apple. Its tag line, Think Differently, says it all. Apple enjoys an energized customer base, impressive earnings, and a growing market share. Apple is on fire. Jobs’ ideas and actions are defined by his Steadfast Passion, a term I use to describe the mind-set and actions of leaders who are Visionaries and Agents of Change.

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Some executives are different. They earn our respect. They are willing to break with convention. They spot opportunities and business risks that others choose to ignore. They prove that finding the truth matters, and being right builds value for stakeholders.

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Joseph Plumeri, chairman and CEO of Willis Group Holdings, is an interesting guy. It’s unusual for a top executive to admit he is changing his ways, and for the better.

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What’s the biggest shortcoming a leader can have? My vote is compromised integrity. If an executive wants to enjoy continuing credibility in his or her position, he needs to pursue the truth and confront the truth in everything he does. Dishonesty, misrepresentation, and cherry picking the facts to make an argument are all unacceptable conduct. Too often, leaders stretch or alter the truth to achieve a bigger goal. At the end of the day, perhaps every day, they are Machiavellian.

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There is a great deal of talk about why the U.S. stimulus has not worked. Obama’s mistake was being too cautious in fearful times, writes columnist Martin Wolf in yesterday’s Financial Times. Wolf, who wanted a much bigger stimulus, glosses over an observation he made on February 4, 2009: “Instead of an overwhelming fiscal stimulus, what is emerging is too small, too wasteful and too ill-focused.”

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According to the Wall Street Journal, the $4+ billion a year outplacement industry has increasingly offered standardized services, falling short of the needs of executives and managers in transition. Is it an issue of extremely high demand, or a business that needs a fresh, new approach?

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Perhaps the biggest surprise in New Jersey is the Governor's commitment to honor his campaign commitments to shrink the size of State government, cut spending and taxes, and get the State's finances back on track. We know that campaigns are only meant to get people elected - by definition, is there such a thing an honest, authentic politician?

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If the product is flawed, what can we say about the leadership that produced it? When selling a successful idea, the most capable marketers rarely market the facts, says marketing guru Seth Godin. They present stories that match the worldview of the people in their audience. Elected officials often take the same approach, using stories and interesting twists to hide the facts, especially when facts are controversial.

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I have been watching the soap opera in Washington with great amazement and a bit of anxiety. Our leaders appear to be taking the country down a road filled with minefields. They speak with distain about Wall Street bankers who were about to drive the country off the cliff, but they fail to see that’s exactly where they could be heading

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The news of a first bipartisan brainstorming session on Tuesday, February 9 represents a dramatic shift in White House strategy and substance, says the New York Times. Can the change transform the course of policy and politics in Washington?

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If your head spins every time you think about the explosive use of social media, it’s time to objectively examine what’s happening on the web and how it can benefit your business or personal brand. Ayelet Nott writes about The Top Five Misconceptions about Social Media.

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Learn from your successes, not your mistakes, says Alex Bogusky, co-chairman of MDC Partners' Crispin Porter + Bogusky, the award winning advertising agency and chief creative insurgent of MDC. Bogusky never learned anything from his mistakes, contrary to conventional wisdom.

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The results of Leadership Pundit's Survey on Leadership and Careers indicate that leaders can take more aggressive steps to innovate, change and grow their companies and organizations. While many of the 320 leaders and managers who took part in the survey expressed concerns about the direction of the economy and future opportunities, the responses indicate that America's passion for excellence is alive and well.

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Is Steve Jobs' sales pitch for the iPad over the top? I'm beginning to think not.

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At the time I interviewed Dave Checkets, founder of SCP Worldwide, the economy was not looking good. People were gloomy and felt, just like Charles Schultz' "Pig-Pen," that they couldn't change their destiny. Yet Checketts was excited by the gloom and doom sweeping the business community. This is a time when exciting things can happen.

Continue reading...

A new survey conducted by Pew Research shows that 93% of the growth in the US workforce from 2006 to 2016 will be among older workers, ages 55 and older.

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I don’t usually read Vogue magazine, but I was eager to see what they had to say about Sheryl Sandberg, the highly successful COO of Facebook. The story is part of a new dialogue about women leaders – a focus on their leadership, accomplishments, and style. Vogue's feature is refreshingly different from the standard themes about women in business.

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Here we go again. Joanne Lipman proclaims in an op-ed in the New York Times that women have not come as far as we would have expected 25 years ago, “and attitudes have taken a giant leap backward.” Lipman, a former deputy managing editor at The Wall Street Journal,

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April 15th was tax day for most, but for women leaders in construction, architecture and engineering, it was day 1 of Groundbreaking Women in Construction, a conference sponsored by the Women Builders Council and McGraw Hill. I had the pleasure of leading the first event of the day, a workshop on Visionary Leaders, the New Champions in Business. Here’s what I did and what I learned.

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