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Monthly Archives: February 2012

Growing People: Give head and elbow room

Posted on February 28, 2012 by David

How does one develop senior people? The evidence is rather clear from sources as far apart as the Center for Creative Leadership (CCL) and the consultants, McKinsey. At CCL they have found that the best preparation for a senior role in any … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged Andreas Kluth, bad bosses, Center for Creative Leadership, Chris Anderson, crisis, ecocycle, elbow room, flawed bosses, fractal, head room, job structure, learning from experience, McKinsey, The Economist, turnaround, Wired magazine | 1 Comment

Halftime in America: The power of story

Posted on February 23, 2012 by David

A day or so ago on the Harvard Business Review Readers discussion group the topic was posted: What did you learn from the best Super Bowl ad? The Super Bowl is a huge marketing showcase… of which a few commercials stood … Continue reading →

Posted in Change, Leadership | Tagged analogy, Clint Eastwood, community, desire, Halftime in America, narrative, narrative truth, seamless success, shareholder value, story-telling mammals, Super Bowl, trouble | Comments Off

Complex Systems – Learning from A River

Posted on February 21, 2012 by David

The Mississippi river complex drains the heartland of America, exiting, as everyone knows, below New Orleans. The river, its catchment basins, flood plains and deltas comprise a complex system that has evolved over the eons to deal with change. Huge … Continue reading →

Posted in Change | Tagged Army Corp of Engineers, Atchafalaya, complex systems, Katrina, Mississippi, Mississippi delta, Mississippi floods, New Orleans, systems, wetlands | Comments Off

The Fusion of Ideas: Welding Imagination to Experience

Posted on February 16, 2012 by David

In a recent HBR blog, Bronwyn Fryer, a contributing editor to hbr.org , put out a call for what she called “idea fusers”. She pointed out that great inventions are often the result of the fusion of ideas from very … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged 3M, Anglo-Saxon capitalism, cooperation and collaboration, creativity, ecologics, egalitarian teams, fission-fusion, Google, herding dynamics, horizontal thinkers, hunting dynamics, IDEO, innovation, Jump Associates, Mitt Romney, neoclassical economics, power hierarchies, Rent the Runway, T-shaped thinkers, vertical thinkers | Comments Off

Command and Collaborate

Posted on February 14, 2012 by David

In a recent HBR blog, INSEAD Professor Herminia Ibarra reported from the World Economic Forum in Davos. The theme of the meeting was “The Great Transformation: Shaping New Models”. As far as leadership was concerned, she wrote that the emerging … Continue reading →

Posted in Leadership | Tagged both...and, command and collaborate, constructivism, critical theory, Davos, ecological management model, either/or, German General Staff, Helmuth von Moltke the Elder, mission-based command, Toyota Production System | 1 Comment

Scribblings from the Garret

Posted on February 7, 2012 by David

Welcome to my blog, the launching of my new website, and the pre-launch publicity for my forthcoming book, The New Ecology of Leadership: Business Mastery in a Chaotic World. In his January/February article in Foreign Affairs, The Future of History: … Continue reading →