Many thought-provoking thinkers and best-selling books have encouraged us to be “in the present.” This is great advice under some, but not all, circumstances. On the positive side of the issue, when being present is used in the sense of listening with focus, being present is a great idea. A wandering mind or thinking too […]
“Lonely at the top” is a myth of leadership. Far from lonely, most top dogs are inundated with too many who suck their mojo dry. A bigger challenge is knowing whom to trust. Smart leaders have super support systems both in and outside an organization. When I advised medical company president Dr. Hamil, baffling distribution […]
The three obvious answers are yes, no, and maybe. I’ll start with an easy yes. You see, as adjunct faculty, that’s what I do. Yesterday, I finished “teaching” a three-hour course in the entrepreneurship program of the Cox School of Business at SMU. The course’s title was Leading a Growing Company; so literally, I just […]
At 21, I remember thinking, “Now, I’m free from the worry of getting into trouble for having a glass of champagne at a wedding.” I felt victorious for skirting any potential recriminations for drinking when it wasn’t legal to do so, although back in those days, the consequences for underage drinking didn’t feel nearly as […]
Kudos to Harvard for asking a provacative question and delivering an even more compelling answer. The question I reference was posed six years ago by three B-school professors among them Rosabeth Moss Kanter, ” How might the mission of a university change in the 21st century?” The answer is even better than the question, “Throw […]
A fully sighted company anticipates and “sees” the obvious and the not-so-obvious events, dynamics, and influences that are critical to success versus ignoring it. According to author Margaret Heffernan who wrote Willfull Blindness: Why We Ignore the Obvious at Our Peril says such blindness happens when there are things we should know, could know, but […]
Lululemon founder Chip Wilson says that the famous Lululemon name had nothing to do with either lemons or any gal named Lulu. The truth is, he sold an earlier company to a group of Asians at a premium in large part because the name of that company had a lot of l’s in it….For […]
Eyes speak louder than words, if anyone’s looking. In my weekly newsletter, Packets and Pauses, about communication and presentations, I’ve been talking a lot about eye contact. How important it is, how to use it, how we screw it up. Recently, I had lunch with Some One who has an even bigger eye problem than […]
When asked to prove if something is true or false, people tend to focus on confirming “the rule” as stated, rather than falsifying it. Humm that’s sort of a brain twister, isn’t it? As a result, even supposedly smart people can be quite illogical. That is, according to research psychologist Keith Stanovich, a prof […]
Dozens of psychological and personality tests provide insight, they insist, into how we think and act. They pronounce with authority that we do or don’t so this or that well. According to one highly regarded test, I’m “gifted” as an ” attorney, ski instructor, forester, geologist, carpenter, minister, physician, writer, architect, fine artist, musician, dentist, […]