“I am reading every book by Peter Drucker I can get my hands on.” That’s what Tsukuba International School Principal, Shaney Crawford, said to me nearly nine years ago. Never before, nor since, has any salaried manager or company CEO ever told me anything even remotely similar even though this is precisely the type of self-education that most ought to be doing. When Shaney Crawford asked me to serve on the school’s board, I immediately agreed.
I define conservatism as clinging to traditional practices with opposition to change and innovation out of principle. You fight conservatism in an organization through initiating bold action independently and dealing with the consequences, not by insisting others change first. It is the way a person acts that makes him or her conservative, and not necessarily the way he or she thinks.
It is not uncommon for a CEO not to know exactly how his or her sales and business development people routinely behave in front of real customers and prospects without observing them in action. I recently learned of how one CEO was blindsided when he did just that.
Engagement surveys mask both organizational dysfunction and organizational health. If you are using their results to make decisions, you are at risk of making the wrong ones.
There is nothing wrong with risk aversion.
It is only aversion to reasonable business risk that is a problem. When a business leader complains of excessive risk aversion in his staff, the underlying concerns are frequently personal. Continue reading
Some people are natural leaders, and I have met a few. For most of us, leadership is something we learn. Making the transition from an operational staff or manager to a leader of people can involve the discarding of false beliefs and misconceptions. Below are five of the most common ones I have encountered when coaching leaders at all levels, along with what I advised.
You should always own and never outsource relationships in your business in Japan or anywhere else, and there is no reason you should have to, no matter what you might have been told.
There is not knowing how to do something and not being comfortable with doing it—and the two are not the same. Leaders I encounter often know more than they think. It is those who possess the discipline to do what they know who achieve the greatest success. Click To Tweet
