“The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.”

Alvin Toffler

How prevalent are poor leaders and what do we do about it?  We all know that poor leadership is rampant in most organizations.  We also know that most commonly, leadership development is viewed as the cure.

To stimulate research on poor leadership, Robert Hogan in 1990 suggested that the base rate of leadership incompetence was between 60 and 75 percent. Additional research also suggests that one out of two executive leaders fail at some point in their career. And according to a recent survey by Badbossology.com and Development Dimensions International (DDI) a majority of employees spend 10 or more hours per month complaining or listening to others complain about bad bosses—and almost one-third spend 20 hours or more per month. 

Jeffrey C. Pfeffer, Ph.D., professor of organizational behavior at Stanford University has been quoted as saying “If we practiced medicine like we practice management–based on hunch, intuition and ideology–we would have much more malpractice and a lot of mortality and morbidity.”  The same seems particularly true of leadership development programs where actual learning, transfer back to the work environment and enhanced performance is more myth than reality.

In fact, Marshall Goldsmith reviewed how well 86,000 leadership training participants actually learned from the experience. He found that the people who went home, talked about the learning and worked deliberately to implement new behaviors learned best. But those who just went back home and did no follow–up showed no improvement at all.

The sad fact is that we know how to do solid leadership development–we’re just not doing it.  Most companies spend their time and money on the training and forget about the actual learning and practice that is required to develop new skills. That’s up to the individual, but companies typically don’t even bother to create and share learning expectations or follow up to see whether a leader is using what he or she was taught. Few companies ever evaluate whether their leadership development efforts work and even fewer provide tools to hold learners accountable for creating and tracking professional development plans.   And we wonder why most leadership development efforts are typically ineffective.
 
Here are some things your company should consider:

Make it More Than an Event
Cooking together or rafting down a river makes for a fun interaction.  Few of these experiences teach leadership skills that are of practical value to the organization.  Link the leadership development intervention to an ongoing process involving the participant’s manager and a mechanism to ensure that developmental plans are tracked and monitored following leadership training.

Consider Different Learning Styles
In my have seen hundreds of people read books and learn nothing.  Not everyone learns the same way.  Consider blended learning approaches to ensure that everyone has an equal opportunity reflect, learn and apply information and skills.

Avoid Case Study Overload
Leadership development that is predominantly using a case study approach may stimulate problem solving and analysis but it certainly won’t teach leadership skills.  Leadership development is about enhancing specific skills and behaviors—you can do case studies all day and not be more competent in what leaders actually are required to do all day.

Practice
Essentially, training is intended to help people develop new habits and enhance effectiveness in specific skills.  In order to do so, repetition is important.  Also, it is important to allow time to develop and integrate the new habit in one’s daily routine.  A week long leadership program is unlikely to lead to the formation of new habits.  Initiating behavior change is hard and sustaining it over time is even more challenging.

Evaluate Your Program
It’s great that the leadership participants liked the facilitator and material.  More important is whether anyone notices actual behavior change after the leader leaves the training.  If you have to use “happy face” evaluations, at least use a “post-then” approach to enhance the validity of your subjective evaluations.  Never heard of “post-then” evaluations?  That’s one of the reasons evaluations of leadership development programs are weak or never go beyond “level 1” approaches.

Hold Participant’s Manager Accountable to be a Coach 
If the participant’s manager isn’t involved in the leadership initiative then you have a weak program.  Managers of program participants minimally need to share the purpose and goals of the program, clarify expectations and hold the participant accountable to put to together a learning development plan to apply and practice one or more skills taught in the program. 

Seek Mentoring and Coaching for Program Participants
Peer coaching and/or mentoring can be incredibly valuable to amplify and accelerate learning from leadership development efforts.  Assigning a peer coach from the program or organizational mentor for each participant can be useful to continue skill practice and discussion outside of the leadership program.

Provide Organizational Problems as Projects
Experience is the best teacher.  Provide actual organizational problems for leaders to solve in small or large groups as part of your leadership development effort.  The transfer of learning is stronger than abstract concepts or case studies so commonly used in most leadership training programs.

Help Executives See Themselves Accurately
We have published research supporting the concept that most leaders have inflated views of their strengths.  Incorporate multi-rater or 360 degree feedback assessments in your leadership development efforts to help leaders compare self-perceptions to those of other key internal and external stakeholders.  Emphasize the strengths of leaders and encourage behavioral action plans following feedback.

Make it Competency Based
Leadership development is most effective when it targets specific competencies that will result in a culture that engages and retains talent (e.g., emotional intelligence).  Leadership development training is more effective when these competencies reinforce the organization’s vision and values.

Focus on Interpersonal Competence
Leadership is about relationship intelligence.  Leaders don’t fail because of a lack of technical knowledge or experience—they derail because they lack interpersonal competence.  Leaders are both born and made so select those with innate talent and create experiences to encourage repetitive practice to sharpen the skills of the others.

Focus on Health
Daniel Goleman suggests that 50% to 70% of the culture of a team or organization is directly attributed to the leader’s behavior.  Our own research suggests that leaders play the strongest role in creating a psychologically healthy climate.  But, it all starts with leaders who have a balance in life and manage emotions and stress in a positive manner.  Driven “Type A” leaders get a lot done but they either breakdown themselves or drive others out of the organization.  Effective leadership development training programs should also be integrated with executive health and wellness.

As Harry Truman said, “It’s what you learn after you know it all that counts”….Be well…

Technorati Tags: ken nowack, envisia learning, executive development, management development, supervisory training, organizational development, leadership training, OD

“One of the hallmarks of the professional, therefore, is his ability to ‘take a convergent knowledge base and convert it into professional services that are tailored to the unique requirements of the client situation”

Adaptability involves both use of the situation and use of theory and experience. Adaptability ultimately involves how well we can read the variability in the situation, understand it and have accessible, operational knowledge and experience to draw upon in taking action.

Masterful practice in action is beautiful! The right action or statement or question at the right time. It got results or the desired results. It worked (according to some yardstick). Perhaps the most important outcome in working with any human systems is that it helped that person or organization in that situation. Thus, we are always dealing with variability and need to quickly interpret the situation, draw upon a readily accessible knowledge base (theory and organized experience) and choose among action alternatives.

Practice in human systems has to be immensely adaptable to the myriad of variables and clues in the environment at the time of execution. The practitioner must interpret the situation, draw upon previously developed/learned principles and frames, decide in the moment what is applicable and say or do something… or nothing. When skill sets were mostly physical, such as crafts, there were fewer variables changing the work situation. Not so in human systems with professional work! All of the players and parts are changeable and in dynamic relationships.

So how do we prepare for both the variability and the need for adaptability? We need to develop a knowledge base that is comprehensive for the human systems we work in, readily accessible to us and operational for application. In other words, we need to have a working understanding of theories, models, concepts and experience that can give us meaning across a variety of situations and readily provide us with action alternatives. Our knowledge base needs grounding in reality for us, integration among its parts and applicability for our use. It can’t just be an interesting model or theory. It has to be visible and operational to us in organization reality. It has to be relevant to our work situations. In fact, as we work with and integrate across various theories and experiences, we develop practice theories or what Argyris and Schön² call theories-in-use.

Therefore, one aspect of learning how to practice is preparing for adaptability by learning/building a ready inventory of principles and frames (drawn from theory and experience) to use when assessing any situation and an understanding of the situational conditions and patterns that lend credence to their applicability. In other words, “there is nothing so practical as a good theory”. Without them we might never know how to give meaning to the myriad of variables and dynamic relationships in any human system, nor which ones are applicable in a given situation, nor what actions are available to take, with reasonable odds of being helpful, in the immediate circumstances. For our purposes here, I’m using theory very broadly to include conceptual frameworks, models and patterns of tacit knowledge³  understood well enough to provide confident interpretation and action choices.

Preparing for adaptability also allows us to move more rapidly from uncertainty (of the new situation) to some certainty in understanding what’s going on and having action alternatives. While this is highly useful from a practical perspective, it is also useful emotionally, for both the professional and client, in raising confidence and lowering anxieties⁴.

Continuing food for thought ….until next time.

Technorati Tags: Dave Jamieson, masterful practice, adaptability,  accessible knowledge, sense-making, tacit knowledge, theories-in-use,  envisia learning

1. Schein, E. and Kommers, D. (1972). Professional Education: Some New Directions. Hightstown, New Jersey: McGraw-Hill Book Company; Schön, D. (1983). The Reflective Practitioner. New York: Basic Books, p.45 [↩]
2. Argyris, C. and Schön, D. (1974). Theories in Practice: Increasing Professional Effectiveness. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers [↩]
3. Raelin, J.A. (2007). “Toward An Epistemology of Practice”.  Academy of Management Learning & Education Journal. Vol 6,No 4, pp. 495-519 [↩]
4. Lundberg, C. (1997). “Towards a General Theory of Consultancy: Foundations”. Journal of Organizational Change Management, Vol. 10, No. 3. pp.193-201 [↩]

HOT READS FOR THE PRACTIONER

Title:  Talent Management for the Twenty-First Century

Competencies: strategic problem analysis; planning/adapting; recruitment, development, retention; executive coaching

Who benefits: The organization and employees

Consultant Usage: internal or external consultants whose practice includes talent management

What’s it about?  When I was a more active player in the HRD/OD field, I found myself on several occasions pushing for a concept called “succession pools”.  This was something different from the more traditional succession plan.  Intuitively I knew succession planning wasn’t key to any organizations long-term selection-development-retention strategy.

I knew part of the answer.  “Change” and “succession plan” should not be used in the same sentence, with the exception of this one.  Succession plans might have been useful during more stable times, but by 1980 the succession plan model was losing any meaningful usefulness.  Of course, like the expiration date on a milk carton, we pay little attention until we experience the sour taste.   So even today some companies still try to make succession plans work (well beyond the expiration date).

Which I hope serves as a transition into today’s recommended reading for those interested in the topic.  The March issue of Harvard Business Review features an interesting and provocative article on talent management. 

I am skeptical about some of the statements the author makes.  I think some of his ideas already exist by different names.  That said, this article makes a valuable contribution to the field and provides a much-needed structure for further and future discussions.

The author got my attention with this quote: “Every talent management process in use today was developed half a century ago.  It’s time for a new model.”

He reviews past models that can be summarized as (1) do nothing, (2) develop your own, and a slightly more modern approach, (3) steal from others.

His proposed new model borrows from the operations side of companies – supply chain management.  He suggests a talent-on-demand framework that is more fluid and flexible as needs fluctuate. 

The remainder of the article looks at four principles of supply chain management, two on the demand side, two on the supply side, and how these principles can be used in the recruitment, development and retention of the right numbers and quality of employees. 

The results will give employers the skills they need when they need them and delivered in a more affordable way.  Employees benefit too by enhancing their internal prospects while retaining control over their careers. 

Agree or disagree – the merits are worthy of debate!

Technorati Tags: talent management, recruitment, employee development, management development, executive development, employee retention, bill bradley, william bradley,   bradley

“All you need is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure.

Mark Twain”

Coaching models and practitioners seem to be increasing exponentially these days.  There are even organizations and training institutes devoted specifically to this particular intervention—each with different models, approaches and even ethical/professional guidelines.  It seems “everyone” is now doing “coaching” for a variety of clients and presenting problems.  Many of the larger human resources consulting and outplacement companies now provide and “specialize” in coaching services. 

Countless coaching books and articles are being published on the topic despite little or no systematic research or evaluation behind them.  Many coaches are typically using a variety of assessments with their coaching interventions including personality, style, mutli-rater feedback, and cognitive ability.

A new book called Psychometrics in Coaching published by Kagen Page (2008) offers expert advice on how coaches, consultants and human resources managers can use psychometrics to support and develop individuals in the workplace and outside. With a growing demand for psychometric testing in the coaching profession, coaches and practitioners alike need to understand the psychology underpinning the tests as well as how to select and apply them effectively. Written by an international team of global coaching practitioners, researchers and psychometricians, this book provides an overview of using psychometrics and providing feedback and offers clear explanations of the key models and tools used in coaching today.

Psychometrics in Coaching includes contributions from the following authors:

Beverly Alimo-Metcalfe • Elizabeth Allworth • Richard Barrett • Dave Bartram • Richard Brady • Eugene Burke • Sally Carr • David Caruso • Roy Childs • Peter Clough • Bernard Cooke • Keith Earle • James Fico • Alexander Fradera • Leanne Harris • Robert Hogan • Thomas Hurley • Quentin Jones • Carol Kauffman • Betsy Kendall • Rainer Kurz • Rab MacIver • Helen Marsh • Dick McCann • Almuth McDowall • Kenneth Nowack • Stephen Palmer • Jonathan Passmore • Peter Pritchett • Peter Salovey • Peter Saville • Jordan Silberman • David Sharpley • Jeff Stagg • Doug Strycharczyk

Table of Contents

Using psychometrics and psychological tools in coaching; Using feedback in coaching; Coaching with MBTI; Coaching for teams – Team Management Systems (TMS); Coaching with OPQ; Coaching with Motivation Questionnaire; Coaching with Saville; Consulting WaveTM; Coaching for emotional intelligence (MSCEIT); Identifying potential derailing behaviors – Hogan Development Instrument; Coaching for Transformational leadership – ELQ (Formerly TLQ); Developing resilience through Coaching – MTQ 48; Using archetypes in Coaching; Coaching for Strengths using VIA; Coaching for Stress – Using Stressscan for Lifestyle Coaching; Coaching for Cultural Transform – CTT; Coaching with FIRO Element B; Coaching with LSI; An overview of psychometric questionnaires.

My chapter on Coaching for Stress: Using StressScan presents information on how and when to use a personal stress and health risk appraisal into executive coaching interventions when issues of job burnout and work/family balance exists. The chapter describes the theory, development and validation of this useful coaching tool as well as our online wellness developmental planning and resource system called Talent Accelerator.

StressScan has over fifteen years of published research showing significant associations with a wide range of health and organizational outcomes such as absenteeism, job satisfaction, physical illness, job burnout, depression, anxiety, and psychological distress in working adults. A large international normative data base is used to compare lifestyle practices, health habits and wellness practices in working adults. This is a great tool for executive and life coaches to get acquainted with and consider including in their assessment “tool kit” to help facilitae behavior change to cope effectively with work and life stress and inbalance.

So, for coaches looking at new and older assessments to utilize in their engagements, I’m honored to be part of a wonderful collection of authors such as Rober Hogan (Hogan Assessments) and Peter Salovey (MSCEI emotional intelligence) to name just a few.

As the great jazz performer and composer Eubie Bale said when he reached 100 years of age. “If I’d known I was gonna live this long, I’d have taken better care of myself.”  I wonder how StressScan might have helped Eubie remain even healthier…Be well…

Technorati Tags: lifestyle coaching, wellness, job burnout, assessments, engagement, retention, health promotion, well-being, Envisia Learning, kenneth nowack, ken nowack, nowack

“In school they told me practice makes perfect,
then they told me nobody’s perfect, so I stopped practicing”
                                                     

                                                            Steven Wright

How do we learn to be good practitioners of anything? Good results come from masterful practice. In most professions and professional endeavors, it’s ultimately the execution that counts. The delivery, of the knowledge and skills accumulated, in a specific situation for specific results… a doctor responding in an emergency, a lawyer arguing her case in a courtroom, a therapist choicefully interrupting a patient, a teacher posing a particular question to a student or a consultant facilitating a group in a certain way in order to enable learning or change. Each of these providers of a human service has learned masterful practice.

Such questions have been with us since the beginning of mankind. Each generation has developed their answers. Some used show and tell, some show and show and show… Some developed elaborate apprenticeships to learn crafts or other forms of watching and learning from masters. While most of these required some physical skills, most of the human service professionals today require some combination of mental/social skills to execute good practice.

Some professions even require supervised field work in order to certify that a person is ready to practice (clinical psychology, occupational therapy). In my field of organization development and change consultation, we’ve never been that sophisticated and most people learn by doing, trial and error, some mentoring and learning from masters and a lot of self-development. I have discussed and wrestled with many colleagues, the deeper questions of how to help more people learn practice better and faster, but masterful practice is a lot like quality was in the 80’s…”I know it when I see it”…but I’m not sure how to teach it!

In a short series of entries to this blog, I’d like to outline some thoughts, on the way to a deeper understanding, of how to learn masterful practice. In this piece I’ll highlight an overview and then elaborate further in a few subsequent entries.

We learn masterful practice through:

• Preparing ourselves for the inherent adaptability of working in and across human systems. The myriad of variables in human organizations, relationships and their dynamics creates “almost unique” situations each time a human service professional encounters their work environment. I’m calling this use of the situation.

• Building a ready repertoire of principles and frames that inform meaning and action choices. Our ability to quickly understand the situation…what’s going on…and consider possible actions…what to do… is enhanced by our easy access to theory and concepts in an operational set of frames. Our confidence rises when we can move more quickly from “uncertainty” to “some certainty”. I’m calling this the use of theory and past experience.

• Creating high levels of self-awareness to continually tune our “instruments of professional practice”. Who we are and what we can and cannot do in reality are all important in executing our professional roles. Honest understanding is necessary for authentic behavior. I’m calling this theme use of self.

• Using critical reflection to tap into and organize our repertoire of tacit knowledge. We build up learning through multiple senses that has to be made conscious and organized for future use. This component I’m calling use of reflection.

• Engaging, singularly and collectively, with mentors and others in a social learning exchange. Having dialogue with others deepens understanding, validates our meanings with others and uses language to organize learning so that it can be shared. I’m calling this use of social interaction.

If one can have experiences in which they interpret, make choices and take actions and can consciously take in feedback, use reflection and social interaction to incorporate new learning into their own repertoire of principles and frameworks, then they can progress towards mastery (Raelin, 2007) .

Food for thought…until next time.

References:

Raelin, J. A. (2007). “Toward An Epistemology of Practice”. Academy of Management Learning & Education Journal. Vol 6, No 4, pp. 495-519.

Technorati Tags: Dave Jamieson, masterful practice, self-awareness, adaptability, critical reflection, social interaction, theory-in-action, use of self, envisia learning

The amount of sleep required by the average person is five minutes more.”

Wilson Mizener

People can maximize their brain capacity to learn by getting enough sleep.  But the amount could determine not just how well you live but how long you live.

USING SLEEP TO MAXIMIZE LEARNING

Sleep occurs in 90 minute cycles with the most important phase called rapid eye movement sleep (REM) coming nearly 60 minutes into this cycle.  Current research suggests that without REM sleep, the brain discards what we learned the previous day preceding sleep.  During REM sleep your voluntary muscles are completely inhibited and this is the time your brain dreams and appears to consolidate learning and memories from the day’s activities. 

 It’s as if during REM the brain cleans the closet and rids itself of the “junk” saving only the critically important things you want stored for the future.  Without enough sleep and REM to organize your brain’s circuits, we just don’t learn as fast and as well.

To maximize learning, try these techniques:

1. Right before sleep, mentally rehearse or review the key points you want to retain and learn.
2. As soon as you wake up in the morning, review the main points again to reinforce the neural circuits that were “layed down” during REM sleep.
3. Get adequate sleep (enough sleep for you so that you don’t feel inappropriately sleepy the next day) before and after you are preparing to and have learned something of importance.

OPTIMUM SLEEP TIME

In a new study by epidemiologist Jane Ferrie who studied over 7,700 British  civil servants about their sleep habits over an 8 year period¹.  The study found a U-shaped association in sleep and subsequent all-cause mortality. Short sleepers (less than 6 hours) and long sleepers (nine hours or more) both had 110% increase risk of dying from heart disease.

The link between decreased hours of sleep and higher cardiovascular mortality risk seems to make some sense based on prior research. Short sleep duration is a risk factor for weight gain, insulin resistance, and type 2 diabetes, increased cortisol levels and abnormal growth hormone secretion (associated with hypertension and some cardiovascular diseases).

The link between death and long sleepers is mysterious.  Long sleep is typically a sign of depression which is characterized as an activated stress state although behaviorally people appear lethargic, fatigued and low energy.

Guess I will go and take a short nap….Be well….

Technorati Tags: insomnia, sleep, fatigue, depression, sleep disorders, fatigue countermeasures, REM, NREM, circadian rhythms, stress, health, job burnout, kenneth nowack, ken nowack, nowack

1. Ferrie, J. et. al (2008).  A Prospective Study of Change in Sleep Duration: Associations with Mortality in the Whitehall II Cohort. Sleep, 30 (12), 1659-1666 [↩]

“Happiness is a Swedish sunset — it is there for all, but most of us look the other way and lose it. 

Mark Twain

Happiness and optimism have long been considered a positive asset in dealing with illness or life challenge.  Happy individuals tend to have more responsive immune systems, less hormonal reactions to stress and are more likely to utilize health lifestyle practices that can make a difference in long term health and well-being¹.

We all seem to have a “set point” about just how happy we are and whether we win the lottery, are diagnosed with a chronic illness or find ourselves out of a job we all tend to approach some predetermined level of happiness.  So, just how much is happiness something we can change?

Past studies suggest that while 10% of happiness is due to situational factors like health, relationships, and career, 40% is due to intentional activity and the other 50% is due to genes.

A recent study by Weiss et al. (2008) involved more than 900 identical and non-identical twin pairs who completed a standardized survey designed to identify personality traits (five factor personality model). The researchers were able to identify evidence for genes tied to certain personality traits and genes that predispose people to psychological well-being and happiness.

The researchers found that people who don’t worry excessively and are extraverted and conscientious tend to be happier, according to the study reported in the March issue of Psychological Science².  Those lucky enough to have the right mix of inherited genes appear to have a disposition for happiness when times are tough.

Is there any evidence that we can change our level of happiness?  Indeed, researchers like Marty Seligman at the University of Pennsylvania and other researchers have convincingly shown that 40% of how happy we are daily is directly associated with what we do, how we think and how we view things each day. In fact, in some of our own research with individuals diagnosed with one of the most baffling auto-immune disorders called multiple sclerosis we have been able to demonstrate a significant increase in psychological well-being after participating in a 12-week “Living Well” program³. 

It appears that even when life is totally unpredictable and our body is literally attacking ourselves we can still maximize our happiness level independent of our natural “set point.”  Here are few of the exercises we encourage our MS clients do:

• Gratitude Gift: Write a letter to someone who has meant a great deal to the individual and express how they have influenced his/her life.
• Identify/Deploy Your Passions: Identify things that truly bring pleasure and joy and make some time to seek these things out on a weekly basis.
• Written Emotional Expression: Write down, at least once a week, how you feel about your work, life and current situation expressing all the emotions you are feelings about them.
• Gratitude Reflections: At least once a day (when you get up or when you go to bed) reflect on at least 1-2 things that made the day special for you and reflect on what you are fortunate for.
• Forgiveness Gift: Find someone who has done something to hurt you or you are angry with and write a note to share how you are willing to let go of the negative emotions you have with this person or the situation they were involved in.

We might not be able to change the world or even our own genetic set point, but we do have a great capacity to “stretch” the emotional rubber band in a positive direction each day. It seems like there may actually be some scientific evidence to support Niebuhr’s Serenity Prayer after all….Be well….

Technorati Tags: emotional optimism, stress, coping, immune suppression, pessimism, hardiness, Envisia learning, Envisia, happiness, multiple sclerosis, psychological well-being, kenneth nowack, ken nowack, nowack

1. Nowack, K. M. (1989). Coping style, cognitive hardiness, & health status. Journal of Behavioral Medicine, 12, 145-158 [↩]
2. Weiss, A., Bates, T. & Luciano, M. (2008). Happiness Is a Personal(ity) Thing: The Genetics of Personality and Well-Being in a Representative Sample. Psychological Science, 19, 205-308 [↩]
3. Giesser, B., Coleman, L., Fisher, S., Guttry, M., Herlihy, E., Nonoguch, S., Nowack, D., Roberts, C. & Nowack, K. (2007). Living Well with Multiple Sclerosis: Lessons Learned from a 12-Week Community Based Quality of Life Program. Paper presented at 17th Annual Art & Science of Health Promotion Conference, March, 2007, San Francisco, CA. [↩]

HOT READS FOR THE PRACTIONER

Title: Executive Development Programs

Competency: self-development

Who benefits: senior managers, executive, high potential employees

Consultant Usage: coaching recommendations

What’s it about?  Many of you who read this Blog are familiar with the Executive MBA and equivalent programs offered though major universities and colleges.  They are great places to send your senior managers and high potential employees.  What you might not be so familiar with are the other programs, usually with a specific theme, these institutions offer executives.  Below are just a few examples from some of the best known US universities. 

I will start with two from Southern California, since a high percentage of our Blog readers come from that area: 

UCLA offers:
Advanced Program in Human Resource Management: Visionary Global HR Management that Drives Business Results
African American Leadership Institute
Creativity and Innovation in the Organization
Entertainment and Media Executive Program
Latino Leadership Institute
Leadership Institute for Managers with Disabilities
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Leadership Institute
Managing the Information Resource Program: New Leadership for the 21st Century
Medical Marketing Program
Women’s Leadership Institute

USC offers:
Master of Medical Management
Talent Management Asia/Pacific Business Outlook 
Implementing Strategy & Complex Change
Effective Negotiations and the Power of Persuasion 
Strategy Analysis for Organization and Human Resources

Up in Northern California there is a rich collection of executive courses offered through Stanford University.  Just a few include:
Leading Family Firms
Financial Management Program
Executing Strategic Change
Executive Program for Women Leaders
Executive Program in Leadership: The Effective Use of Power
Executive Program in Strategy and Organization
Leading Change and Organizational Renewal
Strategic Marketing Management
Influence and Negotiation Strategies Program
Corporate Social Responsibility: Strategic Integration and Competitiveness
Strategic Uses of Information Technology

In the Mid-West try Michigan for a variety of programs:
Advanced Finance for the Non-Financial Manager
Advanced Human Resource Executive Program
Becoming An Exceptional Coach
Business Acumen For High-Potential Leaders
Effective Sales Management
Family Business: Generational Challenges and Growth
The Healthcare Management Series
The Big Picture Series

In the East you can hit the money jackpot at Pennsylvania at the Wharton School:
Creating Value Through Financial Management
Finance and Accounting for the Non-Financial Manager
Financial Management for Nurse Managers and Executives
Investment Strategies and Portfolio Management
Marketing Metrics: Linking Marketing to Financial Consequences
Mergers and Acquisitions
Private Wealth Management
RMA/Wharton Advanced Risk Management Program
The CFO: Becoming a Strategic Partner

And finally, you have a gazillion choices at the Harvard Business School and the Sloan School of Management at MIT.

Technorati Tags: executive development, high potential, management development, leadership development, strategy, finance, change management, innovation, negotiation skills, interpersonal communication, bill bradley, william bradley,   bradley

“It is better to deserve honors and not have them than to have them and not deserve them.”  

Mark Twain

Which of the following below are most important to you with respect to your career?

• Getting ahead
• Getting to do new things regulary so you aren’t bored
• Getting to do the things you truly love
• Getting to take risks and become your own boss

These four primary drivers seem to correspond to how some of us are able to follow our career path preferences in life whether it is leading others, managing diverse projects, specializing and practicing our craft or being entrepreneurial.  To be successful in any of these career paths requires careful attention to how you “play the game” typically called “politics” with others.

No doubt, some of us are better at playing this game of “politics” then others.  It appears helpful to craft our social and emotional intelligence skills as evidenced by some recent research by Witt and colleagues.  In 5 of 7 independent samples of employees, those high in dependability/achievement striving (conscientiousness) who were also low in interpersonal awareness and skills received significantly lower overall ratings of job performance compared to those high in agreeableness.¹.

At the end of the day, employers, colleagues and clients classify all of us into four basic groups based on what we accomplish and how we go about accomplishing things.  Each of these groups are viewed in unique ways and create impressions that are in need of being managed if we hope to be successful in our careers.  Here are some proven political strategies and tips to successfully manage your career:

1. High Performing Psychos
2. Low Performing Psychos
3. Lovable High Performers
4. Lovable Low Performers

HIGH PERFORMING PSYCHOS

HOW YOU ARE EXPERIENCED BY OTHERS: It’s great you are able to bring in large sums of money, close deals, save lives, and convince juries that your client isn’t guilty but have you read what’s written about you in the bathroom walls?  Basically, everyone will respect your intellect, track record and high performance but would taser you each time you came within striking distance if they could.

HOW TO MANAGE YOUR IMAGE POLITICALLY:

1. Start by regulating your amygdala, the small “emotional brake” in your brain whenever you are annoyed, impatient, stressed or frustrated with others to avoid shouting, yelling, screaming, bullying or belittling others.

2. Apologize for being a “putz” to others from time to time. Explain your typically arrogant and demeaning style as being developmentally delayed in emotional intelligence and that you are trying to catch up.  This strategy will at least add a small withdrawal from your narcissistic bank account.

3. Tell your boss what a wonderful job they are doing.  This will remind them how important you are to making him/her look good in the organization.

4. Give credit to anyone else you work with.  Those that deserve it will be shocked and those who do not will wonder when you started taking oxytocin.

LOW PERFORMING PSYCHOS

HOW YOU ARE EXPERIENCED BY OTHERS: You are the most likely to be “voted off the island” by those in charge and very little will be written about you in the bathroom wall.

HOW TO MANAGE YOUR IMAGE POLITICALLY:

1. Start a home business.

2. Use social networks to establish as many professional connections as possible as you are likely to need it to find another job.

3. Look for a common enemy within the organization–a “loafer”, someone disgruntled with management or someone recently fired and establish a club to focus on  this “enemy”.

4. Esablish a solid relationship with the human resources department and seek career coaching while explaining how challenging it is being actively engaged working for the type of leader you report to.

5. Try to “out live” your current boss or see # 4 above.

LOVABLE HIGH PERFORMERS

HOW YOU ARE EXPERIENCED BY OTHERS: People actually listen to your ideas and recommendations and most people will follow you to the bathroom.

HOW TO MANAGE YOUR IMAGE POLITICALLY:

1. Work your peers as they hold the key to any future ambitions you might have to move up in the organization.

2. Identify and spend more time with other employees and leaders that are followed into the bathroom.

3. Describe to your boss how a future role, task or assignment would really “engage” you and watch to see how quickly they try to develop a “stretch assignment” for you.

4. Dress for success–watch how those “voted off the island” dress and find out where they shopped so you can make sure not to fall into the same image trap they did.
 

LOVABLE LOW PERFORMERS

HOW YOU ARE EXPERIENCED BY OTHERS: You will be able to “hold court” with senior leaders and other employees who will join you in the bathroom.

HOW TO MANAGE YOUR IMAGE POLITICALLY:

1. Ask for a coach.  Everyone does and you are likely to have your request accepted by senior management.

2. Tell as many stories about home, health and family problems as you can create.  This will engender sympathy and explain your lack of performance, skills or abilities for a long time.

3. Look to join teams and groups that are largely made of of low performing psychos.  You will “rock” in these situations.

4. Avoid bosses who are serious about performance management.  They will make your life miserable but will tell you about every affair they have ever had, their own vulnerabilities and fears and who they secretly want to screw over.

So, no more whining about how unfair it not to be recognized, promoted and valued.  These proven political secrets are guaranteed to extend and promote your career whether you want to move ahead in your organization, start and grow your own business or become a recognized guru within your profession.

Well as they say, “Though no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new ending”….Be well…..

Technorati Tags: emotional politics, politcal style, impression management, conflict resolution, leadership, interpersonal style, self-promotion, envisia, envisia learning, entrepreneurial, kenneth nowack, ken nowack, nowack

1. Witt, L., Burke, L., Barrick, M. & Mount, M. (2002).  The interactive effects of conscientiousness and agreeableness on job performance.  Journal of Applied Psychology, 87, 164-169 [↩]