Moving leadership to orchestration
Drucker had the foresight to define the difference between what is management and what is leadership. He said management was ensuring that the staff were doing something correctly, whereas, leadership was seeing that staff were doing the right thing.
Drucker compared the role as a leader to the role of a conductor in […]
Outside-In Perspective
Throughout his writings Drucker emphasised the importance of the outside/in perspective. Recently, a television reality programme has replicated this concept with the “CEO undercover” series. Drucker pointed out the importance of the CEO being the outside-in champion. One great CEO I have met takes the executive team for a one week exercise per year […]
Without doubt one of the clearest thinkers on management and leadership was Peter Drucker. The unfortunate situation is that there are many leaders who know little or nothing of the great man’s work. I see Drucker as the Leonardo de Vinci of management and leadership. He will be honoured for centuries to come. It is […]
Great leaders have a thirst for knowledge and constantly are looking at ways to move their learning on, constantly reinventing themselves. Management professor Nancy P. Rothbard, from University of Pennsylvania agrees that Welch’s ability to reinvent himself and the company was pivotal to his success. “He pursued not just one major initiative while he headed […]
Recognition is more important than most of us understand. I believe it is one of the most important driving forces in performance. Yet so many companies, managers, and leaders believe it has to be given sparingly, as if too much recognition would water it down. There appears to be a tax on recognition. McDonalds and […]
President Roosevelt mantra was “if you have consensus on a major decision don’t make the decision because the homework has not been done.” Drucker said that that there should be conflicting views and these should be evaluated before a decision was made.
Jack Welch would throw everything he could to challenge any new idea making sure […]
Great leaders are able to manage their emotions and avoid emotional outbursts that could damage relationships with their staff. Shackleton was the master of conflict resolution: He avoided emotional outbursts. He would gently point out the reason why it should be done a different way. He would only tell staff off in private and when […]
Shackleton understanding of psychology played a big part in saving the lives of his team. He appreciated the importance of understanding the team’s physical as well as psychological needs.
On the hike over the mountains of South Georgia, his two team members wanted to rest. Shackleton knew that this would be the end of them and […]
Jack Welch puts celebrations in his top eight traits of a leader, that is how important it is. As he says “Work is too much a part of life not to recognize moments of achievement. Grab as many celebrations as you can. Make a big deal out of them.” Welch was all about making business […]
Peter Drucker went on to say that it was a leaders job to ensure that there was an able pool of leaders, at least three, to choose from to take over your position when you move on. In other words it is a sign of failure when an organisation needs to seek a leader from […]