The pervasiveness of bullying never ceases to amaze me. I recently met with an organization and it was very clear from the outset who was in charge of the meeting. This individual made it very clear that he was going to set and control the agenda. The guests were there simply for his abuse and [...]
I guess we’re just not there yet. A recent study by Dr Timothy Judge, Dr Beth Livingston and Dr Charlice Hurst in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology suggests that leaders who are agreeable and who focus on relationships and collaboration, earn less than their less-agreeable colleagues. Judge, Livingston and Hurst write that “Nice [...]
It would seem that as each new week goes by, organizations are adopting an ever-increasing variety of new policies, guidelines and rules to influence and, in some cases, control employee behaviour. No one would argue against policies that prevent discrimination, enforce respectful behaviour or take a stand on workplace bullying. But taken together, these new [...]
Leaders may well be a dying breed. Changing expectations and technology may herald the end of the role of leader as we know it. I’m talking about formal leaders. The one’s at the top of the bureaucratic hierarchy. The larger-than-life turnaround CEO leader. The charismatic leader who motivates a team to boldly go where they’ve [...]
It’s said that the best defence is a good offence. A consultant colleague and I were debriefing a recent meeting where one participant, challenged for effectively mocking another participant during a small group discussion, went instead on the attack and, instead of addressing their behaviour, began to verbally attack the other participant. In other words, [...]
Is a good leader the one that says “No” all the time? There are some leaders who believe that the first response should always be a “No” in order to make colleagues or staff work harder to get a “Yes”. There is a tragic flaw with this notion: colleagues and staff are (generally) not morons. [...]
The key requirement for any scientific finding is that it can be replicated. If you conduct the same experiment repeatedly and get the same result, then it is considered proven. In a similar vein, social scientists talk about the interplay of theory and practice. Each should inform the other: the better the alignment, the more [...]
Pastor and leadership opinion leader John C. Maxwell says that leadership is influence. I am sure that many of us have come across – or may even work for – leaders who choose to exercise positional power. How effective are they? Sure, they might get some short-term results but is it sustainable over the long [...]
I have always been fascinated by the language of leadership. Leaders. Followers. Servants. Power. Position. Influence. This language captures the many nuances of leadership, the various places one may dwell on the leadership spectrum and the way one approaches the responsibilities of leadership. At one end of the spectrum lies servant leadership - while the [...]
It’s generally accepted that the best decisions are made when all viewpoints have been considered. Avoiding “group think” has been the mantra for over forty years. And sometimes its imperative for someone on the team to be the loyal contrarian, in other words, the Devil’s Advocate. But what happens when the loyal contrarian goes beyond [...]