Heartfelt thank you, once again, to Doug Dean a Strategic Marketing Guru (whom I met when we both did our MBA in IMD, now based in Hong-Kong), for sharing another inspiring speech he watched on TED.com. It shows Chip Conley, owner of a Motel chain interestingly called “Joie De Vivre” (J.D.V.) Chip is an obvious enthusiastic and, in the strictly…
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Open Network/Open Source Leadership
“From market driven to market driving: challenging conventional customer centricity”
Sunday November 21st, 2010 1 commentJean-Claude Larreche is the holder of the “Alfred H. Heineken Chair in Marketing” at Insead. His last book is called “The Momentum Effect”[1] and has met quite a wide success since its May 2008 launch. One particular tool has grabbed my interest and, with Jean-Claude’s consent, I have started to experiment with it quite widely: the Discovery path matrix (please…
“How the janitor saved our company”
Sunday November 14th, 2010 0 commentsSRC Holdings[1] was founded in 1983, when 13 employees of International Harvester (at the time a leading manufacturer of agricultural machinery) bought that part of the company that was into the business of maintenance and repair of diesel engines. That subsidiary had failed to perform for years so it had been decided to divest it. The new management team of…
“Concrete steps to lead in a complex environment Part. II”
Sunday October 17th, 2010 2 commentsNick van Heck and Berend Jan Hilberts, our partners from Executive Learning Partnership[1], recently shared with me an excellent HBR article[2] from David Snowden founder of “The Cognitive Edge”[3]. Snowden suggests an interesting frame for preparing ourselves to lead in the new emerging Open Economy, whilst keeping on track in today’s uncomfortable aftermath of the financial crisis. The model particularly…
"Concrete steps to lead in a complex environment"
Sunday October 10th, 2010 0 commentsIn the (not so) old days, problems were solved through a four to five steps approach: Problem definition and scope Root cause analysis Selection of solution Implementation Monitoring and feedback It is clear, one-dimensional, sequential, linear and reassuring: For each problem there should be one solution. By now, we all have realized that globalization, “technologization”, acceleration and growing complexity made…
"The unsual way that Fundação Dom Cabral is organized"
Sunday July 25th, 2010 4 commentsAs you probably all know by now, the Fundação Dom Cabral is one of the world’s leading centre for executive and organizations development. In 2010, it was ranked 6th by the Financial Times (I am no great fan of such rankings; it is there for the record and those who need it;) Since July 2009, I regularly join the Foundation…
Leadership is the ball: leadership is a collective process not an individual attribute
Sunday May 2nd, 2010 3 commentsSynchronicity may be seen as a pure coincidence, or an esoteric “was written in the stars” sort of blessed encounter or the fact that we create our own flourishing environment by continuously sharing, listening and being curious. Such a fortunate moment happened this Saturday when, on the one hand, I was proud to be invited in Macolin (Switzerland national elite…
“How the Cirque du Soleil deals with Complexity”
Sunday April 25th, 2010 0 commentsA moment of exceptional beauty and aesthetics to start this week: please take a look at this short clip of highlights of “Alegria”, one of the Cirque du Soleil’s most successful shows… Observe the complexity of movements, the absolute necessity of perfect timing and positioning of the different actors… Look at those subtle and invisible gestures of care and support…
"The Purposeful Leader"
Sunday April 18th, 2010 2 commentsWhen confronted to complexity, humans tend to respond by increasing control, micro-management and closing. The recent crisis provided a strong although well intentioned illustration of this: Some CEO’s were requesting daily cash flow statements of their people as a way to feel “in control”, showing concern and seeking to grow a necessary sense of urgency in the ranks. However, thinking…
“To be in command and out of control”
Sunday April 11th, 2010 2 commentsMy partners and I are about to embark on a journey, with several organizations in the world, which have decided to seriously engage their people in their strategy implementation and create (more) “Intelligent Organizations”. I was looking for leaders having taken their people through similar paths. Fabio Barbosa in Banco Santander Brasil, Jorgen Knudstrop and his team in Lego or…