What do US contemporary business writer, Patrick Lencioni, XXIst century most famous neuroscientist, Portuguese Professor Antonio Damasio, Ancient Greece philosopher Aristotle, and Chilean born psychologist and mathematician Marcial Losada have in common, apart from the fact that we often quote them in our work? Lencioni came up with the observation (see article on our blog) that teams that were focused…
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engagement
Appreciative Inquiry and the power of the positive (by Marvin Faure)
May 11, 2012 0 commentsIn my previous post, Social Constructionism and the Power of Engagement, I wrote about how we can create a healthy, upbeat organizational climate by favouring dialogue over monologue. I also built on Michael’s post on the use of language and suggested that if you want your organization to be more positive and optimistic, you should use positive and optimistic language.…
Social Constructionism and the power of engagement (by Marvin Faure)
May 5, 2012 0 commentsI’d like to take the opportunity to build on Michael’s post “The US 7th Cavalry and the Quantum Zeno Effect” and introduce explicitly an idea that has been hinted at a few times here without ever being directly addressed. Michael’s main point was that, very often, top management unwittingly undermines employee engagement by an inappropriate choice of words, by being…
“Tell me: How will Pathos improve our R.O.I.?”
April 20, 2012 0 commentsThis is the friendly “punch in the stomach” I received one day from one of my favorite C.E.O. and client. I can not think of a leader who wouldn’t wonder, each day, how she could improve the level of motivation and engagement of her troops. We all want it. We all know that motivation is increasingly critical in a fast…
Why “Somatic Markers” are critical to a business leader?
February 4, 2012 5 commentsMichael Newman and I have mentioned Professor Antonio Damasio several times on this blog. Besides being one of the leading neuroscientists of the XXIst century, his work is compelling for leaders of today. One aspect, in particular, touches the topic of decision making. More concretely, to us business leaders, how do we “move our people from intention to action”? In…
Disrupt or be Disrupted: the Principles of War by Michael Newman
December 1, 2011 0 commentsIn 1988, as a newly commissioned Officer in the British Army, the world of disruption was my context. As a commander of 28 Royal Engineer soldiers (the famous ‘Sappers’) I was a very small, but I like to think important, part of the NATO master plan to defend Western Europe from the Warsaw Pact. Back in the 1980s, Hundreds of…
"Generation gap in leadership"
June 26, 2011 2 commentsLast week’s post has been our most successful to date. Heartfelt thanks to all of you who read and shared it with so many new others! The post created a lot of direct exchanges, as, I guess, most of you hesitate in posting public comments and sharing confidential information. In your private comments, one theme seemed to come back consistently…
"Broadcasting is not Engaging"
March 26, 2011 3 commentsYear after year, for the past ten years, my partners and I have run an average of fifteen “Conventions” per year for our clients. Such large gatherings of leaders are usually the moment in the year where the Board seeks to communicate on “The State of the Union” and hopes to unleash further the passion and energy of their leaders.…
"In Praise of the Handshake"
March 20, 2011 2 commentsWhen asked by a new client to describe the Enablers Network, I usually explain that we are no conventional, pyramidal organization but far more an organic and connected community. In our team, seniority is not superiority; we have no contractual agreement between us although we are highly engaged and dead-serious about our values (which we prefer to call “a permanently…
“People don’t buy what you do! They buy why you do it!!!”
February 20, 2011 10 commentsSimon Sinek[1] proposes a simple and elegant model: the golden circle. When talking (as everybody today) about Apple, he challenges its competitors: “Apple is just another computer company… They have the same access to the same talents, the same agencies, the same consultants, the same media, then why is it that they seem to have something different?”. For him most…