Eric Jacobson On Management And Leadership

  Pictured above are two books to add to your list for reading this month. Let The Story Do The Work  explains that at the heart of leadership lies persuasion. And at the heart of persuasion likes storytelling. In her book, author  Esther K. Choy  teaches you how to: Dispel any fears that you can't tell great stories. Connect with an audience by determining their point of view and speaking to their concerns. Tell stories with numbers. Turn complex material into engaging narratives. Enhance stories with simple visual elements. Tell your personal story in a way that builds credibility and forges relationships. Sense & Respond  teaches you how to use a structured feedback loop to: Create two-way conversations. Focus on the outcomes. Embrace continuous processes. Create collaboration. Create a learning culture. It's a management playbook that enables organizations to engage in two-way communications with the market and to drive value from that conversation -- us...

Heed this advice from Julian Birkinshaw , author of the book,  Becoming A Better Boss , on how to be a better leader. Strive to  answer “Yes” to these three questions : Do you invest your time in things that help others to succeed? Do you invest in projects that will help the company in the long run, even if you won’t be around to get any credit for their success? Are you prepared to try out a new way of working that may fail, even if you risk looking foolish?

You can't lead if your employees, team or followers don't trust you. Building trust takes energy, effort and constant attention to how you act. To help build trust, follow these 16 tips , recommended by author Susan H. Shearouse: Be honest Keep commitments and keep your word Avoid surprises Be consistent with your mood Be your best Demonstrate respect Listen Communicate Speak with a positive intent Admit mistakes Be willing to hear feedback Maintain confidences Get to know others Practice empathy Seek input from others Say "thank you"

One of my favorite lessons from the book, The DNA of Leadership , is the importance of being a developing leader. Developing leaders: Create the next generation of leaders Are great listeners Grow talent by challenging others to take on more than what they think they can do Are open, honest and direct Model the behavior they want to mentor for others If you haven't read Judith E. Glaser's book, The DNA of Leadership , give it a read. You won't be disappointed.

The fact is, if you are a budding entrepreneur, future business owner, or relatively “green” business owner, you need to read, The Facts of Business Life , by Bill McBean. Because, in his new book, McBean, a successful businessman with four decades of ownership experience, explains the essential Seven Facts of Business Life and the Five Levels of Business Success . Being a successful business owner means more than knowing one’s industry and understanding the basic concepts of leadership, management, or motivation, according to McBean. It means being able to master many areas of business, and knowing how each of these areas relates to and build on each other. It also means understanding how those areas change as a business goes through its inevitable life cycle , and how the owner must be prepared to change with them . Fortunately, The Facts of Business Life provides readers with the means of achieving the kind of long-term understanding that is the key to true and lasting...

If you haven't read, Good To Great by Jim Collins, do so. Near the top of virtually every list you'll see of the best leadership books, you'll find Good To Great . The book, five years in the making, and published in 2001, addresses the all-important question of: Can a good company become a great company, and if so, how? Some of the lessons from the book are : "Leadership is equally about creating a climate where the truth is heard and the brutal facts confronted." "Leading from good to great does not mean coming up with the answers and then motivating everyone to follow your messianic vision. It means having the humility to grasp the fact that you do not yet understand enough to have the answers and then to ask the questions that will lead to the best possible insights." "Good-to-great companies use technology as an accelerator of momentum, not a creator of it." "Engage in dialogue and debate." Good-to-great companies...

Eric Harvey and Al Lucia wrote a booklet called, 144 Ways To Walk The Talk . They provide the following great advice about giving feedback: 1. Make it timely -- give your feedback as soon as possible to the performance. 2. Make it individualized -- tailor your feedback to the feedback receiver. 3. Make it productive -- focus your feedback on the performance and not the performer . 4. Make is specific -- pinpoint for the receiver observable actions and behaviors.

Imagine navigating a tiny boat through a sudden, violent storm at sea -- with winds roaring at nearly 100 mph and waves soaring to 80 feet -- to not only survive, but triumph over formidable competitors in one of the world's toughest ocean races . It's a feat claimed by the crew of the AFR Midnight Rambler , overall winner of the 1998 Sydney to Hobart -- the most treacherous and tragic race to date in the six-decade history of Australia's iconic competition. As Dennis Perkins , an expert on thriving under daunting conditions, shows in his new book, Into The Storm , it's also a feat rich in lessons for anyone tasked with maintaining smooth, effective teamwork -- and delivering winning results -- in the unpredictable, turbulent waters of today's business environment. Inspired by the Ramblers -- the Midnight Rambler 's team of one determined skipper and six dedicated amateur sailors -- here are five crucial strategies, with proven tactics , for Teamwork ...

Did Abraham Lincoln really say, " Get out of the office and circulate among the troops ," back in 1861? He did. But, not in those exact words. What he said, according to author Donald T. Phillips , is this: "His cardinal mistake is that he isolates himself, and allows nobody to see him; and by which he does not know what is going on in the very matter he is dealing with." Lincoln made this statement when describing his reason for relieving Gen. John C. Fremont from his command in Missouri (September 9, 1861). Phillips writes that for Lincoln, casual contact with his subordinates was as important as formal gatherings, if not more so. Phillips, includes many more leadership lessons from Lincoln in his fascinating book, Lincoln on Leadership , where Phillips presents 15 of Lincoln's leadership statements in today's vernacular . Another leadership lesson from Lincoln is to: Influence people through conversation and storytelling Phillips exp...

Can you step back to lead forward ? That is the key question for you to answer as you start to read Kevin Cashman's new book, The Pause Principle . Because, Cashman firmly believes that as a leader, you need to pause to lead forward . " What sleep is to the mind and body, pause is to leadership and innovation ," explains Cashman. He goes on to say: Pause transforms management into leadership and the status quo into new realities. Pause, the natural capability to step back  in order to move forward with greater clarity, momentum, and impact, holds the creative power to reframe and refresh how we see ourselves and our relationships, our challenges, our capacities, our organizations and missions within a larger context. In his book , Cashman teaches you the value of using pause points to : Build self-awareness and clarity of purpose Explore new ideas Risk experimentation Question, listen, reflect and synthesize Challenge the status quo, within and aro...

If you lead a nonprofit organization, the one hour it will take you to read Peter F. Drucker's book called " The Five Most Important Questions You Will Ever Ask About Your Organization " will be well worth it. This book may fundamentally change the way you work and lead your organization. Perhaps one of most challenging of the five questions is the one where Drucker asks the reader is: " Do we produce results that are sufficiently outstanding for us to justify putting our resources in this area ? Because, Drucker argues that need alone does not justify continuing. Nor does tradition, if your results are not sufficiently outstanding. If you volunteer for a nonprofit or are seeking employment at a nonprofit, this book is also an insightful and inspiring read.

In their new book, How Excellent Companies Avoid Dumb Things , co-authors Neil Smith and Patricia O'Connell list 20 excuses commonly heard in companies for reasons why new business transformation ideas are not considered. The authors recommend eliminating these 20 excuses from your vocabulary : Our company is well run; there are no opportunities. We're inefficient, but my department is not the problem. The issue is support function and allocations, not my costs. Our problem is revenues, not how we do things. We have tried that before. We are already doing that. My boss/theCEO/legal will never agree to that. That won't save money or increase revenues. That would cost too much to implement. No one in the industry is doing that. We will lose customers if we do that. Anything that takes time away from serving my customers will hurt us. But we are unique. No one really understands what we do. I don't have time to think about that. We don't have the...

Spend some quality time with the new book, Rapid Realignment , and you'll learn how to ensure that your strategy, customers, processes and people work seamlessly together in the service of customers and that those four elements continually realign in the face of constant change. The authors, Dr. George H. Labovitz and Victor Rosansky , share throughout the book a series of case studies from Federal Express , Quest Diagnostics , Navy Hospital at Camp Pendleton , Farmington Savings Bank and a host of other organizations who have stepped up to the challenge of rapid realignment. Key takeaways from the book include : Vertical alignment describes a condition in which every employee can articulate the enterprise's strategy and explain how his or her daily work activities support that strategy. Each organization must have a Main Thing .  That Main Thing as a whole must be a common and unifying concept to which every unit can contribute.  Each department and t...

Next month, Overland Park, KS-based author and consultant Leigh Branham will publish an updated version (Second Edition) of his best-seller, The 7 Hidden Reasons Employees Leave . In the meantime, Branham explains that the most effective things a workplace leader can do to keep employee turnover low don't cost money; they just cost time and effort. Branham says a leader should : 1.   Make the commitment to create a great place to work. 2.   Inspire employee confidence in decisions and clear business direction. 3.   Work to build trust based on honesty and integrity. 4.   Practice open, two-way communication, especially in times of uncertainty. 5.   Look out for the organization before you look out for yourself. 6.   Believe employees should be developed and retained; not burned out and discarded. These six leadership skills topped the list of what leaders routinely do in companies that have won "Best-Place-to-Work" competitions in 45 U.S. ci...

Early on in Eli Broad's new book, The Art of Being Unresaonable , he reminds us of the power of a child's instinctive asking, " Why not? "  Unfortunately, most adults lose that habit and Broad goes on to explain that it was his continuing to ask "Why not?" throughout his career that brought him success. " The questions you're willing to ask when others think they have all the answers are doors to discovery ," says Broad. Other words of wisdom from the book, and my favorite takeaways, include : Most successful businesses have to begin by bucking conventional wisdom .  Invention and innovation don't happen without it. Do your homework no matter how much time it takes. Big ideas don't happen in a moment . You can't do it all yourself, so ask questions and delegate . The trick to delegating is to make sure your employees share your priorities . Find the best people to whom you can delegate, and know their strengths and ...

Some of my favorite parts of Douglas Conant's and Mette Norgaards' 2011 book, TouchPoints , are these lessons for leaders: You need to have dual vision. You need to be able to address the most pressing need and do it in a way that makes your employees more capable and ready to take on the next issue. No leader can succeed by being only tough-minded or only tender-hearted. The perfect balance is to be both tough-minded on the issue and tender-hearted with people. Leading with heart doesn't mean you always decide in favor of the individual. It just means that when you need to make a tough-minded decision, you are acutely aware of how it will affect the people involved. The people who are the most committed to mastering their craft are often the most humble. That is because, instead of comparing themselves to others, they are moved by an inner vision of what they might achieve. Ask often, "How can I help?" Doing so at the start of an interaction opens u...

In Leigh Branham's terrific book, The 7 Hidden Reasons Employees L eave, he quotes these sound insights from Dee Hock, the founder and former CEO of Visa: Hire and promote first on the basis of integrity; second, motivation; third, capacity; fourth, understanding; fifth, knowledge; and last and least, experience. Hock explains that: Without integrity, motivation is dangerous Without motivation, capacity is impotent Without capacity, understanding is limited Without understanding, knowledge is meaningless Without knowledge, experience is blind She concludes that experience is easy to provide and quickly put to use by people with all the other qualities.

Some words of wisdom from author Thomas Teal : Integrity in management means : being responsible communicating clearly keeping promises being an honest broker avoiding hidden agendas knowing oneself Great managers serve two masters; one organizational, one moral. Managing is not a series of mechanical tasks but a set of human interactions. One reason for the scarcity of managerial greatness is that in educating and training managers, we focus too much on technical proficiency and too little on character. You can find more advice and expertise from Teal in his book, First Person: Tales of Management Courage and Tenacity (Harvard Business School Press, 1996)

Open Leadership author Charlene Li reminds leaders to periodically ask themselves these " open leadership skills assessment " questions: Do I seek out and listen to different points of view? Do I make myself available to people at all levels of the organization? Do I actively manage how I am authentic? Do I encourage people to share information? Do I publicly admit when I am wrong? Do I update people regularly? Do I take the time to explain how decisions are being made? Thanks for these great questions, Charlene!

Can't decide what business book to read next? I recommend David Grossman's, You Can't Not Communicate, 2 ." Why, because this updated installment of his previous best-seller with virtually the same title is an easy read and one you can finish in an afternoon. And, even more important, David gives you lots of practical, real-world, wise, straight-forward advice on how to communicate more effectively as a leader -- all tips and techniques you can start to implement the day after you finish reading it. Particularly helpful are the: Top 10 must-do strategies for persuasive presentations Five easy strategies for managing the company rumor mill Twelve must-have skills for effective two-way communication David also explains: the importance of having a "messagemap" ways leaders at all levels can build trust by aligning actions with words the four things you need to know about communicating with Millennials Some of the more interesting facts in the book...