Leaders need courage to understand themselves, what their personal values are and how they fit with those of their team members and their organisation. It takes courage to determine and accept one’s weaknesses. Self-awareness and deeply held beliefs are essential elements of courage, the very essence of leadership.
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Starting with the publication of Daniel Goleman’s book on this subject in 1995, Emotional Intelligence has become one of the trendy concepts in the business world. When the Harvard Business Review published an article on this topic in 1998, it became one of the most popular articles read and reprinted by the publication in the last 40 years.
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S. Sherman considers that there are three main forces that forge an organisation’s behaviour: rules, mores, and personal integrity. He suggests thinking of this triad as three circles that partially overlap (see Fig. 1). At the centre, the three elements are impossible to differentiate from one another.
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The idea that you can have both character and success as a leader is still considered by many in the business world to be of secondary importance because character cannot, apparently, be quantified into financial results.
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Some 25 years ago, while in introspection regarding my life’s mission and purpose, and following my first years in P&G, I was hit by a thriving motto: “Be Better Than Yesterday” (thank you Henry!). And since then I have been living every day following this commitment and attitude!
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Mindfulness is a word which has been uttered increasingly often, in a lot of diverse and unexpected places. Not too long ago it was something that was whispered and reluctantly received by westerners, due to its association with the practice of meditation.
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As in the previous years, the challenge of finding the right employees is still one of the main priorities for companies, no matter the industry they are active in or the quality of their employees. According to a Gallup survey this situation is growing worse by the year.
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Living through the marvel of the Enescu Festival these past few days, I started to reflect on what positive leadership means: action, willingness to do good and humbleness among others.
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Some quick highlights from our executive education program in July.
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Adam Leonard from Google and one of the speakers of our event answers some questions about flow, the benefits it brings and the challenges people face when trying to get into a flow state.
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Dr. Srini Pillay, Keynote Speaker at our Executive Program answers a couple of questions about anxiety, burnout and some of the main topics he will be talking about during his presentations
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Join us between June 6-8, in Bucharest, for our 3-day executive development program with Dr. Srini Pillay, Harvard Medical School, Adam Leonard, Google and Radu Manolescu, K.M.Trust & Partners.
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The latest news from our company. Our partner team expands in order to implement our growth strategy and Radu Manolescu is a finalist at EY Entrepreneur of the Year 2018.
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December is usually a good month to put thoughts and things in order, to analyze the year that has passed and reflect on the next one and on its challenges. While running on a weekend, I had some revelations on what would a compassion & kindness training would actually imply. So this is one of them. It is related to teambuildings and why I believe teambuildings done as they are done in most cases, is a waste of time and money.
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Andrei Costache and Basav Ray Chaudhuri have joined the company as partners alongside Radu Manolescu, Founder & Managing Partner. Heike Kuenzel, Co-Founder remains Non-Executive Partner.
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Feedback – a sensitive subject at both ends. A difficult thing to do but among the most efficient in developing a culture of respect and trust.
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On May 23rd we hosted a one-day executive program in Bucharest, the first in a series of events with top business schools executives centered on our mission: helping companies live their values.
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Two years ago, I wrote an article about “the end of Executive Search as we know it” mentioning the fact that I considered that even the name of the industry was inappropriate while the value for the customer has actually never been just “search” but way more than that.
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In the first part of our article we talked about how you can generate a development program that is tailored to the strengths and areas for leadership growth with the help of a thorough assessment of an individual. Let’s now look at how to develop this plan further.
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In our January newsletter we talked about the importance of a “Customized Retention” methodology. This month we will discuss about another key adaptability feature of the employers of choice or of those soon to become one - “Customized Individual Development”.
Read moreIf you force a grasshopper into a jar and fasten the lid, the grasshopper eventually shortens its jump after hitting the lid enough times.
Read moreRobbie Baxter helps companies reinvent their businesses by shifting relationships with customers from transactional to long-term membership. Leaders in this approach, like Amazon and Netflix, are successful and resilient because they clearly identify a problem customers want solved and promise to continuously solve it over the long haul. Though the exact solution may change, the promise stays the same.
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I was fortunate to get in touch with the Blue Ocean strategy concept in 2006 when at INSEAD and was so excited by it as I immersed myself for several weeks into thinking about how to apply it for ‘internal customer/employee’ engagement, with benefits for both my firm and my clients.
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Last year in October during a valuation executive programme with prof. Kevin Kaiser from INSEAD we had the chance to discuss about leadership teams behaviors and long term value creation, my “obsession” for many years.
Read moreWhen we hear about unethical executives whose careers and companies have gone down in flames, it’s sadly unsurprising. Hubris and greed have a way of catching up with people, who then lose the power and wealth they’ve so fervently pursued. But is the opposite also true? Do highly principled leaders and their organizations perform especially well?
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VUCA - short for volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity - seems to be the word du jour, thrown around whenever we don’t know what to make of a situation. Overhyped?
Read moreFollowing our June interview with Dan Bulucea - Google’s New Business Development for APAC - on leadership, naturally, our discussion returned to what makes great leadership. What are those specific situations and contexts that help build better leaders? It turns out, unsurprisingly, that it has to do with education.
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This the first interview of a series of talks with great leaders, with strong moral values, on life, leadership, education and technology. We are very happy to interview Dan who has built the first Google office in Romania.
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This is by no means an exhaustive view or even a scientifically ranked TED Talks leadership top. It’s a collection of insightful talks, drawing parallels from various fields, that have the surprise element able to shift your thinking.
Read moreIf you have room in your head for only one nugget of leadership wisdom, make it this one: the most powerfully motivating condition people experience at work is making progress at something that is personally meaningful. If your job involves leading others, the implications are clear: the most important thing you can do each day is to help your team members experience progress at meaningful work.
Read moreResearch shows that in leaderless groups, leaders emerge by quickly synchronizing their brain waves with followers through high quality conversations. Simply put, synchrony is a neural process where the frequency and scale of brain waves of people become in sync.
Read moreWhat motivates us to work? Contrary to conventional wisdom, it isn't just money. But it's not exactly joy either. It seems that most of us thrive by making constant progress and feeling a sense of purpose. Behavioral economist Dan Ariely presents two eye-opening experiments that reveal our unexpected and nuanced attitudes toward meaning in our work.
Read moreI can't seem to fully get my head around the role of a CEO. Basically the CEO sets the strategy, vision and makes sure everyone is on the same page. May have meetings with other partners etc. Brainstorm ideas with other execs. Talk to investors. Recruiting / Editing the team.
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