The Leading Blog






03.14.24

Leading Thoughts for March 14, 2024

Leading Thoughts

IDEAS shared have the power to expand perspectives, change thinking, and move lives. Here are two ideas for the curious mind to engage with:

I.

Jason Jennings on having a clear destination:

“Not having a clear destination means never knowing the steps you need to take to get to where you want to go, never knowing if you’ve arrived or if you’ve achieved what you set out to accomplish. But if you have your destination in sight, those things that need to be reinvented will become obvious.”

Source: The Reinventors: How Extraordinary Companies Pursue Radical Continuous Change

II.

Alan Weiss on how powerlessness corrupts:

“Psychologically, people cannot comfortably live with the perception that they are powerless. So they make it up. That’s right, they create artificial power. And there is a name for that: bureaucracy. Bureaucracy is the triumph of means over ends.”

Source: Thrive! Stop Wishing Your Life Away

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Leading Thoughts Whats New in Leadership Books

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03.12.24

9 Tips for Navigating the Inevitable Unexpected

 Navigating the Inevitable Unexpected

ALL COMPANIES begin with a vision. Individuals or partners develop a plan and iterate as new information arises. It takes an enormous amount of their time, forces them to commit, and requires some degree of funding. If sophisticated investors are involved — as often happens in biotech — the plan is undoubtedly subjected to intensive due diligence. Models are developed, scrutinized, and refined. Given that the global biotechnology market was valued at USD 1.55 trillion in 2023 and is projected to grow nearly 14% a year in the next 6 years, that's understandable: there's a lot at stake.

All of this hard work usually involves smart people with significant experience. But that's not always enough: some 90 percent of startups do not survive past five years, and 63% of tech startups are doomed to failure. Some fail for a host of strategic or operational shortcomings addressed in any decent business school course. Others fail because no matter their degree of planning or vetting, they are unable to adequately address unexpected events in those moments of truth when they occur.

I call these inevitable unexpected events — inevitable because they occur with relatively high frequency. They're things you never saw coming and you never planned for. No one can predict what they may be or when they may occur, but it's nearly guaranteed that you will encounter them. Over the course of five years, these events will occur frequently enough that your ability to address them will likely determine whether your business succeeds or fails. Any wrong move can take you down.

Barriers and Opportunities

These unexpected events may appear in the form of barriers to overcome, or as opportunities worthy of addressing, but you need to decide whether to do so. They are not always business issues, although they are all issues that will affect your business.

I've learned that from my nearly forty years of working with scientists and clinicians to transform inventions into successful commercial products. Whether a challenge or a potential win, the common ground they share is that they will happen, they will have an impact, and how you respond will be critical to the business.

No Such Thing as a Perfect Plan

Can we avoid these events? Probably not: we'll encounter them no matter the breadth of our collective intelligence and experience, despite the models we develop, and regardless of the plans we base on those models. They're a humbling reminder of the incredible complexity and beauty of biology, life, and the universe we inhabit. The number of factors one would need to have considered, accounted for, and correctly predicted to have a “perfect plan” is comparable to the number of stars in the sky.

This doesn’t mean we’re doomed to failure. The likelihood of making beneficial decisions when facing the unexpected increases if we routinely practice certain values, skills, and approaches. These unexpected events should not be feared but rather appreciated as opportunities to flourish and to distinguish yourself in the eyes of customers, competitors, partners, and investors.

Here's a rundown of nine practices that have been particularly helpful to me when it comes to navigating life’s inevitable unexpected events:

  1. Develop strong foundations, with deep knowledge and experience in your domain.
  2. Develop living plans that are regularly updated.
  3. Respect the unknown and expect unanticipated events.
  4. Assemble diverse teams with complementary skills and a shared vision.
  5. Establish a culture where people with aligned goals can thrive and have fun.
  6. Act in a calm, focused, efficient, and timely manner.
  7. Be persistent yet adaptable: open-minded, flexible, and resilient.
  8. Always be building and leveraging resources and relationships.
  9. Always be thinking about options.

As with any other skill set, awareness can be generated. But there will still be a spectrum of performance across individuals regarding how well they are able to apply these values and approaches to their own businesses. Certain values and approaches may not resonate as well for some as for others.

My advice is not to simply store a list in your memory and pull certain items out when needed. It’s more about developing a practice, a way of conducting business (or your life). If you follow these approaches all the time, you will be as prepared as you possibly can be when it comes to confronting life’s inevitable unexpected events.

The opportunities for bioentrepreneurs can be more exciting and impactful than ever in today's accelerated market. No question the biotech industry is experiencing significant growth. Navigating the unexpected has become a critical skill — and beyond biotech, these 9 tips will certainly help anyone who's pursuing a creative endeavor in any field. Build a strong foundation, cultivate a healthy respect for the unforeseen, and follow a business practice that includes proper preparation and execution, and you not only have the potential to achieve great things, you'll have a lot of fun doing so.

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Leading Forum
Stan Rose, PhD is an MIT biologist turned life sciences executive and entrepreneur who has created and led multiple businesses in the emerging fields of DNA analysis and genomics. After several successful ventures, he was suddenly diagnosed with a life-threatening genetic disease. Some of the same technologies he had helped bring to the clinic became critical to his own survival. Following a kidney transplant, he's continued to contribute to science and medicine. His firm, Rose Ventures, Inc., works with early-stage companies developing innovative, high-impact life science products and services. His new book is Can't Tame a Mongoose: Memoir of a Genomics Entrepreneur. Learn more at roseventures.net.

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Upside of Uncertainty Leading Through Uncertainty

Posted by Michael McKinney at 06:52 PM
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03.08.24

What Is Different About Ethical Leadership?

Ethical Leadership

ADHERING to an ethical code during challenging times is a standout trait in many historical and present-day leaders that we’ve come to admire. Certain principals cut across the lives of such leaders as they transcend traditional leadership roles and prioritize the well-being of the communities, economies, and global society they serve.

Ethical leaders embody a respect for the sanctity of each individual, regardless of culture, country, race, or religion. They have a strong orientation toward justice and fairness. While circumstances vary, their belief that everyone is entitled to the same basic dignity and rights remains a driving force for action. They have an underlying moral courage even when going against great odds. People follow them precisely because of the moral heroism they convey.

Consider, for example, these leaders:

Nelson Mandela – Beginning in his 20s, Mandela led a peaceful, nonviolent movement for civil rights in South Africa, for which he was imprisoned for 27 years. He was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize in 1993 for his efforts to dismantle apartheid and later became the country’s first Black president.

Hamdi Ulukaya – Ulukaya immigrated to the U.S. from Turkey to escape the mistreatment of Kurds. As founder and CEO of Chobani, a top-selling yogurt company, he “operates on a simple fundamental principle, that we do well by doing good.” He has given his employees 10 percent of the company and has donated millions to fight food insecurity, while ensuring 30 percent of his workforce are immigrants and refugees.

Whether leading a country, a movement, or a corporation, principled leaders act from a clear ethical foundation. They engage with issues that may not be found in a job description or easily measured by traditional metrics. At the same time, they ensure that they’re effective in delivering results.

However, engaging in ethical issues is a changing realm for leaders. As witnessed by the pandemic, the world can change overnight, bringing new challenges, new dilemmas, and new choices that must be made. Keeping people safe in the broadest sense of the word becomes a foremost concern.

Principled leaders must operate in a transparent and consistent manner in accordance with the values and beliefs of the organization. They need to provide sound reasons if they make choices that seemingly contradict organizational values.

Clearly, ethical leadership requires a degree of introspection. An aspiring ethical leader needs to identify guiding principles and determine where to develop or reinforce existing skills — including compassion and love, trusting oneself and others, interest in others/inquisitive mindset, perseverance, and non-conforming, among other important traits.

In attempting to evolve into a leader that can promote an ethics-based culture in your organization, ponder these questions:

1. What consequences may your intended decisions have for those around you?

2. In what way do the decisions you make — or the ones you avoid making — trigger consequences on a broader level (interdepartmental or across the organization)?

3. What ideas do you hold about society at a deeper level? In what way does this play into your behavior as a leader?

4. What societal, environmental, and ethical impacts does your organization have on a larger scale?

5. To what extent is your leadership team attuned to their ethical responsibilities? Is there room for improvement?

6. Assuming you can name a variety of personal values you embrace and cherish, how conscious are you of these when leading?

7. In what way do you contribute or want to contribute to the greater good? Where do you make exceptions? Why?

8. In what way do you contribute to the peaceful coexistence of individuals, teams, departments, and groups of people beyond your organization? What are you satisfied with? Where do you identify room for improvement?

Overall, ethical leaders serve something greater than themselves. They have generative will — an urge and desire to create, leave a mark, improve, and serve society and establish community. What matters is the objective of a better world, a better team, a better culture, a better future.

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Leading Forum
Claas Florian Engelke provides consulting services in the fields of leadership advisory, assessment, and development. He invites clients to question themselves in order to foster incessant learning and aspire to be the best versions of themselves. Richard B. Swegan is an author and the founder and principal consultant of ARCH Performance. With a background in human resources and safety, Rick provides consulting to a variety of organizations on the developmental needs of potential leaders. Their new book, The Practice of Ethical Leadership – Insights from Psychology and Business in Building an Ethical Bottom Line (Routledge, March 28, 2024), offers effective suggestions for developing ethical leaders. Learn more at ethicalbottomline.com.

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4 Reasons We Struggle with Ethics Ethics Reinforcing Fixed Points

Posted by Michael McKinney at 09:00 AM
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03.07.24

Leading Thoughts for March 7, 2024

Leading Thoughts

IDEAS shared have the power to expand perspectives, change thinking, and move lives. Here are two ideas for the curious mind to engage with:

I.

Umberto Eco on leading by example:

“I believe that what we become depends on what our fathers teach us at odd moments, when they aren’t trying to teach us. We are formed by little scraps of wisdom.”

Source: Foucault’s Pendulum

II.

Jenifer Goldman-Wetzler on using our emotions to break our conflict habits:

“Putting your emotions to work for you does not involve tamping them down, getting rid of them, or scrutinizing why you feel the way you feel. Instead, it includes identifying, acknowledging, and using your emotions as a catalyst for constructive, pattern-breaking action. You simply cannot free yourself from the conflict loop if you are unable to use your own emotions toward constructive change.”

Source: Optimal Outcomes: Free Yourself from Conflict at Work, at Home, and in Life / Blog Post

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Leading Thoughts Whats New in Leadership Books

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03.04.24

Fueling Innovation: How Microsoft Finally Got It Right

Innovative Leader

WE OFTEN THINK of innovation as something visionaries draw out of thin air, like manna from heaven. That’s a myth. Often, and especially in contemporary times, the real story of innovation doesn’t involve lone geniuses or flashes of inspiration, but teams, organizations, and leaders who cultivate systems and cultures where new ideas can sprout and flourish.

Here’s an innovation story that’s closer to reality: It’s a story of loss, grit, and renewal. It’s about a wildly successful company that went off course. It’s also about a never-too-late approach to innovation that enabled a floundering business to launch a second golden age.

You know this company. It has more subscribers than Netflix and Amazon combined. Its profit margin is higher than Google’s. Its market cap is over $2 trillion. Chances are, you’re one of a billion people that use its flagship software. We’re talking about Microsoft.

Back in the mid-2000s, Microsoft was in trouble. Not only was the U.S. government scrutinizing it for monopolistic practices, but the company was also coming under fierce attack for investing in its archrival, Apple.

Even more alarming, almost every new business it launched failed: e-books, mobile phones, search engines, music; it was one dramatic dud after another.

Inside the company, morale was at an all-time low. Long-timers and new hires alike were deeply disillusioned by a caustic culture that was quick to assign blame and pitted employee against employee. With few wins in the ledger, the best and the brightest started to leave.

For Microsoft, the future looked bleak.

In stepped Satya Nadella. In 2014, when the company’s market capitalization was $380 billion, this Microsoft veteran took over as CEO. The turnaround he engineered was nothing short of remarkable. By 2019, Microsoft’s market capitalization edged past the $1 trillion mark, making it the world’s most valuable company. That same year, the press declared, “Microsoft is cool again.” By 2023, its market cap reached $2.5 trillion, and the company led the race for tech’s next big trophy—making artificial intelligence mainstream.

How did this happen?

Troubleshooting Microsoft

What precisely did Nadella do to steady the company and launch it into a high-octane period of growth and innovation?

Two facts underscore how he made this happen:

Fact #1: Innovation Is Simply a Means to An End

Nadella understood that innovation is a tool rather than a destination. His goal was not to make Microsoft the most innovative company but the most successful in its field. Of course, part of that entailed reestablishing the company’s reputation for cutting-edge technology. But there was much more than that.

To him, Microsoft’s efforts lacked a strong mission. The company had been rolling out one product after another without any guiding rationale other than they were “innovative.” It was no wonder that they failed to gain traction. Innovation had become the goal, and that wasn’t enough.

Nadella changed that. He quickly pivoted Microsoft from being a company that sold boxed software to a global computing engine that rents out its processing power and online storage to businesses.

At the time, this was a bold suggestion. Nadella proposed that Microsoft move beyond its most profitable product, Windows, in favor of chasing a cloud dream, even though Amazon had a four-year head start. Moving into services instead of hardware also meant abandoning ambitions to compete with Apple and Google in smartphones, though Microsoft had already spent billions of dollars buying Nokia’s cellphone business. Naturally, there were many skeptics.

But the decision stood. Nadella made this change in strategy clear when he announced a company-wide goal for his 115,000 employees: “We will take our tiny cloud business and build it into a multibillion-dollar empire.” This meant passing on many seductive “whiz-bang” opportunities—like autonomous vehicle hardware—and staying laser-focused on this core mission.

By 2019, Nadella started shifting his aim. The company wouldn’t just be a leader in cloud, but also in AI. That year, he championed Microsoft’s first $1 billion investment into OpenAI, the company that would shake the industry with its release of ChatGPT. In 2022, he upped the ante, investing $10 billion in OpenAI to acquire just short of a majority stake. Perhaps more significantly, he also pushed each of the company’s business units to infuse AI capabilities throughout their offerings.

Fact #2: Innovation Thrives in Structure

To most people, this fact seems counterintuitive. Doesn’t micromanaging and process smother creativity?

Innovation powerhouses don’t leave innovation up to chance. They know that innovation needs to be nurtured. You do that by setting up structures that notice, encourage, and develop innovative ideas and practices.

At Microsoft, this meant fundamentally changing how people worked. It started with creating systems that captured and vetted new ideas from all over the organization. The company created “rules of the road” for what to do with a new idea: how to test it, how to build a business case for it, and who to pitch it to.

Nadella championed numerous innovation programs, including allocating physical spaces for Microsoft employees to work with local entrepreneurs, creating accelerators to incubate new businesses, and hosting a global hackathon that became one of the largest innovation events in the world.

From top to bottom, everyone was expected to get on board. Those who resisted—and many did at first—were often given a stern talking-to by Nadella himself.

The Takeaway for Leaders and Businesses

If there is one thing you take away from Microsoft’s story, let it be this: Innovation requires planning. When leaders become known as innovators—succeeding at new things again and again—they do not just “get lucky.” They plan their luck.

Innovation doesn’t just show up in the middle of the night, waking you from a dream and pressing you to find a notebook by your bedside to jot down the next big idea. Innovation requires clear goals to reach toward. It demands a process to make it come to life. It’s a campaign—not a quick fix. And it’s a key skill for our 21st-century workplace.

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Leading Forum
Steve Wunker is the managing director of New Markets Advisors, a global consulting firm focused on innovation, and co-author of the new book The Innovative Leader: Step-by-Step Lessons from Top Innovators for You and Your Organization. Learn more at innovativeleaderbook.com.

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Innovation Mindset Innovation is Everybodys Business

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03.01.24

First Look: Leadership Books for March 2024

First Look Books

HERE'S A LOOK at some of the best leadership books to be released in March 2024 curated just for you. Be sure to check out the other great titles being offered this month.

9780593544853Slow Productivity: The Lost Art of Accomplishment Without Burnout by Cal Newport

Our current definition of “productivity” is broken. It pushes us to treat busyness as a proxy for useful effort, leading to impossibly lengthy task lists and ceaseless meetings. We’re overwhelmed by all we have to do and on the edge of burnout, left to decide between giving into soul-sapping hustle culture or rejecting ambition altogether. But are these really our only choices? From the aggressive rethinking of workload management, to introducing seasonal variation, to shifting your performance toward long-term quality, Slow Productivity provides a roadmap for escaping overload and arriving instead at a more timeless approach to pursuing meaningful accomplishment. The world of work is due for a new revolution. Slow productivity is exactly what we need.

9781394245222Think Remarkable: 9 Paths to Transform Your Life and Make a Difference by Guy Kawasaki with Madisun Nuismer

In Think Remarkable, tech titan Guy Kawasaki teams up with Madisun Nuismer, producer of the Remarkable People podcast, to share invaluable knowledge from more than 40 years of working with game-changing organizations such as Apple, Canva, Google, Mercedes Benz, and Wikipedia, and delivers insights from a collection of amazing interviews that'll kick you into high gear and get you ready to start showing the world your best, most amazing self. Together the authors show you how to lead a fulfilling life by drawing on insights from working closely with some of the world's most remarkable people.

9781982172749Cultures of Growth: How the New Science of Mindset Can Transform Individuals, Teams, and Organizations by Mary C. Murphy Ph.D.

In Cultures of Growth, Dweck’s protégé, Mary Murphy, a social psychologist at both Stanford and Indiana University, shows that mindset transcends individuals. A growth mindset culture can transform any group, team, or classroom to reach breakthroughs while also helping each person achieve their potential. Create environments where people want to be, where everyone can thrive and achieve their potential, both individually and together. In a world where success seems reserved for a chosen few, Cultures of Growth unveils a radically different approach to creating organizations that inspire learning, growth, and success at all levels.

9780197759271Leadership from Bad to Worse: What Happens When Bad Festers by Barbara Kellerman

Leadership from Bad to Worse is about how leadership that is bad, invariably, inexorably, gets worse--unless it is somehow, by someone or something, stopped or slowed. The process of going from bad to worse tends to be steady, as opposed to hasty. But once bad burrows in, it digs in. It digs in deeper and then deeper, making it difficult finally to extract or excise without getting rid of whoever and whatever is involved. Bad leadership is a social disease. But unlike diseases that are physical or psychological, it remains at the margins of our collective concerns. Leadership from Bad to Worse is, then, a corrective. Knowing that bad leadership can be checked before it corrupts is knowing that bad and then worse can be, if not completely precluded, then sometimes short-circuited.

9781637745236The Score That Matters: Growing Excellence in Yourself and Those You Lead by Ryan Hawk and Brook Cupps

People love to keep score. Managers keep score of a range of business metrics: market share, revenue, profit margin, growth rate. In our personal lives, social media has us keeping score by likes and followers. Offering both descriptive and prescriptive advice and anecdotes, The Score That Matters will help you unlock true fulfillment and happiness by discovering your purpose, identifying your values, and creating critical behaviors and living them faithfully every day in all aspects of your life.

9781637745144Shine: How Looking Inward Is the Key to Unlocking True Entrepreneurial Freedom by Gino Wickman and Rob Dube

Entrepreneurs often have a burning need to succeed. But that same relentless brilliance that propels you in your career can take a toll on your teams, personal relationships, and even your health. Gino Wickman, bestselling author of Traction, teams up with mindfulness expert Rob Dube to help readers strike a crucial balance between those inner and outer worlds while taking your success to new heights. In Shine, they share 10 disciplines to help you stay sharp and energetic without burning out. You’ll learn to: Set boundaries in your work life (without compromising productivity) that allow you to become a better leader and better person; Practicable sustainable ways to reset your energy and recognize burnout and stress before they happen; Tap into a flow state to harness unbridled creativity, think clearly, and move through your career and life with ease.

More Titles

9781637744741 9781637631836 9781394196180 9780063328822

For bulk orders call 1-626-441-2024

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“... a mind needs books as a sword needs a whetstone, if it is to keep its edge.”
— George R.R. Martin, A Game of Thrones

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Whats New in Leadership Books Best Books of 2023

Posted by Michael McKinney at 09:34 AM
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02.29.24

Leading Thoughts for February 29, 2024

Leading Thoughts

IDEAS shared have the power to expand perspectives, change thinking, and move lives. Here are two ideas for the curious mind to engage with:

I.

Kevin Roberts on the nature of leadership:

“Where should people start with “leadership” in a VUCA world? Leadership is both art and science. There are all kinds of leadership. There is not a one-size-fits-all approach. But the essence of leadership doesn’t change. In the last 50 years, production, distribution, and communication have been reset by technology. Leadership hasn’t changed much in 5,000 years. Technology doesn’t alter leadership. It lets leaders reach more people, quicker, more emotionally—that’s all. Leadership resists change because it’s about human nature. Leaders take people to a better place.”

Source: 64 Shots: Leadership in a Crazy World

II.

Douglas Rushkoff on swallowing the storyteller’s pill to experience relief:

“If a storyteller wants us to believe in a religion, then his god will be responsible for our relief. If he wants us to believe in a politician or product, then one of these will be the solution.”

Source: Get Back in the Box: Innovation from the Inside Out

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Leading Thoughts Whats New in Leadership Books

Posted by Michael McKinney at 03:41 PM
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LeadershipNow 140: February 2024 Compilation

LeadershipNow Twitter

twitter Here is a selection of Posts from February 2024 that you will want to check out:

See more on twitter Twitter.

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Mind Shift Isaacson Elon Musk

Posted by Michael McKinney at 08:05 AM
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