Getting Ready to Get Started

I have my first class this weekend, which I am both excited about and somewhat anxious. But more on that next week.

I appreciated the comments from my friend Patrick Connor (professor emeritus, Willamette University) who said that he was especially amused at the concluding thought in my previous blog ( “We know how to do leadership.”). He told me that he found himself saying something quite similar, after giving an organization change seminar for a few years, winding up the course with “Hey, folks, we know how to do org change. Everybody's got his or her 6 rules for effective change, 10 stages of successful change, whatever. They all say pretty much the same thing.” But what he remembered was a fellow he had heard speak at a conference who asked the audience: “How many of you know how to lose weight? Raise your hands.” Lots of hands were raised -- everybody’s, in fact. Then the speaker asked: “How many of you are 5 pounds or more heavier than you would like to be?” And, of course, there’s the rub, right? The gap between what we know and what we do.

I had lunch the other day with a senior executive who spoke with me about his leadership style as being a blend of “Chinese upbringing, Confucianism spirituality, and 30 years of work experience with an American-based company.” He maintained that while these three were each important, they were not at all in conflict with one another. What he concluded was that integrity (and being integrated) was central to being authentic in his position and self.

In a similar way, one of my current EMBA students at Santa Clara, recently wrote: “I want to share with you that I absolutely love this topic. International leadership is my passion. I know that I have a different way to look at stuff. I always use a holistic approach, which confuses a lot of people. But I believe in me and my style, and I want to keep working on it.” This from a women born and raised in Argentina, educated in the United States, and with years of work experience based in both the Netherlands and Spain.

This weekend I start teaching in the PRC (People’s Republic of China). The class, with 50 second-year MBA students, begins at 9:30 a.m. and finishes at 6:30 p.m. Their pre-class assignment was to prepare a “Personal Best Leadership” case study. Should be interesting, as we struggle to put into practice what we already know needs to be done (the knowing and doing leadership gap, and the challenge of being “as one”).

All the best,

Barry