Education, tools and leadership

There are numerous programs, schools and methodologies helping to understand and learn how to manage business and people:  different master of business administration (MBA) schools with their own programs and almost abundant methodologies and tools they teach their students.  Unfortunately no one ever learns whatsoever about e.g.: ecology at an MBA or in their programs. Unethical business and environmental practices of some MBA students are uncovered consistently.

Responsibility across the broadest spectrum of society is vitally important to the future of the global economy. Having said that the key question in today's business environment still remains: do all those programs, methodologies and tools really come out the way we need them to?

The biggest issue to introduce all of the different programs every couple of years or so is mostly based on the matter that companies are entirely dismissing experience if you do not have a degree. This is short sighted and even negligent but attractive  to those that want higher salary, better career opportunities or better consolidated business network. The second matter is that different methodologies and tools get sold to C-level as a silver bullet that is going to fix all of their issues, problems and will bring out the solutions.

But to probe even deeper - it is not the methodologies or the tools that bring solutions or break problems. They are good and they work when they are just frameworks to organize efforts. The important and mostly overlooked aspect of application of methodologies and tools is: they need to be based on the business needs, culture of organization and should be properly trimmed to benefit from using them.

MARSocial copetition: Leadership by Virtue

My book excerpt from “Leadership by Virtue” available on AMAZON.COM (Chapter 6, pages 117-120 of 539 p.) is entered into the Marsocial.com Author of the Year Competition                        Please Click the link and like, shares it. Thank you.

As for Shifu’s words, Tara asks Ben if he has seen a monster

 Culture sophistication of employees pressures on realization of decisions

 Leadership cannot really be taught. It can only be learned. (Harold S. Geneen)

The words “If you do not handle your time, how can you manage the time of the people you lead” from yesterday evening echoed in my ears through the night. And still now I cannot forget them. It is very true, and I feel that I need some guidance about how to overcome these rapidly evolving events that are consuming me and my energy. Drinking tea in my office and shuffling through my e-mail, I just cannot get rid of Shifu’s words. Where is the key that will unlock the doors that will allow all the negative energy accumulated in these two companies to exit? It seems to me that even an exceptional martial artist could not fight through all this piled-up problems.

I don’t even hear it when Gemini enters with the report I asked for about all those subsidiary companies and our ex-employees working in them mostly for FixCom. She starts to explain the background and the concerns she has if we cancelled contracts with companies right now. I agree with her and ask her if she can prepare a plan to pass important services to a new company smoothly and then to pass other less important services that are not our core business and do not bring high value added on to those companies. The plan should include the costs and people involved, and we can have preliminary discussion about it today at the merge meeting. I inform her that we will have this on the agenda of our first directors’ board meeting in two weeks.

Fedor enters with a smile on his face. This should be a good sign. And it is.
“Hi, Ben. I have the papers with me.”
“Make it good news, please.”
“It is. We finally entered all the data yesterday evening and tested them with the new SW module. This morning we cleaned the errors and ran them again through the system and the results are here.”
“That is great, and I should apologize for being rude to you yesterday.” It is a relief to say these words that I truly mean. Finally, a positive effect offering me proof that I’m steering the problems correctly.
“No problem. I understand the pressure on you, and we did not help you much to overcome them. Would you like to see the results?”
“Yes please, but first let us call Dylan too.”
“I already informed him, and he is on his way up here.”
Dylan arrives a few minutes later, and we have a long presentation and Fedor’s explanation of the data. It is half past nine when we are through, and I shock them by saying, “Would you mind if I leave now and you two carry out the meeting?”
“Something more important?”
“In some ways, you could say yes. But please can you inform me about the results afterward?”
“Is she young?” was Fedor’s provocative question.

Interested? READ MORE HERE.

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Qi–energy–leadership

In search for describing the Chinese term Qi (氣) I found: Ki in Japanese, Prana or Shakti in India, Gi in Korea, Ka in ancient Egypt, the ancient Greeks called it Pneum, for native Americans it was the Great Spirit, in Africa it’s known as Ashe and in Hawaii as Ha or Mana and the list is not yet complete.

In all those old philosophies, Qi expresses the life force which animates the forms of the world. It is the vital energy or circulating life force that is thought to be inherent in all things. A living being is filled with it. A dead person has no more Qi - the warmth, the life energy is gone. The Egyptian described the same concept very similarly. A living person has the Ka and in a dead one Ka left the body. They also believed that the Ka was sustained through food and drink. This is then the reason why food and drink offerings were presented to the dead. In traditional Chinese medicine, Qi is believed to regulate a person’s spiritual, emotional, mental, and physical balance. A healthy individual has more Qi than one who is ill. However, health is more than an abundance of Qi. Health implies that the Qi in our bodies is clear rather than polluted and turbid; it is flowing smoothly like a stream and does not appear to be blocked or stagnant.

In martial arts (or acupuncture) the capacity to perceive the flow of Qi or to actually see or feel it, is something that can be cultivated through Qi Gong training. During the practice one cultivates the capacity to perceive Qi on different levels. It seems like a potential to be yet expressed. One could say it is like fullness and/or emptiness (compared to yin and yang concept) when we perceive ourselves and the world around as fluid and spacious. In those concepts it is not just experiencing our body to be comprised of patterns and flows of Qì, but we also get to understand that ‘emotions’ and ‘thoughts’ are forms of energy. When a person understands this concept, it is possible to control and deviate the opponent’s energy with our own. Posing the question “Have you ever tried to pick up a child or a dog who did not want to be lifted?” Joe Hyams offers the result: “They both seem to be heavier—this is because the mind is truly a source of power, and when a mind and body are coordinated, Qi manifests itself.”

But Qi is more than the above. It is also the life energy one senses in Nature, the vibratory nature of any phenomena, the flow and tremor that is happening continuously at molecular, atomic and subatomic levels. The Earth itself is also moving, transforming, breathing, and alive with it.

Consultant - Coach

There is quite a selection of titles for people offering services to businesses such as: adviser, consultant, mentor, coach. In the last two decades in organizations business coaching has become increasingly popular to assist executives, managers, and employees in their personal and professional growth. How and what makes us decide that in particular case if we need a business consultant or a business coach?

As both, coaching and consulting process, are built on trust and confidentiality to differentiate them one can pose the following questions:

• Do they question and listen?
• Do they spend most of the time talking?
• Do they offer alternatives and let you make the choice?
• Do they tell you what to do?
• Do they think they know all of the answers?
• Do they appear to ask the right questions?
• Do you learn from them?
• Do you end up wiser or not?

The above questions help, but to determine which business service you actually need, more description is needed.