Articles Tagged Leadership

“Prior to Sandy’s landfall, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie had brutally attacked President Obama’s leadership credentials in his keynote address at the Republican convention. And President Obama was focused on his re-election campaign, increasingly attacking Republican positions. But a crisis makes strange bedfellows, and this week, these political enemies together toured the damage, comforted victims, […]

It must be easy to starve the education sector of funds, if your own children are not affected by the decision. If your offspring invariably go to private educational institutions, here or abroad, I imagine it is not difficult to wield the axe and say, “We can’t pay, won’t pay.” Your kids will be just […]

There is a simple, widely observable incongruity in the higher planes of business life. Where are all the women? Specifically, where are all the women when it comes to decision-making and direction-setting? Look at the upper echelons of corporate life, and you will see only a few token feminine faces. This situation is found even […]

“There are three classic models of leadership: the first is “autocratic leadership” where the leader manages to get somewhere but doesn’t take people with them, for example Margaret Thatcher. Then there is “charismatic leadership” where the leader takes everyone with him but doesn’t actually get anywhere, Tony Blair being a good example. Finally there’s the […]

Travel is great for a variety of reasons. One of the most important is the possibility of serendipitously coming across something you might not otherwise have seen. This happened to me recently when I opened a magazine on an airplane to find the following: “There was this one instance when a woman in her early […]

“Marissa Mayer, the Google (GOOG) executive who today was named Yahoo’s (YHOO) new chief executive, is pregnant. Mayer told Fortune exclusively that her first child is due October 7. It’s a boy! …Mayer first disclosed to the Yahoo board that she is pregnant in late June, in a meeting with Michael Wolf, a member of […]

“When news emerged in May that Facebook had hired an executive search firm to look for a woman to add to its board of directors, I had hoped that with the appointment would come a great deal of diversity of thought and experience and an independent voice. Facebook has now announced that it has chosen its […]

Do you want to know how to spot a good leader? Here’s a simple test: Good leaders spend more time looking out of windows than into mirrors. Let me explain. Good leaders are insatiably curious about the world. They are always interested in what’s going on, in how things work, in what’s changing and what’s […]

“The three directors who oversee risk at JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) include a museum head who sat on American International Group Inc.’s governance committee in 2008, the grandson of a billionaire and the chief executive officer of a company that makes flight controls and work boots. What the risk committee of the biggest U.S. […]

“The corporate world is emerging from several weeks of boardroom turbulence dubbed the “Shareholder Spring.” In annual meeting after annual meeting around the world, boards have been taken to task by investors and other stakeholders on a wide range of issues: remuneration, board composition, competence, diversity, voting control, dual stock, and more. In the meantime, […]

“Pep Guardiola has defended Lionel Messi after his penalty miss as good as cost Barcelona a place in the Champions League final. Messi has enjoyed an extraordinary run of form in the past four seasons, scoring 63 goals in all competitions this season alone. However, he failed to find the net in either leg of […]

To rate the leader, study the followers. Here’s the first reason why. Good leaders seek out, and attract, good followers. Bad leaders seek out, and attract, bad followers. So if you want to know whether the leader you are about to follow is any good, look around you. Who are your fellow followers? Are they […]

“As I jogged down Wall Street in New York in October through the barricades, police horses, and thousands of activists, something became clear. The masses had self-organized and social media had added yet another social movement to its résumé. At the same time, something else became clear to me. Much higher than street level, in […]

A drive on one of Kenya’s highways is, we can all agree, a hair-raising experience. We have one of the world’s highest road fatality rates, for one simple reason: the roads are full of what our president fondly calls “pumbavus” who have inexplicably been allowed to drive. So you will get pea-brained drivers coming at […]

“The Italian cruise ship the Costa Concordia sank off the coast of Tuscany last Friday night, after smashing into rocks off the island of Giglio. The 114,500-tonne vessel, carrying 3,200 passengers and 1,000 crew, hit a submerged reef at 9.42pm, after the ship’s captain, Francesco Schettino, had steered it to within 200m of shore to […]

“I long ago realised that to understand a business I would learn much more by talking to people involved in day-to-day operations than the chief executive. They represented “what is really going on here?”” JOHN KAY, Financial Times (January 3, 2011) The excerpt shown, from Professor John Kay’s regular FT column, caught my eye. I […]

“This was a year, sadly, when examples of poor leadership (bad decision-making, selfish actions and inexplicably bone-headed moves) seemed to outnumber the good.” JENA MCGREGOR, The Washington Post (Dec 19, 2011) As we end another year, we in the business world have to concede an uncomfortable fact: 2011 was not a great year for corporate […]

“”We hired a new CEO, but had to let him go after just seven months,” the chairman of an East Coast think tank complained to me recently.” His resumé looked spectacular, he did splendidly in all the interviews. But within a week or two we were hearing pushback from the staff. They were telling us, […]

“Female executives packed the room as former Xerox CEO and Chairman Anne Mulcahy took the stage at Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Summit to share her best and worst practices on building boards. Throughout her career, Mulcahy has sat on boards of six public companies, three non-profits, and one privately held international company. “Sometimes, I did not […]

“On the face of it, scouring the world for a superstar makes perfect sense. Surely a great manager can make all the difference to an ailing firm? Jack Welch boosted General Electric’s market capitalisation by 4,500% at a time when its old rival, Westinghouse, was disintegrating. Surely management skills are portable? What other justification is […]

1. Kisses-up and kicks-down: “How does the prospective boss respond to feedback from people higher in rank and lower in rank?” 2. Can’t take it: “Does the prospective boss accept criticism or blame when the going gets tough?” Be wary of people who constantly dish out criticism but can’t take a healthy dose themselves.  3. […]

So many good people are dying in quick succession. First, it was Wangari Maathai, our very own iron lady of legendary courage. Next Steve Jobs passed on, leaving an army of bereft customers in his wake. And now another man goes leaving a gaping hole in so many lives: Jagjit Singh, India’s renowned singer and […]

Wangari Maathai deservedly got a state funeral, the first ever for a woman in these parts. She warranted it, for rarely has a Kenyan received such global acclaim. But here’s the thing: once the funeral is over, and we have stopped shedding the requisite tears, how are we going to honour her memory? The fact […]

“Really, Hewlett-Packard? This is what’s become of the company of Bill and Dave — not just the founders of HP, but the founding fathers of Silicon Valley? Three CEOs in six years. Two of those CEOs who embarrassed themselves with inept campaigns for elective office. The other CEO who managed to get tossed out of […]

“Steve Jobs is above all an Apple customer. He and Steve Wozniak built devices that both of them wanted to use themselves. Wozniak brought exceptional engineering chops. Even more important, Jobs (who can’t program) brought the perspective of a passionate and non-technical customer into the design, the look and feel, and the excitement of Apple […]

I am so very tired of writing about disasters. And I am sure you are so very tired of reading about them. It was a bad week. First a ferry sank off Zanzibar. Several hundred people, including little children, were thrown into the sea. More than two hundred are believed to have died. Next, fuel […]

“Today, greater professionalism is expected of a Chairman. S/he must possess a range of ‘soft skills’ and have the ability to coach new board members (especially executive directors); handle debates with skill; tease out concerns; orchestrate and unite an often disparate group; recruit the right people; and effect behavioural change where necessary. The chairman needs […]

“Some CEOs of long tenure must have gotten a slightly queasy feeling as they watched the recent events in the Arab world. Even if they bear no resemblance at all to Hosni Mubarak or Muammar Qaddafi—even if they are the most competent and benevolent of leaders—they may well feel horror at how rapidly the fortunes […]