Coaching in many ways has been with us for years. It’s really not a new concept. Maybe what’s new is that in the last two decades it has become a legitimate part of the workplace lexicon. For the most part, however, coaching has been disproportionately seen as an intimate, one-on-one, relationship between an experienced guiding light and a aspiring or floundering pupil.
There’s been a lot of confusion about coaching, about the role of boundaries in …

1. As Bruce Lynn explains, this cartoon gets to the heart of the separation between managers and leaders.
2. How leaders should NOT handle their IT team.
3. The line between a negative employee and logical one is imperceptible.
4. Motivating employees requires that you set an example.
5. What you say…what employees hear.
6. The highlights of job descriptions. How would you describe your job to a class full of kids?
7. Listening to advice (from grown-ups) can sometimes fog …

Last week we outlined directive leadership; what it means, what forms it takes, and when it is used. We were careful to point out that directive leadership, although task driven, isn’t the only or the best way to sustain momentum within an organization. Sometimes it can force an organization to produce unexpected results and, on other occasions, it can smother employee motivation and drive.
Leaders who are opposed to directive leadership’s main tenants and rely on …

In the last few days the Israeli foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, maintained that he could not be involved in negotiations over the West Bank territories because he has a home on the West Bank and is thus a self-interested party. Mr. Lieberman’s lack of action can be characterized as taking a moral stand; however, beneath the surface, it’s a true failure of leadership.
Leaders who don’t have the capacity to understand the collective good and are …

Why is it every time that the president assigns a special urgent and unique project–the assignment is never to a director, administrator, not even to a chief of staff, always to a ruler, or more specifically, to a czar.  The very notion of calling someone a “czar” speaks to a strange type of insecurity, both historically and dramaturgically.  It may denote majestic expertise, autocratic control, and Olympian judgement. While aggrandizing, I wonder sometimes what any …