CorpU Weekly Digest: Leadership Development (2012-Apr-02)

Topics: Leadership

Here are this past week's headlines in leadership development: 

• (1) Discriminatory filings may signal that your leaders need skills to recognize and address discontent ;  
• (2) Can you measure trust? ; 
• (3) IESE research on "Marginalized Biculturals" as being good candidates for global leadership positions ; 
• (4) Deloitte research connects the market perception of the quality of your organization's leaders. Will this change how we develop leaders and leadership? ; 
• Books: Superpower! and The Institutional Logics Perspective: A New Approach to Culture, Structure and Process ; 
• Webinars ; and
• Conferences

 Discriminatory filings may signal that your leaders need skills to recognize and address discontent
According to the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission report tracking charge filing and resolution cases from 1997 through 2011, charges rose to their highest levels in 2011. Yet the percentage of reasonable cause findings of discrimination stayed relatively flat, at 3.8 percent. The other 96.2 percent of the cases were settled with benefits, withdrawn or dismissed. A number of explanations leap to mind. But, there's a new dynamic at play that may be a central part of the problem. Leaders increasingly lack the skills needed to recognize and address employee discontent, which allows decisions and actions to appear unfair or potentially illegal even when they may not be. Also, many leaders fail to understand that conduct and actions need not be explicitly illegal to appear discriminatory. A recent post in Harvard Business Review summarized a study suggesting that people whose time is focused on computer-based work may be "diminishing their empathy and social skills." Read Stephen Paskoff's latest posting in The Ethical Workplace, "Teach Trust First"

 Can you measure trust? 
Trust is difficult to measure quantitatively, but when managers are attuned to the mood and behaviors of employees, they can sense when trust has been strengthened or undermined. John Mackey, CEO at Whole Foods, explains why the heart is as important as the head in effective management. John suggests that he does not measure trust per se. But, what he measures is the overall morale of the organization. According to him, low morale is often an indicator of a bad leadership. Trust can be measured up to some degree, but, more importantly, something about trust can be felt.Watch John Mackey Video "Can you measure trust?"

 IESE research on "Marginalized Biculturals" as good candidates for global leadership positions
People who have lived in more than one culture but who don't identify strongly with any of them are sometimes viewed as poor adapters, psychologically overwhelmed or socially weak. Such typecasting would seem to make so-called "marginalized bicultural" less than ideal candidates to be global leaders, who need to be masters of connecting with and influencing many different people. Global leaders frequently encounter greater levels of diversity, complexity and uncertainty in their business dealings. Not a job, you would think, for "socially weak" types.  However, Stacey R. Fitzsimmons of Western Michigan University, IESE's Yih-teen Lee and Mary Yoko Brannen of INSEAD seek to challenge such notions. Indeed, their article, "Demystifying the Myth about Marginals: Implications for Global Leadership," argues that "marginalized bicultural" may, in fact, outperform as global leaders. Read the IESE article "Why Marginalized Expats Make Great Global Leaders"

 Deloitte research connects the market perception of the quality of your organization's leaders. Will this change how we develop leaders and leadership? 
According to the Deloitte's research The Leadership Premium, financial markets reward a premium of 15.7%, on average, for effective leadership and discount of 19.8% for what is perceived as weaker leadership. The paper finds that analysts look beyond financial ratios to the broader picture of public and press opinion and corporate governance, to core leadership capabilities and to personal qualities such as honesty and integrity. Simon Holland, head of Deloitte's global change and transformation practice, comments: “To succeed over the long term, an organization needs a clear and inspiring vision of where it wants to be and the resources, ability and drive to get there. It also needs a culture that supports new ideas and that fosters a strong sense of belonging and purpose. These conditions aren’t developed accidentally: effective leaders design them in, and analysts recognize that.” Read the summary, "Effective leaders worth stock market premium of 16%, says Deloitte report"

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 The Business of Learning: New Major Products, Mergers, Acquisitions, and Partnerships

No major news in mergers, acquisitions, or product releases.

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 Books To Read

Do you want more out of your life and your job with less effort and better results? Have you ever felt that there just has to be a better way to get there? If so, you're not alone. Millions of people, just like you, are faced with many challenges in their professional and personal lives on their journey to success. Superpower! to be released on June 5, 2012, is internet marketing guru Ford Saeks first book bringing together principlesto solve problems faster, make better decisions, and improve one's professional and personal life. In today's competitive, information-overloaded, and challenging economic conditions, there is no such thing as job security—only skills security. And sometimes, learning from a skilled marketer can help you stay ahead. Buy Now

How do institutions influence and shape cognition and action in individuals and organizations, and how are they in turn shaped by them? Various social science disciplines have offered a range of theories and perspectives to provide answers to this question. Within organization studies in recent years, several scholars have developed the institutional logics perspective, as first introduced by Alford and Friedland in Powers of Theory: Capitalism, the State, and Democracy (1985). In The Institutional Logics Perspective: A New Approach to Culture, Structure and Process, Prof. Patricia H. Thornton (Duke University, Fuqua School of Business), Prof. William Ocasio (Kellogg School of Management and Northwestern University), and Prof. Michael Lounsbury (University of Alberta School of Business) bring together a lot of the research on institutional logics perspective, making it accessible for the practitioner as well. This approach affords significant insights, methodologies, and research tools, to analyze the multiple combinations of factors that may determine cognition, behavior, and rationalities, and is likely to be the go-to book for some time. Buy Now

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 Webinars 

HR Analytics Roadmap 
Date: Wednesday, April 04, 2012, 2:00 PM ET
Presenter: Laurie Bassi, CEO of McBassi & Company Register now

Ensuring High-Quality Healthcare in the Midst of Rapid Growth & Change 
Date: Thursday, April 5, at 11:00 AM ET
Presenters: Suzanne Darrow and Allison Parish, Cancer Treatment Centers of America® (CTCA) Register now

LMS evaluation and deployment for a small and medium sized business
Date: Thursday, April 05, 2012, 2:00 PM ET
Presenter: ACD Learning Solutions Register now

Making E-Learning Stick  
Date: Tuesday, April 10, 2012, 1:00 PM ET 
Presenter: Carole Robin, Stanford Graduate School of Business Register now

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 Conferences

The Six Disciplines of Learning Transfer: Presented by ASTD in Partnership with Fort Hill Company
Date: April 4-5, 2012
Location: Atlanta, GA, USA Register now 

Talent Management Summit
Date April 10-12, 2012
Location: São Paulo, Brazil Register now

Assessing & Developing High Potentials
Date: April 16-17, 2012
Location: Washington DC, USA Register now

OnBoarding Talent
Date: April 16-18, 2012
Location: Sydney, Australia Register now

Emotions and Education: Affect, Anxiety and Achievement
Date: April 19, 2012
Location: New York City, NY, USA Register now

2012 Sloan-C Blended Learning Conference and Workshop: Perfecting the Blend
Date: April 23-24, 2012
Location: Milwaukee, WI, USA Register now

Learning TECH 2012
Date: April 23 - 25, 2012
Location: Chicago, IL, USA Register now 

Delivering the Strategic Role of HR
Date: May 2, 2012 
Location: New Zealand Register now

Global Management Conference: Fourth Annual Conference on Globalization, Sustainability and Development, 2012
Date: May 2-5, 2012
Location: Rio De Janeiro, Brazil Register now

1st Annual People Effectiveness @ Work Conference
Date: May 8, 2012
Location: Johannesburg, South Africa Register now

HR Summit 2012
Date: May 9-12, 2012 
Location: Singapore Register now

Corporate University Xchange's Global Leadership Congress
Date:  May 15-17, 2012
Location: Philadelphia, PA, USA Register now 

Social Recruiting Strategies Conference
Date: 22 to 25 May 2012
Location: Chicago, IL, United States Register now

National Institute on the Assessment of Adult Learning
Date: June 6-8, 2012
Location: Atlantic City, NJ, USA Register now

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