May 4, 2009
Final blog final thoughts…just for now…
Its been a fun semester….many cases, presentations, nice videos, some nice songs and music in some of the classes provided by the professor…and more importantly, a class, a learning, that would stay with me throughout my personal, professional, social, and every other life, more so than all other classes I have taken. This class has started a journey inside of me, the journey of constant introspection and improvement, and what better can a person wish for…a skill for constant improvement..
Saying, this, however, I also wish to add that this class should be MANDATORY for all MBA’s and other graduate programs too… I wish this class was dispersed throughout my MBA career in slow and steady offerings, rather than as a one semester course..The learnings are tremendous, of impact huge enough to set me on a life changing path…and as such, to keep in line with this huge scope, my suggestions would be to offer shorter classes throughout the MBA program for the student make this a part of the complete program rather than as a single semsnter course..
Of religions and leadership…
I realize that this is really a sensitive topic to blog on, but if religions all over the world are examined, all these religions provide a moral compass and a path to act when taking a decision…If one encounters crossroads of integrity, every religion in the world provides a moral answerthat would be very similar on the decision…so also about managing people…as in the case of servant leadership, every religion in the world could be a form of servant-leadership example…
Leadership and Management.
I have had several experiences in my career to see that unless the top leaders in a company drive change, the company will lack change. Everytime I have seen change, it has always come from the top. Likewise, everytime I have seen decay, it also has begun from the top. This tells me the importance of having a solid and ethical leadership at the top, and the good percolated down automatically…
Importance of LPI and IOPT
I have had the opportunity to complete the survey and solicit feedback from folks who have workked with me. I have had these two reports with me for months and have gone through these reports. But in the last few days I have had the opportunity to really give each page a thought about what that means. Its amazing what these reports reveal and this is like having your own mentor in this report. The report is such an unbiased reflection of yourself and offers an excellent opportunity for improvement…
Leadership in my Company
My company designs and manufactures medical devices. As such, more so than any other areas, integrity and openness to improvement is very critical. The devices we manufacture goes into patients who are already in a state of compromised health. As such, in our company, there are structures in place that ensure that all thoughts are opinions are heard, and every chance for improvement is taken seriously. This can be seen in the actions of our leaders in the facility. No amount of integrity policies can make a difference if the right people are not in place to execute it.
May 3, 2009
Leadership Assignments
These last few days I have been completing some of the worksheets that our Professor had given us. In the process, I realized how much of an eye opener these worksheets were, and how it forces you to recognize your weaknesses and strengths. I am actually looking forward to making these worksheets part of my future learning process..and my advice to whosoever reads this is to start these in good time,…and it will help you.
April 22, 2009
Flashback of Ford Pinto discussions
I recently moved to a quality role in my career, and it was amazing how many times I have recounted the Ford Pinto case. While the situations may not be as deep, but nevertheless, was customer facing in every way…being in the quality role, I am now the check and balance for my manufacturing line, and when making decisions about product on the field..very different from the manufacturing engineering role I had where I was always pushing the boundry of compliance and efficiency..!
April 10, 2009
About good bosses and the not so good..
Some musings about the good and the not-so-good bosses I’ve had..
The good ones have always:
Kept the business goals in perspective…
Kept integrity and ethics in perspective..
Brought out the best in me….(I used to work 12 -14 hours days and would actually look forward to doing the same the next day !!)
Always made sure that it Wasn’t All Business, but inquired and shared light personal happenings..
Now, Now that I have written about the good boss I’ve had, those were basically the end effects…but the mechanics of how this boss was able to get that opinion and feedback about himself from me is something else…
This is where I refer bact to my IOPT report and the things I gleaned from it. Importantly, it tells me what my information processing style is, and also more importantly, the fact that every person has their own styles, and to lead effectively, it is important to recognize this person’s style, and coach and lead accordingly..people skills…:)
Now the not-so-good ones were just about the opposite:
Never was a good coach (nothing new to offer…)
Never gave the time to listen to project concerns, but yelled when things did not go quite as planned..
Never was a good sounding board…
And very importantly, did not recognize the fact that different people are best led with different styles..
April 3, 2009
About passion and perseverance.
Last class, there was a few musings on what the role of passion was in being a effective leader. One thought was that it leads to perseverance. As one person rightly mentioned in the discussion, the path to success is littered with failures, but passion feeds perseverance and the leader with a resolve gets her/his strength to move beyond failures, from the underlying passion. Jim Collins mentions one of the traits of a level 5 leader is the steely resolve that they possess, and in my opinion, this resolve is fueled by passion towards the enterprise, and not the self.
April 2, 2009
Good to Great and else..
I have been reading Good to Great and a few other books, but nothing drove home the point better than the presentations last class. The presentations were from different teams that were presenting slides on some of the best companies with excellent ethical standings. Almost all these companies had at their leadership positions, people who would be considered as level 5 leaders. Leaders who put their enterprise first and selves second. These folks were true examples of modest but effective leaders who knew how to bring out the best in people…
