Monday, February 16, 2015
Saturday, February 14, 2015
Tuesday, February 10, 2015
Herminia Ibarra’s Book ‘Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader – Reviewer Professor M.S. Rao
Acclaim
about the Book
“Herminia Ibarra has created a
valuable and successful model for helping forward-thinking professionals move
up the corporate ladder.” — Marshall Goldsmith, author of New York Times and
global best seller What Got You Here
Won’t Get You There
What
are the Details of the Book?
If you want to acquire practical knowledge
about leadership, read this book. If you
want to devise a plan of action to become a better leader, read this book. If
you want to grow your network to fast-track your career by acquiring latest
leadership tools and techniques, read this book. Herminia Ibarra’s authored
book Act Like a Leader, Think Like a
Leader is divided into five chapters and concludes with a message to act.
What
is Inside?
Herminia Ibarra gives very practical
advice on how managers and executives at all levels can step up to leadership
by making small but crucial changes in three areas as follows: redefine the
scope of your day job by plunging into new projects and activities; form
relationships and interact with people who see the world differently; and experiment
with unfamiliar and playful ways of connecting and engaging with others to get
things done. She shows that contrary to
popular opinion, experimentation, not self-reflection is the secret to
leadership development. Too much introspection shields us from discovering our
leadership potential and pigeonholes us as our past selves instead of pointing
the way to the self we can become. This type of inside out thinking can impede
change and hold back careers.
Herminia Ibarra outlines to invest in
activities that will grow your network as follows: use projects and assignments
strategically; invest in extracurricular activities; create your own
communities of interest; use lunches and business trips to connect to people
you don’t see often; favor active rather than passive networking opportunities
(for example, don’t just how up for events-organize, or speak at them); and use
social media to broadcast your interests and cast a wider net to people who
share them.
Operational,
Personal and Strategic Network
Three different networks-operational,
personal, and strategic-can play a vital role in helping you step up to lead.
The first helps you manage current internal responsibilities, the second boosts
personal development, and the third focuses on new business directions and the
stakeholders you must get on board to pursue these directions. While people
differ a lot in how well they build and use operational and personal networks,
author discovered that nearly everyone underutilizes strategic networking. Most
of the people the author comes across have good operational networks. These
networks include the people on whom you depend in order to get your work done.
The people include your direct reports, your superiors, people in other units,
and key outsiders such as suppliers, distributors, and customers. Personal networks include relationships with
the people that you feel closest to-friends, family, and trusted advisers-and
the people you meet through things like professional associations, alumni
groups, clubs, hobbies, charities, and other personal-interest communities. The
third kind of network-your strategic network-is made up of relationships that
help you to envision the future, sell your ideas, and get the information and
resources you need to exploit these ideas. It requires both time and attention
outside operational demands and strategic investment in outside activities that
can give you outsight on what else you might be doing.
A strategic network has to include
people and groups that can help you compete in the future. Part of the trick is
that it is not always so obvious who should be a part of this network. A good
strategic network gives you connective advantage: the ability to marshal
information, support, or other resources from one of your networks to obtain
results in another. It’s not so much about the one-on-one relationships you have,
but it is more about how they intersect.
Leadership
Takeaways
- To step up to leadership, you have to learn to think like a leader.
- The way you think is a product of your past experience.
- The only way to change how you think, therefore, is to do different things.
- Doing things-rather than simply thinking about them-will increase your outsight on what leadership is all about.
- Outsight comes from a “tripod” of sources: new ways of doing your work (your job), new relationships (your network), and new ways of connecting to and engaging people (yourself).
- Sustainable change in your leadership capacity requires shifts on all three legs of the tripod.
- Success creates competency traps. We fall into a competency trap when these three things occur: you enjoy what you do well, so you do more of it and get yet better at it; when you allocate more time to what you do best, you devote less time to learning other things that are also important; and over time, it gets more costly to invest in learning to do new things.
- To act like a leader, you must devote time to four tasks you won’t learn to do if you are in a competency trap: bridging across diverse people and groups, envisioning new possibilities; engaging people in the change process; and embodying the change.
- It’s hard to learn these things directly and especially without the benefit of a new assignment. So, no matter what your current situation is, there are five things you can do to begin to make your job a platform for expanding your leadership: develop your situation sensors; get involved in projects outside your area; participate in extracurricular activities; communicate your personal “why” and create slack in your schedule.
- As you embark on the transition to leadership, networking outside your organization, team, and close connections becomes a vital lifeline to who and what you might become.
- The only way to realize that networking is one of the most important requirements of a leadership role is to act.
- If you leave things to chance and natural chemistry, then your network will be narcissistic and lazy.
- You need operational, personal, and strategic networks to get things done, to develop personally and professionally, and to step up to leadership. Although most good managers have good operational networks, their personal networks are disconnected from their leadership work, and their strategic networks are nonexistent or underutilized.
- Network advantage is a function of your BCDs: the breadth of your contacts, the connectivity of your networks, and your network’s dynamism.
- Enhance or rebuild your strategic network from the periphery of your current network outward as a first step toward increasing your outsight on your self: seek outside expertise and elicit input and perspectives of peers from different functional or support groups.
- Many of the typical challenges of stepping up to leadership make people feel like fakes: taking charge in a new role, selling their ideas, managing their higher-ups, working in an alien culture, and learning from negative feedback.
- Chameleons are comfortable shifting shapes and styles to fit each new situation; true-to-selfers, on the other hand, tend to feel inauthentic when asked to stretch outside their comfort zone.
- Authenticity traps really get you into trouble when you are stepping up to leadership, because what feels like the authentic you is the old self that you are trying to shed.
- One way to escape the authenticity trap is to think about experimenting with new behaviors as playing around with your sense of who you are instead of working on it. The new behaviors might feel unnatural in the beginning, but they help you figure out who you might want to be, without your actually committing to become it-playing gives you outsight on yourself.
- Identity-who you are-is not just about the past; it’s also the possibilities you envision for yourself in the future.
- Here are the three ways you can play around with your sense of who you are: - steal like an artist; observe a broad range of role models to create your own collage of things you want to learn from these models, and keep refining your style until it is effective and authentic; aim to learn: set learning goals, not just performance goals; and don’t stick to your story; try different versions, narrate different defining moments, and keep editing, much as you would your curriculum vitae.
- Stepping to play a bigger leadership role is not an event; it’s a process that takes time before it pays off. It is a transition built from small changes.
- Most methods for changing ask you to begin with the end in mind-the desired outcome. But in reality, knowing what kind of leader you want to become comes last, not first, in the stepping-up process.
- The transition process is rarely linear; difficulties and complications will inevitably arise and often follow a predictable sequence of five stages: disconfirmation; simple addition; complication; course correction; and internalization.
- Making major, external moves like changing jobs and careers, however, does not necessarily take you to a better place. More important is to grow by questioning where you are today. Actively entertaining alternatives, and eventually committing to making changes. The changes can be external, like job moves, or more internal, like changing the way you think about what you do and why.
- Breaking free from your “ought self” – what important people in your life think and ought to be-is at the heart of the transition process.
What
is the Recommendation?
Herminia Ibarra is an exceptional
leadership scholar and intellectual. She authored this book based on her 25
years of teaching experience that includes executive education. She also
covered this book from psychology perspective. This book reveals her keen
interest in psychology as she referred lots of research works by renowned
psychologists in the world. She shares several
inspiring stories including Margaret Thatcher and Sheryl Sandberg. This book
reflects honest account of her perspective on leadership. It outlines summary at the end of each
chapter and offers self-assessment exercises, case studies, quotes and diagrams.
This is one of the finest books I have
read in my lifetime. I took lots of notes and created new triggers for my
research on leadership and organizational behavior. It is an inspiring and thought
provoking book to grow as a great leader.
It is a well researched with both scholarly and practitioner
application. It is an insightful and inspiring book worth investing your time. It
is useful for educators, scholars, learners, leaders and CEOs. A must read for
professionals to grow as great leaders. You
can gift this book to others. Enjoy reading this book!
“This intelligent and
thought-provoking book is for those who really want to make a difference—those
willing to act their way into leadership situations they might previously have
thought themselves out of.” — Paul Polman, CEO, Unilever
If you like this article, Like and
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Read my ‘Vision 2030 One Million
Global Leaders’ URL: http://professormsraovision2030.blogspot.in/2014/12/professor-m-s-raos-vision-2030-one_31.html
Life is great!
Professor M.S.Rao, India
Founder of MSR
Leadership Consultants India
Listed
in Marquis Who's Who in the World in 2013
Vision 2030: http://professormsraovision2030.blogspot.in/
Google
Plus: https://plus.google.com/+ProfessorMSRao
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Speakerpedia:
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21
Success Sutras for Leaders:
Top 10 Leadership Books of the Year (San Diego University) Amazon URL: http://www.amazon.com/21-Success-Sutras-Leaders-ebook/dp/B00AK98ELI
Thanks for reading!
Kindly share your thoughts and
comments below, I’m sure someone out there will find your story useful.
Copyright©2015 MSR Leadership
Consultants India. All Rights Reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part
without permission is prohibited.
This is an educational blog for free
sharing of knowledge, not for commercial use. Please don't cut articles from my
blog and redistribute by email or post to the web. The use of this material is
free provided copyright is acknowledged and reference or link is made to the
Blog http://professormsraoguru.blogspot.com This material may not be sold, or published
in any form, or used in the provision of business services to a third party
without permission.
Monday, February 9, 2015
“Encourage Question and Answer Session in Your Leadership Development Training Programs” - Professor M.S.Rao
“Judge a man by his questions rather
than his answers.” - Voltaire
Most trainers and teachers encourage
question and answer (Q&A) session at the end of their teaching and training
programs. It helps them understand what the audiences understood apart from
serving it as a feedback tool to improve their content for next program. Here
are some of the advantages of encouraging Q&A session at the end of
teaching and training program:
Q&A session makes the audience
lively and engaging. It alerts the non-participants in the audience to think
and participate actively. It helps the teachers and trainers assess how far
they reached out to the expectations of the audiences. They will be able to
judge whether they justified their program. Questioning improves the knowledge
levels because the audience can ask any kind of question spontaneously but the
teachers and trainers must be in a position to respond up to the satisfaction.
Hence, Q&A session encourages spontaneity among the teachers and trainers. It
brings synergy among the participants as they appreciate the knowledge levels
of other participants in the program thus improving their knowledge levels. When
you look at the teaching in prestigious business schools in the world, it is
basically case study driven with interactive sessions. It helps create more
knowledge as there will be dialogue, discussion, debate and dissent among the
participants and also helps transfer knowledge among the participants.
Through Q&A session, the teachers
and trainers will be able to assess mindset, intelligence and maturity levels
of the audiences. They can acquire knowledge and internalize the best of
behavior and styles from participants. It is essential to encourage more
questions during the post-lunch session as the participants feel sleepy after
taking lunch.
To summarize, handling Q&A session
is very challenging for teachers and trainers. If handled well, it showcases
your authenticity; builds your credibility; and enhances your image as a
thought leader. Above all, it builds
your leadership brand. Hence, encourage questions, and be prepared to respond
with tact and intelligence to excel as a great trainer and thought leader.
“Learn from yesterday, live for today,
hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning.” - Albert
Einstein
If you like this article, Like and
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Read my ‘Vision 2030 One Million
Global Leaders’ URL: http://professormsraovision2030.blogspot.in/2014/12/professor-m-s-raos-vision-2030-one_31.html
Life is great!
Professor M.S.Rao, India
Founder of MSR
Leadership Consultants India
Listed
in Marquis Who's Who in the World in 2013
Vision 2030: http://professormsraovision2030.blogspot.in
Twitter: @professormsrao
Google
Plus: https://plus.google.com/+ProfessorMSRao
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/user/profmsr7
Global Top Gurus 30: http://www.globalgurus.org/leadership/upcoming.php
Speakerpedia:
http://speakerpedia.com/speakers/professor-msrao
21
Success Sutras for Leaders:
Top 10 Leadership Books of the Year (San Diego University) Amazon URL: http://www.amazon.com/21-Success-Sutras-Leaders-ebook/dp/B00AK98ELI
Thanks for reading!
Kindly share your thoughts and
comments below, I’m sure someone out there will find your story useful.
Copyright©2015 MSR Leadership
Consultants India. All Rights Reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part
without permission is prohibited.
This is an educational blog for free
sharing of knowledge, not for commercial use. Please don't cut articles from my
blog and redistribute by email or post to the web. The use of this material is
free provided copyright is acknowledged and reference or link is made to the Blog
http://professormsrao.blogspot.com
This material may not be sold, or
published in any form, or used in the provision of business services to a third
party without permission.
Thursday, February 5, 2015
Monday, February 2, 2015
“Manage Your Stress to Ensure Work-Life Balance and Lead Your Life Happily” - Professor M.S.Rao
“Everybody's going through a lot of
stress these days, no matter how well off you are and how many advantages you
have, it's a stressful time in everybody's lives.” - Chris Frantz
Stress is taking a major toll
globally. There are a number of reasons for rising stress levels among the
people globally. Technology has brought both comforts and complications. It has
become a boon and bane. It revolutionized the world converting into a small
global village. It created more goods and services resulting in higher
expectations from all stakeholders. At
times all the expectations cannot be met thus leading to conflicts and stress. There
is a cutthroat competition globally. People are into rat race and chase money
thus leading to high stress levels. At times, unrealistic ambition among the
people results in higher stress levels.
Stress has both positive and negative
effects. There are people who made use of stress to unlock their creativity,
and there are people who failed to manage their stress resulting in stifling
their creativity. Therefore, stress is a double-edged sword and you must know
how to make use of it intelligently. Brian Tracy rightly remarked, "Stress
comes from within; it is your reaction to circumstances, not the circumstances
themselves." If stress gives positive results, it is known as eustress. If
it gives negative results, it is known as distress. Overall, stress adversely
effects health. If stress goes unchecked, it leads to burnout. Here are the
tools and techniques to manage your stress:
- Act and don’t react. Have a right attitude towards stress. Hans Selye rightly remarked, “Adopting the right attitude can convert a negative stress into a positive one.”
- Avoid procrastination. Execute tasks in a planned and systematic manner as per the timeline. It helps you achieve the desired outcomes easily. David Allen outlines in Getting Things Done, “Much of the stress that people feel doesn't come from having too much to do. It comes from not finishing what they started."
- Be assertive in the workplace and avoid accepting unrelated work. Bring synergy among the team members to leverage their strengths. Allocate roles and responsibilities as per their competencies and capabilities.
- Do what is possible to you. Understand your abilities and limitations. You can stretch up to some levels only. Avoid overstretching to avoid getting burnt out.
- Don’t set unrealistic goals and objectives. Set only feasible and possible goals to accomplish.
- Avoid expecting from others as it might lead to conflicts thus increasing your stress levels.
- Empathize with others and understand their limitations.
- Have sex regularly.
- Go for regular physical exercises to beat stress and rejuvenate yourself. Hit gym or go for swimming or jogging to build your energy levels. You may also consider doing mediation or yoga.
There are three symptoms of good
health – sound sleep, free motion and good appetite. Ensure that you maintain
the same to check your stress levels. To conclude, reach your destination by
enjoying your life journey. Balance your personal, professional and social life
to provide meaning to your life.
“Life is indeed beautiful. It's times
when we sink into our hectic and stressful lifestyles that we are blinded and
fail to see what we really have.” - Unknown
If you like this article, Like and
share Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Professor-MSRao/451516514937414
Read my ‘Vision 2030 One Million
Global Leaders’ URL: http://professormsraovision2030.blogspot.in/2014/12/professor-m-s-raos-vision-2030-one_31.html
Life is great!
Professor M.S.Rao, India
Founder of MSR
Leadership Consultants India
Listed
in Marquis Who's Who in the World in 2013
Vision 2030: http://professormsraovision2030.blogspot.in
Twitter: @professormsrao
Google
Plus: https://plus.google.com/+ProfessorMSRao
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/user/profmsr7
Global Top Gurus 30: http://www.globalgurus.org/leadership/upcoming.php
Speakerpedia:
http://speakerpedia.com/speakers/professor-msrao
21
Success Sutras for Leaders:
Top 10 Leadership Books of the Year (San Diego University) Amazon URL: http://www.amazon.com/21-Success-Sutras-Leaders-ebook/dp/B00AK98ELI
Thanks for reading!
Kindly share your thoughts and
comments below, I’m sure someone out there will find your story useful.
Copyright©2015 MSR Leadership
Consultants India. All Rights Reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part
without permission is prohibited.
This is an educational blog for free
sharing of knowledge, not for commercial use. Please don't cut articles from my
blog and redistribute by email or post to the web. The use of this material is
free provided copyright is acknowledged and reference or link is made to the Blog
http://professormsrao.blogspot.com
This material may not be sold, or
published in any form, or used in the provision of business services to a third
party without permission.
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