by Lynn Harrison, Ph.D. The focus of my dissertation research was the phenomenon of abrasive leadership, that is, a pattern of managerial behavior that causes significant distress for coworkers, impacting organizational functioning. In doing my initial research, I found that most of the writing on this topic was focused (quite understandably) on the recipients of this… Read more »
Tag: Leadership
Stop managing and start leading!
No one likes to be managed. It is intrinsically diminishing and a poor substitute for leadership. Managing also doesn’t work as a long-term strategy for enrolling people in a shared effort, whether in business, families, or communities. So, how did we come to elevate managing and management as the epitome of leadership, and why do… Read more »
Holocracy: Leadership from inside out
Holacracy is a real-world-tested social technology for purposeful organization. It radically changes how an organization is structured, how decisions are made, and how power is distributed.Implementing holocracy means that CEOs give up some level of power. The advantage is that they get to view their company through an entirely different vantage point. But it’s an adjustment… Read more »
Education contributing to issues and being a solution for environmental sustainability
The world of education is under a tremendous amount of pressure to serve two masters. Traditional approaches are called for to ensure students gain opportunities for the next step in their learning journey and new thinking and innovation are required to ensure students are prepared for a world that is ever changing and uncertain. These… Read more »
Rethinking Ghana’s Energy Future
In late 2006 and continuing into 2007, Ghana experienced a major power crisis that caused planned power outages, also known as load shedding, with outages lasting up to 72 consecutive hours. Since then, Ghana has sought to strengthen its electricity sector. However, in spite of these efforts, power supply continues to be a challenge. For… Read more »
Engaging Team Members: Managing by Building Relationships
As discussed in Keeping Team Members Engaged in a Distributed Workplace: Initial Thoughts for Discussion, it is hard to stay current with everything, let alone be fully active in all of the networks in which we are members. It is a challenge to accomplish work demands while fulfilling personal responsibilities, not to mention trying to… Read more »
Effective Teams Begin with Trust
Dysfunctional teams can produce results, but not consistently and not over the long term. An effective team that produces results consistently requires many attributes, but they all must begin with trust. More than anything else, trust enables people to work together effectively. Stephen M. R. Covey, author of The Speed of Trust, says this workplace… Read more »
5 Things Managers Should Say to Employees
Now that the economy is beginning to pick up, it’s becoming harder to retain quality employees. And just because your company may offer many attractive benefits and good wages, doesn’t mean you’ll be able to hold on to your best performers. Research has found that people join a company due to its reputation, but they… Read more »
The Importance of Gender Equity
In my last blog Strengthening our Social Fabric, I mentioned Sweden’s emphasis on gender equity as a way to create a good society. Here I will further consider the systemic implications of gender equity in hopes that we consider its importance to all societies. The Global Gender Gap report (2013) rates 136 countries on their… Read more »
Learning Across Boundaries – The ISSS-2014 Conference in Washington, D.C.
The 58th meeting of the International Society for the Systems Sciences was held George Washington University, in Washington, D.C. Gerald Midgley president for this year, and his conference team, are to be commended for creating a great week of learning. The theme of the conference was “Learning Across Boundaries: Exploring the variety of systemic theory and practice.” That theme was reflected… Read more »