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Real Time Strategic Change: How to Involve an Entire Organization in Fast and Far-Reaching Change
by Robert H. JacobsReal time strategic change is a way of redesigning how organizations change-a mindset and accompanying methodology-that ensures that • Change occurs at a fast pace and in real time throughout an organization. • Change occurs simultaneously within the whole organization. • Buy-in, commitment to, and ownership of a change effort is a natural by-product of involving people in the process of change. • People feel responsible for the ultimate success of the organization's change effort. • Broad, whole-picture views of the organization's reality form the basis of information used to support people in making changes. • Change is viewed as an integral component of people's "real business." • Substantial changes are made across an entire organization. The most successful organizations of the future will be those that are capable of rapidly and effectively bringing about fundamental, lasting, system-wide changes. In response to this challenge, Real Time Strategic Change advocates a fundamental redesign of the way organizations change. The result is an approach that involves an entire organization in fast and far-reaching change. Interactive large group meetings form the foundation for this approach, enabling hundreds and even thousands of people to collaborate in crafting their collective future. Change happens faster because the total organization is the "in group" that decides which changes are needed; and the actions people throughout the organization take on a daily basis are aligned behind an overall strategic direction that they helped create. Complete with conceptual frameworks, tools and techniques, agendas, and roles key actors need to play, this is the first book published on this powerful approach to organizational change. The process Robert Jacobs details has proven effective in diverse settings, ranging from business and industry to health care, education, government, non-profit agencies, and communities. Real Time Strategic Change demonstrates the flexibility and power of this approach in stories from such diverse organizations as Marriott Hotels, Ford Motor Company, Kaiser Permanente, First Nationwide Bank, United Airlines, and a group of 18 school districts.
Leadership for a Fractured World: How to Cross Boundaries, Build Bridges, and Lead Change
by Dean WIlliamsLeaders today—whether in corporations or associations, nonprofits or nations—face massive, messy, multidimensional problems. No one person or group can possibly solve them—they require the broadest possible cooperation. But, says Harvard scholar Dean Williams, our leadership models are still essentially tribal: individuals with formal authority leading in the interest of their own group. In this deeply needed new book, he outlines an approach that enables leaders to transcend internal and external boundaries and help people to collaborate, even people over whom they technically have no power.Drawing on what he's learned from years of working in countries and organizations around the world, Williams shows leaders how to approach the delicate and creative work of boundary spanning, whether those boundaries are cultural, organizational, political, geographic, religious, or structural. Sometimes leaders themselves have to be the ones who cross the boundaries between groups. Other times, a leader's job is to build relational bridges between divided groups or even to completely break down the boundaries that block collaborative problem solving. By thinking about power and authority in a different way, leaders will become genuine change agents, able to heal wounds, resolve conflicts, and bring a fractured world together.
A Black Woman's Guide to Getting Free
by Tamara Winfrey HarrisEmpowering, feminist guidance for Black women on living unapologetically and authentically-from the bestselling author of The Sisters Are Alright.Unshackle your authentic self from the expectations and stereotypes of American culture through the 6 pillars of living free as a Black woman.Tamara Winfrey Harris harnesses her knowledge as a two-time author and storyteller of the Black femme experience and nationally known expert on the intersections of race and gender to deliver a sharp feminist analysis that is illustrated by real-life stories and examples plucked from popular culture and intimate Black woman-to-Black woman truth-telling.This book is separated into two parts. First, the meaning of liberation is explored and Black women will be guided in creating sustaining practice to mature their well-being along the freedom journey. In part two, readers are introduced to the 6 pillars of living free as a Black woman: Spot the distortionsKnow your truthCelebrate the real youUnderstand the cost of liberationPractice freedomSEE free Black women everywhereWith the bold, astute writing that you have come to expect from Winfrey-Harris, A Black Woman's Guide to Getting Free urges Black women everywhere to choose themselves, and choose freedom, in a world that would have you chained.
Leading People Through Disasters: An Action Guide: Preparing for and Dealing with the Human Side of Crises
by Liz Guthridge Kathryn McKee, SPHRSooner or later, most organizations will face some kind of disaster--flood, fire, hurricane, earthquake, workplace violence, bombings, even the arrest or sudden death of the CEO. Existing books on crisis management deal almost exclusively with physical breakdowns, logistics issues, data losses and environmental and economic impacts. But it is people who actually make a business run, and Leading People Through Disasters is the first book to deal with the all-important human side of recovery. Kathryn McKee and Liz Guthridge show how to ensure that your business continuity plan addresses human as well as business issues and they offer detailed advice on what to do when disaster actually strikes--how to keep people safe, calm, and informed; help managers care for employees; and deal with employees' immediate and ongoing emotional and psychological needs while getting the organization back on its feet. This comprehensive guide features a wealth of examples, checklists, forms, and other practical tools that will help you take action when you need it most.
Women Lead the Way: Your Guide to Stepping Up to Leadership and Changing the World
by Linda Tarr-WhelanOffers practical steps for women to bring their passion, brains, and background to the power tables and make life better for themselves, their company or organization and global society. • Combines compelling research, international experience, and fascinating personal stories with solid advice • Tarr-Whelan has extensive background as a business woman, a government official, a non-profit leader, and a nurse A few “first women” are making key decisions in high places but a few is not enough to have a significant impact. Changing what gets decided takes changing who makes the decisions. But with just 17% of Congressional seats and 14% of Fortune 500 board seats held by women, the leaders defining priorities and solutions continue to look and act much the same as generations ago. Linda Tarr-Whelan marshals eye-opening facts and figures to decisively dispel the myths that still hold women back and shows women how to build their confidence and skills to pioneer a distinctive approach to leadership, one that emphasizes collaboration, communication and consensus. The proven tipping point, surprisingly, is just 30%--when women’s representation at the top reaches 30%, real change starts to happen. Drawing on her extraordinarily diverse background as a consultant, organizer, and diplomat, Tarr-Whelan offers a women-led strategy for change and a complete set of practical road-tested tools readers can use to become powerful partners in creating a better future in a rapidly changing world. Closing the leadership gap is a win for everyone—it brings in new ideas, creates a more balanced and productive work environment, a revitalized social compact and demonstrable positive effects on the bottom line in business and government. Women Lead the Way artfully combines advocacy, research, and tactical guidance to help readers wedge the door open and bring more women through and up.
Great Lessons in Project Management
by David Pratt PMPLearn from Other Projects to Avoid Pitfalls on Your Projects!Projects fail at an alarming rate, whether they are information technology, training, construction, or policy development projects. No matter the focus, each year we experience an abundance of challenged projects that either require super-human effort to resuscitate or die an untimely death.Great Lessons in Project Management is a treasure trove of lessons learned from troubled projects—and from projects that went well. This collection of stories describes the events surrounding a particular challenge a project manager faced or a tool that another used effectively. Project managers of all types of projects can draw on these stories to validate their own good practices and to avoid the pitfalls so many have encountered on their projects.
Second Innocence: Rediscovering Joy and Wonder; A Guide to Renewal in Work Relati Ons and Daily Life
by John B. Izzo"What might happen," John Izzo writes, "if we began to think of innocence as a quality we bring to our lives, a perspective and a way of looking at the world, which is not replaced by experience but which influences our experience? When we choose innocence as a frame to experience the world, the qualities of hope, idealism, openness, and faith nurture the experience of wonder and joy in our lives." In the tradition of Robert Fulgham and Richard Carlson, Izzo uses his experiences as a son, husband, father, employee, minister, author and corporate speaker to inspire readers to see the world from this new, rejuvenating perspective. Chapters with titles like Full Speed Ahead In The Wrong Direction, Choose Your Glasses Carefully, Getting Past Your Expiration Date, The Burned-Out Buddha and The Power of Not Now explore how to reclaim our innocence in four realms --- daily life, faith, work, and relationships. "It is not that experience should not shape our idealism", Izzo tells us. "In fact, our initial innocence must be shaped by our experiences. To hold on to our innocence is a life long process and it is our ability to foster the quality of innocence that continues to bring us to the edge of what is possible in our lives and in our communities. That we may choose innocence and idealism while incorporating the harder experiences of living is the core premise of this book." Both practical and inspiring, Second Innocence combines wonderful stories with an inspiring philosophy to help us maintain our idealism and enthusiasm throughout our lives.
Human Resource Management in the Knowledge Economy: New Challenges, New Roles, New Capabilities
by Cyndy Lengnick-Hall Mark Lengnick-HallOffers a fundamentally new conceptual model for the human resource function to meet the challenges of the knowledge economy Provides concrete suggestions for implementing this model, including numerous examples of effective practices from leading-edge firms Synthesizes current thinking on knowledge management and intellectual capital and identifies how human resource management can make a value-added contribution As more organizations recognize the importance of intellectual capital and knowledge management to competitive success, you would expect human resources (HR) to move to the forefront of organizational leadership. Yet, to the contrary, HR continues to be criticized for its operational and bureaucratic focus and its inability to keep up with changes in the environment. Human Resource Management in the Knowledge Economy examines how human resource management must change if it is to remain a vital part of the organization. The Lengnick-Halls show how HR departments can move beyond a simple operational focus on attracting, selecting, developing, retaining, and using employees to a more strategic focus on managing human capital and managing knowledge. The book identifies the most important features of the knowledge economy and details four new roles HR must adopt in order to help organizations succeed in this new environment: human capital steward, knowledge facilitator, relationship builder, and rapid deployment specialist. Each of these roles is defined and described in detail using examples from leading-edge businesses. Human Resource Management in the Knowledge Economy describes how human resource management has evolved and continues to evolve to meet the increasing demands of organizations for sources of competitive advantage.
Hot Spots: Why Some Teams, Workplaces, and Organizations Buzz with Energy - And Others Don't
by Lynda GrattonYou always know when you are in a Hot Spot. You feel energized and vibrantly alive. Your brain is buzzing with ideas, and the people around you share your joy and excitement. Things you've always known become clearer, adding value becomes more possible. Ideas and insights from others miraculously combine with your own to create new thinking and innovation. When Hot Spots arise in and between companies, they provide energy for exploiting and applying knowledge that is already known and genuinely exploring what was previously unknown. Hot Spots are marvelous creators of value for organizations and wonderful, life-enhancing phenomena for each of us. Lynda Gratton has spent more than ten years investigating Hot Spots--discovering how they emerge and how organizations can create environments where they will proliferate and thrive. She has studied dozens of companies and talked to hundreds of employees, managers, and executives in the US, Europe, and Asia. She has asked the important questions: Why and when do Hot Spots emerge? What is it about certain groups of people that support the emergence of Hot Spots? What role do leaders play? She's discovered a host of elements that together contribute to the emergence of Hot Spots--creating energy and excitement, and supporting and channeling that energy into productive outcomes. In this groundbreaking book, Gratton describes four crucial qualities that an organizational culture must have to support the emergence of Hot Spots, looks at what leaders can do to encourage them, and offers activities and tools you can use in your own company to increase the probability of them arising. In these days when traditional organizational boundaries are becoming barriers to progress, Gratton offers advice and guidance that you can use right now to increase the probability of Hot Spots emerging in your organization.
Power Through Partnership: How Women Lead Better Together
by Betsy Polk Maggie Ellis ChotasWINNER OF THE 2015 SILVER MEDAL IPPY AWARD IN BUSINESS/CAREER/SALES. Betsy Polk and Maggie Chotas have learned something powerful: when women work together they discover a level of support, flexibility, confidence, accountability, and freedom to be themselves that they rarely find in other work relationships. Drawing on their own twelve-year partnership and from interviews with 125 women business partners, Polk and Chotas demolish the myths that keep women from collaborating and offer advice for handling a host of potential challenges. This groundbreaking book shows that when women team up—combining complementary skills, channeling their egos into the partnership, and encouraging each other—they can work as full equals to achieve something that's exponentially greater than each woman alone.
Finding Our Way: Leadership for an Uncertain Time
by Margaret J. WheatleyFor years, Margaret Wheatley has written eloquently about humanizing our organizations and helping people to work together more effectively and compassionately. She has shown how breakthroughs in chaos theory and quantum physics can enable organizations to function more like responsive, self-organizing living systems, rather than cold mechanisms of control. And she has gradually expanded these ideas into the wider arena of human society.In short, Margaret Wheatley is one of the most innovative and influential organizational thinkers of our time, and Finding Our Way brings together her shorter writings for the first time, touching on all the topics she has addressed throughout her career, showing how she has applied the ideas in her books s in many different situations. "The pieces presented here", she writes, "represent ten years of work, of how I took the ideas in my books and applied them in practice in many different situations. However, this is not a collection of articles. I updated, revised, or substantially added to the original content of each one. In this way, everything written here represents my current views on the subjects I write about." Provocative, challenging, at times poetic, and often deeply moving, Finding Our Way sums up Wheatley's thinking on a diverse scope of topics from leadership and management to education and raising children in turbulent times; from societal commentary to specific organizational techniques and more.
The 6 Enablers of Business Agility: How to Thrive in an Uncertain World
by Karim HarbottAdopting the latest agile tools and practices won't be enough to respond to rapid market change. Leaders must first lay the groundwork by creating the right environment for these tools to work. Many managers struggle to install the underlying organizational operating system for business agility. High-performing agile organizations depend on the strength of six key enabling factors: leadership, culture, structure, people, governance, and ways of working. This book explains why these factors are important and how they work together to increase organizational agility. Real-world examples, stories, and tools will help leaders get realistic about the scope of changes needed in their organizations and show them how to get started.Karim Harbott does not offer a book of recipes. Instead, he focuses on mindset, principles, and general patterns. This book summarizes of the most important factors in increasing organizational agility and why they work, which leaders will need to consider in a so-called agile transformation. Because every organization is different, each will have its own route to agility and high performance. Managers will need to tackle all the areas that are crucial to creating an environment in which any chosen approach can work.
Revolutionizing Business Operations: How to Build Dynamic Processes for Enduring Competitive Advantage
by Tony Saldanha Filippo PasseriniDon't risk the dire consequences of your work processes becoming obsolete-discover a powerful model for constant, ongoing, enterprise-wide process evolution and optimization.If you have a great product, but don't have the operations in place to efficiently and effectively support it-production, manufacturing, sales, finance, human resources, etc.-you won't succeed. Product innovation is seen as flashier and so gets far more attention, but you can create an enduring competitive advantage by revolutionizing business operations. The problem is most attempts to improve business operations are reactive, sporadic, and siloed. Tony Saldanha and Filippo Passerini's Dynamic Process Transformation model provides a living model for constant, ongoing process evolution and optimization. The authors focus on maximizing three drivers of change. First, open market rules-each business process must be run as a separate business, instead of via monolithic mandates coming down from on high. Second, there must be unified accountability- outcomes must be clear and consistent across the company, instead of being siloed within departments. And third, there needs to be a dynamic operating engine, a methodology to convert the constantly changing business process goals into tactical day-to-day employee actions.With numerous examples from leading companies, this book shows how to proactively keep business processes across the company from becoming obsolete and take advantage of a neglected key to success.
The Serious Business of Small Talk: Becoming Fluent, Comfortable, and Charming
by Carol FlemingSmall Talk Is the Single Most Important Communication Skill You Can Develop Carol Fleming wants to show you that small talk is not as "small" as you might think. It's the foundation of every relationship, professional and personal. It is the sound of people reaching out to each other, searching for similarities, shared interests, goodwill, connections, and friendship. And it's something we all do every day with people we know. It's just the one little bit about strangers that throws some people off. Graceful social conversation can be learned, even by those requiring the smallest of baby steps.Fleming covers the inner and outer aspects—from the right attitude to how to dress, move around, and introduce yourself. Most importantly, she lays out a series of simple, memorable conversational strategies that make it easy to go from "Nice weather we're having" to a genuine, rewarding give-and-take. But she won't tell you what to say. Believe it or not, you already have what you need inside you. She merely provides the keys to unlock it. Small talk is the language of welcome, the extension of friendliness, the gracious acknowledgment of others, the kindly exchange of introductions and smiles, and the creation of a safe, courteous social space—and this is what has you terrified? After you read this book, you'll wonder what all the fuss was about.
The Innovation Paradox: Why Good Businesses Kill Breakthroughs and How They Can Change
by Tony Davila Marc EpsteinFor more than twenty years, major innovations—the kind that transform industries and even societies—seem to have come almost exclusively from startups, despite massive efforts and millions of dollars spent by established companies. Tony Davila and Marc Epstein, authors of the bestselling Making Innovation Work, say the problem is that the very processes and structures responsible for established companies’ enduring success prevent them from developing breakthroughs. This is the innovation paradox. Most established companies succeed through incremental innovation—taking a product they’re known for and adding a feature here, cutting a cost there. Major breakthroughs are hard to achieve when everything about the way your organization is built and run is designed to reward making what already works work a little better. But incremental innovation can coexist with breakthrough thinking. Using examples from both scrappy startups and long-term innovators such as IBM, 3M, Apple, and Google, Davila and Epstein explain how corporate culture, leadership style, strategy, incentives, and management systems can be structured to encourage breakthroughs. Then they bring it all together in a new model called the Startup Corporation, which combines the philosophy of the startup with the experience, resources, and network of an established company. Breakthrough innovation no longer has to be the nearly exclusive province of the new kids on the block. With Davila and Epstein’s assistance, any company can develop paradigm-shifting products and services and maximize the ROI on its R&D.
Accountability: Freedom and Responsibility Without Control
by Randy Spitzer Robert LebowUsing a wealth of real-world examples, this breakthrough book offers a new freedom-based management paradigm that radically improves every aspect of business-from how we hire, compensate, and motivate people to how we address quality issues, serve customers, review employees, and more. Accountability tells the story of Pete Williams, a hard-charging CEO, who meets Stan "Kip" Kiplinger, a retired businessman, during a cross-country train trip. Pete's manufacturing business is in critical condition; productivity is falling. He's tried all the popular management approaches, but he can't get his people to be accountable for meeting their goals. Kip points out that every management system Pete has used is ultimately based on controlling people. Rather than encouraging people to be accountable, control-based systems discourage accountability by destroying people's sense of ownership of their job. Kip introduces Pete to a new way of leading people based on freedom-giving people the freedom to make their own choices and to do it their way. This doesn't mean anarchy; it means leadership expects everyone to act like an adult and take responsibility for his or her actions and their outcomes. Accountability details how this new approach yields a consistent flow of creative innovations and organizational improvements impossible under the old, coercive systems.
The Cornerstones of Engaging Leadership
by Casey WilsonIn the 21st Century, people are the competitive advantage. The talent and level of dedication of an organization's workforce make the difference in achieving success. The traditional command-oriented leadership style is not enough to keep today's employees motivated—they need to be engaged. They need passion, connection, and inspiration, and a willingness to put forth their best efforts to benefit themselves and their organization. The Cornerstones of Engaging Leadership connects what we know about engagement on an organizational level to what an individual leader can do to increase engagement. Using real-world examples, Wilson reveals the key actions leaders must take to connect with and engage others: •Build trust•Leverage unique motivators•Manage performance from a people-centric perspective•Engage emotions By committing to these four cornerstones of engaging leadership, leaders can unleash the potential of others and inspire effective performance. Through practice tools and exercises, readers are challenged to explore, reflect upon, and apply key concepts and techniques of the engaging leader approach.
Building Better Ideas: How Constructive Debate Inspires Courage, Collaboration, and Breakthrough Solutions
by B. Kim BarnesWhy do teams settle for bad ideas or kill good ones? Popular consultant B. Kim Barnes's unique process of constructive debate shows how teams can create better ideas and outcomes by eliminating obstacles to honest discussion, creativity, and collaboration. In too many organizations, great ideas and unusual solutions can be suppressed, ignored, or attacked. Departments defend their turf, and people choose what is safe over what is better. Bad ideas move forward and good ideas die, which can lead to disastrous results—financial or otherwise. Luckily, there is a workable path out of this dysfunction. Kim Barnes's process of constructive debate shows how to establish conditions that encourage the free exchange, discussion, and development of ideas and eliminate conditions that prevent potentially useful ideas from getting heard. By using this tested model, any company or team can improve outcomes and bring out everyone's best ideas.A constructive debate is one in which a diverse group of individuals can express their ideas, engage others in building on and improving them, explore ideas deeply, and challenge one another's positions in a fair and productive way. In this book, you'll learn a set of behaviors you can model and encourage and a process you can facilitate, lead, or support your client in leading. In this time, where opinions can be tribal and differences can lead to unconstructive conflict, it's important to find ways to build robust ideas through a thoughtful, fair, and inclusive approach.
Thinking at the Speed of Bias: How to Shift Our Unconscious Filters
by Sara TaylorA practical guide to tackling unconscious bias in a polarized world.Learn to recognize your unconscious bias and create positive change.Respected DEI expert Sara Taylor presents a down-to-earth guide on how to tackle unconscious biases and foster true equity in our rapidly changing world. Through relatable examples and practical strategies, readers learn to deliberately slow down their thought processes and become aware of their filters in various situations. Taylor encourages readers to question their own assumptions by asking, "Do I know that what I'm thinking is actually true?" and "Why might I be reacting this way?"The book demonstrates the importance of a clear set of competencies, skills, and strategies for addressing unconscious bias. By developing a culturally competent mindset and using a shared, holistic language to discuss these issues, readers gain the tools to understand, discuss, and implement change both at home and in the workplace. This approach avoids blame or shame, making it accessible and empowering for everyone.The book's insights extend beyond individuals; it demonstrates how organizations can scale up cultural competence to transform their structures and systems. With a strong sense of hope, readers are empowered to make a difference, creating a more just and equitable world for all.
Presencing: 7 Practices for Transforming Self, Society, and Business
by C. Otto Scharmer Katrin KauferA revolutionary guide to catalyzing multi-system change and planetary healing.Experience 7 practices combined with powerful frameworks to create a more integrated and conscious future from the bestselling author of Theory U.We are living in a time of unprecedented crisis and breakdown. But amid the chaos, small "islands of coherence" are emerging-localized pockets of pioneering thought leaders taking action to begin to catalyze multi-system transformation.Incorporating proven frameworks like Social Fields and the Collective Evolutionary Mirror, the authors share transformative real-world stories of these islands of coherence from the frontlines of change across the globe. You'll go inside the experiences of paradigm-shifting change makers and gain powerful practices for sensing and actualizing the future that wants to emerge.This book outlines 7 critical contributions for elevating our civilization including:•becoming aware•generative listening•dialogue and co-sensing•presencing•ecosystem leadership•co-creating across boundaries•build unityWith this holistic guide, you'll discover how your local actions can cascade into a planetary movement for human and ecological flourishing. The next renaissance is emergent-be a part of birthing it into reality.
Designing Transformative Experiences: A Toolkit for Leaders, Trainers, Teachers, and other Experience Designers
by Brad McLainOffering a new lens on leadership and living, this research-based guide shows how to design experiences that can touch hearts, provoke minds, and change lives in powerful ways.Transformative experiences are life events that change our sense of self in important ways. How do they work? What elements do they require? How can we learn to design them intentionally?By embracing the research-based approach of ELVIS (the Experiential Learning Variables and Indicators System), this book details how to recast yourself as an Experience Design Leader, one that can provide those in your organization with the opportunities needed to reflect and grow as individuals.Beginning with the ELVIS Framework, you will gain deep foundational insight into how transformative experiences work. And then with the ELVIS Toolkit, which includes seven practical design elements, you will have the key to unlocking these powerful experiences for yourself and others.Whether you are new to the idea of designing experiences for others or are a seasoned veteran, ELVIS shows you how to tap into the psychology operating behind the most powerful and important experiences of our lives-those that shape who we are.
How to Save a Failing Project: Chaos to Control
by Dennis C. Nagle Ralph R. Young DBA Steve M. Brady PMPYou CAN Turn Around A Failing Project!Poor project results are all too common and result in dissatisfied customers, users, and project staff. With countless people, goals, objectives, expectations, budgets, schedules, deliverables, and deadlines to consider, it can be difficult to keep projects in focus and on track. How to Save a Failing Project: Chaos to Control arms project managers with the tools and techniques needed to address these project challenges. The authors provide guidance to develop a project plan, establish a schedule for execution, identify project tracking mechanisms, and implement turnaround methods to avoid failure and regain control.With this valuable resource you will be able to:• Identify key factors leading to failure• Learn how to recover a failing project and minimize future risk• Better analyze your project by defining proper business objectives and goals• Gain insight on industry best practices for planning
The Innovation Code: The Creative Power of Constructive Conflict
by Jeff DeGraff Staney DeGraffThe Innovation CodeThe Creative Power of Constructive ConflictHarmony is sublime in music but deadly to innovation. The only way to create new, hybrid solutions is to clash. Innovation happens when we bring people with contrasting perspectives and complementary areas of expertise together in one room. We innovate best with people who challenge us, not people who agree with us. It sounds like a recipe for chaos and confusion. But in The Innovation Code, Jeff DeGraff, dubbed the "Dean of Innovation," and Staney DeGraff introduce a simple framework to explain the ways different kinds of thinkers and leaders can create constructive conflict in any organization. This positive tension produces ingenious solutions that go far beyond "the best of both worlds." Drawing on their work with nearly half of the Fortune 500 companies, the DeGraffs help you harness the creative energy that arises from opposing viewpoints. They identify four contrasting styles of innovator—the Artist, the Engineer, the Athlete, and the Sage—and include exercises and assessments for building, managing, and embracing the dynamic discord of a team that contains all four. You can also figure out where you fit on the continuum of innovator archetypes. Using vivid examples, The Innovation Code offers four steps to normalize conflict and channel it to develop something completely new. By following these simple steps, you will get breakthrough innovations that are both good for you and your customers. This is a rigorous but highly accessible guide for achieving breakthrough solutions by utilizing the full—and seemingly contradictory—spectrum of innovative thinking.
Inclusion Breakthrough: Unleashing the Real Power of Diversity
by Judith H. Katz Frederick A. MillerConstant, continuing, and cataclysmic change is causing a major crisis within business organizations today. Faced with constantly advancing technology, unpredictable market shifts, intense global competition, and an increasingly independent "free agent" workforce, the only way for an organization to adapt and succeed is to build a "culture of inclusion" that nurtures and draws on the talents of a diverse workforce. Easy to say but hard to do; most organizations are mired in industrial revolution, static-world business models administered by monocultural, bordering-on-oppressive, "command and control" hierarchies. Organizations at risk include Fortune 500 giants, entrepreneurial start-ups, manufacturing and retail operations, government agencies, not-for-profits, educational institutions, and others. Most organizational change efforts-whether labeled as diversity efforts, re-engineering, right-sizing, or total-quality-management-are a waste of time, money, and human effort. Most produce more cynicism than results, and they can poison the waters for future change efforts. The Inclusion Breakthrough cuts a path through this potential minefield, offering a proven methodology for strategic organizational change, including models for diagnosing, planning, and implementing inclusion-focused, culture-change strategies tailored to each organization's individual needs. It also describes the key competencies for leading and sustaining a culture of inclusion. Offering real-world results of "before and after" surveys, including anecdotal and statistical reports of organizational change achieved using the methodologies described, The Inclusion Breakthrough presents an overview of current workplace conditions, attitudes, and policies based on interviews, surveys, and focus groups encompassing thousands of people in major organizations. The Inclusion Breakthrough demonstrates why the bottom line must be the central focus of any change strategy-and more importantly, how to carry that strategy out successfully.
The Greater Goal: Connecting Purpose and Performance
by Ken Jennings Heather HydeOne of the most powerful forces on Earth is an organization fully aligned, individual by individual, team by team, to achieve mutual success. In this vivid business story, Ken Jennings and Heather Hyde provide a road map to guide leaders through the process of engaging employees at all levels of the organization to find the deeper meaning and higher purposes of their work. Learning these methods is Alex Beckley, a leader who receives a wake-up call that inspires him to live and lead differently. He discovers how to invite his coworkers to join a cause, not just a company—to commit to a Greater Goal—and lead the process of shared goal achievement. Alex learns the Star Model, a process encompassing five practices that can help you discover and deliver on your own purpose and passions, in alignment with many others, to accomplish something good and great. Come along on the adventure!