How to Manage Conflicts the Emotionally Intelligent Way

Throwing Chairs

Conflicts are present in our lives no matter whether we are at work or home or in a volunteer position.

Managing conflicts can be a stressful experience for all parties involved.

Dealing With Conflict

Sometimes we create conflicts by our own actions and at other times, it comes our way by no doing of our own.

Irrespective of how it came about, we ought to have the skills to deal with it.

There is a spectrum of people on how they view conflicts. On one extreme is someone who avoids conflict at any cost and on the other extreme is a person who invites conflict. A lot of us are in the middle of this broad spectrum. I would say that neither of the extremes is good.

  • One should not avoid conflicts because if you throw things under the rug, there will come a point where you will trip over the rug yourself.
  • On the other extreme, you have people throwing (virtual) chairs at others by inviting conflict with people around them. And of course, this is certainly not the way to live in a social world.

Where ever we happen to be on this spectrum, we ought to know how to come out of a conflicting situation in a win-win manner.

Emotional Intelligence Steps

If you happen to have created the conflicting situation yourself, it should be easy for you to fix it. Keep your ego aside and make amends with the person with whom you have created the situation.

However, it is not that straightforward of a case when someone else creates a conflicting situation for you. In that case, you need to follow a certain process to deal with the entire situation.

  • First of all, try to get a hold on your emotions. When someone springs a conflict on you, usually, your emotions of anger will run high. They will most probably manifest in a physical way. Getting a hold on your emotions during the first few hours and not reacting is the key to handling it intelligently. I once got a great advice from my mentor – he told me to write an email to the person who had created a conflicting situation with me but save it as draft only. He told me to sit on it for twenty-four hours and then re-read my email. If you follow this advice, you will invariably find yourself changing the wordings of the email. I actually practiced this approach for first few times; after a few iterations, I got to a stage where I didn’t have to even pen down my emotions on a drafted email. I could work on it in my head but the point is to not take action until your emotions have subsided.
  • When your emotions have cooled down, you will be able to think rationally and put yourself in the shoes of the other person to understand why they acted in the way they did. Try and find out what exactly did you dislike about their behavior.
    • Is it what they said?
    • Is it the manner in which they said it?
    • Are they under some pressure to act in the way they did?
    • What really is the cause of your concern?
  • When you understand the cause of concern, have that important conversation with them in a heartfelt way. Show them that you understand where they are coming from and genuinely make them understand what you disliked about their behavior. When you speak from your heart, you will certainly succeed in reaching out to the other person and resolving the conflict.

So what type of person are you when it comes to handling conflicts at work? Are you more likely to throw it under a rug, or are you more likely to throw a chair? What steps can you take to moderate your tendencies to better handle conflict with emotional intelligence? I would love to hear your thoughts!

**********

Never miss an issue of Linked 2 Leadership, subscribe today here
Learn, Grow & Develop Other Leaders

———————
Aditi Chopra
Aditi Chopra is an experienced leader in the software industry
She is a consultant, writer and a leader
Email | LinkedIn |  Web | Blog | Twitter | Book

Image Sources: sd.keepcalm-o-matic.co.uk, kritischestudenten.nl

Leaders: How to Be a Successful CEO

Facebook and Apple

The Social Network movie gave a behind-the-scenes story on Mark Zuckerberg telling how he dropped out of Harvard while developing Facebook and has become one of the most famous, powerful, and youngest CEOs in the world.

How has he done this?

Leadership Lessons of Mark Zuckerberg and Steven Jobs

Walter Isaacson’s biography on Steven Jobs has generated many “spirited conversations” around “good leadership/bad leadership” and people have tried to pull leadership lessons and success stories from it.  I have shared many with my clients and colleagues.

What can we learn from these two very successful CEO’s?

Taken from ChiefExecuutive.net newsletter, Fast Company Magazine, Harvard Business Review, and a few of my own, here are lessons from two of the most famous and powerful CEO’s in the world.

1. Make your own evolution and development as a leader a top priority

Zuckerberg is one of the few CEOs in history to come to significant power without his personality fully formed. He was smart enough to take himself on as a project and proactively continues to grow and mold himself into the leader he aspires to be.

He began by studying and evaluating the successful people and companies around him; tapping them for insider lessons in leadership.

Jobs is all about employees engaging face to face. He had the Pixar and Apple buildings designed to promote unplanned encounters and collaborations.

If a building does not encourage that, you’ll lose a lot of innovation and the magic that’s sparked by serendipity

2. Be Open and allow for “true” communication

Facebook keeps their employees in the loop on where the company is going; especially in a fast-growing start up. This enhances confidence and unity.

3. Create a real office culture

Facebook’s is the Hacker Way and so it “questions assumptions, moves fast, takes risks, shares information, and learns from other smart people,” says FC.

4. Tolerate only “A” Players

Jobs passion for perfection and his desire to work with only the best is his way of preventing what he called “the bozo explosion”. This is when managers are so polite that mediocre people feel comfortable sticking around.

I’ve learned over the years that when you have really good people, you don’t have to baby them. By expecting them to do great things, you can get them to do great things.

5. Bend reality

They both pushed people to do the impossible because they didn’t realize it was possible. They helped their people to not be afraid if they got their mind around it; using the “yes you can” my magic motto.

As a leader, your best move might be to step out of the way and let someone else take charge.

Put people and products before profit.

6. Involve everyone in hiring practices

When Facebook was growing, everyone helped to bring in new talent and all had interviewing duties, even engineers. After all your current employees will be the ones working with the new hires.

Jobs shares:

“My passion has been to build an enduring company where people were motivated to make great products. Everything else was secondary. Sure, it was great to make a profit, because that allowed you to make great products. But the products not the profits were the motivation.”

Zuckerberg’s  team approaches every hire with an eye on the future.

“The people we hired were capable of solving the problems we knew were coming.”

7. Practice Leadership

“Making decisions on the basis of incomplete, inconclusive, or contradictory information is a skill that managers at every level must master. The learning comes from making thousands of small choices and mistakes on the way there.” ~Marc Randolph; Co-Founder Netflix

  • Focus: Trust data and your gut.

“Deciding what not to do is as important as deciding what to do. That is true for companies and it is true for products.” ~steve Jobs

  • Simplify: Cut clutter and make it easy to use.

Jobs insisted on being able to get whatever he wanted in three clicks. He even got rid of the on/off button

  • When behind, Leapfrog.

The mark of a good leader is not only that it comes up with new ideas first, but it also knows who to leapfrog when he finds himself behind.

  • Don’t be a slave to focus groups. 
  1. “Customers don’t know what they want until we’ve shown them. As Henry Ford shared many years ago, ‘If I’d asked customers what they wanted, they would have told me a faster horse.’”

Caring deeply about what customers want is much different from consistently asking them what they want, it requires intuition and instinct about desires that have not yet formed.

  • Push for perfection. 

Hit the pause button and go back to the drawing board if it is not perfect. Then take responsibility end to end for the employee and the customer interface.

8. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes

Zuckerberg says:

“So many businesses get worried about looking like they might make a mistake, they become afraid to take any risk. Companies are set up so that people judge each other on failure.”

  • Stay hungry; stay foolish.

“The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.” ~Apple’s Think Different commercial

Both of these men changed themselves and will continue to change the world. How will you? What can you do to become truly successful? I’d love to hear your thoughts!

**********

Never miss an issue of Linked 2 Leadership, subscribe today here!
Learn, Grow & Develop Other Leaders

——————–
Kristi Royse is CEO of KLR Consulting
She inspires success in leaders and teams with coaching and staff development

Email | LinkedIn | Web | Blog | Articles | Services | (650) 578-9626

Image Sources: techwench.com

Lazy Leaders: Get Off Your Pedestal

Drunken King

Whether leaders put themselves on a pedestal or the employees who work for them do, the pedestal is a wobbly place to be especially when the ground shakes beneath it.

I recently interviewed for a position in our Executive Leadership Development organization.  The interviewer, a person I’ve known for some time and greatly respect, had some of the best interview questions I’ve come across.

One question which resonated with me: 

 “If you could sprinkle magic dust over our leaders to change a perception or the way they do things, what would that be?”

The Faux Pedestal

In previous positions, I worked closely with technical assistants or directly with the executive.  What I found most interesting was that in many cases, employees feared these executives or put them on an unrealistic pedestal.

I also discovered that an executive’s technical assistant could be much more demanding than the executive would have condoned.  Leaders cannot be successful unless the people they lead respect and trust them.

Fear rarely triumphs.

Jim Collins outlines the issue when leaders care about themselves more than the institutions they are responsible for in his article The Misguided Mix-Up of Celebrity and Leadership.

A Most Respected Leader

The best memory of my favorite, most respected executive was the leader of the sales and marketing organization, we’ll call him Shane.  I had taken over a highly visible position running our largest internal conference.

I was quite nervous to actually hold a meeting with him the first time. I thought it odd that everyone was waiting patiently outside of the conference room when the clock struck 2:00pm.

Then I realized we had to “wait” until Shane invited us in.

One of the meeting attendees came up to me nervously and said “I promise I won’t speak.  I know that you aren’t supposed to speak, especially when Shane is thinking.”

My first thought was to run for the exit door.

A Better Approach

Was this exemplifying the “open door” culture my company embraced?  During the meeting while waiting for the thinking process to happen, I did not get the critical decisions I needed to move forward.  So my initial reaction after the meeting was that this standard approach was not going to work going forward.

Needless to say for subsequent meetings:

  • I entered the room at the time the meeting was to start.
  • I led the conversation to ensure the critical decisions were made.
  • I didn’t stress about the order of slides but focused on the context.
  • I was also very selective about having groupies not in attendance.

This created an environment of trust built around the conversation.  This approach allowed me to get what I needed and what Shane needed to make the necessary data driven decisions.  The two-year relationship was one of the best I have had with a great leader.

I am always amazed how employees still hold Shane on a pedestal he never put himself on.

He is the most “real” leader I’ve ever met.

It is a shame that others don’t get the opportunity to get past the celebrity persona.

Acting Like Drunken Kings

Unfortunately all of our executive leaders are not like Shane.

  • I have dealt with leaders who demand special treatment even though it goes against our company culture.
  • I have seen leaders dismiss the “peasants.”
  • I encountered one leader whose entourage walked around introducing themselves as “I’m John, I work for Mike”.  “I’m Chris, I work for Mike.”

Apparently I hadn’t had the privilege of drinking the “Mike Koolaid.”

In many cases regardless of a leader’s inappropriate pedestal, employees are still spellbound.  In many cases for those who see through the ego and acts of greatness, the disappointment and de-motivation comes at a high cost that the leader doesn’t even realize.

 The key lessons on the Pedestal Phenomena:

  • Get off the pedestal, it doesn’t benefit anyone including you
  • Be real.  If most employees knew leaders for the people they really are as human beings, the respect and output from the employees would be much higher
  • Make sure the ego doesn’t trump the cultural expectations of the ranks
  • Leaders need to be involved, human and respectful.  Remember “it takes a village” to run a company.  Every employee plays a role.
  • Don’t forget your roots.  Unless you are royalty, most aren’t born into a leadership role; they all started somewhere and earned their role to lead others.

**********

Never miss an issue of Linked 2 Leadership, subscribe today
Learn, Grow & Develop Other Leaders

——————–
Cheryl Dilley 
is a Program Director at Intel Corporation
She is a transformation leader, coach, and program strategist
Email | LinkedIn WebFacebook

Image Sources:  arm1.staticflickr.com

The Penalty Box: Plight of a Good Leader

Penalty

Believe it or not, leaders are human too. They make mistakes. And they suffer the consequences like the rest of us.

These mistakes can result from many reasons:

  • Not having all the right information before a decision is made
  • Not understanding the impact to all levels of the organization
  • Underestimating underlying relationships between stakeholdersmanagerscustomers, or peers
  • Not comprehending where alliances reside within the organization and among the upper ranks

Mistakes can also happen when a split-second-decision or choice ends up being the wrong one sending waves of repercussion.

On Mistakes and The Penalty Box

I recently reconnected with a dear friend of mine who I deeply respect as a manager and a leader. She shared with me her story of the Penalty Box. With her permission, here is Janet’s story.

Things are going good…

Janet had the pleasure of being promoted to manage a phenomenal team. The organization felt the stars had aligned and the teams were finally under the right umbrella.

Things turned bad…

But unfortunately paradise was short-lived. The leader of the larger organization (who we will call Bob) continually made bad choices that seemed to come straight from “Five Leadership Mistakes of the Galactic Empire.” Janet had made several attempts to escalate the issue to his managers. But this backfired on her. And unfortunately, this was a big mistake.

Her efforts backfired on her because she failed to comprehend the alignment of “The Good Ole Boys Club.”  

But things got better…

But over time, fate finally prevailed and the leader’s bad deeds caught up with Bob through an anonymous tip to the Ethics Committee. When the investigation hit, all of the documentation of issues she had provided to senior leaders were disclosed.

  • Hands were slapped for years of inaction.
  • The time between the escalation of the issue and the termination of Bob was quick.
  • Janet felt for once that “the system worked.

But things got worse…

What Janet did not comprehend was the aftermath it would have on her as a leader. The victory of a bad apple finally ousted became overshadowed by hurt egos from the VPs who had allowed a poor leader to wreak havoc for years.

Vengeance was swift, too:

  • Janet’s team was yanked and dispersed to the winds
  • She was moved to an individual contributor role; career death to any manager
  • She was told by Human Resources they couldn’t talk to her about it
  • And oddly, HR couldn’t explain her high manager feedback scores

The process finally became crystal clear:  “protect the manager and the company at all cost.

And they got even worse…

The additional consequence was her team believed she too must have done something wrong.

She was wrongly convicted:  Guilt by association.

Because everything had to be kept confidential, suspicion turned to distrust.

As the saying goes… No good deed goes unpunished.

On Misery and Its Company

What amazed me even more than the plight was what Janet told me next. She started to have conversations with other leaders and managers she trusted to get some advice on what to do.

Story after story emerged that was very similar to her own plight. She discovered that with high-stress, individuals take one of two actions:  Fight or Flight.

  • Many of the trusted colleagues fled
  • They left the company
  • Took a leave of absent
  • Accepted a demotion
  • Or moved to a different department

My friend had tried to move to another internal position, but was blocked from jobs she was more than qualified for.

This was when she decided to FIGHT!

Bringing It

Janet took the initiative to encouraged her manager to take on a critical transformation program. Within 18 weeks, she delivered a program that had not yet successfully been delivered before. Within 13 months the team developed a fully comprehensive world-class employee development system.

What a fight indeed!

Unhappy Endings

Unfortunately this isn’t a fairy tale with a happy ending. My friend is still in the Penalty Box because the VPs of the past still lead the organization.

Despite her accomplishments, she has not regained much needed trust to make her career there a success. Unfortunately for her, her company, and her career, her next step will probably be to leave the company.

She will take with her some valuable leadership lessons:

  •  Always understand underlying relationships within an organization, past, present and future
  • Comprehend where alliances reside amongst the leadership ranks

True Leadership

True leaders fight for their teams and their companies first and foremost. Unfortunately, many individuals today who hold leadership positions have regressed to “Survival of the Fittest.” As companies continue to get more and more top-heavy, the battle will continue to get uglier. The need for true leaders is more important than ever.

My final question to her was, where do you go from here? She told me her new golden rules: Even when others don’t believe in you, believe in yourself. Trust your gut, and those few trusted advisors.

Hopefully for this true leader, fate will prevail to release her from the Penalty Box landing her in the best job of her life.

**********

Never miss an issue of Linked 2 Leadership, subscribe today
Learn, Grow & Develop Other Leaders

——————–
Cheryl Dilley 
is a Program Director at Intel Corporation
She is a transformation leader, coach, and program strategist
Email | LinkedIn WebFacebook

Image Sources: seomoz.org


Leaders: How to Get More Creativity, Energy, and Clarity

Energized Employees

Do you want more creativity, energy, problem-solving, and clear-thinking at your workplace? Of course you do! Who doesn’t want a team that is happy, energetic, creative, and solves problems easily? 

I can’t think of one organization that couldn’t benefit in this way. I think we may have found the magic bullet.

And the great news is this:  it’s free, easy, and you don’t have to sell your soul to get it.

It’s not:

  • Some new drug
  • Some revolutionary new way of leading
  • More coffee or energy drinks in the vending machine
  • And it definitely is not that sugary donuts in the break room

But it is pretty much free and very easy to implement.

It’s (drum roll please). . . . . . . . exercise.

Be Wise, Exercise

I’m not talking about installing a new fitness center in your organization.  I’m talking about taking a 15-minute walk during the traditional smoke break, possibly having some of those meetings while walking around the facility, and encouraging your employees to do the same.  The impact could be nothing short of amazing!

Lack of activity destroys the good condition of every human being, while movement and methodical physical exercise save it and preserve it. Plato

In his book, Brain Rules, John Medinamakes a compelling case for change regarding productivity, creativity, and cognitive abilities.

Some of the key findings presented based on a multitude of scientific evidence include:

  • There is a direct link between exercise and brain function.
  • Our brains were designed to move.  Movement increases blood flow and oxygen to the brain which allows it to function at maximum capacity.
  • Exercise actually fertilizes the brain.
  • Studies indicate that children who exercise for just 30-minutes three times a week experienced increased test scores.  If you translate that logic to the workplace, can you see the potential?

Some Key Examples

Google is well-known for their facilities that encourage creativity.  The Googleplex in Mountain View, California boasts four fitness centers, bicycles located throughout the campus that employees use to get from one building to the other for meetings, volleyball courts, ping-pong tables, pool tables, and a host of other activities that promote movement throughout the day.

Google has experienced tremendous growth and continues to carry 61% of the search engine market.

Could the environment in which these people work have something to do with the capability of the company?

Patagonia, an outdoor apparel manufacturer, encourages employees to take breaks to go running, biking, or surfing in the middle of the workday.  Showers are provided and their flex schedules allow them to manage their time.

Physical fitness is not only one of the most important keys to a healthy body, it is the basis of dynamic and creative intellectual activity.  -John F. Kennedy

Take a Hike

On a personal note, I have very fond memories of a position I once held in which, like many of you, I ran from meeting to meeting all day long.  I found it difficult to touch base with my employees so I implemented, quite by accident, walking meetings.  This was a large campus and my meetings were often scattered.

I’d have the employee meet me and walk with me to the next meeting while we discussed whatever it was that needed discussing.  I never felt more productive, creative, or as healthy as I did while holding that position.

Looking back I have to wonder if the increased activity contributed to the increased creativity and productivity of our entire team.

You may be wondering at this point how on earth you can make such a massive change in your organization.  Maybe you own or work in a small business.  You likely do not have the resources of Google.

Here is what you can do on a smaller scale.

  • Hold more walking meetings.
  • Consider having a yoga instructor come on site once a week.
  • Consider putting a treadmill or two in a room.  When you need to have a closed-door meeting, invite your participant to get on a treadmill and talk.
  • Set the example for your employees so they feel comfortable getting more exercise.
  • Encourage others to walk during lunch.

What experiences have you had regarding exercise and your own productivity and creativity? What small, easy, and inexpensive solutions can you implement to get people moving? How can you create a culture of movement that helps your team get in some exercise during the day? I’d love to hear your thoughts.  

**********

Never miss an issue of Linked 2 Leadership, subscribe today.
Learn, Grow & Develop Other Leaders

——————–
Mari Peck is an Independent Consultant specializing in Leadership & OD
She helps leaders be their best & effectively implement organizational change
Email │Blog │LinkedInTwitter

Image Sources: corporatewellnessmagazine.com


Leadership Follies: Training Is Not A Cure-All

TrainingFor many years consultants and experts have tried to convince leaders that training can impact performance. It seems like the problem is no longer that they don’t believe that training is important, but that now those same leaders thing that training is the “cure-all” or “silver-bullet.”

“What has made people think that training people will magically make them more effective, efficient and overall higher performing?”  

Well, we told them it would.  But, we did too good of a job. We have too many people thinking that “training is a cure-all” for all leadership sins.

Training Feels Like the Right Thing

Problem:

My team is not performing up to expectations…

Solution:

Well, train them to perform better!

Problem:

My team is suffering from low morale…

Solution:

Well, train them… Of course!

Uhm… Really??? Do you actually think that ‘training is the cure-all?

Leaders and organizations are so concerned about making quick changes and hitting quarterly numbers that they are always looking for the fastest way to make employees “better.”

Training feels like the right thing. And in some cases it can be, But this is the case only if it used properly. Remember that it is an arrow in the quiver that is needed to solve organizational issues and not just the the bow and arrow.

About $5.6 billion to $16.8 billion is wasted annually on ineffective training programs. ~Cary Cherniss, Rutgers University

According to improvement consultant Jim Clemmer, most organizations use their training investments about as strategically as they deploy their office supplies spending.

In the end, the impact on customer satisfaction, cost containment, or quality improvement is just as useless.

Using Training Wisely

Training is an excellent way to help people increase their skill or learn about a big change. It is not a method to change behavior, And it is certainly not effective without set up and follow up.

A great way to think about using training is this:

  • Develop an overall plan to alter organizational performance, introduce effective processes, and show how training will fit in.
  • Make sure that people understand why they are being trained.
  • Create the training course so that they have a tangible outcome or things they can use right away.
  • Discuss the training with the group or individual very soon after the training.
  • Set new expectations for performance once the training is completed.
  • Allow time for the training to take.
  • Communicate with people as if the training has worked.

“Training as a stand alone tool is like trying lose weight with exercise alone.”

It’s a lot of work and only gets you 20 to 30 percent of the solution desired. In order train in the most effective way, your training needs to be part of a larger plan designed for a particular outcome. It is a great tool to support change or introduce new concepts.

The key is that training needs to be put into context of the larger effort.

Simple Rules

Just remember these three simple rules if you want to succeed:

  1. You can train skill; You cannot train will.
  2. Training is a great tool, but not the only tool for change
  3. Training is not magic and will NOT solve every problem. You can’t train away the blues.

Organizations that use training as the panacea will quickly see that people will not take to the training and in turn, resent it.

So, do you have a strategy for the training systems that you use? Does your training plan fit into a larger organizational strategy? Are you making sure that the training that you pay for is being used effectively? Are you paying enough attention to the ROI of your training budget? I’d love to hear your thoughts!

**********

Never miss an issue of Linked 2 Leadership, subscribe today.
Learn, Grow & Develop Other Leaders

——————–
Anil Saxena is a Senior Consultant and Business Partner with Corpus Optima
He helps organizations create environments that generate repeatable superior results
Email | LinkedIn | Web | Blog | (800) 267-1530 x711

Image Sources: cruxaustralisgroup.com

Occupied With Ethics

Occupy This

The following comments, spoken by a once-prominent business executive, appear to be a warning for graduates about the ethical challenges awaiting them in the business world. As it turns out, his words provide a hint that the speaker is a crook.

“You will be confronted with questions every day that test your morals. Think carefully, and for your sake, do the right thing, not the easy thing.” –Commencement Speaker to St. Anselm College’s Class of 2002

The Story Unfolds

That speaker is Dennis Kozlowski, the former CEO of Tyco International, who is currently serving a prison sentence for stealing hundreds of millions of dollars from his employer’s coffers.

You might remember seeing news stories about Kozlowski’s lavish lifestyle—a vintage yacht, millions in artwork, a $2.1 million birthday party for his wife in Sardinia—all paid for by the money he looted from Tyco.

What in Kozlowski’s seemingly helpful commencement remarks should have alarmed us to his lack of ethics? He played his hand by suggesting that doing the right thing is a choice—one that requires careful consideration.

“Truly ethical leaders know that behaving ethically is not an option to be weighed day-by-day, or question-by-question.

You’re either ethical or unethical. If you have to stop and think about how to respond to life’s moral tests, odds are you’re the latter. And that’s what should have tipped us off to Kozlowski’s true character.

“Doing the right thing should be an automatic reaction. But is doing the right thing always enough?”

Too Big to Fail?

Government BailoutsWhen a handful of New York City protesters first took to the streets to Occupy Wall Street, they were calling attention to an obvious injustice: the Wall Street leaders whose greed and corruption caused the Great Recession managed to escape the crisis largely untouched.

Taxpayer bailouts restored their companies’ damaged balance sheets—along with their outrageous personal bonuses—while ordinary Americans lost their jobs, their homes, and their faith in fairness.

In a sense, the Wall Street Occupiers are modern-day revolutionaries who, by standing up to corporate misbehavior, have fired a symbolic first shot in an emerging class war between the haves and have-nots.

“What took so long for the rebellion to begin?”

Why is it that, nearly four years into a devastating economic downturn, someone is finally pointing out that Wall Street institutions were not victims of the financial crisis—as many of them would like us to believe?

They were, to a large extent, the perpetrators who created it.

Occupy This

To be sure, critics of Occupy <your city name here> say the “movement” is too unorganized, too unfocused, or even too irrelevant.

But regardless of how you feel about them, these grassroots demonstrations are providing a needed reminder that ethical leadership requires a greater commitment than simply behaving ethically.

As leaders, we have the added duty to confront the unethical behavior we witness—to call out those people involved, lest they go unpunished.

Ironically, Dennis Kozlowski’s plummet from sought-after commencement speaker to convicted criminal symbolizes the wave of corporate corruption that made Business Ethics:101 a must-take college course.

For its part, Occupy Wall Street offers a lesson not covered in most business ethics classes: the willingness to speak out against unethical behavior—at work or on the streets—is a requirement to being an ethical leader.

And, like always doing the right thing, there really is no other choice.

**********

Never miss an issue of Linked 2 Leadership, subscribe today
Learn, Grow & Develop Other Leaders

——————-
George Brymer is the creator of The Leading from the Heart Workshop®
He delivers Leadership Workshops that help leaders at all levels evolve

Email | LinkedIn | Facebook | Twitter | Web | Blog | Skype: allsquareinc | (419) 265-3467

Image Sources: ritholtz.com, governmentbailout.org

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 37,792 other followers

%d bloggers like this: