Archive for the 'CEO' Category
Mein Artikel “Coaching in der arabischen Welt” wurde nun im Coaching Magazin 2/2011! veröffentlicht:
Coaching im internationalen Kontext – Erfahrungen und Einblicke
Ich arbeite immer mehr als Coach mit international tätigen Führungskräften. Mich hat bisher frustriert, dass die Welt des Coaching und die Welt international tätiger Führungskräfte kein relevantes Modell oder Konzept verbindet. Die zahlreichen Angebote kulturspezifischer oder interkultureller Coachings greifen in der Regel zu kurz, wenn es etwa um die Betrachtung unterschiedlicher Führungsverständnisse im internationalen Kontext geht. Auch die Forschungswelt bietet nur wenig Hilfestellung, um das Thema umfassend zu durchdringen.
Deshalb habe ich meine Praxiserfahrung und meine Lessons Learned in einem Artikel. Erschienen in Ausgabe 2/2009 des Coaching-Magazins. hier pdf download
Hier eine Lesermeinung:
„Glückwunsch, Ihr Beitrag „Coaching im internationalen Kontext“ war für mich einer der interessantesten seit langem – sehr ansprechend, konkret und theoretisch relevant aufbereitet, selten in der Qualität vorzufinden. Macht deutlich worum es gehen kann, sehr differenziert und zustimmungsfähig, auch die ausdrückliche Relativierung der Bennennungen von Coaching mit Betonung, richtig sei, was hilft – was ja nicht Beliebigkeit meint.“
Report on 2nd ESMT Annual Forum: CEOs and leading international academic experts analyze economic crisis
After the opening of the ESMT Annual Forum by Michael Diekmann, leading CEOs such as Dr. Josef Ackermann, Håkan Samuelsson, James S. Turley, Narayana Murthy and Dr. Dieter Zetsche discussed the effects of the financial crisis on the real economy. The strongest mindset change I could sense was that “I do not know and it is helpful to ask others for support – I am not a genius” became OK for a CEO to say. Personally I do think the discussion could have been more interactive (German way of dealing with authorities may have played a role) and the questions more challenging.
The video shown by the artist Marina Landia was great, she managed to develop a sequence where you could see and feel global leaders behind their faccade – a virtual discussion as a patchwork of interview pieces. This video could have been showed before the panel discussion, it would have surely changed the tone and brought a more reflective and holistic view! Read the rest of this entry »
TRICKY COACHING: DEALING WITH DIFFICULT CASES IN LEADERSHIP COACHING
Here you can find a case study of a difficult coaching situation and I how I dealt with it. Read the rest of this entry »
Obama’s example in this video is definitely a role model for me. Many people are moaning he is not doing enough, but which “werstern” president have quoted different religions and a Hadith from Islam in such an important speech. It is an important lesson for people working in a diverse environment, you can reach people hurts by connecting to their culture, it needs little effort and has a huge impact.
Video: President Obama quotes Hadith in Speech
common sense but not common practice!
How to make decisions in such a chaotic situation?
Today’s finance and somehow also world crisis is challenging for many leaders. The tools they have learned, the experiences they have made are no longer helpful. Reading the newspaper every morning, you find tons of reports about top manager who are paralyzed with fear, even panicking, mainly because they just do not know what to do. They do not know what impact their decisions will have. To put it in a nutshell they lost all CONTROL!
Today’s situation is not just complicated or complex – it is chaotic. The turbulence is extremely high; there are no cause-and effect-relationships – so no point for looking for right versus wrong answers. The number of unknowable is increasing and everybody is under pressure to make decisions but we all lack time to think. Which results in high tension, pressure and even burn out. It is however a great chance to learn. I do not want to sound sarcastic, but we – as systemic consultants and researcher in the field – are preaching since many years that leading in complex and chaotic situations will become the norm and that leaders should start practicing. Today you can start. How? Read the rest of this entry »
Martin (CEO) called on the phone Friday 5pm:
Martin: “I need to talk to you, I want to make a decision if I want to continue working with my CFO or not! You know him, what do you think?”
Amel: “If you ask me if you should fire him or not, I am not going to give you an answer. However lets talk about what is going on in your mind right now. I can help you make your own decision based on your criteria and observation and reflect with you consequences for the business and for the organization.”
During our conversation, we found out the following main issues:
• Martin was not happy with the performance of the CFO nor was the top team. The CFO did not follow up on decisions made by the board if he did not agree personally, he would say yes and then act differently upon his convictions.
• We also found out that the CFO who was part of the organization since 25 years was hoping to become CEO himself, he never accepted Martin – an outside newcomer – as a boss. And the two were too different in their styles. Martin was suffering because of this lack of acceptance.
• The CFO had a lot of fans and high acceptance within the organization, Martin was afraid if he would fire him, that he will have an “internal rebellion” perhaps even sabotage and the organization was in a difficult turn around situation. Read the rest of this entry »
I am reading the book of Carly Fiorina, Tough Choices: A Memoir. Actually I am listening to it since a dear friend made me a gift of the CD’s. Carly Fiorina herself is the speaker. She talks about her whole carrier and about her time as HP CEO. I am impressed by the openness and details of different events. Almost every story includes a leadership lesson. For every person working in the corporate world, this book is probably reassuring since you discover that not only you has these weird corporate craziness experiences but that is totally normal!!!
One lesson I liked very much is when she says: “Any structure, even one that it awkward and unwieldy, can work with enough alignment and teamwork”. I used this immediately within a client project. The head of R&D wanted to restructure the whole department. So I interviewed him about his management team: how aligned are they? and also about the level of collaboration and teamwork. He discovered that he needs to work on these issues and spend his energy and the commitment of his employees on increasing alignment and collaboration instead of wasting a lot of energy and focus during a big reorganization. If after all efforts he still believed it needs reorganization – than yes, he can still do it.
common sense but not common practice
4 pm during leadership training for middle managers in the Alps. The new Japanese senior leader Ishikawa San is invited to get into an open dialog with these young and high potential managers. Ishikawa San was well known of being not only successful business wise but for having developed many talented and inspiring people in his organization and also for his high sense of integrity.
One participant asks him: “you have been a leader for 20 years now and have experienced different styles and overcome many challenges all over the world, what is your leadership secret?”
Ishikawa San answers: “ for most people being the leader means being top of a pyramid and they try all their life very hard to climb up the hill, what I learned over the years to be successful is to turn the pyramid ups and down and to try hard to stay at the bottom!”
Silence in the room … that kind of silence you know now something unusual happened, now some of these young people had an Aha!
common sense but not common practice
Ich habe mich gestern Abend geärgert um mich heute früh dann erst richtig zu freuen. Ich hatte Ende dieser Woche ein Workshop mit der Geschäftsleitung eines Telekommunikationsunternehmen zum Thema Serviceorientierung geplant. Dies wurde am Telefon extrem kurzfristig abgesagt … auch in letzter zeit war der Umgang mit meinen Terminen bei diesem Kunden nicht wirklich verlässlich. Heute früh traf ich den Leiter der Geschäftsleitung um die weitere Vorgehensweise zu besprechen und … er überreichte mir diesen wunderschönen Blumenstrauß, als Entschuldigung für die erneute kurzfristige Absage.
Ich habe mich echt gefreut und dann wurde meine Freude noch größer als er sagte: „Das Thema Serviceorientierung steht groß auf unserer Agenda. Unsere Mitarbeiter haben sehr wenig Spielraum verärgerten Kunden etwas zukommen zu lassen, im Sinne einer symbolischen Wiedergutmachung. Ich habe mir überlegt, dass wir zwar Fehler nie ganz abstellen werden aber ein Budget pro Team zu Verfügung stellen werden, damit sie auch „solche“ Blumen oder ähnliches verschenken können.“ BINGO!
Hier ein Berufgeheimnis: Wie der Kunde mit uns Berater umgeht spiegelt ziemlich gut wie sie a) mit ihren eigenen Mitarbeitern umgehen und b) mit ihren Kunden umgehen… Deshalb anbei ein Diagnose Tool (checkliste-serviceorientierung PDF Download!), was Mann/Frau recht schnell am Anfang nutzen kann um Serviceorientierung in einer Organisation zu checken! – Für Nebenwirkungen fragen Sie sich selbst!
common sense but not common practice