What Plato Knew About Enron

This paper applies Plato’s cave allegory to Enron’s success and downfall. Plato’s famous tale of cave dwellers illustrates the different levels of truth and understanding. These levels include images, the sources of images, and the ultimate reality behind both. The paper first describes these levels of perception as they apply to Plato’s cave dwellers and then provides a brief history of the rise of Enron. Then we apply Plato’s levels of understanding to Enron, showing how the company created its image and presented information to support that image, and how the public eventually emerged from the cave to realize the truth about Enron’s actual accounting practices and financial state, which led to the corporation’s downfall. We find Plato’s allegory both useful in analyzing the relationship between Enron and the public and instructive about the power and moral responsibility of Enron’s executives.     

战略性领导

卓越的领导才能包括诸多因素,其中之一就是能够识别真正的市场机会并通过组织的调整抓住机遇。这一战略才能使得商业活动不断产生并相互关联。最近,我在蒙大拿州待了几个星期,在那里我继续对飞钓进行探索,并试图弄明白人们为何对其如此狂热。可以毫不夸张地说,一个优秀的飞钓者就是一个战略家。他们对这项运动的热爱与我对获取战略机遇的热情难分高下,下面就是我从这些垂钓大师身上学到的。1.这些人是狂热的垂钓者:飞钓者们会整日整夜地钓鱼。他们通过因特网获取河流中的信息。从河流的流量(流速)到水温,他们努力获取所有的细节,一杯啤酒过后他们会侃侃而谈水温下降了10度的各种原因。他们每个人不只有一根钓竿,而是有很多根。他们不仅有一些鱼饵,而是有数百个。     

Leadership for Sustainability: An Evolution of Leadership Ability

This article examines the existing confusion over the multiple leadership styles related to successful implementation of corporate social responsibility/sustainability in organisations. The researchers find that the problem is the complex nature of sustainability itself. We posit that organisations are complex adaptive systems operating within wider complex adaptive systems, making the problem of interpreting just in what way an organisation is to be sustainable, an extraordinary demand on leaders. Hence, leadership for sustainability requires leaders of extraordinary abilities. These are leaders who can read and predict through complexity, think through complex problems, engage groups in dynamic adaptive organisational change and have the emotional intelligence to adaptively engage with their own emotions associated with complex problem solving. Leaders and leadership is a key interpreter of how sustainability of the organisation ‘links’ to the wider systems in which the organisation sits, and executing that link well requires unusual leaders and leadership systems.     

自恋型领导对建言采纳的影响

领导采纳建言是员工建言发挥作用的重要前提,以往研究较少考察建言采纳的影响因素。基于相关理论,提出自恋型领导与建言采纳的关系假设,考察了建言建设性感知的中介效应与领导—成员交换关系(LMX)的调节效应,并通过271份上下级配对数据对研究假设进行了检验。实证结果表明:自恋型领导负向影响建言采纳;建言建设性感知在自恋型领导与建言采纳之间起部分中介作用; LMX在自恋型领导与建言建设性感知之间起负向调节作用,即LMX水平越高,自恋型领导对建言建设性感知的影响越弱,反之,则越强。研究有助于加深对领导因素与建言采纳关系的理解,是对现有建言采纳前因探讨的有益补充,同时对于企业员工管理及领导力提升等实践具有一定指导意义。     

企业现场领导行为及其有效性研究

针对目前对企业现场领导行为研究较少这一现象,以国有企业为研究对象,运用PM领导行为理论对企业现场领导行为进行分类,并用因子分析法得出影响各领导行为有效性的主要情景因素。研究发现目标企业现场领导行为水平不高,影响企业现场领导行为有效性的主要因素是团队精神、信息沟通、会议成效等。     

Service Opinion Leadership

No abstract available for this article.     

Impact of Leadership Style on Channel Partner Motivation

Abstract

While channel decision makers can expend considerable effort in designing efficient and effective distribution channel systems to serve their target markets, success in achieving the firm's distribution objectives may not be realized without implementing a systematic program for motivating distribution channel partners. This places a premium on the identification and use of effective channel strategies for motivating channel partners as well as the capacity of the channel captain to provide leadership as a means of attaining a differential advantage. Thus, channel leadership style has become a critical issue in the administration of distribution channels. Despite the importance of motivating channel partners, there is a paucity of research on this construct. To augment the existing knowledge on channel partner motivation-a fundamental area of interorganizational management-this study empirically examined the influence of participative, supportive, and directive leadership styles on channel partner motivation. Moreover, the relationship between channel partner motivation and channel partner performance is also investigated.

The linkages among the constructs were empirically tested on data drawn from a sample of distributive institutions for new automobiles. The findings from this investigation indicate that participative, supportive and directive leadership styles are statistically significant predictors of channel partner motivation, which, in turn, is a determinant of channel partner performance. Distribution channel management implications are discussed, the limitations of the study are identified, and directions for future research are proffered.     

Impact of Personality on Sales Manager Leadership Style

ABSTRACT

Much research in sales management has examined the impact sales manager leadership styles have on salesperson work outcomes. What has not been investigated is what factors may lead an individual to adopt one leadership approach over an alternate. Theorists in organizational behavior posit that personality characteristics may be predictive of the leadership style an individual employs. This paper reports the results of a study that explored whether two key personality variables-extraversion and neuroticism-are related to three prominent leadership styles-laissez-faire, transaction-al, and charismatic. The findings support the overriding hypothesis that the two personality variables are strongly related to and account for a substantial portion of the variance in the three leadership styles. Implications for sales management practice and research are provided.     

领导行为中的情绪感染研究述评

近年来,情绪感染理论在领导行为研究领域得到了很大重视和发展。情绪感染理论的引入为企业管理研究提供了独特的视角。领导行为中情绪感染的影响因素包括交往双方的个人差异和个人以外的情景因素两个方面。交往双方在情绪表现力和情绪敏感度两个方面的个人差异均有可能对情绪感染产生影响。领导行为中情绪感染研究的研究方法有情绪唤起水平与传递的处理、领导者—追随者关系的确定以及数据资料采集方法三个方面。今后国内学者可以从深化个体差异和情景因素对领导行为中情绪感染过程的影响研究,领导行为中的情绪感染研究需要综合各种研究方法,着眼于领导理论的发展来开展未来研究等方面深入探讨领导行为中的情绪感染。     

Integrity and Global Leadership

This paper addresses the role of integrity in global leadership. It reviews the philosophy of ethics and suggests that both contractarianism and pluralism are particularly helpful in understanding ethics from a global leadership perspective. It also reviews the challenges to integrity that come through interactions that are both external and internal to the company. Finally, the paper provides helpful suggestions on how global leaders can define appropriate ethical standards for themselves and their organizations.     

Channel Leadership Behavior:

This paper presents a conceptual framework for analyzing the effects of channel leadership behaviors on channel performance. The model emphasizes the role of the channel leader in assessing the deficiencies in the channel member's role perceptions, motivation, abilities and/or environmental conditions, and in taking action to alleviate deficiencies which inhibit channel member performance. The model incorporates constructs and research findings from leadership and channel management literature. Basic propositions by the model are stated.     

Apologies and Transformational Leadership

This empirical investigation showed that contrary to the popular notion that apologies signify weakness, the victims of mistakes made by leaders consistently perceived leaders who apologized as more transformational than those who did not apologize. In a field experiment (Study 1), male referees who were perceived as having apologized for mistakes made officiating hockey games were rated by male coaches (n = 93) as more transformational than when no apology was made. Studies 2 (n = 50) and 3 (n = 224) replicated this effect in two vignette studies to enhance internal and ecological validity. Contrary to expectations in Study 3, there were no apology×leader gender interactions. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.     

Leadership in challenging times

It's an understatement to say that the current business climate is a challenging one. Tom Brown weighed the insights offered at London Business School's Global Leadership Summit and offers the best thoughts on what it takes to lead organizations right now.     

诚信领导与员工关联绩效

本文通过对多家企业的536个样本的实证研究,认为诚信领导与员工关联绩效水平显著正相关,领导-成员交换关系作为调节变量对诚信领导与员工关联绩效之间的关系起调节作用;企业可以从管理者诚信领导层面和调节变量层面加强管理,引导和优化管理者领导方式,提高企业整体绩效水平。     

The Influence of Servant Leadership on Restaurant Employee Engagement

Servant leadership is a leadership philosophy which addresses the concerns of ethics, customer experience, and employee engagement while creating a unique organizational culture where both leaders and followers unite to reach organizational goals without positional or authoritative power. With employees viewed as one of the greatest assets for organizations, maintaining loyal, productive employees while balancing profits becomes a challenge for leaders, and drives the need to understand employee engagement drivers. Thus, the purpose of this study was to qualitatively explore servant leadership from the perspective of employees. Participants were 11 employees from a servant leadership led restaurant who took part in two focus groups. The modified van Kaam method (Moustakas 1994) contributed to data analysis, which examined employee responses for comparison and assessment. Several themes emerged including servant leader experience, servant leader traits, the impact of servant leadership, the application of servant leadership, and limited employee attrition. The themes revealed servant leadership positively influences employee engagement while contributing to employee loyalty to the workplace. Based on the servant leader experience, participants were more committed, built healthy work relationships, and actively participated in achieving organizational goals. Findings are discussed in light of current research and practical applications are provided.