The people who make organizations go--or stop

Managers invariably use their personal contacts when they need to, say, meet an impossible deadline or learn the truth about a new boss. Increasingly, it's through these informal networks--not just through traditional organizational hierarchies--that information is found and work gets done. But to many senior executives, informal networks are unobservable and ungovernable--and, therefore, not amenable to the tools of management. As a result, executives tend to work around informal networks or, worse, try to ignore them. When they do acknowledge the networks' existence, executives fall back on intuition--scarcely a dependable tool--to guide them in nurturing this social capital. It doesn't have to be that way. It is entirely possible to develop and manage informal networks systematically, say management experts Cross and Prusak. Specifically, senior executives need to focus their attention on four key role-players in informal networks: Central connectors link most employees in an informal network with one another; they provide the critical information or expertise that the entire network draws on to get work done. Boundary spanners connect an informal network with other parts of the company or with similar networks in other organizations. Information brokers link different subgroups in an informal network; if they didn't, the network would splinter into smaller, less effective segments. And finally, there are peripheral specialists, who anyone in an informal network can turn to for specialized expertise but who work apart from most people in the network. The authors describe the four roles in detail, discuss the use of a well-established tool called social network analysis for determining who these role-players are in the network, and suggest ways that executives can transform ineffective informal networks into productive ones.     

Six IT decisions your IT people shouldn't make

Senior managers often feel frustration--even exasperation--toward information technology and their IT departments. The managers complain that they don't see much business value from the high-priced systems they install, but they don't understand the technology well enough to manage it in detail. So they often leave IT people to make, by default, choices that affect the company's business strategy. The frequent result? Too many projects, a demoralized IT unit, and disappointing returns on IT investments. What distinguishes companies that generate substantial value from their IT investments from those that don't? The leadership of senior managers in making six key IT decisions. The first three relate to strategy: How much should we spend on IT? Which business processes should receive our IT dollars? Which IT capabilities need to be companywide? The second three relate to execution: How good do our IT services really need to be? Which security and privacy risks will we accept? Whom do we blame if an IT initiative fails? When senior managers aren't involved in these decisions, the results can be profound. For example, if they don't take the lead in deciding which IT initiatives to fund, they end up overloading the IT department with projects that may not further the company's strategy. And if they aren't assessing security and privacy risks, they are ignoring crucial business trade-offs. Smart companies are establishing IT governance structures that identify who should be responsible for critical IT decisions and ensure that such decisions further IT's strategic role in the organization.     

Why people follow the leader: the power of transference

We all admire leaders. In trying to understand how leadership works, however, we often lose sight of the fact that followers are a crucial part of the equation. Regrettably, they get short shrift in the management literature, where they are described as merely responding to their leaders' charisma or caring attitudes. What most analyses seem to ignore is that followers have their own motivations and are as powerfully driven to follow as leaders are to lead. In this article, psychoanalyst, anthropologist, and management consultant Michael Maccoby delves into the unconscious recesses of followers' minds. He looks closely at the often irrational tendency to relate to a leader as some important person from the past--a parent, a sibling, a close friend, or even a nanny. Sigmund Freud discovered this dynamic when working with his patients and called it"transference." But as important as it is, the concept remains little understood outside the realm of clinical psychoanalysis. This is unfortunate, because a solid understanding of transference can yield great insight into organizational behavior and endow you with the wisdom and compassion to be a tremendous leader. The author explains the most common types of transference--paternal, maternal, and sibling--and shows how they play out in the workplace. He notes that they have evolved as our family structures have changed. Whether followers perceive a leader as an all-knowing father figure, as an authoritative yet unconditionally loving mother figure, or as a brother or sister who isn't necessarily a model of good behavior, the leader can manage transferential ties by bringing unconscious projections to light. Then debilitating resentment and animosity can give way to mutual understanding and productivity--and a limping organization can start to thrive.     

让百姓躺着挣点儿钱,货币基金不为过

货币基金持有人是普通公众,让百姓挣点儿钱,不为过 货币基金,全称"货币市场基金",是公募基金的一种,它将众多小额投资者的资金集合起来、由专门的基金公司进行投资运作,获取收益后按持有份额进行分配.购买了货币基金的大众,是基金的持有人和受益人.譬如余额宝,9月某日每万分收益1.0901元,七日年化收益率4.048%,都是归广大基金持有人的."货币基金用高收益吸收公众资金",让百姓挣点儿钱,不是什么坏事.     

How to make enemies and influence people: anatomy of the anti-pluralist, totalitarian mindset

This essay outlines the characteristics of what I call the ‘totalitarian mindset’. Under certain circumstances, human beings engage in patterns of thinking and behavior that are extremely closed and intolerant of difference and pluralism. These patterns of thinking and behaving lead us towards totalitarian, anti-pluralistic futures. An awareness of how these patterns arise, how individuals and groups can be manipulated through the use of fear, and how totalitarianism plays into the desire in human beings for ‘absolute’ answers and solutions, can be helpful in preventing attempts at manipulation and from the dangers of actively wanting to succumb to totalitarian, simplistic, black-and-white solutions in times of stress and anxiety. I present a broad outline of an agenda for education for a pluralistic future. The lived experience of pluralism is still largely unfamiliar and anxiety inducing, and that the phenomenon is generally not understood, with many myths of purity and racial or cultural superiority still prevalent. Finally, as part of that agenda for education, I stress the importance of creativity as an adaptive capacity, an attitude that allows us to see pluralism as an opportunity for growth and positive change rather than simply conflict.     

The uncompromising leader

Managing the tension between performance and people is at the heart of the CEO's job. But CEOs under fierce pressure from capital markets often focus solely on the shareholder, which can lead to employee disenchantment. Others put so much stock in their firms' heritage that they don't notice as their organizations slide into complacency. Some leaders, though, manage to avoid those traps and create high-commitment, high-performance (HCHP) companies. The authors' in-depth research of HCHP CEOs reveals several shared traits: These CEOs earn the trust of their organizations through their openness to the unvarnished truth. They are deeply engaged with their people, and their exchanges are direct and personal. They mobilize employees around a focused agenda, concentrating on only one or two initiatives. And they work to build collective leadership capabilities. These leaders also forge an emotionally resonant shared purpose across their companies. That consists of a three-part promise: The company will help employees build a better world and deliver performance they can be proud of, and will provide an environment in which they can grow. HCHP CEOs approach finding a firm's moral and strategic center in a competitive market as a calling, not an engineering problem. They drive their firms to be strongly market focused while at the same time reinforcing their firms' core values. They are committed to short-term performance while also investing in long-term leadership and organizational capabilities. By refusing to compromise on any of these terms, they build great companies.     

The failure-tolerant leader

"The fastest way to succeed," IBM's Thomas Watson, Sr., once said, "is to double your failure rate." In recent years, more and more executives have embraced Watson's point of view, coming to understand what innovators have always known: Failure is a prerequisite to invention. But while companies may grasp the value of making mistakes at the level of corporate practices, they have a harder time accepting the idea at the personal level. People are afraid to fail, and corporate culture reinforces that fear. In this article, psychologist and former Harvard Business School professor Richard Farson and coauthor Ralph Keyes discuss how companies can reduce the fear of miscues. What's crucial is the presence of failure-tolerant leaders--executives who, through their words and actions, help employees overcome their anxieties about making mistakes and, in the process, create a culture of intelligent risk-taking that leads to sustained innovation. Such leaders don't just accept productive failure, they promote it. Drawing from their research in business, politics, sports, and science, the authors identify common practices among failure-tolerant leaders. These leaders break down the social and bureaucratic barriers that separate them from their followers. They engage at a personal level with the people they lead. They avoid giving either praise or criticism, preferring to take a nonjudgmental, analytical posture as they interact with staff. They openly admit their own mistakes rather than trying to cover them up or shifting the blame. And they try to root out the destructive competitiveness built into most organizations. Above all else, failure-tolerant leaders push people to see beyond traditional definitions of success and failure. They know that as long as a person views failure as the opposite of success, rather than its complement, he or she will never be able to take the risks necessary for innovation.     

The wise leader

In an era of increasing discontinuity, wise leadership has nearly vanished. Many leaders find it difficult to reinvent their corporations rapidly enough to cope with new technologies, demographic shifts, and consumption trends. They can't develop truly global organizations that operate effortlessly across borders. And they find it tough to ensure that their people adhere to values and ethics. The authors assert that leaders must acquire practical wisdom, or what Aristotle called phronesis: experiential knowledge that enables people to make ethically sound judgments. Wise leaders demonstrate six abilities: (i) They make decisions on the basis of what is good for the organization and for society. (2) They quickly grasp the essence of a situation and fathom the nature and meaning of people, things, and events. (3) They provide contexts in which executives and employees can interact to create new meaning. (4) They employ metaphors and stories to convert their experience into tacit knowledge that others can use. (5) They exert political power to bring people together and spur them to act. (6) They use apprenticeship and mentoring to cultivate practical wisdom in orders.     

What makes great boards great

In the wake of meltdowns at WorldCom, Tyco, and Enron, enormous attention has been focused on the companies' boards. It seems inconceivable that business disasters of such magnitude could happen without gross or even criminal negligence on the part of board members. And yet a close examination of those boards reveals no broad pattern of incompetence or corruption. In fact, they followed most of the accepted standards for board operations: Members showed up for meetings; they had money invested in the company; audit committees, compensation committees, and codes of ethics were in place; the boards weren't too small or too big, nor were they dominated by insiders. In other words, they passed the tests that would normally be applied to determine whether a board of directors was likely to do a good job. And that's precisely what's so scary, according to corporate governance expert Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, who suggests that it's time for some new thinking about how corporate boards operate and are evaluated. He proposes thinking not only about how to structure the board's work but also about how to manage it as a social system. Good boards are, very simply, high-functioning work groups. They're distinguished by a climate of respect, trust, and candor among board members and between the board and management. Information is shared openly and on time; emergent political factions are quickly eliminated. Members feel free to challenge one another's assumptions and conclusions, and management encourages lively discussion of strategic issues. Directors feel a responsibility to contribute meaningfully to the board's performance. In addition, good boards assess their own performance, both collectively and individually.     

The leader as lobbyist

Guidant's Ginger Graham argues that senior executives are actually better prepared than most lobbyists to inform and educate members of Congress about the issues that will affect their businesses.     

The work of the leader

Lieutenant General William G. Pagonis led the 40,000 men and women who ran the theater logistics in the Persian Gulf War during its three phases of operation: Desert Shield (buildup), Desert Storm (ground war), and Desert Farewell (redeployment). By military standards, it was a challenging assignment. By the conventions of any nonmilitary complex organization, it was unheard of. In the Persian Gulf, Pagonis's challenges included feeding, clothing, sheltering, and arming over 550,000 people. All of this in an hostile, desert region with a Muslim community distrustful of the "infidels" sent there to protect them. The lessons of leadership gleaned through Pagonis's experiences in the Gulf cross military boundaries--they apply equally to general management and leadership development in the private, civilian sector. To gain a clear sense of the overall organization in an area the size of the Southwest Asian theater, Pagonis deputized proxies, dubbed "Ghostbusters," to be his eyes and ears throughout the desert. His goal was to build a leadership-supporting environment, combining centralized control with decentralized execution. Pagonis believes vision is defined by the leader, but the subordinates define the objectives that move the organization toward the desired outcome. The roots of leadership, Pagonis claims, are expertise and empathy. A leader's work is not only to apply these traits but also to cultivate them--both on a personal and organizational level. True leaders create organizations that themselves cultivate leadership. This can only be achieved through rigorous and systematic organizational development.     

What your leader expects of you

The success of an executive team depends heavily on the relationships the boss has with his or her direct reports. Yet the leadership literature has had little to say about what is expected in those relationships-on either side. Larry Bossidy, formerly the chairman and CEO of Honeywell, and before that of AlliedSignal, shares what he calls "the CEO compact," detailing the behaviors a leader should look for in subordinates and what they should be able to expect in return. A CEO's best people, he says, know when a situation calls for them to get involved. They generate ideas-remembering that some of the best ones may sound crazy at first. They are willing to collaborate, putting the long-term good of the company above short-term goals of their divisions. They step up to lead initiatives, even if the outcome is uncertain. They develop leaders among their people, especially through direct involvement in performance appraisals. They stay current on world events and anticipate how those events may affect the company and its competition. They drive their own growth by exposing themselves to new people and ideas and by accepting demanding assignments. And they sustain these behaviors in bad times as well as good. On the other side of the compact, the boss should provide clarity of direction; set goals and objectives; give frequent, specific, and immediate feedback; be decisive and timely; demonstrate honesty and candor; and offer an equitable compensation plan. Executives who aren't lucky enough to have such a boss can create a compact with their own subordinates, Bossidy says, and demonstrate by example. The result will be to improve team and company performance and accelerate individual growth.     

In praise of the incomplete leader

Today's top executives are expected to do everything right, from coming up with solutions to unfathomably complex problems to having the charisma and prescience to rally stakeholders around a perfect vision of the future. But no one leader can be all things to all people. It's time to end the myth of the complete leader, say the authors. Those at the top must come to understand their weaknesses as well as their strengths. Only by embracing the ways in which they are incomplete can leaders fill in the gaps in their knowledge with others' skills.The incomplete leader has the confidence and humility to recognize unique talents and perspectives throughout the organization--and to let those qualities shine. The authors' work studying leadership over the past six years has led them to develop a framework of distributed leadership. Within that model, leadership consists of four capabilities: sensemaking, relating, "visioning," and inventing. Sensemaking involves understanding and mapping the context in which a company and its people operate. A leader skilled in this area can quickly identify the complexities of a given situation and explain them to others. The second capability, relating, means being able to build trusting relationships with others through inquiring (listening with intention), advocating (explaining one's own point of view), and connecting (establishing a network of allies who can help a leader accomplish his or her goals). Visioning, the third capability, means coming up with a compelling image of the future. It is a collaborative process that articulates what the members of an organization want to create. Finally, inventing involves developing new ways to bring that vision to life. Rarely will a single person be skilled in all four areas. That's why it's critical that leaders find others who can offset their limitations and complement their strengths. Those who don't will not only bear the burden of leadership alone but will find themselves at the helm of an unbalanced ship.     

The seven ages of the leader

Leaders go through many transitions in their careers. Each brings new crises and challenges--from taking over a damaged organization to having to fire somebody to passing the baton to the next generation. These moments can be wrenching--and can threaten your confidence--but they're also predictable. Knowing what to expect can help you get through and perhaps emerge stronger. In this engaging article, Warren G. Bennis, professor and founding chairman of the University of Southern California's Leadership Institute, reflects on leadership, recounting his own experiences as a young lieutenant in the infantry in World War II, as the new president of a university, and as the mentor to a unique nursing student. Bennis also describes the experiences of other leaders he has known throughout his career. Drawing on more than 50 years of academic research and business expertise--and borrowing from Shakespeare's seven ages of man--Bennis says the leader's life unfolds in seven stages. "The infant executive" seeks to recruit a mentor for guidance. "The schoolboy" must learn how to do the job in public, subjected to unsettling scrutiny of every word and act. "The lover with a woeful ballad" struggles with the tsunami of problems every organization presents. "The bearded soldier" must be willing--even eager--to hire people better than he is, because he knows that talented underlings can help him shine. "The general" must become adept at not simply allowing people to speak the truth but at actually being able to hear what they are saying. "The statesman" is hard at work preparing to pass on wisdom in the interests of the organization. And, finally, "the sage" embraces the role of mentor to young executives.     

The great transition

As China's economy grows and opens further, the opportunity it presents to multinationals is changing. Foreign companies are moving to country development and new strategic choices. Now, foreign firms can actually go after the Chinese domestic market, and it's worth going after. Improvements in China's infrastructure, workforce, and regulatory environment are making it possible for companies to lower their costs to reap new competitive advantages. Multifaceted and often-shifting risks accompany this shifting opportunity. The reforms required for admission into the WTO will be politically difficult for China to implement, and its progress will be slowed by the scarcity of resources for the country's shaky banking system, the inadequacy of the social safety net, environmental problems, and local governments' cash shortage. China's breathtaking 9% average annual GDP growth rests on an unsteady foundation of overcapitalized state-owned enterprises, which have oversupplied many markets, and fiercely protectionist regional government officials pursuing growth-at-almost-all-costs policies. Frequent changes in regulations, bureaucracies, and reporting relationships will continue to make planning difficult, and, as the SARS epidemic demonstrated, there is always the potential for serious disruptions. But for at least the next ten years, multinationals should be the biggest winners in China. To reap the benefits, a multinational must properly nest its effort into its overall organization, show "one face to China" at the national level but also tailor local strategies, be wary of joint ventures, and mitigate risk, in particular the theft of intellectual property. China is a major opportunity for companies that forthrightly face its complexities. It will remain largely inscrutable--and unprofitable--for the rest.     

The great intimidators

After Disney's Michael Eisner, Miramax's Harvey Weinstein, and Hewlett-Packard's Carly Fiorina fell from their heights of power, the business media quickly proclaimed thatthe reign of abrasive, intimidating leaders was over. However, it's premature to proclaim their extinction. Many great intimidators have done fine for a long time and continue to thrive. Their modus operandi runs counter to a lot of preconceptions about what it takes to be a good leader. They're rough, loud, and in your face. Their tactics include invading others' personal space, staging tantrums, keeping people guessing, and possessing an indisputable command of facts. But make no mistake--great intimidators are not your typical bullies. They're driven by vision, not by sheer ego or malice. Beneath their tough exteriors and sharp edges are some genuine, deep insights into human motivation and organizational behavior. Indeed, these leaders possess political intelligence, which can make the difference between paralysis and successful--if sometimes wrenching--organizational change. Like socially intelligent leaders, politically intelligent leaders are adept at sizing up others, but they notice different things. Those with social intelligence assess people's strengths and figure out how to leverage them; those with political intelligence exploit people's weaknesses and insecurities. Despite all the obvious drawbacks of working under them, great intimidators often attract the best and brightest. And their appeal goes beyond their ability to inspire high performance. Many accomplished professionals who gravitate toward these leaders want to cultivate a little "inner intimidator" of their own. In the author's research, quite a few individuals reported having positive relationships with intimidating leaders. In fact, some described these relationships as profoundly educational and even transformational. So before we throw out all the great intimidators, the author argues, we should stop to consider what we would lose.     

一场伟大的争吵

教科书上说:管理会计是以企业现在和未来的资金运动为对象,以提高经济效益为目的,为企业内部管理者提供经营管理决策的科学依据为目标而进行的经济管理活动,又称内部报告会计.     

Creativity and the role of the leader

In today's innovation-driven economy, understanding how to generate great ideas has become an urgent managerial priority. Suddenly, the spotlight has turned on the academics who've studied creativity for decades. How relevant is their research to the practical challenges leaders face? To connect theory and practice, Harvard Business School professors Amabile and Khaire convened a two-day colloquium of leading creativity scholars and executives from companies such as Google, IDEO, Novartis, Intuit, and E Ink. In this article, the authors present highlights of the research presented and the discussion of its implications. At the event, a new leadership agenda began to take shape, one rooted in the awareness that you can't manage creativity--you can only manage for creativity. A number of themes emerged: The leader's job is not to be the source of ideas but to encourage and champion ideas. Leaders must tap the imagination of employees at all ranks and ask inspiring questions. They also need to help their organizations incorporate diverse perspectives, which spur creative insights, and facilitate creative collaboration by, for instance, harnessing new technologies. The participants shared tactics for enabling discoveries, as well as thoughts on how to bring process to bear on creativity without straitjacketing it. They pointed out that process management isn't appropriate in all stages of creative work; leaders should apply it thoughtfully and manage the handoff from idea generators to commercializers deftly. The discussion also examined the need to clear paths through bureaucracy, weed out weak ideas, and maximize the organization's learning from failure. Though points of view varied, the theories and frameworks explored advance the understanding of creativity in business and offer executives a playbook for increasing innovation.     

科林能源:太阳能发电产业技术升级的引领者

打破瓶颈,开启清洁能源新篇章 近年来,面临资源枯竭危机,开发利用太阳能和可再生能源已成为各国制定可持续发展战略的重要内容,欧盟、日本和美国已把2030年以后能源供应安全重点放在了太阳能等可再生能源方面,从能源供应安全和清洁利用的角度出发,太阳能的商业化开发及利用已成为不可阻挡的发展趋势.预计到2020年,太阳能发电将占世界电力供应的10%以上,市场容量在5~7.5万亿美元,2050年将达到20%以上.