Optimal Continuation versus the Timeless Perspective in Monetary Policy

The timeless‐perspective approach suggests that policymakers implement in each period policy actions conforming to a rule that would have been fully optimal to adopt in the distant past. A motivating advantage is that policy henceforth would continue by recommending the same optimality conditions if reconsidered, thereby enhancing credibility. We argue that continuation can alternatively be achieved with better results, on average, in terms of policymakers' objectives, by implementing in each period the time‐invariant policy that is optimal from the viewpoint of the contemporary understanding of objectives and constraints, but while ignoring the conditions that happen to prevail at the time.     

Zeitgeist leadership

Companies and leaders don't succeed or fail in a vacuum. When it comes to longterm success, the ability to understand and adapt to changing business conditions is at least as important as any particular personality trait or competency. A clear picture of how powerful the zeitgeist can be emerges from the authors' comprehensive study of the way the business landscape in the United States evolved, decade by decade, throughout the twentieth century. Six contextual factors in particular, they found, most affected the prospects for business: the level of government intervention in business, global events, demographics, shifts in social mores, developments in technology, and the strength or weakness of the labor movement. A lack of contextual sensitivity can trip up even the most brilliant executive. No less a luminary than Alfred P. Sloan was relieved of GM's day-to-day management in the 1930s because he was unwilling to meet with the new UAW. Conversely, an understanding of the zeitgeist can play a crucial but unheralded role in business performance. Jack Welch is widely credited with GE's remarkable success during the 1980s and 1990s, for example, but far less attention has been paid to his predecessor, the statesmanlike and prudent Reginald Jones, who sustained strong revenue and profit growth during the heavily regulated stagflation of the 1970s. To better understand this connection between business performance and context, the authors studied 1,000 great U.S. business leaders of the twentieth century and identified three distinct archetypes: Entrepreneurs, often ahead of their time, overcame dire challenges to build something new. Managers excelled at reading and exploiting the existing zeitgeist to grow their businesses. Leaders defied context to identify latent potential in businesses others considered mature, stagnant, or in decline. In every decade, all three archetypes were vital. It is the ongoing regeneration of this pattern in the business life cycle that ultimately sustains development and progress.     

YES,财务领导力

拥有良好的财务技能不一定能创造出更为优异的财务业绩;拥有MBA或者其他财会学位不-定能更有益于公司财务业绩的改进;掌握金融、财会乃至经济的知识不一定能有助于整个公司价值的提升.     

Crucibles of leadership

What makes a great leader? Why do some people appear to know instinctively how to inspire employees--bringing out their confidence, loyalty, and dedication--while others flounder again and again? No simple formula can explain how great leaders come to be, but Bennis and Thomas believe it has something to do with the ways people handle adversity. The authors' recent research suggests that one of the most reliable indicators and predictors of true leadership is the ability to learn from even the most negative experiences. An extraordinary leader is a kind of phoenix rising from the ashes of adversity stronger and more committed than ever. In interviewing more than 40 leaders in business and the public sector over the past three years, the authors discovered that all of them--young and old alike--had endured intense, often traumatic, experiences that transformed them and became the source of their distinctive leadership abilities. Bennis and Thomas call these shaping experiences "crucibles," after the vessels medieval alchemists used in their attempts to turn base metals into gold. For the interviewees, their crucibles were the points at which they were forced to question who they were and what was important to them. These experiences made them stronger and more confident and changed their sense of purpose in some fundamental way. Through a variety of examples, the authors explore the idea of the crucible in detail. They also reveal that great leaders possess four essential skills, the most critical of which is "adaptive capacity"--an almost magical ability to transcend adversity and emerge stronger than before.     

Tipping point leadership

When William Bratton was appointed police commissioner of New York City in 1994, turf wars over jurisdiction and funding were rife and crime was out of control. Yet in less than two years, and without an increase in his budget, Bratton turned New York into the safest large city in the nation. And the NYPD was only the latest of five law-enforcement agencies Bratton had turned around. In each case, he succeeded in record time despite limited resources, a demotivated staff, opposition from powerful vested interests, and an organization wedded to the status quo. Bratton's turnarounds demonstrate what the authors call tipping point leadership. The theory of tipping points hinges on the insight that in any organization, fundamental changes can occur quickly when the beliefs and energies of a critical mass of people create an epidemic movement toward an idea. Bratton begins by overcoming the cognitive hurdles that block organizations from recognizing the need for change. He does this by putting managers face-to-face with operational problems. Next, he manages around limitations on funds, staff, or equipment by concentrating resources on the areas that are most in need of change and that have the biggest payoffs. He meanwhile solves the motivation problem by singling out key influencers--people with disproportionate power due to their connections or persuasive abilities. Finally, he closes off resistance from powerful opponents. Not every CEO has the personality to be a Bill Bratton, but his successes are due to much more than his personality. He relies on a remarkably consistent method that any manager looking to turn around an organization can use to overcome the forces of inertia and reach the tipping point.     

The leadership journey

It isn't always easy to change leadership hats or to alter the way you assess a business problem. Under pressure, most executives fall back on the management style or approach that worked in the last crisis they faced. But old approaches rarely work in new and demanding situations. Just ask Leonard Schaeffer, chairman and CEO of WellPoint Health Networks, one of the country's largest and most successful managed-care companies. In this account, he describes how he consciously adopted three very different styles of leadership at critical points during his 30-year career, depending on the business challenges at hand. Schaeffer headed up the U.S. Health Care Finance Administration during the Carter years--and led the charge toward more efficient work practices at that agency. Then he transformed Blue Cross of California from a floundering bureaucracy losing close to $1 million each day into a strong public company, WellPoint. The dire circumstances at Blue Cross had dictated that Schaeffer initially be an autocratic leader, which he considers the managerial equivalent of being an emergency room surgeon--forced to do whatever it takes to save a patient's life. But as the company rebounded, the CEO shed that "any decision is better than no decision" style. He has become a participative, hands-off leader-setting strategies and goals from above but letting WellPoint's line managers and executives figure out how best to achieve those goals. Most recently, Schaeffer has turned into a reformer--a leader who works with one foot outside the company to spur changes in health care and society. There are pitfalls in switching leadership styles, Schaeffer admits, but this flexibility is necessary for realizing corporate- and personal-success.     

从做“总账”到当领导

基于从2008～2011年在全球范围多次调查,一份新的CGMA说明报告揭示了财务职能转变的若干关键领域。作为这一报告的重要贡献者之一,拜尔公司的CFOWerner Baumann为我们做了有关财务职能转变的进一步解释。     

The work of leadership

More and more companies today are facing adaptive challenges: changes in societies, markets, and technology around the globe are forcing them to clarify their values, develop new strategies, and learn new ways of operating. And the most important task for leaders in the face of such challenges is mobilizing people throughout the organization to do adaptive work. Yet for many senior executives, providing such leadership is difficult. Why? One reason is that they are accustomed to solving problems themselves. Another is that adaptive change is distressing for the people going through it. They need to take on new roles, relationships, values, and approaches to work. Many employees are ambivalent about the sacrifices required of them and look to senior executives to take problems off their shoulders. But both sets of expectations have to be unlearned. Rather than providing answers, leaders have to ask tough questions. Rather than protecting people from outside threats, leaders should let the pinch of reality stimulate them to adapt. Instead of orienting people to their current roles, leaders must disorient them so that new relationships can develop. Instead of quelling conflict, leaders should draw the issues out. Instead of maintaining norms, leaders must challenge "the way we do business" and help others distinguish immutable values from the historical practices that have become obsolete. The authors offer six principles for leading adaptive work: "getting on the balcony," identifying the adaptive challenge, regulating distress, maintaining disciplined attention, giving the work back to people, and protecting voices of leadership from below.     

Discovering your authentic leadership

The ongoing problems in business leadership over the past five years have underscored the need for a new kind of leader in the twenty-first century: the authentic leader. Author Bill George, a Harvard Business School professor and the former chairman and CEO of Medtronic, and his colleagues, conducted the largest leadership development study ever undertaken. They interviewed 125 business leaders from different racial, religious, national, and socioeconomic backgrounds to understand how leaders become and remain authentic. Their interviews showed that you do not have to be born with any particular characteristics or traits to lead. You also do not have to be at the top of your organization. Anyone can learn to be an authentic leader. The journey begins with leaders understanding their life stories. Authentic leaders frame their stories in ways that allow them to see themselves not as passive observers but as individuals who learn from their experiences. These leaders make time to examine their experiences and to reflect on them, and in doing so they grow as individuals and as leaders. Authentic leaders also work hard at developing self-awareness through persistent and often courageous self-exploration. Denial can be the greatest hurdle that leaders face in becoming self-aware, but authentic leaders ask for, and listen to, honest feedback. They also use formal and informal support networks to help them stay grounded and lead integrated lives. The authors argue that achieving business results over a sustained period of time is the ultimate mark of authentic leadership. It may be possible to drive short-term outcomes without being authentic, but authentic leadership is the only way to create long-term results.     

7 transformations of leadership

Most developmental psychologists agree that what differentiates one leader from another is not so much philosophy of leadership, personality, or style of management. Rather, it's internal "action logic"--how a leader interprets the surroundings and reacts when his or her power or safety is challenged. Relatively few leaders, however, try to understand their action logic, and fewer still have explored the possibility of changing it. They should, because leaders who undertake this voyage of personal understanding and development can transform not only their own capabilities but also those of their companies. The authors draw on 25 years of consulting experience and collaboration with psychologist Susanne Cook-Greuter to present a typology of leadership based on the way managers personally make sense of the world around them. Rooke and Torbert classify leaders into seven distinct actionlogic categories: Opportunists, Diplomats, Experts, Achievers, Individualists, Strategists, and Alchemists-the first three associated with below-average performance, the latter four with medium to high performance. These leadership styles are not fixed, the authors say, and executives who are willing to work at developing themselves and becoming more self-aware can almost certainly move toward one of the more effective action logics. A Diplomat, for instance, can succeed through hard work and self-reflection at transforming himself into a Strategist. Few people may become Alchemists, but many will have the desire and potential to become Individualists and Strategists. Corporations that help their executives and leadership teams to examine their action logics can reap rich rewards.     

Developing your leadership pipeline

Why do so many newly minted leaders fail so spectacularly? Part of the problem is that in many companies, succession planning is little more than creating a list of high-potential employees and the slots they might fill. It's a mechanical process that's too narrow and hidebound to uncover and correct skill gaps that can derail promising young executives. And it's completely divorced from organizational efforts to transform managers into leaders. Some companies, however, do succeed in building a steady, reliable pipeline of leadership talent by marrying succession planning with leadership development. Eli Lilly, Dow Chemical, Bank of America, and Sonoco Products have created long-term processes for managing the talent roster throughout their organizations--a process Conger and Fulmer call succession management. Drawing on the experiences of these best-practice organizations, the authors outline five rules for establishing a healthy succession management system: Focus on opportunities for development, identify linchpin positions, make the system transparent, measure progress regularly, and be flexible. In Eli Lilly's "action-learning" program, high-potential employees are given a strategic problem to solve so they can learn something of what it takes to be a general manager. The company--and most other best-practice organizations--also relies on Web-based succession management tools to demystify the succession process, and it makes employees themselves responsible for updating the information in their personnel files. Best-practice organizations also track various metrics that reveal whether the right people are moving into the right jobs at the right time, and they assess the strengths and weaknesses not only of individuals but of the entire group. These companies also expect to be tweaking their systems continually, making them easier to use and more responsive to the needs of the organization.     

财务领导力的价值观

罗伯特·卡普兰：哈佛商学院贝克基金会教席教授,会计与管理教研组成员;卡普兰是营运成本和平衡计分卡的共同开发者,卡普兰在麻省理工学院取得电器工程学士和硕士学位,并在康耐尔大学取得营运研究博士学位,被称为平衡计分卡之父。     

Building a leadership brand

How do some firms produce a pipeline of consistently excellent managers? Instead of concentrating merely on strengthening the skills of individuals, these companies focus on building a broad organizational leadership capability. It's what Ulrich and Smallwood--cofounders of the RBL Group, a leadership development consultancy--call a leadership brand. Organizations with leadership brands take an "outside-in" approach to executive development. They begin with a clear statement of what they want to be known for by customers and then link it with a required set of management skills. The Lexus division of Toyota, for instance, translates its tagline--"The pursuit of perfection"--into an expectation that its leaders excel at managing quality processes. The slogan of Bon Secours Health System is "Good help to those in need." It demands that its managers balance business skills with compassion and caring. The outside-in approach helps firms build a reputation for high-quality leaders whom customers trust to deliver on the company's promises. In examining 150 companies with strong leadership capabilities, the authors found that the organizations follow five strategies. First, make sure managers master the basics of leadership--for example, setting strategy and grooming talent. Second, ensure that leaders internalize customers' high expectations. Third, incorporate customer feedback into evaluations of executives. Fourth, invest in programs that help managers hone the right skills, by tapping customers to participate in such programs. Finally, track the success of efforts to build leadership bench strength over the long-term. The result is outstanding management that persists even when individual executives leave. In fact, companies with the strongest leadership brands often become "leader feeders"--firms that regularly graduate leaders who go on to head other companies.     

领导力技能连续体

财务领导力是个连续体,而不是一个终点。无论你处在职业生涯的什么阶段,你总有机会进一步成长并提升技能。     

Putting leadership back into strategy

In recent decades an infusion of economics has lent the study of strategy much needed theory and empirical evidence. Strategy consultants, armed with frameworks and techniques, have stepped forward to help managers analyze their industries and position their companies for strategic advantage. Strategy has come to be seen as an analytical problem to be solved. But, says Montgomery, the Timken Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School, the benefits of this rigorous approach have attendant costs: Strategy has become a competitive game plan, separate from the company's larger sense of purpose. The CEO's unique role as arbiter and steward of strategy has been eclipsed. And an overemphasis on sustainable competitive advantage has obscured the importance of making strategy a dynamic tool for guiding the company's development over time. For any company, intelligent guidance requires a clear sense of purpose, of what makes the organization truly distinctive. Purpose, Montgomery says, serves as both a constraint on activity and a guide to behavior. Creativity and insight are key to forging a compelling organizational purpose; analysis alone will never suffice. As the CEO--properly a company's chief strategist--translates purpose into practice, he or she must remain open to the possibility that the purpose itself may need to change. Lou Gerstner did this in the 1990s, when he decided that IBM would evolve to focus on applying technology rather than on inventing it. So did Steve Jobs, when he rescued Apple from a poorly performing strategy and expanded the company into attractive new businesses. Watching over strategy day in and day out is the CEO's greatest opportunity to shape the firm as well as outwit the competition.     

Regional strategies for global leadership

The leaders of such global powerhouses as GE, Wal-Mart, and Toyota seem to have grasped two crucial truths: First, far from becoming submerged by the rising tide of globalization, geographic and other regional distinctions may in fact be increasing in importance. Second, regionally focused strategies, used in conjunction with local and global initiatives, can significantly boost a company's performance. The business and economic data reveal a highly regionalized world. For example, trade within regions, rather than across them, drove the surge of international commerce in the second half of the twentieth century. Regionalization is also apparent in foreign direct investment, companies' international sales, and competition among the world's largest multinationals. Harvard Business School Professor Pankaj Ghemawat says that the most successful companies employ five types of regional strategies in addition to--or even instead of--global ones: home base, portfolio, hub, platform, and mandate. Some companies adopt the strategies in sequence, but the most nimble switch from one to another and combine approaches as their markets and businesses evolve. At Toyota, for example, exports from the home base continue to be substantial even as the company builds up an international manufacturing presence. And as Toyota achieves economies of scale and scope with a strong network of hubs, the company also pursues economies of specialization through interregional mandates. Embracing regional strategies requires flexibility and creativity. A company must decide what constitutes a region, choose the most appropriate strategies, and mesh those strategies with the organization's existing structures. In a world that is neither truly global nor truly local, finding ways of coordinating within and across regions can deliver a powerful competitive advantage.     

Four lessons in adaptive leadership

The armed services have been in the business of leadership development much longer than the corporate world has. Today's military leaders need tools and techniques to face a fast-changing and unpredictable type of enemy--so the armed services train their officers in ways that build a culture of readiness and commitment. Business leaders need to foster an adaptive culture to survive and succeed, given that they, too, face unprecedented uncertainty--and new types of competitors. Michael Useem and his colleagues at the Wharton School incorporate exposure to military leadership into MBA and executive MBA programs. Highlights include direct contact in the classroom with leaders in the U.S. Army, the U.S. Marine Corps, and the Department of Defense, along with field-training exercises and battlefield visits. The programs are designed to help students connect viscerally to essential leadership lessons. Four are featured in the article: Meet the troops. Creating a personal link is crucial to leading people in challenging times. Make decisions. Making good and timely calls is the crux of leadership. Mission first. Focus on common purpose and eschew personal gain. Convey strategic intent. Make the objectives clear, but give people the freedom to execute on them in their own way.     

Women and the labyrinth of leadership

Two decades ago, people began using the "glass ceiling" catchphrase to describe organizations' failure to promote women into top leadership roles. Eagly and Carli, of Northwestern University and Wellesley College, argue in this article (based on a forthcoming book from Harvard Business School Press) that the metaphor has outlived its usefulness. In fact, it leads managers to overlook interventions that would attack the problem at its roots, wherever it occurs. A labyrinth is a more fitting image to help organizations understand and address the obstacles to women's progress. Rather than depicting just one absolute barrier at the penultimate stage of a distinguished career, a labyrinth conveys the complexity and variety of challenges that can appear along the way. Passage through a labyrinth requires persistence, awareness of one's progress, and a careful analysis of the puzzles that lie ahead. Routes to the center exist but are full of twists and turns, both expected and unexpected. Vestiges of prejudice against women, issues of leadership style and authenticity, and family responsibilities are just a few of the challenges. For instance, married mothers now devote even more time to primary child care per week than they did in earlier generations (12.9 hours of close interaction versus 10.6), despite the fact that fathers, too, put in a lot more hours than they used to (6.5 versus 2.6). Pressures for intensive parenting and the increasing demands of most high-level careers have left women with very little time to socialize with colleagues and build professional networks--that is, to accumulate the social capital that is essential to managers who want to move up. The remedies proposed--such as changing the long-hours culture, using open-recruitment tools, and preparing women for line management with appropriately demanding assignments--are wide ranging, but together they have a chance of achieving leadership equity in our time.