Tag Archives: Leaders

Building High Performance Teams Takes More Than Talent

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By Chris Cancialosi

We’ve all come across this type of person in our careers: the guy who is miserable to work with but who’s also “the top salesman we have.” Or how about “the smartest guy in the room,” who’s also the most unapproachable person you’ve ever met?  The talent may well be there but, in today’s increasingly networked workplace, it isn’t a guarantee of success.

Sometimes, very talented people just aren’t a good fit for your organization, but more often, the problem lies in a leaders’ inability to harness or align their employees’ talent to the mission. Either of these situations can cause employees’ talent to atrophy — or, worse, give them a reason to move on to a more engaging position at another company. Your job, as a leader, is to recognize when talent isn’t being used to its fullest potential and correct the situation. Continue reading →

Meet The Boss Of The Future

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by Jane Porter

The power is shifting, and what it means to be a great boss is taking a dramatic turn.

We work in an ever-changing, hyper connected, world-scattered workplace. As the way we work changes, so too will the boss’s role need to shift to meet those demands.

Take, for example, the very makeup of the U.S. workforce. One in every three Americans is a freelancer of some sort, according to a 2014 survey by Freelancers Union and Elance. This includes independent contractors, moonlighters, people working temporary or multiple jobs, and freelance business owners. Many expect this figure will increase to up to 50% by 2020, filling half the workforce with free agents.

What does this mean for the boss of the future? Continue reading →

Leaders Who Can Read Collective Emotions Are More Effective

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by Quy Huy

 

How a leader manages collective emotions can create or destroy enormous market value. It can also have a huge bearing on what large groups of stakeholders think of you.

One of the reasons Nokia lost the smartphone battle, despite holding a strong position before the iPhone came along, was its lack of speed and inability to react to changing circumstances. As I argued in a previous article, the reason for Nokia’s sluggish reaction was a collective fear among the company’s middle managers, not of the competition, but of losing status and resources within the organization. Continue reading →

How Emotional Intelligence Became a Key Leadership Skill

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By Andrea Ovans

Anyone trying to come up to speed on emotional intelligence would have a pretty easy time of it since the concept is remarkably recent, and its application to business newer still. The term was coined in 1990 in a research paper by two psychology professors, John D. Mayer of UNH and Peter Salovey of Yale. Some years later, Mayer defined it in HBR this way:

From a scientific (rather than a popular) standpoint, emotional intelligence is the ability to accurately perceive your own and others’ emotions; to understand the signals that emotions send about relationships; and to manage your own and others’ emotions. It doesn’t necessarily include the qualities (like optimism, initiative, and self-confidence) that some popular definitions ascribe to it. Continue reading →

What is top talent and how is that identified?

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As a part of our talent acquisition engagements, we ask our clients how they define “top talent” and how they would assess those traits in the interview process.  Reflecting on the insightful comments we hear every day, we thought there would be great value in a new blog in which senior executives/thought leaders share their “Take on Talent.”

This is the second in a series of blogs/interviews with senior executives who are thought leaders in the areas of Talent Acquisition, Career Development and Leadership who will share their perspectives on this ever present question.

 


Mark Trepanier is the EVP Managed Services, Client Delivery of Axiom, a recognized leader in the business of law and the world’s largest provider of tech-enabled legal, contracts and compliance solutions for large enterprises. Axiom’s unique solutions combine legal expertise, technology and data analytics to deliver work in a way that dramatically reduces risk, cost and cycle-time. Continue reading →