What New Team Leaders Should Do First

80-Carolyn_OHara by Carolyn O’Hara

Getting people to work together isn’t easy, and unfortunately many leaders skip over the basics of team building in a rush to start achieving goals. But your actions in the first few weeks and months can have a major impact on whether your team ultimately delivers results. What steps should you take to set your team up for success? How do you form group norms, establish clear goals, and create an environment where everyone feels comfortable and motivated to contribute? Continue reading

The New Leadership

Gianpiero Petriglieri, an Associate Professor of Organizational Behavior at INSEAD, trained as a psychiatrist before becoming an award-winning teacher and researcher whose work bridges the domains of leadership, adult development and experiential learning. He is also a frequent Harvard Business Review and Wall Street Journal blogger, and a fast speaking – and thinking – interviewee. He talked with Thinkers50 co-founder, Stuart Crainer

 

What is particularly striking about your resume is the move from psychiatry into management academia business schools. It seems an unusual leap.
Lots of people ask me that, why spend ten years training, do all this work and then change career? But personally I don’t feel I have changed direction that much.

I have always had a passion for understanding and assisting the unfolding of human lives in social contexts. At the broadest level, all my work — whether it is research, writing, teaching, coaching, consulting, and in the past, my practice as a psychotherapist — has gravitated around two endeavors. The first is to examine how people’s history and aspirations, and the dynamics of groups and social systems they are in, affect the way they think, feel and act in personal and professional roles. I am interested in how those forces, consciously and unconsciously, shape human being as well as human becoming. The second is to help people take their experience seriously without however taking it too literally, so they can make new meaning out of their experience, and develop more options for dealing with it. Continue reading

A View From The Buy Side

 

 

 

 

 

This first of a series of blogs designed to share with you the thoughts and insights of corporate leaders and their perspectives on the decision making process around outsourcing. Our first is with Ed Susman, who is with Citibank.

What are the most important attributes you seek in a potential provider/ partner?

While each sourcing opportunity is distinct with specific attributes that drive the selection of a provider there is one attribute that is transcendent, integrity. If a provider does not behave with integrity it does not matter how capable they are or what savings they might be offering. Sooner or later  the anticipated benefits will be outweighed by the cost of a contentious relationship. Continue reading

Why Vacation Matters …

by Ellyn Shook

As chief HR officer for a professional services company, I’m focused on providing our clients the talent they need when and where they need it. Doing this means I often spend time analyzing key data — from chargeability and payroll costs to talent supply/demand forecasting and retention. Then there’s a metric many might be surprised to learn I also keep a close eye on: vacation time used.

Why? Certainly, a company’s balance sheet can benefit from employees using their paid time off. But to me, the advantages lie in innovation and productivity. Continue reading

General Manager, North America Shared Service Center

Position Overview:

The General Manager, North America Shared Service Center (NASSC) is responsible for managing the overall Shared Services organization and oversees performance across all operations, including internal operations and customer-facing functional areas (Finance & Accounting, Information Technology, Human Resources, and Strategic Sourcing). This role reports to the North American Chairman and CEO and is an integral part of the Company senior management team. The individual in this role must understand and be part of the development of corporate strategies, objectives, and key business processes directly affecting the Shared Services activities, with the ability to drive process integration, service improvement, technology enhancement, and engage and lead people. Leadership skills and a profound understanding of what it takes to manage a service-oriented organization is the key to success. This position also requires the individual in this role to establish close working relationships with Business stakeholders to understand their needs and interests, and to put effective resources in place to meet them. Experience operating in a large, complex global-oriented corporate environment is important. Continue reading