Big Dreams, Hard Work

October 25, 2013

On a September day in 1913, a baby was born in Alabama who was destined for greatness, though no one would have dreamed it at the time. It wasn’t until the summer of 1936 when Jesse Owens, the son of a sharecropper, would make history at the Berlin Olympics. Though we can create blueprints for […]

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Will You Be the Ripple or the Stone?

October 17, 2013

The next time you’re standing by a pond, toss a pebble in, and then watch the ripples. Now think of yourself as the stone, and start to imagine the ripples that you could make in the pond of life. Want people in your office to think positive? Watch what happens when you start to model […]

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Face the Unexpected by Cultivating the Power of Adaptive Energy

October 10, 2013

“Houston, we’ve had a problem.” Jack Swigert, Astronaut, Apollo 13 On April 14, 1970, the lives of three American astronauts hung in the balance when an explosion took place aboard their spacecraft, 200,000 miles from Earth. As Jim Lovell, Fred Haise, and Jack Swigert scrambled to stop a massive oxygen leak, the team at Mission […]

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Becoming Proactive about Blind Spots

September 26, 2013

“He was right in my blind spot!” How many times has that been said after a car or a cyclist has suddenly pulled into view? Sometimes you hear the horn before you see the vehicle, or you glance in your mirror one more time and feel a sense of panic when you see a car […]

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Gaining Altitude through Reflection

September 19, 2013

Thousands of times a day, people board airplanes that carry them across the country and around the world. Navy pilots land on aircraft carriers, helicopters are used to help fight wildfires, and men and women are living and working aboard the International Space Station. One-hundred-and-ten years after their 12-second flight, Orville and Wilbur Wright are […]

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Turning Failure Into Success

September 12, 2013

A visionary who was unable to successfully manage finances, Walt Disney experienced bankruptcy before his 22nd birthday. After writing his first children’s book, And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street, Theodor Seuss Geisel had 27 publishers reject his manuscript. Oprah Winfrey was fired from her reporting job because she “wasn’t fit” for […]

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Finding Balance

September 6, 2013

Finding a balance might be one of the most relatable aspects of leadership struggle, even for those who are not currently in a position to lead. In Leadership and the Art of Struggle, I primarily focused on the struggle to find balance in leadership, but most of us can identify with trying to find balance […]

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Struggle as Art

August 1, 2013

What do Michelangelo, da Vinci, Beethoven, and Steve Jobs have in common? At first glance, perhaps nothing. But what would you think if I said that they are all artists? Michelangelo is known for sculpting David, da Vinci for the secretive Mona Lisa, and Beethoven for his epic Ode to Joy. Steve Jobs? Contrary to […]

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Leadership Opportunities and Lessons from Bill Gates

July 25, 2013

In late June, I had the opportunity to join with several of my fellow Berrett-Koehler authors to share our stories of open door opportunities. Our webinar host for the evening was Bill Treasurer, who recently released a book titled, Leaders Open Doors. In preparation for the webinar, Bill encouraged us to talk about an individual […]

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In Memory of John Riedl: A pioneer of recommender systems

July 16, 2013

Yesterday, my friend, John Riedl, 51, passed away after a three-year battle with melanoma. John was one of those quiet, unassuming leaders, not into self-promotion. Yet he leaves a powerful legacy, the recommender system: a bold new class of computing capability that we have come to take for granted in modern life. The concept of […]

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