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----- Original Message -----

From: Clawson, Jim

To: MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.pace.edu

Sent: Saturday, January 26, 2008 2:01 PM

Subject: Re: Institutional Leadership

Such a crowded, diverse field.  I assert that leadership is about managing energy, first in yourself and THEN in those around you.  (first sentence in Level Three Leadership)  I am concerned that many courses teach intellectual overviews of research with too little emphasis on personal implementation.  In the end, every effective leader will, I believe, have developed their own implicit or explicit model of what leadership is and how it plays out in their lives.  My concern about Blanchard’s definition below is that it would include overuse/abuse of power and I think there’s a big distinction between power abuse and leadership.  And the real issue is whether the attempts to lead (I introduce three categories of influence categories in L3L) produce what many practitioners call “buy in” or not.  I’ve developed a seven level model of buy-in… so attempting to influence others may actually produce “active resistance” and that’s not effective leadership.  I realize this is not the place for all of the debates and discussion that might occur.  And I believe that unless every instructor who teaches leadership has an “inside-out” model that they “know” the discussions just become intellectual explorations of others’ theories.  I’d encourage every instructor to clarify their own model and work hard at being authentic in modeling that in life and the classroom.  It’s a tall order, but as Emerson said, “what you do thunders so loudly in my ears I cannot hear what you say.”

 

Best wishes,

 

   Jim

James G. S. Clawson

Johnson & Higgins Professor of Business Administration

Darden GSB, University of Virginia

Box 6550, Charlottesville, VA 22906  

100 Darden Boulevard, Charlottesville, VA 22903  USA

Tel:  434 924 7488              Fax:  434 243 7680

Web:  http://faculty.darden.virginia.edu/clawsonj

 

From: Management Education and Development Discussion [mailto:MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.pace.edu] On Behalf Of BOBPIKECTT@AOL.COM
Sent: Saturday, January 26, 2008 11:38 AM
To: MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.pace.edu
Subject: Re: Institutional Leadership

 

I like Ken Blanchard's definition of leadership in his book, "Leading at a Higher Level".  Any time you are attempting to influence the thoughts, behavior, or development of another person -- you are a leader."

 

Bob Pike CSP, CPAE- Speakers Hall of Fame
Chairman/CEO The Bob Pike Group
Founder/Editor, the Creative Training Techniques newsletter
Chairman of the Executive Board - Center for FaithWalk Leadership

visit our website at www.BobPikeGroup.com for dozens of free articles on improving training and performance.

---

Who's never won? Biggest Grammy Award surprises of all time on AOL Music.

A69F81FBDE70834F92A1184B93AEF7C901AE2A34@MAIL01.darden.virginia.edu" type="cite">

Such a crowded, diverse field.  I assert that leadership is about managing energy, first in yourself and THEN in those around you.  (first sentence in Level Three Leadership)  I am concerned that many courses teach intellectual overviews of research with too little emphasis on personal implementation.  In the end, every effective leader will, I believe, have developed their own implicit or explicit model of what leadership is and how it plays out in their lives.  My concern about Blanchard's definition below is that it would include overuse/abuse of power and I think there's a big distinction between power abuse and leadership.  And the real issue is whether the attempts to lead (I introduce three categories of influence categories in L3L) produce what many practitioners call "buy in" or not.  I've developed a seven level model of buy-in... so attempting to influence others may actually produce "active resistance" and that's not effective leadership.  I realize this is not the place for all of the debates and discussion that might occur.  And I believe that unless every instructor who teaches leadership has an "inside-out" model that they "know" the discussions just become intellectual explorations of others' theories.  I'd encourage every instructor to clarify their own model and work hard at being authentic in modeling that in life and the classroom.  It's a tall order, but as Emerson said, "what you do thunders so loudly in my ears I cannot hear what you say."

 

Best wishes,

 

   Jim

James G. S. Clawson

Johnson & Higgins Professor of Business Administration

Darden GSB, University of Virginia

Box 6550, Charlottesville, VA 22906  

100 Darden Boulevard, Charlottesville, VA 22903  USA

Tel:  434 924 7488              Fax:  434 243 7680

Web:  http://faculty.darden.virginia.edu/clawsonj

 

From: Management Education and Development Discussion [mailto:MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.pace.edu] On Behalf Of BOBPIKECTT@AOL.COM
Sent: Saturday, January 26, 2008 11:38 AM
To: MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.pace.edu
Subject: Re: Institutional Leadership

 

I like Ken Blanchard's definition of leadership in his book, "Leading at a Higher Level".  Any time you are attempting to influence the thoughts, behavior, or development of another person -- you are a leader."

 

Bob Pike CSP, CPAE- Speakers Hall of Fame
Chairman/CEO The Bob Pike Group
Founder/Editor, the Creative Training Techniques newsletter
Chairman of the Executive Board - Center for FaithWalk Leadership

visit our website at www.BobPikeGroup.com for dozens of free articles on improving training and performance.

---

Who's never won? Biggest Grammy Award surprises of all time on AOL Music.

Does “concept mastery” imply that a concept is, or ought to be, unitary? If so, leadership will no doubt fail the test, but in this case I don't think that's the most important or relevant test. 

 In teaching leadership, I often tell people  that there are two things on which people tend to agree: (1) leadership is a good thing – at least if it’s “good” leadership, and (2) we need more of it (“It’s hard to fly like an eagle when you’re led by a turkey,” as the placard on more than one manager’s desk reads). But after that, I suggest, people have difficulty agreeing of just what this good thing is. To test, I ask people how they define leadership. By now, I must have asked thousands of students and professionals, and I doubt there are very many answers out there that I haven’t heard. Most common is some variant of “getting others to do what you want,” which often prompts me to ask, “Is leadership the same thing as influence?”  Someone may then say, “Leadership is getting people to buy in, to want to do what you want,” which opens the door to questions like, “Is there a difference between leadership and, say, manipulation or seduction?” After the conversation has gone for a while, we’ll have a list that typically includes phrases like vision, inspiration, motivation, communication, empowerment, getting things done through people, etc.) I’ll ask if we all seem to agree about leadership, and it’s usually obvious to all that we don’t. I’ll suggest that’s important in itself, because when you try to lead it’s probable that not all your constituents are using the same yardstick. But it’s also important that there’s not an infinite number of definitions – I mostly get the same relatively small and bounded set of words and phrases over and over, and a lot of the differences involve choosing different points along a dimension of how you conceptualize the influence relationship between leaders and constituents -- is leadership mostly one-way influence, or it is a more collaborative process? 

The same lack of consensus is also true of scholars who study and write about it, including me and the participants in this thread.

Which I think is OK. I tell the folks I teach that they arrived with differing conceptions of leadership, and that will still be true when they depart, but I hope they’ll be clearer about their own definition, and that they’ll learn from exploring other possibilities.  Leadership is a bit like the concept of “God” -- it’s big, important, culturally-rooted and value-laden. Its boundaries are ambiguous and our conceptions of leadership overlap and get confounded with concepts like power, influence, management, position, and authority, to name a few. I don’t expect a unitary concept of leadership to gain broad assent in any of our lifetimes. More important, I think, is to have a sense about the possible alternatives, and to be clear about where you come down – as scholar or practitioner. I’m reasonably clear on my concept of leadership (and I’ve written a fair amount about it), but I don’t have any final answers, don’t expect that I will, and hope to keep learning.  It's a lot of fun to write and talk about. 

 Lee Bolman

On Wed, 30 Jan 2008 19:25:52 -0500, "Erwin Rausch" <DidacticRa@AOL.COM> said:  

In a message dated 1/30/2008 12:32:02 PM Eastern Standard Time, nickols@att.net writes:

That raises the question as to whether or not the other part of concept mastery, that is, the correct classification of examples and non-examples, can be applied.  Based on my observations of discussions of leadership, including good and bad examples, I rather doubt it.

-----Original Message-----
From: Management Education and Development Discussion [mailto:MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.pace.edu] On Behalf Of Lee Bolman
Sent: Wednesday, January 30, 2008 9:00 PM
To: MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.pace.edu
Subject: Re: Institutional Leadership

Does "concept mastery" imply that a concept is, or ought to be, unitary? If so, leadership will no doubt fail the test, but in this case I don't think that's the most important or relevant test. 

 In teaching leadership, I often tell people  that there are two things on which people tend to agree: (1) leadership is a good thing – at least if it's "good" leadership, and (2) we need more of it ("It's hard to fly like an eagle when you're led by a turkey," as the placard on more than one manager's desk reads). But after that, I suggest, people have difficulty agreeing of just what this good thing is. To test, I ask people how they define leadership. By now, I must have asked thousands of students and professionals, and I doubt there are very many answers out there that I haven't heard. Most common is some variant of "getting others to do what you want," which often prompts me to ask, "Is leadership the same thing as influence?"  Someone may then say, "Leadership is getting people to buy in, to want to do what you want," which opens the door to questions like, "Is there a difference between leadership and, say, manipulation or seduction?" After the conversation has gone for a while, we'll have a list that typically includes phrases like vision, inspiration, motivation, communication, empowerment, getting things done through people, etc.) I'll ask if we all seem to agree about leadership, and it's usually obvious to all that we don't. I'll suggest that's important in itself, because when you try to lead it's probable that not all your constituents are using the same yardstick. But it's also important that there's not an infinite number of definitions – I mostly get the same relatively small and bounded set of words and phrases over and over, and a lot of the differences involve choosing different points along a dimension of how you conceptualize the influence relationship between leaders and constituents -- is leadership mostly one-way influence, or it is a more collaborative process? 

The same lack of consensus is also true of scholars who study and write about it, including me and the participants in this thread.

Which I think is OK. I tell the folks I teach that they arrived with differing conceptions of leadership, and that will still be true when they depart, but I hope they'll be clearer about their own definition, and that they'll learn from exploring other possibilities.  Leadership is a bit like the concept of "God" -- it's big, important, culturally-rooted and value-laden. Its boundaries are ambiguous and our conceptions of leadership overlap and get confounded with concepts like power, influence, management, position, and authority, to name a few. I don't expect a unitary concept of leadership to gain broad assent in any of our lifetimes. More important, I think, is to have a sense about the possible alternatives, and to be clear about where you come down – as scholar or practitioner. I'm reasonably clear on my concept of leadership (and I've written a fair amount about it), but I don't have any final answers, don't expect that I will, and hope to keep learning.  It's a lot of fun to write and talk about. 

 Lee Bolman

 

On Wed, 30 Jan 2008 19:25:52 -0500, "Erwin Rausch" <DidacticRa@AOL.COM> said:  

In a message dated 1/30/2008 12:32:02 PM Eastern Standard Time, nickols@att.net writes:

That raises the question as to whether or not the other part of concept mastery, that is, the correct classification of examples and non-examples, can be applied.  Based on my observations of discussions of leadership, including good and bad examples, I rather doubt it.