A reason for leaders to learn to tell tales; 100 reasons procrastination is keeping you from being an innovator; and CEOs toughen up, Navy SEAL-style.
Read about all this and more in this week’s top five most-clicked links in SmartBrief on Leadership:
- Why CEOs should learn to tell stories
- 100 reasons you’ll never be an innovator
- Teach your workers to do without you, says JetBlue chief
- Ex-Navy SEAL starts boot camp for bosses
- War breaks out between would-be Morgan Stanley chiefs
Image credit: narvikk, via iStockphoto (read more…)
Jack Welch, according to Fortune magazine, had another key priority as CEO of General Electric: evaluating people.
Selecting, training, developing and evaluating people might be a company’s prime directive.
As a senior leader, your role is to “evaluate the evaluators.” Not only must you consider how well they are doing numbers-wise but also how well they are performing people-wise.
In this video, I pose three questions leaders must ask themselves when judging the talent and skills of their people.
Your people are your company’s chief asset; your executive team is your chief responsibility. (read more…)
SmartPulse — our weekly nonscientific reader poll in SmartBrief on Small Business — tracks feedback from small-business owners. We run the poll question each Thursday in our e-newsletter.
Two weeks ago, we asked: Have you posted the new National Labor Relations Board poster on employee rights?
- No, the requirement doesn’t apply to our business: 35.29%
- Not yet, but we will have it posted before the law takes effect: 24.51%
- I don’t know about this; tell me more: 20.59%
- Yes: 19.61%
The National Labor Relations Board recently issued a ruling requiring all employers subject to the National Labor Relations Act to notify employees of their rights under the act by posting a notice in the workplace. The ruling states that the notice must be posted by Nov. 14, even if a business is non-union.
The act is broad and extends to many private-sector employers. Any organization that questions whether this rule applies to it should seek legal advice for confirmation. (read more…)
I attended — and tweeted from — the Center for the Polyurethanes Industry’s Technical Conference in Nashville, Tenn. One of the highlights of the annual event is the presentation of the Polyurethane Innovation Award, which helped close the conference Wednesday. Of 14 entrants, three finalists emerged, with Albemarle winning.
Polyurethane is by nature a flexible polymer, so a steady stream of products and innovative uses might not surprise. What CPI tries to do at its annual Technical Conference, however, is determine which innovation presents the most significant and original benefits. Conference attendees vote among three finalists during the conference’s opening session, with the award presented at the closing session.
This year, the finalists for the Polyurethane Innovation Award — Dow Chemical, Cannon and Albemarle — presented different ways of improving existing products and applications, with varying benefits in production, performance, efficiency and environmental impact. A bit more about each, and what benefits you might see in everyday life: (read more…)
SmartPulse — our weekly nonscientific reader poll in SmartBrief on Sales — tracks feedback from sales managers and executives. We run the poll question each Wednesday in our e-newsletter.
Last week, we asked: Would you consider using games to increase your salespeople’s interest in training?
- Yes, we already have and it’s great: 33.33%
- Yes, but we haven’t done it yet: 32.48%
- Yes, we already have, but it didn’t work so well: 23.93%
- No: 10.26%
The key to training and motivating salespeople is keeping them engaged and making them feel a part of the process. Using games is one way to do this, especially because it gives you the opportunity to underscore your key learning takeaways so they will stick. If the game reinforces a training technique and the salesperson has fun engaging in the game, then it’s going to increase the odds that the salesperson will apply the technique in the field. (read more…)
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