Andrew St George (2013) writes that “This branch of the British armed services consciously fosters cheerfulness and nourishes its collective memory. Business executives should take note.” “Britain’s Royal Navy is a disciplined command-and-control organization that moves across 140 million square miles of the world’s oceans. Although few environments are tougher than a ship or submarine, I’ve… Read More
Playing Managerial Roles in Military Operations
The military is not just another organisation, at least not all of it, all of the time. It is an organisation with at least two faces: One dealing with peacetime conditions and, hence, resembling an ‘ordinary organisation’; and One operating in ‘hot’ conditions, during crisis and peace operations or outright war (Soeters, in Wilderom and… Read More
Family Leadership Affects Dietary & Physical Activity Behaviours
Research Paper Title Family Leadership Styles and Adolescent Dietary and Physical Activity Behaviors: A Cross-sectional Study. Background Transformational leadership is conceptualised as a set of behaviours designed to inspire, energise and motivate others to achieve higher levels of functioning, and is associated with salient health-related outcomes in organisational settings. Given (a) the similarities that exist between leadership… Read More
The Hawthorne Effect in a New Light!
The iconic Hawthorne experiments at a Western Electric factory used changes in working conditions such as subtle adjustments to lighting and noise levels to improve the working environment. They were founded on the insights of psychology and affected a sea change in workplace relations. This new “human relations” approach broke the influence of scientific management… Read More
Management Fads, Just Another Fad!
“A US psychologist, Carl Rabstejnek, has identified at least 100 management fads since the second world war, from ‘acceptable risk’ at one end of the alphabet to ‘zero defects’ at the other. He argues that fads reflect managers’ need to appear to be ‘in the know’ and to talk the language of change even when… Read More
Leading Virtual Teams
Leading a virtual team is a challenge faced by many, whether an organisation has one person working from home, to having a team spread around the world on different time zones. Citing research that estimates an 800% increase in virtual working over the past five years, the authors examine the critical leadership skills needed in… Read More
Seven Pillars of Leadership Wisdom
Can you learn leadership? And what is wisdom? These are teasing questions for many of us so an article looking at both wisdom and leadership is almost irresistible. Mike Clayton says leaders need to be smart – they need to know how things work and how to get things done. They need to motivate their team,… Read More
