… a technique that allows people to iterate on ideas without using harsh or judgmental language. While used typically in teams and on the ideas of others, plussing works equally well on one’s own ideas - when one’s self critic can be particularly vocal.
… a strong desire to know or learn something
Today, most organizations, including a university’s IT organization, structure their work through a set of teams. Other examples include professional sports teams with their structure, their practice day-after-day of plays they may execute in the game, and a surgical team that performs the same procedure, for example, hip replacement, under tightly controlled conditions, perhaps multiple times, day after day.
The MOR Leaders Program, as the name implies, is about leadership. Just what is it that leaders do and how do they go about doing it? Two weeks ago, we focused on the humble leader. There we wrote about what makes a leader humble1 and how a leader can cultivate those characteristics in his or her leadership style.
Leadership style has to do with the way a leader provides direction, implements plans, and motivates people. The literature on leadership discusses many different styles.
Today’s Tuesday Reading turns again to focus on another aspect of bias, how to keep our minds from falling for bad advice.
Steven Westlund is the author of today’s Tuesday Reading. He is the Director of Enterprise Applications Architecture at Washington University in St. Louis. His essay first appeared as a leadership program reflection earlier this year. [Steve may be reached at swestlund@wustl.edu.]
Early this decade Google was focused on building the perfect team. Even earlier, the company had endeavored to capture large quantities of data about employees and how they worked. They knew, for example, how frequently particular people ate together (more productive people had larger networks of dining partners) and were able to identify key traits shared by the very best managers (good communication and avoidance of micromanaging).
Brian McDonald is the author of today’s Tuesday Reading. He is the president of MOR Associates an organization he founded in 1983 based on the belief that many organizations do not maximize the contribution most people want to make at work. More recently, he has led the development of the MOR family of leadership programs.
During the past two years there has been a more intentional focus on the leader’s responsibility to create a more inclusive environment in the MOR Leaders Program.
