Thought Sparks

A visionary leader from a rather surprising place, Paul LeBlanc has presided over the dramatic transformation of Southern New Hampshire University and shown many skeptics that it is possible to reinvent our institutions.  From a sleepy school with a few thousand on-campus students experiencing their "coming of age" years, to a national powerhouse of around 135,000 enrolees, LeBlanc has been a beacon for rethinking what Higher Ed is all about.  In this #FridayFiresideChat​ we chat about his vision, which is that access to high quality, affordable education is still crucial for social mobility.  For many of SNHU's adult learners, the "job" they want to get done is to get a credential as fast as possible because they are by and large stuck. And even worse, some 80% have some course credits, and even student debt, but no degree.  Our conversation covered the changes taking place in higher education and how it is likely to change to become less of an industrial age relic and more forward looking.  One inspiring idea that I took away was Pauls' observation that every time the United States has had a major catastrophe, like the one we are going through now, we have reinvented higher education for the better.  Let's hope this black swan moment has a similar next step.  Enjoy listening to one of the most thoughtful strategists in the world of higher education today.

TED phenomenon and author of the book "Powerful," Patty McCord, the founding talent leader at Netflix, will be joining me for a Friday fireside chat. We'll talk about why so many things we believe about HR are just plain wrong, what people should be thinking about with respect to their talent today and how to create the context that releases the power of high performing teams.

Victoria Montgomery-Brown has a new book out - "Digital Goddess" which tells a no-holds-barred history of her abandoning her nice, safe, corporate job and hurtling into the world of entrepreneurship.  The book is full of stories that are honest, often funny and really illuminating for anyone who has ever wanted to follow their dreams and start a business.  From getting arrested just as you were about to launch (as it turns out, a politically motivated and trumped-up charge), to how picking a business partner is like getting married, to actually getting married (as it happens, at City Hall), to battling depression and axiety and even to what it's like to date as a CEO, the book is a treasure trove.  We talk about some of those stories and more in this recording of our Friday Fireside Chat.  Have a listen! Screen reader support enabled.

Rita Gunther McGrath is a best-selling author, a sought-after speaker, and a longtime professor at Columbia Business School. Rita is one of the world’s top experts on innovation and growth and is one of the most regularly published authors in the Harvard Business Review. She is consistently ranked among the top 10 management thinkers in the world and was ranked #1 for strategy by Thinkers50. Rita is the author of the best-selling The End of Competitive Advantage (Harvard Business Review Press, 2013). Her new book is Seeing Around Corners: How to Spot Inflection Points in Business Before They Happen (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2019).

Why Do So Many Incompetent Men Become Leaders? Asks the provocative title of Dr Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic's recent book. A major issue, he suggests, is that we all too often confuse confidence with competence, meaning that many - even most - people who achieve formal leadership roles are not actually very good leaders. Among the solutions we'll discuss are improving the way we evaluate and select leaders, in particular paying more attention to emotional intelligence, or EQ in our evaluations. It should be a fascinating conversation.

How do you go from a newly-minted music degree to a secretarial position to becoming one of the leading analysts on Wall Street to co-founding one of the most successful boutique investment firms of all time to running your own business and being ranked as a top thinker by #Thinkers50​? Not to mention writing best-selling books?  My #FridayFiresideChat​ guest Whitney Johnson would say that it is the happy result of moving from S curve to S curve in your own life! We had a far-ranging conversation, including her "aha" discovery that @Clayton Christensen's theory of disruption could apply at a personal level.  And we even slipped Lady Gaga and Madonna in on the conversation.  Special note for those interested in #womeninleadership​ - we touch on a few themes relevant to that topic as well.  Have a look!

Creator of the Business Model Canvas and CEO of Strategyzer, Alexander Osterwalder joins Rita McGrath in conversation. Rita interviewed Alex about his new co-authored book "The Invincible Company," the implications of its lessons for other firms and his guidance for how to navigate through these nerve-wracking times.

With everyone wondering what the future holds, especially now, it was an enormous pleasure to welcome my friend, quantitative futurist Amy Webb to a #FridayFiresideChat​.  She offered a great key to thinking about the future, namely "what would it take for X to be Y".  I brought up the Jetsons, that old 1960's era television show and Amy astonished me by recounting that the first patent for a flying car was filed in 1917!  Who knew?  And apparently the flying car has become the standard by which all progress and innovation is judged.  We spent a chunk of time talking about how organizations can become more future-ready by building distributed teams that can converse across organizational silos and share what they see happening with the 11 forces that will shape the future.  She also encourages our listeners to "stop chasing certainty" and that we should move from beginning - middle - end thinking to past - present- future thinking.  Amy also directs the Future Today Institute (https://futuretodayinstitute.com/​) on which she posts all kinds of free resources for people interested in improving their level of future proof-ness.  Have a listen - I know I learned a lot and suspect you will as well.

Dave Ulrich is a legend in the world of talent and organizations. In this fireside chat, he and Rita McGrath will exchange ideas on the people implications of the COVID-19 crisis, focusing on the critical leadership behaviors that are going to be essential now and as we rebuild for the future.

I was absolutely delighted to welcome David Kidder, serial entrepreneur and founder of Bionic to our #FridayFiresideChat​!  David shares Bionic's approach to building growth engines quickly - going from $1 to $100 million, fast.  We also talk about the Startup Mindset and the five practices that gifted entrepreneurs use to build and scale their businesses, why minimizing regret is a great guide to setting priorities and how creating a growth mindset is a path to moving through this crisis.  The hour flew by, and I think you'll come away from this session feeling more positive and energized!