There are many amazing things about teaching at the Wharton School. One of them is attending the Annual Wharton Leadership Conference, which was held this past week. The theme of this year's event was Developing Leadership Talent: How Organizations Prepare Their Present and Future Leadership. Masters of Ceremony Peter Cappelli and Michael Useem kept the day moving, no small feat with a line-up of nine of the most interesting speakers I've heard in a long time.
Having attended the conference for the past several years, this one is at the top of my "don't miss" list. Just as you're thinking there's no way you can sit through nine 50-minute talks, you can't help but get hooked: each is so different and passionate. Most of all, they're memorable.
Thomas Stewart, Editor and Managing Director of the Harvard Business Review, talked about the three tests every leader goes through - whether it's Indiana Jones, Jeff Bezos or you. He calls them the initation test (when they become a boss/CEO/leader for the first time), the crisis test (when they go through their first business or personal crisis) and the rejuvenation test (when they realize it's time to move on.) "Organization life is the only place where square pegs can actually fit into round holes."
Jennifer Deal, Research Scientist at the Center for Creative Leadership, gave what I call the research portion of the program. She presented data from her survey of 3,400 employees mostly working in large companies, representative of all generations. You can read more about it in her December 2006 book Retiring the Generation Gap: How Employees Young and Old Can Find Common Ground. What can everyone everyone agree on? "An opportunity to learn is about as important as pay."
Steve Harrison, Chairman of Lee Hecht Harrison, talked about his experiences and observations and the need for companies to move from legal compliance to a model of integrity, which he talks about in his book, The Manager's Book of Decencies. A gem of a job title: "Director of First Impressions."
David Nadler, Senior Partner, Oliver Wyman, and Vice Chairman of Marsh & McLennan, explained how CEOs lead their organization through the metaphor of a three-act play. They get on the stage stepping into the CEO role. They got the role having succeeded in another company faced with the same challenges. So Act I begins as the CEO figures out what's needed to meet the current crisis. The transition to Act II begins once the shift takes hold, and the CEO may need to change style or tactics to fully implement the strategy. Finally, as Act III begins, the CEO plans for the next generation of leadership to take the company to the next stage as the CEO leaves the stage. Nadler's article, The CEO's Second Act, in which he talks about the causes of CEO success and failure, appeared in the January 2007 Harvard Business Review.
Richard Greene, Consultant and Author of Words that Shook the World, talked about the ins and outs of giving great speaches.
Kirbyjon Caldwell, Senior Pastor,Windsor Village United Methodist Church, was no doubt the inspirational speaker of the day. Wharton undergrad leaves Wall Street to become a Pastor in Texas? You know that's got to be a heck of a story. "So all of you who do 360 feedback in your companies: does the feedback from the lowest level employees in the organization affect the compensation of the highest level employees? If not, do you tell them that their input doesn't count? That's where the rubber meets the road."
Dana Gioia, Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, was probably the biggest surprise of the day. Stamford Business School grad leaves big General Foods marketing job to become a poet? The connection between poetry, leadership and managing turnarounds - whether it's the Jello brand or a quasi-government organization? It's all about creativity.
Tim O'Toole, CEO of the London Underground, was the last speaker of the day. His talk about the strength of every employee involved in the 2005 bombings. Unlike 9/11, the fact that they used 19 different radio systems to communicate with safety and Underground personnel was not a significant factor that day. The secret sauce: station staff had gone through so many drills, they knew what to do and courageously did whatever needed to be done, any way it could be done.
Which brought us right back to the start of the day: The one thing 97% of the workforce wants is to learn on the job - regardless of their age or job.
I hope you'll check out Knowledge@Wharton for interviews, articles and podcasts about each of the speakers -- and consider attending next year.
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