1st Edition
Guiding the Tide The Call for Agency in 21st Century Business Leaders
In a world increasingly driven by artificial intelligence, leadership needs to move beyond the “agile” approach, which dominated organizational leadership practices at the end of the 20th century. What is required now for successful leaders is a skillful juxtaposition of proactivity and humility, which we call guiding the tide. Successful leaders of today must demonstrate personal agency in order to guide the tide of events around them rather than be swept along with the crowd. The “tide,” like a river within an ocean akin to a gulf stream, is a unique, ever-changing stream of business systems, technology, consumers, and competitors. This book uses storytelling, examples, and clear, everyday language to blend leading-edge psychological research and leadership practices with the authors’ own work in coaching, assessing, and developing leaders for three decades around the world. The book takes the reader on a journey through three major learnings: First, the authors describe the nature of the tide and the demands on leaders to move beyond a reactionary, agile approach towards the forward-leaning, active stance of personal agency. Second, they describe three critical practices to successfully lead with agency and guide the tide: • Honest Engagement -- the practice of dealing with others from a place of openness, honesty, and a willingness to be vulnerable. • Addressing Reality -- the practice of seeing the world as it is rather than as we wish it to be and the ability to separate fact from fiction and data from desire. • Adaptive Impact - the practice of driving the organization, team, and one’s self forward in a way that creates sustainable competitive advantage. Third, they offer leaders a practical path to achieving the personal agency to successfully guide their organization through the tide that shapes their world.
CHAPTER 1: THE IMPERATIVES OF 21ST CENTURY LEADERSHIP
WHERE DID THE 20TH CENTURY GO? I SWEAR IT WAS HERE A MINUTE AGO
COMFORTABLY NUMB
BECOMING IRRELEVANT
WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?
IT'S ABOUT: GUIDING THE TIDE
CHAPTER 2: LEARNING TO GUIDE THE TIDE
LEADERSHIP AND THE TIDE
GUIDING THE TIDE PRACTICES
DEVELOPING HONEST ENGAGEMENT – THE CHALLENGE OF UNDERSTANDING MYSELF AND MY RELATIONSHIP WITH THE WORLD
ADDRESSING REALITY – THE CHALLENGE OF TRULY PERCEIVING THE WORLD
ADAPTIVE IMPACT – THE CHALLENGE OF DRIVING SUCCESSFUL EXECUTION
HOW DO LEADERS EVOLVE? - MINDSETS, VERTICAL GROWTH, AND TURNS
IN SUMMARY
CHAPTER 3: HONEST ENGAGEMENT
HONEST ENGAGEMENT - NAVIGATING LEADERSHIP DILEMMAS
THE TWO SIDES OF HONEST ENGAGEMENT – LOOKING INSIDE-OUT AND OUTSIDE-IN
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL PERSPECTIVE - WHAT MUST I DO?
THE BIOGRAPHICAL PERSPECTIVE - WHAT AM I BEING CALLED UPON TO DO?
HONEST ENGAGEMENT – BALANCING THE INSIDE-OUT AND OUTSIDE-IN PERSPECTIVES
AUTHENTIC CONVERSATIONS
IN SUMMARY
CHAPTER 4: ADDRESSING REALITY
THE VALUE OF ADDRESSING REALITY
TACKLING OBJECTIVE REALITY – SEEING THROUGH THE FOG OF YOUR OWN WISHES
COMING TO TERMS WITH SUBJECTIVE REALITY – MOVING FROM DATA TO INSIGHT
INTERSUBJECTIVE REALITY: ENROLLING OTHERS
APPROACHING THE WORLD BY BEING MINDFUL
IN SUMMARY
CHAPTER 5: ADAPTIVE IMPACT
WHAT IS ADAPTIVE IMPACT
THE COMPONENTS OF ADAPTIVE IMPACT
STEPPING INTO THE TIDE
EMBODYING AMBITIOUS REALISM
THE TALENT CHALLENGE
IN SUMMARY
CHAPTER 6: THE PARADOX OF DEVELOPING LEADERSHIP AGENCY
THE NEED TO ACHIEVE PERSPECTIVE
STEP BACK – THE ATTRACTION OF BALCONIES
LET GO – HOW DID IT GET SO LATE SO SOON?
HANDDING OFF EFFECTIVELY
STEPPING FORWARD – NEXT PLEASE
COMFORT WITH DISCOMFORT
SELF-CARE
IN THE END – THERE IS NO ESCAPING JOSEPH CAMPBELL
IN SUMMARY
CHAPTER 7: A PLAYBOOK FOR LEADERS DEVELOPING THEMSELVES
DUH – WE LEARN FROM EXPERIENCE
SIMULTANEITY
GROWTH THROUGH ADVERSITY (AND SUCCESS) - THE BOUNCE
THE HOW OF LEARNING FROM EXPERIENCE
IN SUMMARY
Epilogue: STEPPING FORWARD
Bibliography
Biography
Frank Guglielmo is an award-winning educator, consultant, and coach. He has created and led executive development programs around the world for over two decades. Currently, he is Managing Director of Park Consulting, a firm he founded, focusing on helping organizations deal with the leadership and talent management requirements of the “post-information age” – a competitive environment defined by connections driven through digital media and socially created information.
Prior to this, Frank was Senior Vice President of leadership and Organizational Development at the Interpublic Group of Companies, a Fortune 500 company and one of the world's leading marketing and advertising firms. In this role Frank was accountable for internal development and talent management strategies across Interpublic’s global agency networks and was directly accountable for the company’s executive development and succession management efforts.
Frank has also been Director of Management and Organizational Development at Altria Corporate Services Inc. and Vice President, Branch Management Selection and Development at Prudential Securities. In both of these roles, Frank was accountable for leading efforts in management selection and development, high-potential development, and succession management. He began his career as a Senior Consultant at Applied Research Corp., a consulting firm specializing in management assessment and development. Frank holds both an MS and a Ph.D. in organizational psychology. He has conducted training programs and organizational interventions in Europe and Latin America as well as the U.S. He is a member of the American Psychological Association and the Metropolitan New York Association for Applied Psychology. Specialties: Leadership Development, Succession Planning, Change Management, Executive Coaching, HR Strategy
Jonathan Donner is an internationally recognized expert in senior leadership development, Jonathan Donner has led leadership development efforts at some of the world’s most successful global enterprises including Amazon, the UN World Food Programme, Unilever, Altria, and Marks & Spencer.
Sudhanshu Palsule is an award-winning educator, CEO advisor, and leadership coach, Sudhanshu Palsule is regarded as one of the leading thinkers in the field of transformative leadership. He teaches at Duke Corporate Education and is a Fellow at Cambridge University. His clients include several Fortune 100 companies, governments, and the UN.
