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Yesterday, I received a “Major Issues, Major Impact Questionnaire” from the American Association of University Women (AAUW), an organization breaking barriers for women and girls.  Answering the questionnaire is important since “AAUW research and education programs are used by federal, state, and local agencies and academics to address gender and gender gap issues positively.”

AAUW was the resource that the U.S. Congress used to pass the Lilly Ledbetter bill, the first bill signed by President Barack Obama.  According to an article “Obama Signs Equal-Pay Legislation” by Sheryl Gay Stolberg in The New York Times on January 29, 2009, “the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act (is) a law named for an Alabama woman who at the end of a 19-year career as a supervisor in a tire factory complained that she had been paid less than men.”

The author goes on to write that “After a Supreme Court ruling against her, Congress approved the legislation that expands workers’ rights to sue in this kind of case, relaxing the statute of limitations.”  President Obama stated that, “It is fitting that with the very first bill I sign — the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act — we are upholding one of this nation’s first principles: that we are all created equal and each deserve a chance to pursue our own version of happiness.”

Stolberg wrote that the president “was signing the bill not only in honor of Ms. Ledbetter — who stood behind him, shaking her head and clasping her hands in seeming disbelief — but in honor of his own grandmother, ‘who worked in a bank all her life, and even after she hit that glass ceiling, kept getting up again’ and for his daughters, ‘because I want them to grow up in a nation that values their contributions, where there are no limits to their dreams.’

That was in 2009 and not much progress has been made on the gender pay gap since then.  The AAUW warned that, “Women have only gained 13 CENTS toward pay equity with men in the last 30 years.  At this rate, it will take another 60 years before we achieve pay equity.”

Women working full time earn 77 cents, on average, for every dollar earned by men.  AAUW also stated that, “just one year out of college, women working full time already earn less than male colleagues, even in the same field, and that the pay gap widens as time goes by.”

Here are examples of the impact of paycheck inequity:  if he makes $10,000, she makes $7,700.  If he makes $30,000, she makes $23,100.  If he makes $50,000, she makes $38,500.  If he makes $70,000, she makes $53,900.  If he makes $100,000, she makes $77,000.

AAUW and other organizations are doing their best to help women earn an equal paycheck.  Enacting bills from the U.S. Congress on equity is not all that can be done, however.  It takes women, especially young women, to do their research before accepting a salary offer.  Often, it is the first salary you get that determines how much you will be making as you climb the corporate ladder.  So be prepared to state that you want to receive a salary equal to the one that a male would — a small but important step to end the gender pay gap.

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Timeless leadership is always about character, and it is always about authenticity…To be authentic is literally to be your own author (the words derive from the same Greek root), to discover your own narrative energies and desires, and then to find your own way of acting on them.

When you are real in your music, people know it and they feel your authenticity.

Warren Bennis, in On Becoming a Leader, and Wynonna Judd describing her experience as a musician, are two descriptions of authenticity.

Authenticity is the buzzword of the twenty-first century according to Robert Doniger, in Michael Crichton’s Timeline as quoted in Authenticity: What Consumers Really Want by James H. Gilmore and B. Joseph Pine II.  “Authenticity is in the air.  You see it, feel it, all around you,” according to the authors.  However, “Most of what we experience in today’s consumer-oriented society revolves around issues of what is real and what is fake.”

A parallel trend that demonstrates authenticity is to develop story telling skills to get a job, pitch a product, or motivate employees.  Peter Guber’s book Tell to Win:  Connect, Persuade, and Triumph with the Hidden Power of Story, has a slightly different take on the power of authenticity at work.  In his chapter on “Are Your Motives Authentic and Congruent with Your Goal?” Guber writes:

Whether you’re a CEO, salesperson, volunteer organizer, or small business owner, your listeners will never fully connect to you, buy into your proposition, or join your parade unless they can trust you.  And only if they respect your motives and empathize with you as a fellow human being will they feel that trust.  To tell a compelling story, then, you need to be authentic in your passion for your goal, and that passion needs to be congruent with your experience and commitment.

Authenticity in the Classroom

My teaching style in the course I teach on “Organizational Behavior” is based around experiential learning, meaning that as one former student told me in class, “I chose this class because I couldn’t fall asleep.”  He is right.  My time is spent moving my students out of their comfort zones by asking questions, having them interact with their classmates by name, wanting opinions, and making them memorize and recite lines from Shakespeare’s “Romeo & Juliet” and “Hamlet” as an exercise in emotional intelligence.

During our 29 sessions together each semester, I tell stories about places where I worked in my career and personal experiences in order to bring up, illustrate, and reaffirm a topic in class.  In turn and in keeping with honoring the students’ disclosures, I am asked questions.  Most of the time, the queries are about an organizational behavior.  However, I am asked many personal questions to which I answer authentically—up to a point.  As the leader of a classroom, I am the authority figure and aim to earn the trust of each of my students.  I am not in front of a classroom to tell the details of my life’s story every session; I am there to further my students’ education and prepare them to be effective managers and leaders.

Authentic Leadership

We are living in an age of transparency—or at least that is what Google and Facebook would like so that they can capture and sell more data from their users.  How can someone be authentic and not transparent?  I’ve heard about a manager who when he was transferred to a district office suggested that the staff have a sleep over at his house, go to meals together regularly, and build a bond of transparency with everyone.  Is that relevant to the work that they do?  Does his version of team building build trust?

The class textbook, Organizational Behavior, 14^th edition, by Stephens P. Robbins and Timothy A. Judge, describes the authentic leader in the section on “Authentic Leadership:  Ethics and Trust are the Foundation of Leadership:”

Authentic leaders know who they are, know what they believe in and value, and act on their values and beliefs openly and candidly.  Their followers consider them ethical people.  The primary quality produced by authentic leadership, therefore, is trust.  Authentic leaders share information, encourage open communication, and stick to their ideals.  The result:  people come to have faith in them.

Inauthentic Leaders

In a quote I found online, Coco Chanel, the French haute couterie, said, Hard times arouse an instinctive desire for authenticity.

The global economic condition and fast moving technology innovations are stretching the borderlines of what authenticity really means.  And how inauthentic leaders have failed their followers.

Bernie Madoff is the poster boy for the financial professionals on Wall Street who like others escaped close scrutiny from the Security & Exchange Commission by a façade of authenticity, a façade that in this case led Madoff to being sentenced to 150 years in prison for the largest financial fraud in U.S. history.

Google, Facebook, and other social media sites are fearless in making their users transparent—to a fault in some cases.  We are instructed to want to know everything about everyone and to display all there is to know about ourselves.  But knowledge doesn’t mean authenticity.  Knowledge is one aspect of an individual.  It is the individual herself that needs to be the author of the story of her authentic life.

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Out of 20,000 new hires, the failure rate was 46% according to Mark Murphy, founder and CEO of Leadership IQ.  His research on this topic revealed that the reason the failure rate was so high was because 89% of the new hires demonstrated a lack of coachability, poor emotional intelligence, mixed motivation (to do or to be paid?), and temperament.  In only 11% of new hires was a lack a technical skills a failure factor.

“Hiring for Attitude” was one in the series of Thought Leader Teleforums offered by Marshall Goldsmith and Patricia Wheeler at Leading News.  Guest speaker Murphy talked about what he learned writing his most recent book, Hiring for Attitude:  A Revolutionary Approach to Recruiting and Selecting People with Both Tremendous Skills and Superb Attitude (McGraw Hill, 2011).  He summarized his book by saying, “Hire for attitude, train for aptitude” because “companies want attitudes that perfectly match their unique culture.”

Hiring for attitude is applicable at all levels within an organization.  For instance, CEOs fail so often because they misread the organization’s culture, Murphy said.  In my previous post “The Price of Ignoring Workplace Culture”, I write about why Jack Griffin, Chairman and CEO of Time Inc., was forced out after less than six months of starting at the company.  The basic reason for his departure was because he didn’t closely read the organization’s culture but instead moved forward with his own agenda without consulting with his staff.

“Who do you want by your side?” is one of the questions an interviewer can ask employees at their company use to discover the attitude needed by a job candidate.  By soliciting input from the staff, it is possible to create a checklist of the needed attitudes because the interviewer is looking for the psychological characteristics of what the company needs on their team.  For instance, Murphy shared the example of ‘brown shorts.’  Southwest Airlines brought in pilots for interviews.  One of the first things the interviewers did was ask the pilots if they would change from their suits and instead put on brown shorts.  Not all the candidates were willing to change their attire.  And guess what?  It was those who did put on the brown shorts who continued to be interviewed.  The others were eliminated because they didn’t have a sense of humor, one of the required attributes of a pilot at the airline.

Murphy’s “Five Part Interview” was an eye-opener.  Here’s what the interviewer will ask the candidate.  1)  Think about your job before your current one, name a key person there, and spell out the person’s name.  2)  Tell me about that person; describe them.  3)  How could you have improved your working relationship with that person?  4)  What would that person say were your strengths?  5)  What would that person say about your weaknesses (like not being open to coaching?).  The purpose of this is to generate self-awareness in the candidate and personal reflections on whether he is a good fit for the new company culture.

Researching the corporate culture of the workplace to see if you will be a good fit is the key to having the right —and authentic attitude—when you apply.  Don’t try on brown shorts if that is not something you want to do at an interview.  Be yourself and you will find the culture that is a good fit for your career.

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“Are women less stable employees than men,” the authors ask in “Chapter 2: Diversity in Organizations” in the class textbook Organizational Behavior by Stephen P. Robbins and Timothy A. Judge used in my “Organizational Behavior” class.  The authors were also interested in “What about absence and turnover rates?” 

The immediate answers for many people are that women are the caregivers and therefore less stable and more likely to change jobs than men.  And they are right based on the article “Challenging Conventional Wisdom About Who Quits: Revelations from Corporate America” in the Journal of Applied Psychology (93, no. 1 [2008], pp. 1-34).  “…evidence from a study of nearly 500,000 professional employees indicates significant differences, with women more likely to turn over than men.”  Additional researchers found that women have higher rates of being absent and are the ones who take time from work if her child is sick or needs to go to a doctor, wait for a delivery person or a vendor like the plumber, etc.

However, the roles women and men play are changing.  “The U.S. Census Bureau reported yesterday that “One-Third of Fathers with Working Wives Regularly Care for Their Children” wrote Lance Somerfeld in his blog post at www.NYCDadsgroup.com (Tuesday, December 6, 2011).  A quote Somerfeld used stated that “Among fathers with a wife in the workforce, 32 percent were a regular source of care for their children under age 15, up from 26 percent in 2002, the U.S. Census Bureau reported.” The statistics about fathers with preschool-age children was even more interesting:  “one in five fathers was the primary caregiver, meaning their child spent more time in their care than any other type of arrangement.”

Somerfeld stated that the recession triggered a significant increase in men staying home (he uses the term “mancession”).  But there is also the fact that “fathers genuinely want to spend more time with their children.”  Somerfeld’s opinion based on the approximately 500 dads within the NYC Dads Group is that men step in to be the primary caregiver as a choice.

Somerfeld cited another article that brought a new slant to caregiving.  Jobless Dads Get Quality Time With Children as Caregiving Rises by Joel Stonington of Bloomberg/Businessweek reports that “The recession isn’t the only reason (that dads spend more time as a partial or primary caregiver). Women are increasingly contributing more to family income than men, and there is a growing desire among men to take part in the lives of their children, according to Ellen Galinsky, president and co-founder of the New York-based Families and Work Institute.”

Fifty percent of women are managers, for the first time there are 18 female CEOs on the Fortune 500 list, and a growing number of women at all levels of companies are making more money than their husbands.  The fact that dads want to stay home is refreshing.  Mothers are freed up to develop their skills to climb the corporate ladder at one company while dads are able to stay home and care for their children.

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Tomorrow, I am going to be speaking for a class of second year graduate students at Columbia University’s School of Social Work.  My topic is “The Learning Organization” and I’ll be sharing my experiences as a consultant helping a non-profit take a systems approach and become a learning organization.  My audience of social workers is not interested in clinical work but instead is interested in administrative work in the non-profit area, public management, human resources management, social and economic development, and global and transnational practice.  In addition to the presentation I’ll be making, I am going to recommend a book that will be helpful to this audience and the larger one as well.

The Organization of the Future 2:  Visions, Strategies, and Insights on Managing in a New Era is a collection of 26 informational essays written by great thought leaders, produced by the Leader to Leader Institute, and published by Jossey-Bass in 2009.  (Note:  The institute changed is name to the Frances Hesselbein Leadership Institute.)  According to the cover, “The book describes how tomorrow’s organizations can chart the path toward growth and prosperity in rapidly changing times and includes amazing examples of how organizations from different sectors have created cultures that are empowering their employees and transforming their industries and communities.”

Editors are two well-known leaders:  Frances Hesselbein and Marshall Goldsmith.  Hesselbein is the founding president and CEO of the institute named after her and is well-known known for her service as CEO of the Girl Scouts of the USA for which she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.  Goldsmith is one of the top executive coaches in the world and was recognized by the American Management Association as one of 50 great thinkers who have influenced the field of management.

The Leader to Leader Institute was established in 1990, and was then called the Peter F. Drucker Foundation for Non-Profit Management.  The more encompassing name furthers the image and the book “furthers its mission—to strengthen the leadership of the social sector—by providing social sector leaders with essential leadership wisdom, inspiration, and resources to lead for innovation and to build vibrant social sector organizations.”

There are five sections in the book:  Part One – Strategy and Vision:  Setting the Direction of the Organization of the Future.  Part Two – Organizational Culture:  Values, Emotions, Hope, Ethics, Spirit, and Behavior.  Part Three – Designing the Organization of the Future.  Part Four – Working Together.  Part Five – Leadership.

When I looked up ‘learning organization’ in the Index, I was referred to pages of an article in Part One “Managing the Whole Mandate for the Twenty-First Century: Ditching the Quick-Fix Approach to Management” by Paul Borawski and Maryann Brennan.  Borawski, executive director and chief strategic officer of the American Society for Quality, and Brennan, principal for Brennan Worldwide, write that “Organizations that rely on quick fixes don’t necessarily learn from their endeavors.”  They go on to state that, “To avoid making the same mistake, you need to share knowledge about what worked and what didn’t throughout your organization so that other functional areas with similar problems can apply the solution.”

Developing a systems approach can foster a learning organization in large as well as small companies.  To make it happen and change to a systems approach to management, the authors of the article describe a process of three stages:
—Decide you believe in a systems approach.
—Help your organization build broad support to view the organization as a system by preparing for an investment of time to learn, experiment, and learn more, and making a commitment to a journey toward performance excellence that will take years.
—Craft a plan on how your organization is going to move from its current state toward a systems approach.

Tomorrow, I am going to recommend the article I referenced and the over 300 pages of other articles in the book to my audience because although a little dated, I believe the thought experts can help the reader learn how to lead with intelligence in order to effectively manage the organization of the future.

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“Writing to Be Heard” was posted on July 16, 2007, the first time I used my blog.  After writing hundreds of posts since then—especially this year—I decided to share my favorite posts of 2011 with you.

The posts below all have a story behind them, a reason to share the information, and a desire to help you on your career journey.  The posts could have been written to address an issue that came up during a coaching or consulting meeting, a topic that was discussed in a management class I teach at the Zicklin School of Business, an opportunity to expand horizons, etc.  The focus of each one is categorized by one or more of the tiles above the post which include Career, Coaching, College, Culture, Economy, Health, Leadership, Life Business, Management, Technology.

Below is a month-by-month list of posts that I hope you will find relevant, inspiring, and even fun.

January 17:  Are You Afraid of Feedback?  The topic emerged from two different threads.  The first was to offer guidance to decision-makers who were working with a very resistant executive.  The second was the loan of an academic colleague’s DVD on feedback.

February 21:  The Price of Ignoring Corporate Culture  As I told my students in an “Organizational Behavior” class, teaching corporate culture is my favorite unit to teach.  It is because of the environment executives create and how it impacts employee’s behavior.  In this particular case, the executive did not take into account his behavior in an established culture.

March 10:  Women’s Month 2011: Shake the World  To acknowledge the progress women make in a range of fields, I wrote about their accomplishments including that of Justine Siegal who had fulfilled her dream of throwing batting practice for the Cleveland Indians in spring training.

April 4:  Lasting Impressions  I am impressed by the number of people who even when we have not seen or spoken with one another for months or years, still remember me and the work I do.  The need to make a good first—and subsequent—impact on everyone you come in touch with is an important part of career development.

May 27:  Shakespeare in a Management Classroom  In April 2010, I attended a workshop on teaching Shakespeare in the workplace.  To my delight and my students’ reluctance, I developed a class session on emotional intelligence by having students get on a stage with a partner and recite excerpts from scenes in Romeo & Juliet and Hamlet, their favorite because they get to yell!

June 17:  Ten Guideposts on Your Reinvention Highway  Exploring a new career can be stressful and tiring.  Since I have reinvented myself a few times—I like to call it evolution—I share ideas on how to practice active patience to realize a new career.

July 7:  Holistic Professional Resume  In addition to teaching a business course, I also teach a program called “SuperCharge Your Career” at Zicklin.  What I don’t see on many resumes is Activities or another heading that can fill out the profile of a candidate and give an interviewer a sense of their lives outside the company.

August 30:  Career as a Farmer:  Sasha J. Farkas  Not everyone wants to work in an office in New York or any urban environment for that matter.  USA Today’s headline on December 26, 2011, “More Young People See Farming Opportunities,” confirmed that those in their 20’s and 30’s who have been downsized or unable to get a job, are seeking ways to survive on a farm.

September 13:  LockerDome:  The Facebook of Team Sports  Gabe Lozano, Co-Founder and CEO of a website for young athletes, read my post Women’s Month 2011: Shake the World and left a comment.  That comment led to a conversation, two interviews—his and Justine Siegal’s—and my own profile on LockerDome’s social media site.

October 29:  Disability:  A Second Career for L.I.R.R. Workers  Last year, I wrote about the ethical behavior of Long Island Railroad workers who claimed disability when they were obviously fine since they played golf sometimes daily.  Recently, I read that the cost of disbursing those on disability can be close to $1 billion.

November 12:  Walking Meetings  One of the many takeaways I had from reading Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson was learning the pleasures of a walking meeting.  A friend gave me that opportunity and I’m very grateful for it.

December 24:  Dear Santa:  My Wish List  It had been ages since I wrote a “Dear Santa” letter so I put tongue in cheek and infused my humor into the serious requests I made for the greater good—and not just the sweater and earrings I hoped Santa would bring!

Thank you for your time to browse and read my posts.  Looking forward to writing more in 2012!

Very best wishes for a HAPPY NEW YEAR!

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This week I’ve written posts about business gifts of music, books, plus power and influence.  Today, the ‘business’ gift of coaching is the focus, a practical and meaningful present to give yourself.  If you are interested in coaching with me, the first half-hour of coaching on the phone is complimentary!

“Coaching done well may be the most effective intervention designed for human performance,” Atul Gawande wrote in his article “Personal Best.  Top athletes and singers have coaches.  Should you?” that appeared in the “Annals of Medicine section of The New Yorker on October 3, 2011.  The bio on his website reads that “Gawande is a surgeon, writer, and public health researcher. He practices general and endocrine surgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. He is also Associate Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School and Associate Professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Harvard School of Public Health.”  As the author of The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right, a New York Times Bestseller, he shares the importance of following step-by-step procedures to be thorough, efficient, and effective in procedures and projects.

“No matter how well trained people are, few can sustain their best performance on their own. That’s where coaching comes in.”  Gawande writes that after eight years as a surgeon, his “performance in an operating room has reached a plateau.  I’d like to think that it’s a good thing—I’ve arrived at my professional peak.  But mainly it seems as if I’ve just stopped getting better.”

My experience coaching executives, leaders on their way to the executive suite, managers seeking ways to be more productive and profitable, recent M.B.A.s and other graduate students starting out in their career fields, and those looking to enhance their career potential has helped my clients to ‘get better.’  Getting better is a process that makes the client vulnerable and my warning to potential clients is that they will need to “move out of your comfort zone.”

Many corporate employees I know who need coaching refuse to get it.  Executives especially are stubborn to the point that they put the blame on others for a failed initiative and do not clearly see how they are holding back the progress of their small companies or large divisions.  They resist change in order to maintain their image and/or ego and do not take into account the greater good.

In case you are wondering, I follow my own advice.  That is, I have signed up to resume coaching with an excellent coach I worked with previously.  In January, I will undertake a major project and know that my investment in having someone to listen carefully to what I say—and not say— then ask appropriate questions can lead to specific appropriate actions and the realization of my goals.

If you are not interested in my coaching services, you should be wary of other coaches who do not have the specific experience you seek or lead you in the wrong direction.  For instance, when I had a small project, I called a coach who was offering a free session.  When I told her about my interest in starting a career coaching group, she told me that when I started marketing the program I had to offer a guarantee that each person would get a job.  That was not a wise coach who thought strategically since no one could guarantee a job for someone else.  I didn’t follow her advice since I wanted clients who would trust me and could be guaranteed that I would be honest about the career coaching I offered.

 To help you get an idea of what working with a coach is like, you might want to sign up for “Leigh’s Leader Offer” (on the right of this page).  If you are already interested, below is a general overview of my coaching process and session development:

-       Initial Conversation: Each potential client has a half-hour telephone conversation with me to articulate reasons for seeking a coach and identify outcomes from the coaching process.

-       Good Fit Decision: The client and I decide if there is a ‘good fit’ for both ‘coachee’ and coach in order for the coaching process to be successful.  Fees are discussed with the potential client.  Being comfortable talking about what investments in career development are worth is part of the coaching process.

-       Assessments: Client completes appropriate formal self-assessments such as the “Coaching Report for Leaders” or informal assessments such as writing a “Life Story.”

-       Session Focus Form (Optional but suggested): Client writes up their progress in specific areas; this document then becomes the agenda for a coaching session and a way to track progress toward a client’s goals.

-       90-Day Goals: Client sets reasonable expectations for achieving three goals within a 90-day period.

-       Conversation: Client and coach engage in honest interactions during which client is invited to express deep-seeded ideas or wishes. I listen carefully to what is said and not said in order to discern and offer effective strategies for client success.

-       Action steps: Client and coach agree on a series of specific ways to help client get ‘unstuck’ and on track to realize goals.

-       6-Month Planning Guide: Client identifies specific projects and places them on a calendar for completion.

-       In-Between Sessions: Client and coach discuss ideas to help the client build on the insights gained in a coaching session and/or engage in new behaviors to avoid missed opportunities.

Signing up for coaching isn’t major surgery.  All you have to do is e-mail me at Leigh@ltr-nyc.com and we can set up your half-hour complimentary telephone coaching session.

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Stuck as to what business gift you can give to a talented college senior?  Or someone who earned an M.B.A but couldn’t land a job in their field of study?  There isn’t a product you can buy for them but there is a way to give them each a gift.

The gift is coming from you, your power and influence to seek out colleagues who are in positions to hire employees for temporary or contract jobs or a full-time position.  For instance, Ken, one of the speakers for my “Organizational Behavior” class, ended his engaging talk by saying he welcomed students to send him their resumes.  He had some contract jobs that he had to fill and, even if he filled those positions, he would send resumes to his colleagues.  That, in itself, was a gift:  the gift of the power the speaker had to hire a student.

Along with some outstanding students in the class, there were also ‘alumni’ who had taken my courses previously who were looking for work.  That was where my influence came in.  I reached out to absolutely outstanding students and sent them Ken’s information.  I knew that the fit for two of the candidates would be an excellent one because of their work ethics, workplace experience, performance in my classes, and eagerness to learn.  I used my influence to help them by sending recommendations of the students to Ken.  But Ken would have hired them anyway.

After six months, the students are enjoying their work—and send me updates regularly to let me be acquainted with how they are doing.  They both enjoy observing and gaining knowledge from their managers, participating in teams, and knowing that there is always more to learn.

One of my students gave me a ‘Thank You’ card recently.  And what he wrote at the end of the message described the value he got and wanted to pass along:  “I hope that in the not so distant future, I will return the favor with some one in a similar position in which I was.”

Who do you know who could use a leg up?  How can you use your power and influence to find the right ladder for a younger person to climb?  The gift of time to find the answers then act on them is one that will always be remembered.

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Still looking for a thoughtful gift for a business colleague?  What about a book?  But “What book?” you ask.  A book that will resonate with their personality, performance, and preferences.

Non-fiction books and memoirs are appropriate, especially ones that colleagues or consultants would appreciate.  For instance, a few years ago when I was doing consulting work at a small non-profit, the Executive Director/CEO wrote in the book he gave for Christmas:  “To Leigh:  To another winner from California.  Thank you for all you do for our company and your friendship.”  When I opened the gift from the CEO, a smile came to my face. Seabiscuit:  An American Legend by Laura Hillenbrand turned out to be not just a very good read, it was a book about a memorable occasion earlier that year.  During a visit to see my sister Alice in Los Angeles, we saw the movie Seabiscuit, the first time we had seen a movie together in decades.  Sadly, my sister died in November.  When I see the spine of Seabiscuit on my bookshelf, I am reminded of a terrific sister.

After searching lists online of the best business books for 2011 at newspapers, bookstores, and blogs—plus my own library of recent purchases of business books—I’ve come up with a list of books that are arranged in no particular order.

STEVE JOBS by Walter Isaacson (Simon & Schuster).  A very well-written book that profiles the successful revolutionary guru whose temperamental behavior with Board and staff members was recorded but not ‘investigated’ enough in my opinion.  Isaacson writes that “At a time when the United States is seeking ways to sustain its innovative edge, and when societies around the world are trying to build creative digital-age economies, Jobs stands as the ultimate icon of inventiveness, imagination and sustained innovation. He knew that the best way to create value in the twenty-first century was to connect creativity with technology, so he built a company where leaps of the imagination were combined with remarkable feats of engineering.”  Give to peers and direct reports, if they are the type to read an almost 600 page book.

THE PROGRESS PRINCIPLE by Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer (Harvard Business Review Press).  When searching for business books by women, this is one of the first ones that I found.  In fact, some lists of business books do not include one publication by a woman.  The results from a husband-and-wife research team “discovered that the key to engagement is feeling that you are making progress. So if you want your staff to feel positive and engaged in their work, help them to make progress—and to recognize the progress they are making. This a pioneering work on employee engagement, with lots of memorable examples culled from those in-the-trenches diary entries.”  Give to yourself and selected peers.

GOOD STRATEGY, BAD STRATEGY:  THE DIFFERENCE AND WHY IT MATTERS by Richard Rumelt (Crown Business).  I was intrigued when I found this book on a Canadian newspaper site because I learned that Henry Mintzberg only reads books by Rumelt, a professor of business and society at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA).  A professor of management at McGill University in Montreal, Mintzberg wrote the book Managers Not MBAs:  A Hard Look at the Soft Practice of Managing and Management Development, a book worth a read itself on how experiential learning can provide more insights than an advanced diploma at a business school.  In my experiences, executive clients and business students often overlook strategic thinking—or it goes wrong.  This accessible book is about learning how to do it right.  Give to selected peers, selected direct reports; buy a copy for yourself.

GREAT BY CHOICE:  UNCERTAINTY, CHAOS AND LUCK—WHY SOME THRIVE DESPITE THEM ALL by Jim Collins and Morten Hansen (HarperBusiness).  This book is the latest in a series of best-sellers by Jim Collins; others include Good to Great:  Why Some Companies Make the Leap…and Others Don’t and Built to Last:  Successful Habits of Visionary Companies.  These well researched and written books contain valuable contributions for CEOs and other executives on how leaders can manage effectively in difficult times.  Fortune Magazine’s cover story on the October 17, 2011 issue “Collins on Chaos:  It’s one thing to rise to greatness.  It’s another to do so in a time of upheaval, disruption, and economic turmoil (hello, 2011)” is a great introduction to how you can manage for success.  Give to selected executives, peers, selected direct reports.

MONEY AND POWER:  HOW GOLDMAN SACHS CAME TO RULE THE WORLD by William D. Cohan (Doubleday/Allen Lane).  This is a “…scrupulously balanced if sometimes ponderous history of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. by the author of House of Cards: A Tale of Hubris and Wretched Excess on Wall Street and The Last Tycoons:  The Secret History of Lazard Frères & Co.”  Cohan, who was a banker at Lazard when I was a temp, is a brilliant writer whose access to former clients, rivals, plus current and former employees of financial firms produces stories of the evolution of the headline making giants and, in the case of Lazard, the quiet giant of Wall Street.  “Cohan evinces an eye for images and an ear for quotations as he explores Goldman’s ‘schizophrenic’ behavior.”  One former Goldman employee stated, “I saw what they did to their customers. … They’d steal from them, rape them, anything they could do.”  Give any of these to those who will read about 600 pages and M.B.A. finance students who want to be investment bankers.

TELL TO WIN: CONNECT, PERSUADE, AND TRIUMPH WITH THE HIDDEN POWER OF STORY by Peter Guber (Crown Business).  This is an excellent book well worth the reading time.  It is excellent because of Gruber’s storytelling; his stories have helped me look at my re-branding process in a new way.  “Today everyone, whether they know it or not, is in the emotional transportation business. More and more, success is won by creating compelling stories that have the power to move partners, shareholders, customers and employees to action. Simply put, if you can’t tell it, you can’t sell it. And if you can’t sell it, you won’t win.”  Give yourself a copy and see how your stories impact your performance.

AN INVISIBLE THREAD: THE TRUE STORY OF AN 11-YEAR-OLD PANHANDLER, A BUSY SALES EXECUTIVE, AND AN UNLIKELY MEETING WITH DESTINY by Laura Schroff (Howard Books)  When I went to an online bookstore, I keyed in ‘Business Books’ and this was second on the list of results.  I had not seen it on any list but began to read the description and quickly knew that it would be a significant read on what a difference you can make with one person.  “When Schroff first met Maurice on a New York City street corner, she had no idea that she was standing on the brink of an incredible and unlikely friendship that would inevitably change both their lives. As one lunch at McDonald’s with Maurice turns into two, then into a weekly occurrence that is fast growing into an inexplicable connection, Laura learns heart-wrenching details about Maurice’s horrific childhood” and she remembers her own.  It is not about the business of work; it is about the business of taking the time to help save one individual’s world.  Give to colleagues and friends who need to find a meaningful engagement with the world.

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‘Tis the season for individuals of many cultures to give and receive gifts to their business colleagues.  Since mine is a blog about understanding corporate culture while working to be a leader, I have posted the first of a series of ‘gift’ ideas and will continue these posts during the next week—all framed in the context of a business environment.

Two of my very best friends have given me gifts of music.  One gift was a ticket to go with my friend to hear Joshua Bell play Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 35 with the New York Philharmonic at Lincoln Center.  The other was a gift certificate from the TKTS Ticket Booth to see a Broadway production at 50% of retail price and my opportunity to see the winner of the Best Musical 2010 Tony Award:  Memphis.

The last time I listened to music at Lincoln Center was in the summer when I enjoyed hearing a range of bands play—including one from New Orleans—during the Midsummer Night Swing.  Last week when Joshua Bell began his beautiful playing surrounded by a spectacularly large symphony orchestra and Daniel Harding, a very physical conductor, I almost expected to hear him break into a blue grass tune and not Tchaikovsky’s violin concerto.  That thought receded quickly while I was transported into Bell’s world of magnificent music.

Bell’s bio on his website states that he was first noticed when he was 14 and his career began to bloom after that.  He “has enchanted audiences worldwide with his breathtaking virtuosity and tone of rare beauty. His restless curiosity and multifaceted musical interests have taken him in exciting new directions which have earned him the rare title of ‘classical music superstar.’ Often referred to as the poet of the violin, Bell is the recipient of the Avery Fisher Prize and is the newly named Music Director of The Academy of St. Martin in the Fields.”

While watching Bell and the others on the stage, I thought “How long did it take to master the concerto?”  “How can he remember every note, every pause, every moment of being onstage with only the conductor to guide if not him then the orchestra?”  My management hat went on and I wondered how to translate Bell’s dedication to his career to my clients, colleagues, and students.  To try over and over to hit the right pitch in conversations, to keep everyone in tune on teams, to stay centered during a presentation the way Bell did as he wound up an amazing performance that brought a standing ovation and many ‘curtain calls.’

This week, I was exposed to another type of music:  the Broadway musical.  The show’s description on the web reads, “Inspired by actual events, MEMPHIS is about a white radio DJ who wants to change the world and a black club singer who is ready for her big break. Come along on their incredible journey to the ends of the airwaves—filled with laughter, soaring emotion and roof-raising rock ‘n’ roll.”  In my opinion, that of the man on vacation from Denmark sitting next to me, and a very good audience agreed completely.  It is a brilliant and moving show of an historical period of America.

One reason that I chose to use my gift certificate on Memphis was that last February I attended a panel presentation on the “The Production Process” part of CUNY’s series on “The Business of Theater” and afterwards posted Managing the Business of Theater.  The three panelists were involved in Memphis so the discussion focused on the beginnings and evolution of this show.  Friends and even my students encouraged me to go see the show.  I’ve very glad that I did.

If you are still looking for a very special and thoughtful gift, think of all the performances that producers have created for you, the performers who have invested their time to practice until perfection, the opportunity to experience a live production that you will not forget.