Entrepreneurs can't survive without being positive

• The book I recommend is Pour Your heart Into It.
• Entrepreneurs can't survive without being positive and inspired.
• I'm inspired by Walt Disney.
• Entrepreneurs need to stop doubting themselves.

~Dylan Lauren
Dylan's Candy Bar

Forbes' millennial CEO faux pas

Martin Shkreli, former CEO | Turing Pharmaceuticals

Martin Shkreli (Turing), Elizabeth Holmes (Theranos) and Sean Rad (Tinder) prove that Millennial entrepreneurs are not immune to major blunders.

Forbes' multinational CEO faux pas

Martin Winterkorn (VW) and Marissa Mayer (Yahoo!) head up this list of serious CEO faux pas.

Herbert Hainer on company culture

Adidas CEO Herbert Hainer wants to surround himself with people like him - fast, direct, innovative - and that's how he sets the culture for the company.
 

Sukhinder Singh Cassidy on women on the Board

Joyus CEO Sukhinder Singh Cassidy: Having more women on the Board is "not really a pipeline problem as much as it is an access-to-networks problem."
 

Michael Dell on $67 billion EMC deal

Michael Dell: "I'm confident that we're building an incredible company," which is the Dell $67 billion acquisition of EMC.
 

On Leadership (3) What is our ballast?

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Leadership isn't just about hand-in-hand as we climb up, although I believe that's crucial.  It's also about those who are ahead, including the leader herself, helping to pull up those following behind.  Moreover, from this image, I see that those who follow can serve as an anchor or ballast for those who are ahead.
 

On Leadership (2) What is our true north?

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This image is, to me, evocative.  It reminds me of the lovely film with Robin Wright Penn and Kevin Costner:

I've never been lost before. You were my true north. I could always steer for home when you were my home.

Leadership may hardly be characterized as romance or grief.  But I'd like to believe the much more than lending direction, leadership is about pointing us to what is meaningful, perhaps deeply so, and to what is right, perhaps tenaciously so.

 

On Leadership (1) What are our notions?

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This week, first, it is important to pause in front of the blackboard, or white space, if you will, and reflect on our notions of leadership.  It is important to set aside for now other notions of it, as there is simply no shortage of concepts, models and positions on it.
 

Catherine Courage (3) Sustaining Design Thinking

Needless to say, executive support is de rigueur for any initiative, new or existing, to be successful.  Top leaders in the company lend vision and guidance as well as emphasize execution and accountability.  There are other factors, of course, such as right capability and satisfactory resources, but the CEO and his or her direct team must put spirit and muscle behind sustaining initiatives. 
 

Catherine Courage (2) Embedding Design Thinking

Design thinking may start off as a one-off, maybe experimental effort.  But to Catherine Courage's point, for it to have optimal impact, companies must embed it in their processes and foundation and their culture and mindset.  That's easier said than done, of course.  But a CEO who has foresight, strategy and discipline can do so systematically and progressively over time.

Catherine Courage (1) Shifting to Design Thinking

Catherine Courage, Senior Vice President of Customer Experience, leads the shift at Citrix - from dreaming up technology and delivery technology for technology's sake, to building a deeper empathy for customers and creating products and solutions that meet their actual needs.  This is not new thinking at all, but the fact that a renowned consultancy like McKinsey highlights it suggests that companies are still far far from adopting it, let alone grasp what it truly means.  As I argued in Part 2 - Making the Future, CEOs and their people may find themselves trapped in The Dilemma of Self-Centeredness, and not even know it.

Courage distinguishes the design thinking approach that she and her team adopts, from others who start with the problem, which they have an intuition about, and race toward a solution.  To me, starting with a problem, or an issue, challenge or objective, is actually a fine thing to do.  But to her point, Theory of Algorithms and The Core Algorithm emphasize focusing on the problem without preconceived notions and without a toolkit of solutions clambering to be used.  Instead, like design thinking, my conceptual framework and practical applications model work at engaging others - seek first to understand, then to be understood - for example, via an algorithm I call Galileo (Human) Algorithm, which counters Self-Centeredness.
 

Quotes for Leaders (5) Lead the Pack

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I have this belief, I have this confidence.  If anyone does something or makes something, I know I can do it and make it better.  That is, if I truly want to.  For nearly five years now, I have been laboring on a conceptual framework and its practical applications model that under gird my belief and confidence.  It is a framework and model that anyone can adopt, too.

Quotes for Leaders (4) Take On, Give Up

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The New Year brings a rash of resolutions from many Americans, and the main reason why quite a number fall by the wayside is that they're much easier said than done.  Any meaningful goal, target or aim is inviolably complex and challenging.  So, to the quote above, one question is what we are willing to take on and what we are willing to give up in order to reach that goal, hit that target, and realize that aim.  What?

Quotes for Leaders (3) Make Ourselves

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Granted, many things are outside our sphere of knowledge and also out of our control.  Life and the world at large are a dynamic complex, and sometimes shit, as they say, happens.  But if we are to distinguish ourselves from others, we ought to listen to what existential philosopher and playwright Jean Paul Sartre says.

Quotes for Leaders (2) Believe in Ourselves

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This is what psychologist Albert Bandura called self efficacy. 

Quotes for Leaders (1) Bring in the Future

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Goals are inviolably about the future.  If something isn't in the future, then it cannot be a goal.  So to realize whatever goal we may set, we must get out of ourselves and go into a future where that goal is realized.  Then, to the quote above, it's a matter of forging the pathways backward to the present.  Our plan is how we intend to walk these pathways. 

Leadership Lessons from Fortune 40 Under 40

Reference: 5 things to learn from this year's 40 under 40 | Fortune.  These are your lessons, discuss.

IBM Transforms for the Future

(a) Never protect the past; (b) never define yourself as a product (and never define yourself by your competition, either); and (c) reinvent relentlessly are IBM CEO Ginni Rometty's guiding principles for transforming a company.  They apply for individuals and countries as well.  She has been under some fire for the lackluster performance of a storied US company, but she sounds determined, cheerful and confident through it all.  I commend her, because after Google, I believe IBM is a major leader for our technology future.  Their smarter planet campaign was terrific, as they played up Big Data and analytics in for a stretch.  But their vision on artificial intelligence and sentient robots makes me feel like IBM can actually pull off what her technology and entrepreneurial predecessors could not. 

Google Leads on Technology Innovation

Gmail has been my personal e-mail platform for years, and Google has become the verb for search.  I am active on Google+ and YouTube, and my Samsung Galaxy Note operates on Android.  Google Maps helps me navigate my surroundings, while Blogger helps me navigate the interiors of my ideas, projects and aspirations.  Google News is the default page for my browser, which used to be Chrome, by the way, except it was fighting with Windows 8, apparently, so I switched to Firefox.  It must be clear by now that I am a Google Guy.  This short clip on Larry Page tells in a nutshell why I think Google leads the way for technology innovation.  Page & Co. have long solved The Innovator's Dilemma by (a) having a highly successful business model, centered on search; (b) creating a structure and schedule where staff can roam and pursue ideas; and (c) deploying the closely guarded Google X where more diverse, radical innovations are being hatched.