Business Learning Coach Blog : 4/6 : Succinct yet informative original articles on leadership & management

So You Work for a Bumblacrat

By Jim Grinnell, Ph.D. In 1969 Laurence Peter and Raymond Hull introduced their now famous Peter Principle, which posits that organizations promote managers until they reach their level of incompetence. What this means in practice is that at any given time there are a whole lot of stumbling, bumbling executives swimming way out of their [...]

But I’m a Great Leader… Look at My Results!

By Jim Grinnell, Ph.D. Ask any successful executive if they are a great leader and nine out of ten times the answer will come back as an emphatic yes. Yet, ask the same group of people whether they have ever worked under a great leader and you’re likely to hear an emphatic no from nine [...]

When Persistence Meets Possibility

By Jim Grinnell, Ph.D. We are all faced with a series of great opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations. –Charles R. Swindoll, Senior Pastor at Stonebriar Community Church Those who regularly read my blog may have noticed a feature on the main page called Quotes to Note. This box displays a different inspirational quote each [...]

Building a High-Performance Organization

By Jim Grinnell, Ph.D. In The Human Equation: Building Profits by Putting People First, Jeffery Pfeffer details the practices of high performance organizations. According to Pfeffer, these organizations draw peak performance out of all members by 1) offering job security, 2) hiring selectively, 3) organizing around self-managed teams, 4) investing in training and development, 5) [...]

Difficult to Manage… Difficult to Fire

By Jim Grinnell, Ph.D. All managers would love to lead a team comprised entirely of A-players. Unfortunately, such a scenario is rare. The manager’s job is complicated by a world of mixed attitudes, aspirations, and abilities. At the two ends of the spectrum are the stars and the dogs, both of whom are easy to [...]

Bad Decisions Begone

By Jim Grinnell, Ph.D. Managers make decisions– that’s what they get paid for. Unfortunately many times the decisions they make are flawed. It’s not necessarily because managers are inept. The roots of bad decision making stem from three sources: neurological wiring, a flawed decision-making process, and counter-productive interpersonal dynamics. Cognitive Inhibitors The notion that business [...]

Setting Stretch Goals… and Avoiding SNAP Goals

By Jim Grinnell, Ph.D. Take a quick gander at some popular leadership books and you’ll come across exhortations to set sky-high goals and then step back and watch your direct reports move heaven and earth to attain them. There has been ample research at both the individual and organizational levels demonstrating the positive correlation between [...]

Leading Through Persuasion

By Jim Grinnell, Ph.D. “There is only one way under high Heaven to get anybody to do anything. Did you ever stop to think of that? Yes, just one way. And that is by making the other person want to do it. Remember, there is no other way.” – Dale Carnegie As the world of [...]

What Business Leaders Can Learn From George and Abe

By Jim Grinnell, Ph.D. As we come upon the President’s Day holiday, I thought it would be an opportune moment to reflect on the leadership of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. This article discusses four leadership qualities these two men shared. Specifically Washington and Lincoln both kept their egos in check, built strong teams around [...]

Unleashing Intrinsic Motivation Through Servant Leadership

By Jim Grinnell, Ph.D. The prevailing paradigm of workplace motivation is about to be shattered, at least according to Daniel Pink’s well-grounded book Drive. In this book Pink not only takes a shot across the bow of the mainstream approach to employee motivation, he lands a fatal blow to the midsection. Pink’s central thesis is [...]

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