The Focused Leader; Harvard Business Review Magazine, December 2013

Daniel Goleman, Harvard Business Review Magazine; The Focused Leader: "A primary task of leadership is to direct attention.To do so, leaders must learn to focus their own attention. When we speak about being focused, we commonly mean thinking about one thing while filtering out distractions. But a wealth of recent research in neuroscience shows that we focus in many ways, for different purposes, drawing on different neural pathways—some of which work in concert, while others tend to stand in opposition. Grouping these modes of attention into three broad buckets—focusing on yourself, focusing on others, and focusing on the wider world—sheds new light on the practice of many essential leadership skills. Focusing inward and focusing constructively on others helps leaders cultivate the primary elements of emotional intelligence. A fuller understanding of how they focus on the wider world can improve their ability to devise strategy, innovate, and manage organizations. Every leader needs to cultivate this triad of awareness, in abundance and in the proper balance, because a failure to focus inward leaves you rudderless, a failure to focus on others renders you clueless, and a failure to focus outward may leave you blindsided."

Pittsburgh Center Honoring Playwright Finds Itself Short on Visitors and Donors; New York Times, 11/23/13

Trip Gabriel, New York Times; Pittsburgh Center Honoring Playwright Finds Itself Short on Visitors and Donors: "Named for the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright who found a street-savvy poetry in the lives of poor Pittsburgh blacks, the culture center’s plight has been especially painful for those who had hoped it would enshrine the music, art and literature of the urban world he knew. Instead, it appears to be a victim of mismanagement by its senior staff and board of directors, who borrowed to build a grand palace of culture, but failed to find a wide enough audience and donor base in the hometown of Wilson, whose plays are mostly set in the Hill District just blocks away... Mark Clayton Southers, a former director of its theater program, said the Wilson center struggled to find an audience among the people Wilson portrayed: working-class blacks, many of whom feel unwelcome downtown with its skyscrapers and largely white-owned businesses, he added. “You can’t build it and they will come,” Mr. Southers said. “Not when you’re trying to work with a community that is not traditional theatergoers or cultural consumers.”... Neither the founders nor a new board of directors that took over in 2010 could come up with a business plan to fund ambitious programs in dance, theater, jazz and art while making the $53,600 monthly loan payments."

After Forcing Rapid Change at U. of Wyoming, President Abruptly Resigns; Chronicle of Higher Education, 11/15/13

Lindsay Ellis, Chronicle of Higher Education; After Forcing Rapid Change at U. of Wyoming, President Abruptly Resigns: "In an interview last week, Mr. Sternberg said that he had not arrived on the campus expecting to change its personnel. Though he received advice from trustees and board members of the UW Foundation about the university's leadership, he said he had made his own decisions. The president also said in the interview that he was not surprised by the criticism of the pace of change at the university. "When someone comes in as a disruptive innovator, metaphorically, it's like an antibody attack," he said. "They attack objects not because they're harmful but because they're foreign. The result is predictable."... Ms. Persichitte, the former education dean, said she thought Mr. Sternberg had not fit into the institution's culture well. She said she hoped Mr. McGinity would move forward carefully, listening to the faculty and staff. "If he does that as we search for a new president," she said, "we have every opportunity to rebuild the leadership gap that now exists.""

Year in Architecture 2013: Something for Everyone [8 Photo Galleries]; Library Journal, 11/15/13

Bette-Lee Fox, Library Journal; Year in Architecture 2013: Something for Everyone [8 Photo Galleries] : "This year’s listing of library building projects completed between July 1, 2012, and June 30, 2013, expands on the concept of all-purpose spaces to suit a variety of patrons and needs."

De Blasio as Manager: Delegating, Yet Keeping a Tight Leash; New York Times, 10/31/13

Michael M. Grynbaum and Kate Taylor, New York Times; De Blasio as Manager: Delegating, Yet Keeping a Tight Leash: "They have staked out positions on taxes and charter schools, pedestrian plazas and a ban on large sugary drinks. But the Democratic and Republican candidates to succeed Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg have rarely expounded on the biggest day-to-day challenge that awaits them in City Hall: managing a bureaucracy of 300,000 workers. The New York Times asked Bill de Blasio, the Democratic nominee, and Joseph J. Lhota, the Republican nominee, to explain their approaches to being a boss: making tough choices, recruiting a savvy staff and coping with the crises that inevitably confront the leader of the nation’s largest municipality. Mr. de Blasio spoke with the Times at Bar Toto in Park Slope, Brooklyn. An interview with Mr. Lhota was published in print on Thursday. This interview has been condensed and edited. "How would your management style be different from Mayor Bloomberg? Well, I absolutely oppose the 30,000-feet approach. What do you mean by that? It’s the cursory nature of it. To truly manage that place effectively and the agencies, you have to be, in my opinion, hands-on enough. I think Michael Bloomberg was too cold. To choose the good commissioner, then let them do their thing to the point of distraction, unfortunately led to some of the mistakes in crisis, like the snowstorm or Sandy. I think it led to some commissioners that alienated communities unnecessarily. I think it led to some bad policy decisions... Is there a mayoral model you admire? I think the Giuliani hyper-micromanagement model proved to be very disruptive to agencies and to their leaders. The La Guardia model is where I look in all things, which is a hands-on, very connected-to-the-grass-roots, very present, very communicative with the people. Choosing top-flight people, but also keeping some reins on them, and being able and willing to intervene as needed, I think that’s the right balance... Do you have a favorite management theorist? No."

Research: Cubicles Are the Absolute Worst; Harvard Business Review, 11/13/13

Sarah Green, Harvard Business Review; Research: Cubicles Are the Absolute Worst: "The worst part, according to the data, is that these office workers can’t control what they hear — or who hears them. Lack of sound privacy was far and away the most despised issue in the survey, with 60% of cubicle workers and half of all partitionless people indicating it as a frustration... Make everything modular. Let the collaboration flow. Not so fast. Previous research, cited by Kim and de Dear, has already shown that “the loss of productivity due to noise distraction… was doubled in open-plan offices compared to private offices, and the tasks requiring complex verbal process” — the most important tasks, you might argue — “were more likely to be disturbed than relatively simple or routine tasks.” In this paper, Kim and de Dear show that this loss of productivity is not offset by increased collaboration."

Lessons In Leadership: It's Not About You. (It's About Them); NPR, 11/11/13

Shankar Vedantam, NPR; Lessons In Leadership: It's Not About You. (It's About Them) : "Heifetz trained as a psychiatrist, and he describes his view of effective leadership with an analogy from medicine. "When a patient comes to a surgeon, the surgeon's default setting is to say, 'You've got a problem? I'll take the problem off your shoulders and I'll deliver back to you a solution.' In psychiatry, when a person comes to you with a problem, it's not your job actually to solve their problem. It's your job to develop their capacity to solve their own problem." Many intractable political issues, such as civil war, poverty or ethnic tension are complicated, and solving them may require a whole nation of people to change their mindset. As they approach these sorts of "nontechnical" problems, Heifetz says, leaders should think less like surgeons, and more like psychiatrists."

Harvard Business Review summary, "When You Feel Powerful You Talk Too Much, and Your Subordinates Perform Poorly", of forthcoming paper in Academy of Management Journal, 11/5/13

Andrew O'Connell, Harvard Business Review; When You Feel Powerful You Talk Too Much, and Your Subordinates Perform Poorly: [Harvard Business Review summary of paper, When Power Makes Others Speechless: The Negative Impact of Leader Power on Team Performance] "In a computer-based simulation of a Mount Everest expedition, teams whose leaders had been induced to feel powerful (“Think about a time when you had power over someone”) achieved just 59% of their goals, in comparison with 76% by teams whose leaders hadn’t been induced to feel powerful, according Leigh Plunkett Tost of the University of Michigan, Francesca Gino of Harvard, and Richard P. Larrick of Duke. A feeling of power prompts leaders to verbally dominate, which gives the impression that they are less open to others’ ideas; this perception diminishes team performance. Organizations might be able to minimize this effect by maintaining an egalitarian culture, reminding leaders of subordinates’ importance, and encouraging employees to question the legitimacy of leaders who dominate social interactions, the researchers say."

Libraries in the Time of MOOCs; Educause Review, 11/4/13

Curtis Kendrick and Irene Gashurov, Educause Review; Libraries in the Time of MOOCs: "At the City University of New York Curtis Kendrick is university dean for Libraries and Information Resources and Irene Gashurov is a communications writer and a trained librarian. A wave of disruptive technological changes has hit higher education, forcing us to rethink the way we teach, learn, and provide educational resources. For libraries, the growing reach and sheer numbers of massive open online courses (MOOCs) raise unprecedented challenges and opportunities. As we try to see our role within this new market, it might be worth reflecting on our readiness to operate in the increasingly complex online landscape. Soon, librarians might be asked to provide access to copyrighted, licensed electronic resources for MOOC students around the world. Will we be equipped with the technology to accommodate unprecedented numbers of students inside and outside the university? We will also have to deal with legal issues related to MOOCs, such as intellectual property rights, privacy issues, and state regulations. After exhausting the many ways of saying no to difficult change, perhaps we can find a way to work with all the stakeholders and help shape the rapidly changing MOOC model in concert with our own needs while we still can... Libraries should not miss out on a chance to get involved in the future of MOOCs on campus; as Michalko noted, "At the times that libraries were slow to help, slow to reconfigure their resources, and waited to see what might develop, they lost chances to renew their importance to their home institution." The MOOC frontier offers new opportunities for librarians to provide leadership and guidance in advising administration, faculty, and students about changes in higher education. But first, we must study and analyze the MOOCs landscape so that we can shape the conversation about MOOCs and their successors in a more purposeful and organized way."

Emerging Leader participants for Class of 2014 announced; ALA News, 11/6/13

Beatrice Calvin, ALA News; [Press Release] Emerging Leader participants for Class of 2014 announced: For Immediate Release Wed, 11/06/2013 Contact: Beatrice Calvin Program Officer Office for Human Resource Development and Recruitment 280-4280 bcalvin@ala.org CHICAGO — The American Library Association (ALA) has selected 56 people to participate in its 2014 class of Emerging Leaders. The program is designed to enable library staff and information workers to participate in project planning workgroups; network with peers; gain an inside look into ALA structure and have an opportunity to serve the profession in a leadership capacity early in their careers. The program kicks off with a day-long session during the 2014 ALA Midwinter Meeting in Philadelphia. Following the kickoff session, which includes orientation and training, the program will continue in an online learning and networking environment for six months, culminating with a poster session with the 2014 Emerging Leaders showcasing the results of their project planning work at the ALA 2014 Annual Conference in Las Vegas. Participants commit to taking part in all aspects of the program and may have an opportunity to serve on an ALA, division, chapter, round table or affiliate committee or workgroup upon completion of program. ALA Past-President, program facilitator and subcommittee Co-Chair, Maureen Sullivan, stated: “This very successful program has enabled a number of very talented new professionals to assume leadership positions in ALA at earlier career stage. These individuals have brought fresh ideas, new approaches and significant energy to the association. I welcome this next class and look forward to working with them.” Nearly 70 percent of this year’s participants have received sponsorships. The sponsors included ALA divisions, roundtables, state chapters, ALA affiliate groups and other organizations. Each sponsor commits to financial support of an Emerging Leader in order to help defray costs for attending the ALA Midwinter Meeting and the Annual Conference. Co-Chair of the Emerging Leaders subcommittee, Audra Caplan, said, “I am very pleased to welcome the 2014 class of Emerging Leaders. The success of past participants of the program attest to the value of the program. Many past participants are now in leadership positions in ALA and its Divisions and Roundtables. In addition many of the projects completed by past groups have been implemented successfully by the sponsoring organizations. I am gratified to know that the Emerging Leader program is stronger than ever." Read the complete list of 2014 Class of Emerging Leader Participants (PDF). (http://www.ala.org/news/press-releases/2013/11/emerging-leader-participants-class-2014-announced)

How the Redskins Could Ditch Their Name – But Keep Their Fans; Harvard Business Review, 11/4/13

Tim Halloran, Harvard Business Review; How the Redskins Could Ditch Their Name – But Keep Their Fans: "AdAge estimates that a rebrand could cost $15 million. According to Forbes, the organization is worth $1.7 billion. What Snyder, and the team name’s defenders, need to acknowledge – if they can peek up from their foxholes – is that over time, the controversy over the name will erode the brand’s value. NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, originally a supporter of Snyder’s, has been careful to back down from a strong position of support. Influential sports journalists like Peter King and Christine Brennan have said they’ll no longer use the name. Members of Congress have weighed in. Snyder should act, now, before the controversy gets worse. But how do you change a brand that isn’t working for you any more without alienating your most loyal customers? Here are some thoughts on how I would seek to resolve this extremely difficult branding problem."