Comments for ExecutiveDevelopmentBlog

Comment on Frame-Breaking Career Moves by mkizilos

mkizilos — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 22:34:48 +0000

Ryan,

Thanks for the post! This new model has really been resonating with people and has pretty broad appeal. I presented the model to 150 law school students at the U of M yesterday and had a great reception. I hope you enjoy the webinar!

Comment on Frame-Breaking Career Moves by Ryan Stellar

Ryan Stellar — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 18:50:50 +0000

Great insight. I will be joining one of your webinars next week to learn more.

Comment on Creating a “real” development plan for a high potential leader by mkizilos

mkizilos — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 19:23:44 +0000

I definitely agree! Just having another person involved in your development can make a huge difference. It helps both with providing additional perspective, and in simply following through on what you plan to do. I think it also helps to have regularly scheduled updates with such a person. Don’t wait for “important things” to happen to have a conversation about what you are learning. If you do, you will probably miss a lot of opportunities for insightful reflection and discussion.

Comment on Creating a “real” development plan for a high potential leader by ralphjacob

ralphjacob — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 19:14:36 +0000

Indeed most traditional competency approaches to developing people seem logical…in reality they have little impact on personal or organization growth. One thing I add to these great thoughts…it is helpful to identify someone who can support you on the change journey…it makes it so much easier one this kind of help is around. It can be an HR person, an internal or external coach, etc., but someone who can be direct, supportive, encouraging, and insightful.

Comment on Theory versus Practice?…Or, Is “theory” a dirty word? by Carlos Serrano

Carlos Serrano — Wed, 25 May 2011 12:52:41 +0000

I have observed that it is common to reject theory in companies. What I see is that people leading companies believe that theoretical argues are a waste of time. Sometime I hear that someone fall on paralysis by analysis. From my point of view, the root of the problem (and here is my theory), is the kind of knowledge you manage in companies. Unlike universities, the knowledge managed in companies is a kind of “Know how to” while in universities is a “Know what to”. And my hypothesis is that leader that manage a good balance between know how and know what, make it better for one simple reason: they build sense to the action, they know why they are doing what they do, they can explain and communicate reason, they relate their proposals with the net of the organization, they are not acting like automats.
Unfortunately, the most common is doing by doing which, I guess, makes companies to loose a lot of money. There is just one suggestion to overcome this: teach people to think, show them that they are not wasting time while thinking and let them find out how revenues increase when thinking takes part of their time.
I just want to finish with a reflection on e-learning programs. It is truth that most of them lack the practical component, it is also truth that this is bad e-learning. THere are a lot of e-learning courses including huge space for application where learners get used to the new skill and consequently improve their practice. These usually are more expensive programs.

Comment on Theory versus Practice?…Or, Is “theory” a dirty word? by Dr. Shamim Anwar

Dr. Shamim Anwar — Mon, 17 Jan 2011 03:05:35 +0000

What do you say about the e-learning programs that lack in practical component? Companies are spending a significant percentage of their total expenditure on e-learning for their employees. Do you think e-learning while on one side ensures the documentatory proof of a company’s employees, it actually lacks the practical aspect? I just want to know the rate of success of online training programs. I mean if you read the techniques of ‘how to swim’online, can you be called as trained swimmer without stepping into a swimming pool?

Comment on Theory versus Practice?…Or, Is “theory” a dirty word? by Abdullah

Abdullah — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 01:54:32 +0000

we could say then that theory build by experince and it is only approved statment of examined experince

Comment on Strategic Talent Management by Tim Donahue

Tim Donahue — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 04:47:00 +0000

Mark:

Great post! Especially important is your recommendation that the talent piece be discussed as part of strategy formulation – not as an afterthought once the cement of the new strategy had hardened.

As for John Boudreau, when he worked with us at The Concours Group, he used to sum up pivotal talent this way: “Where would the biggest difference (in talent investment) make the biggest difference? (in organizational impact). That about says it all!

Comment on “Can You Show Me a Well-Written Development Plan?” by mkizilos

mkizilos — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 12:52:21 +0000

Simplemindpower,

thanks for the comment. I am a proponent of written development plans. In other posts in my blog you will see that I advise written plans to clarify thinking and focus progress. My point in this post is simply that there is no secret for the written plan itself. In fact, looking at prepackaged or prewritten plans is like picking a destination for vacation before thinking about how you want to spend your time. It is the reflective process of creating the plan which can produce the right plan for an individual.

Thanks again for posting.

Mark

Comment on “Can You Show Me a Well-Written Development Plan?” by SimpleMindPower

SimpleMindPower — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 08:11:43 +0000

At least with a written development plan maps out what you are trying to accomplish. To succeed or not is another different thing.