Focus on Boeing and the State of Arizona Manufacturing is responsible for a great deal of pollution in our environment, extending as far back as the 1700s. Anyone reading this article can probably easily recall pictures from grade-school history books depicting the early American factories of the industrial revolution: Smokey, dirty, and dangerous.  The effects of these historic factories on the environment and those of the following centuries have created a negative stereotype that manufacturing [...]

Dealing with and leading change is possibly one of the most challenging tasks a leader faces.  The leadership of change is made difficult because organizations have developed a culture to eliminate variation; to standardize processes— to resist the forces of change that tend to disrupt processes and create new and different ones.  If history of change is the judge, most organizations fail to change when they should, and those who do try, most also fail [...]

Recently, CAAL was asked to address the Connecticut SBIR and Global Trade conference on the subjects of leadership and innovation. In the process of preparing our remarks I reviewed the 2012 IBM CEO Survey. Titled “Leading Through Connections”, IBM identifies a number of business imperatives that are upper most of CEOs’ business concerns (IBM, 2012). Prominently on the list are: connections, engagement, collaboration, analytical competencies, partnerships, and tolerance for change. All of these subjects are [...]

Do you manage people? If so, do you give regular performance feedback to your employees?  Performance reviews are fundamental to good leadership and organizational improvement. If your employees receive feedback now, they will have time to make use of it and improve their performance.  If, on the other hand, they find out in December that you think they need to improve upon something, they won’t have the chance for development and improvement. Communicate with your [...]

Many people comment on the lack of leadership abilities in most managers, complaining that many managers do not set good examples, do not empower employees to play a role in decision-making, do not listen to those that work for them, and do not give their employees credit when credit is due. I searched for some statistics to determine how typical this experience is. Do most employees think their managers are less than effective? As I [...]

How many of you have played an instrument in a band or an orchestra? Perhaps this was as a child. Do you remember those rare times when everything came together and suddenly your section (in my case it was the trombones) became part of the greater whole, and the music was suddenly coming from the entire orchestra instead of simply a collection of sections defined by the instruments played? How about NASCAR fans who watch [...]

Whether in sports or in business, serious competitors are constantly seeking an advantage. In business, this often leads to process improvements, innovative practices, and the application of new technologies. Finding new areas of competitive advantage takes time but can make all the difference in performance and outcome.

The more we practice, the more critical thinking becomes part of our natural thinking process. This is important, because we are normally wired to take shortcuts in an effort to conserve our energy, to survive, or just to move on. If our thought processes are normally intellectually lazy, can we expect to be able to turn on the critical and creative juices in a crunch?

Over two years ago, I got a phone call one afternoon from Dr. Robert Materna. He asked me if I wanted to be involved in something exciting. Knowing Robert as a serious person, I took him at his word and heard him out. Robert laid out an ambitious vision – of an organization dedicated to enhancing and building the competitive advantage of US aviation and aerospace on a global basis. The instrument would be an [...]

Hello All, In my last post I mentioned the five leadership actions of Ken Jennings’ Serving Leader. In this post I’d like to cover one called “Upend the Pyramid.” Most of us have joined or been part of organizations where the first thing we did was to look at the organizational diagram to figure out where we fit and how that related to our job, and who we reported to or perhaps who reported to [...]