Posts from — November 2007

Howard Gardner’s leading minds - reviewed

A while ago I went back to a book form Howard Gardner about leadership and leading minds and re-read it. This time I was smarter and actually wrote down what most impressed and resonated with me. For your leadership development, I believe there are a number of interesting and useful nuggets here.

Coming from different countries and social backgrounds, and trained in a range of vocations, these eleven individuals all became leaders in the sense that I am using the term: persons, who, by word and/or personal example, markedly influenced the behavior, thoughts, and/or feelings of a significant number of their fellow human beings (here termed  followers or audience members). (Gardner, 1995, p.

A leader is a man who has the ability to get other people to do what they don’t want to do and like it. (Gardner, 1995, p.22)

By unanimous consent Oppenheimer proved a brilliant success as the scientific director of the Manhattan Project. He had all of the desired virtues. (Gardner, 1995, p. 96)

In the term of this study Oppenheimer made an effective transition from being an indirect leader, working within a narrow (though pivotal) area of physics, to being a direct leader of a large and heterogeneous scientific establishment. (Gardner, 1995, p.97)

For all of his charm and leadership qualities, Hutchins was essentially a divider – one who liked to sharpen contrasts and, in exclusionary fashion, to align himself with the angels and his opponents with the devil. He once gave vent to his strong philosophy on this point: -to find out more about good and bad leaders and what went on in their minds, click here-

I found this nugget (below) about leadership from Jack Welch. He wrote this as part of a series of leaders being asked by the Harvard Business Review, The goal at the time was to find those that most influenced us in our development as leaders.

For me the influence came mostly from my military service as an officer in the Air Force. It wasn’t so much the training the military gave me, but the level of respect that it taught me. In addition I participated in a number of courses and classes in confidence building.

This led to the realization that all individuals deserve respect, but they are also normal people. Just because someone has a high level of responsibility or authority, or has had much success in his or her life does not mean they are no longer normal individuals. In my view, ‘normal’ means regular. Many successful people, especially in show business seem to have developed habits or pull stunts, basically “because they can”. -To read the rest of this article, please click here-