The Secret Language of Leadership E-Book

Stephen Denning

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Serie: J-B US non-Franchise Leadership
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 468

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2011

Beschreibung

The book introduces the concept of narrative intelligence--an ability to understand and act and react agilely in the quicksilver world of interacting narratives. It shows why this is key to the central task of leadership, what its dimensions are, and how you can measure it. The book's lucid explanations, vivid examples and practical tips are essential reading for CEOs, managers, change agents, marketers, salespersons, brand managers, politicians, teachers, parents--anyone who is setting out to the change the world.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Praise

Title Page

Copyright Page

The Secret Language of Leadership.

PREFACE

PART 1 - WHAT IS TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP?

INTRODUCTION - TEN MISTAKES TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERS MAKE

Mistake #1: Unclear, Uninspiring Goal

Mistake #2: Lack of Total Commitment for Change

Mistake #3: Incongruent Body Language

Mistake #4: Misreading the Audience

Mistake #5: Lack of Narrative Intelligence

Mistake #6: Not Telling the Truth

Mistake #7: Attention Misdirected

Mistake #8: Inability to Elicit Desire for Change

Mistake #9: His Reasons Backfired

Mistake #10: The Conversation Died

Learning the Language of Leadership

Chapter 1 - THE SECRET LANGUAGE OF LEADERSHIP

What Is Transformational Leadership?

The Pitfalls of the Traditional Approach to Communication

The Language of Leadership in Action

The Language of Leadership: Key Steps

The Language of Leadership: Key Enablers

Mastering the Language of Leadership

PART 2 - THE LANGUAGE OF LEADERSHIP: KEY ENABLERS

Chapter 2 - ARTICULATING A CLEAR, INSPIRING GOAL

Articulating a Worthwhile Purpose

Setting Priorities Among Goals

Chapter 3 - THE LEADER’S OWN STORY

Politicians as Leaders

CEOs as Leaders

Speaking to the CEO

The Leader’s Own Story

Chapter 4 - MASTERING THE AUDIENCE’S STORY

Managerial Action Is Less Effective Than We Realize

Audiences Are More Difficult Than They Used to Be

Basic Change Is More Disruptive Than We Expect

Leaders Must Understand the Audience’s Story

Finding and Encouraging New Leaders

Raines’s Mistake

Chapter 5 - CULTIVATING NARRATIVE INTELLIGENCE

Why Do People Change Their Minds?

Getting Other People to Change Their Minds

The Leader as Storyteller

The Central Role of Narrative Intelligence

Chapter 6 - TELLING TRUTHFUL STORIES

Truthfulness in the Marketplace

Authentically Communicating Distinctiveness

From Sales Pitch to Trusted Partnership

Truthfulness in the March to War

Chapter 7 - LEADERSHIP PRESENCE

And What Are Those Basics?

Practice, Practice, Practice

Do Leaders Need Charisma?

Can Leaders Use Written Stories?

Should Leaders Use PowerPoint?

PART 3 - THE LANGUAGE OF LEADERSHIP: KEY STEPS

Chapter 8 - GETTING PEOPLE’S ATTENTION

Generally Effective Tools for Getting Attention

Moderately Effective Ways to Get Attention

Generally Ineffective Ways of Getting Attention

Chapter 9 - STIMULATING DESIRE

General Principles

Most Promising Methods

Methods Requiring Special Talents

Generally Ineffective Methods

The Productivity of Communication

Chapter 10 - REINFORCING WITH REASONS

Characteristics of the Stories That Reinforce with Reasons

Closing the Presentation

Chapter 11 - CONTINUING THE CONVERSATION

Three Challenges

Overcoming the Challenges

Leadership and Innovation

Chapter 12 - EPILOGUE

Why Does It Work?

Narrative Is More Important Than We Thought

The Language of Leadership Can Be Learned

The Ethics of Leadership

The Age of Leadership

[APPENDIX 1] - PRESENTATION TO THE CHANGE MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE OF THE WORLD ...

[APPENDIX 2] - TEMPLATES AND EXERCISES

[APPENDIX 3] - WHAT’S YOUR NARRATIVE INTELLIGENCE?

[NOTES]

Acknowledgments

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

INDEX

More Praise for The Secret Language of Leadership

“Out of the morass of strategies leaders are given to transform organizations, Denning plucks a powerful one—storytelling—and shows how and why it works.”

—Dorothy Leonard, William J. Abernathy Professor of Business, Emerita, Harvard Business School, and author, Deep Smarts:How to Cultivate and Transfer Enduring Business Wisdom

“The Secret Language of Leadership shows why narrative intelligence is central to transformational leadership and how to harness its power.”

—Carol Pearson, director, James MacGregor Burns Academy of Leadership, University of Maryland, and coauthor, The Hero and the Outlaw

“The Secret Language of Leadership is not only the best analysis I have seen of how and why leaders succeed or fail, it’s highly readable, as well as downright practical. It should be mandatory reading for anyone interested in engaging a company with big ideas who understands that leaders live and die by the quality of what they say.”

—Richard Stone, story analytics master, i.d.e.a.s

“A primary role of leaders is to create and maintain meaning for their organizations. Denning clearly demonstrates that meaningmaking comes from stories well told.”

—Thomas Davenport, President’s Distinguished Professor of I.T. and Management, Babson College, and author, The Attention Economy

“Steve Denning is one of the leading thinkers on the power of narrative in business settings. His latest book is a smart, useful guide that can help leaders of every kind add value to their organizations and add meaning to their own journeys.”

—Daniel H. Pink, author, A Whole New Mind

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Denning, Stephen.

p. cm.

“A Wiley Imprint.”

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-7879-8789-3 (cloth)

1. Leadership. 2. Communication in organizations. 3. Storytelling. I. Title.

HD57.7.D49 2007

658.4’5—dc22

2007028784

HB Printing

The Secret Language of Leadership.

PREFACE

MY LEADERSHIP JOURNEY

My own leadership journey began abruptly late on Monday afternoon, February 5, 1996. That day, I’d asked for a meeting with one of the managing directors of the World Bank—one of the three people who reported to the president of the bank and were charged with running its operations. As the director of the Africa Region, I needed to see him because that curious thing known as “my career” had just then taken a turn for the worse.

The World Bank is an international lending organization located in Washington, D.C., and aimed at relieving global poverty. For several decades, I had held a number of positions and functions, including programming and budgeting, the West Africa riverblindness program, population, health and nutrition programs, and the quality control of operations. In the early 1990s, I had been director of the Southern Africa Department, where I had overseen the work of several hundred people working in ten countries. Now, as director of the Africa Region, I was responsible for the operations of more than a thousand staff working in forty-three countries. After that much experience as an executive, I believed that I understood management, although I was about to discover that I had much to learn about leadership.

Large organizations may look stable, but appearances are deceptive. In the past year, the president had unexpectedly died. Last month, my boss had decided to retire. Now someone else had just been named to my post.

The office of managing director is just two grade levels above director. To an outsider, those two grade levels might not seem like much, but from the inside, the difference was an abyss.

Like most organizations, the World Bank has a hierarchical management style. It’s the same “look-up-and-yell-down” style as in the private sector.

At the beginning of the interview, I told the managing director that I’d heard the announcement that someone else was to fill my position. Did they have anything in mind for me?

“Not really,” he replied with a smile.

I wasn’t surprised. There had been inklings of trouble afoot. Just one month before, I’d been asked in the street if it was true that I was being pushed aside. My boss had confirmed that the scene was turbulent: his own decision to retire exposed me to the vagaries of the clan warfare that pervades large organizations.

The managing director quickly explained to me the diminishing range of my career options. The organization had no plans for me. There were no specific positions available. There weren’t even any lists of possible positions on which I might figure.

He spoke to me dismissively, as though I had had no prior reputation, no credit for anything I had done over several decades, and no prospects. His world was a personnel chessboard and I was no longer a player. I had become a nobody.

When I pressed him, he said finally, “Why don’t you look into information?”

Information? In February 1996, information in the World Bank had all the prestige of the garage or the cafeteria—a wasteland from which no traveler had ever returned. The message was unmistakable: I was being sent to Siberia.