Leadership Best Practices

(SAP Business event type: 50105045)

Introduction

Leadership always has been a key differentiator between successful and

unsuccessful organizations.

In today's complex and competitive business environment, achieving and

retaining the leadership edge often seems to be an unattainable goal.
Leadership Best Practices focuses on proven leadership strategies and
takes cutting-edge research one step further by giving participants the
tools and techniques needed to both benchmark and enhance their
leadership practices and those of their organizations.

The program features several stimulating modules facilitated by HBS

faculty who examine the phenomenon of leadership and who have broken new
ground in the study of leaders or leadership development. Each expert
will unveil his or her latest groundbreaking research.

The essence of great leaders;

Cultural perspectives and organizational performance;
Service strategies that retain profitable customers;
The power of confidence in organizations;
The care and feeding of entrepreneurial leaders in companies;
Ambidextrous organizations and their competitive edge; and
Leadership with impact.
Through interaction with faculty thought leaders, senior executives
acquire new knowledge and enlightened perspectives on innovative
leadership practices.

Program Objectives

Incorporating a powerful mix of lectures, case studies, class

discussions, small-group interactions, and informal gatherings, the
program provides an important opportunity for participants to:

Gain early access to groundbreaking research on leadership;

Examine leadership best practices within complex organizations;
Build relationships with other organizational change agents for ongoing
collaboration;
Strengthen their individual capacity to position contemporary
organizations with the leadership edge by rethinking their approaches to
leadership and leader development;
Learn to bridge the gap between research theory and practical
application; and
Develop an implementable action plan for applying innovative concepts
and best practices within their own workplaces.
With more than 50 years' experience in executive education, Harvard
Business School is the leading provider of advanced learning
opportunities that strengthen the leadership capacity of both
individuals and their organizations. Unlike any other, the HBS Executive
Education learning model immerses the world's most promising managers in
a transformational experience that transcends the acquisition of
knowledge, skills, and tools—and fosters professional, intellectual, and
personal development. Every program challenges executives to grow as
leaders, to shape powerful ideas into competitive solutions, and to
think and manage differently in a changing business world.

Curriculum
Do your company's leaders enhance the lives of others?

THE MEANING OF LEADERSHIP

Joel Podolny, author of a forthcoming book provisionally titled, The
Logic of Position, the Meaning of Leadership, and of a newly developed
case study on Sapient Corporation, considers the complex question: What
defines a great leader? While scholars have proposed many answers, he
believes that great leaders are defined by their ability to infuse
meaning and purpose into the lives of the individuals they lead and
serve. This meaning-making function of leadership is especially
important given the prevalence of economic trends that makes it harder
for people to pursue meaningful lives. Drawing upon a number of case
histories, he highlights different ways in which leaders create meaning
for others. Participants will examine the key reasons why great leaders
sometimes "fall" after their initial success and will develop an
enlightened perspective on the relationship between meaning creation and
the development of shareholder value.

Is your company benefitting from its cultural differences?

DIVERSITY AND ITS IMPACT ON PERFORMANCE

Robin J. Ely, coauthor of the case study, "Diversity at Work: The Impact
of Learning on the Diversity-Performance Link," addresses an important
organizational question: Does cultural diversity in a work group enhance
or detract from the group's performance? Based on in-depth analysis, she
suggests that the answer lies in the group's perspective on its
diversity. Specifically, she examines how a learning perspective enables
a group to reap process and performance benefits, while a nonlearning
perspective inhibits such gains. Participants will better understand how
a group's learning environment directly translates into performance
gains or losses from diversity and will learn to create more
constructive, productive intergroup relations in their organizations.

Is your company capitalizing on the power of its customers?

DIFFERENTIATING ON CUSTOMER SERVICE

Frances X. Frei, author of "Your Customers: Use Them or Lose Them" in
Harvard Business School's Working Knowledge online newsletter, claims
that companies can differentiate on service profitability. Sharing
research insights into the interactions between firms and customers, she
demonstrates the impact of leadership best practices on competitive
differentiation and sustainability. From real-life examples of win/win
situations, she demonstrates how service can benefit customers, while
delivering a disproportionate share of the profits to the company.
Participants will think differently about the realities of customer
service and profitability and will explore unconventional methods for
leveraging customer power to win.

Does your company foster the confidence necessary to create a culture of

success?

BUILDING A FOUNDATION OF CONFIDENCE

Rosabeth Moss Kanter, author of Confidence: How Winning Streaks and
Losing Streaks Begin and End, presents a new theory of organizational
cycles and dynamics, in which confidence is central to propelling
winning streaks or shifting downward spirals to cycles of growth. Citing
universal principles, real-life examples, and inspiring leadership
successes, she shows how confidence influences the outcome of virtually
every challenge in life and how the ways in which leaders respond
ultimately distinguish winning and losing organizations. Participants
will gain a greater awareness of the role that confidence plays in the
ability of organizations to achieve their missions. Through practical,
enduring lessons about creating a culture of success, they will learn
what is required of them as leaders to feed motivation and morale,
create a culture for productive problem solving, and encourage the
highest level of performance.

Does your company champion or shun emerging business opportunities?

LAUNCHING BUSINESSES FROM WITHIN: THE CHALLENGE OF CORPORATE

ENTREPRENEURSHIP
David A. Garvin, author of the recent Harvard Business Review article,
"What Every CEO Should Know About Creating New Businesses," and of a new
three-case series on IBM, tackles the huge challenges associated with
creating emerging businesses in large, complex companies. He develops a
list of essential "rules of the road," the 10 things that all corporate
entrepreneurs should know in order to move forward and improve their
odds of success. Spotlighting IBM as a success story, he illustrates how
the company's hybrid management system fosters an environment that is
hospitable to corporate entrepreneurship. Participants will gain a
better understanding of the barriers to success, the distinctive
features and management requirements of emerging businesses, and the
common stages of growth and development. Ultimately, they will acquire a
set of guidelines for effectively launching a new business in an
established company culture.

Are your company's leaders adept at exploiting the present and exploring
the future?

AMBIDEXTROUS ORGANIZATIONS FOR INNOVATION AND PERFORMANCE

Michael L. Tushman, coauthor of Winning Through Innovation: A Practical
Guide to Leading Organizational Change and Renewal and of "The
Ambidextrous Organization" in the Harvard Business Review, foresees a
possible end to the common management battle between refining existing
product and service offerings and pioneering radically new offerings.
Why do some enterprises falter when others succeed at accomplishing
both? From a study of 35 breakthrough projects, he identifies key
managerial and organizational characteristics shared by "ambidextrous
organizations" to explain what makes them work. Participants will learn
what it takes for an established company to renew itself through the
creation of breakthrough innovations without destroying or jeopardizing
its traditional business. They also will recognize the crucial role that
senior executives and their teams play in shaping ambidextrous
organizations.

In what ways do you inspire others to reach their maximum potential?

EXTRAORDINARY LEADERSHIP IN AN ERA OF TURBULENCE AND CHANGE

John P. Kotter, coauthor of The Heart of Change, depicts the notion of
leadership as the ambition and will to make a difference. Focusing on
issues such as visionary leadership, leading change, unleashing
leadership potential within one's organization, and the power to
astound, he details the challenges and responsibilities of leadership.
He reveals that change actually happens by influencing people's feelings
with truths, not by shifting their thinking through analysis.
Contrasting success stories with failures, he shows how to and how not
to implement the eight steps of change. His creative approach to "see-
feel" change is aimed at inspiring "feelings that motivate useful
action" within participants.

Participant Mix
Leadership Best Practices is intended specifically for senior executives
with significant corporate management responsibilities.

Typical participant titles include:

Chief operating officer;

Chief administrative officer;
Senior vice president;
General manager;
Senior human resources officer; and
Divisional director/leader.

Faculty
TEACHING TEAM This Executive Education program is developed and taught
by Harvard Business School faculty who are distinguished scholars,
skilled educators, groundbreaking researchers, award-winning authors,
and entrepreneurs in their respective fields. Representing various
disciplines, they remain close to practice through relationships with
business and industry leaders and personal involvement as board members
and consultants for top companies around the world. HBS faculty leverage
their business expertise and field-based research to create new
knowledge and enduring concepts that shape the practice of management
and leadership. Short biographical sketches follow; more detailed
biographies are accessible at www.hbs.edu/research/faculty.html.

ROBIN J. ELY, Associate Professor of Business Administration, teaches

the MBA elective, "Leadership in a Multicultural World" and previously
taught the required course on leadership and organizational behavior.
Focusing on organizational change, group dynamics, learning, conflict,
power, and social identity, she investigates how organizations can
better manage race and gender relations while increasing their
effectiveness. The author or coauthor of two books, as well as of
numerous chapters and articles, Professor Ely presently is working on a
new book about gender and race relations as a lever for individual and
organizational transformation. Frequently, she consults with
organizations on related issues and lectures both in the U.S. and
abroad.

FRANCES X. FREI, Associate Professor of Business Administration,

developed the MBA elective, "Managing Service Operations" and also
teaches in several other Executive Education programs. Her research
focuses on developing strategies to help firms differentiate on service,
and has been published in top-tier journals, such as Management Science
and the Harvard Business Review. In addition, she has published dozens
of case studies on companies in a wide range of service industries.
Professor Frei has worked with firms around the world to achieve a
customer focus and to leverage superior service for superior profits. In
2002 and 2003, she received the HBS MBA Class Award for teaching
excellence.

DAVID A. GARVIN, C. Roland Christensen Professor of Business

Administration, has taught MBA and Executive Education courses on
general management and operations since 1979. His research on general
management and strategic change focuses on organizational learning,
process management, and the leadership of large, complex organizations.
Professor Garvin is the author or coauthor of nine books and 26
articles, including, most recently, General Management: Processes and
Action and "What Every CEO Should Know About Creating New Businesses" in
the Harvard Business Review. He has three times won the Harvard Business
Review McKinsey Award for best article, as well as the Sloan Management
Review's Beckhard Prize and Harvard Magazine's Smith-Weld Prize.

ROSABETH MOSS KANTER, Ernest L. Arbuckle Professor of Business

Administration, is recognized widely as one of the most influential
experts on leadership, innovation, transformation, and change. Her
current research on the leadership of organizational turnarounds is the
basis for her new book, Confidence: How Winning Streaks and Losing
Streaks Begin and End. She also has written 15 other popular titles,
including Evolve!: Succeeding in the Digital Culture of Tomorrow and
Rosabeth Moss Kanter on the Frontiers of Management. She has received
more than a dozen leadership awards and has been named to the lists of
the "50 most influential business thinkers in the world," "100 most
important women in America," and "50 most powerful women in the world."

JOHN P. KOTTER, Konosuke Matsushita Professor of Leadership, Retired, is

one of the world's most sought-after speakers on leadership and change.
In October 2001, BusinessWeek reported a survey of 504 enterprises that
rated him the #1 "leadership guru" in America. Professor Kotter is the
author of 15 business books printed in more than 80 foreign-language
editions, with total sales approaching two million copies. His latest,
The Heart of Change, made the 2002 best book list of both Amazon.com and
Soundview Executive Book Summaries. Other acclaimed titles include John
P. Kotter on What Leaders Really Do; Matsushita Leadership; and Leading
Change. His Harvard Business Review articles have sold more than a
million and a half reprints.

JOEL PODOLNY, Novartis Professor of Leadership and Management, serves as

the program faculty chair. Holding a joint faculty appointment, he has
taught MBA courses in organizational behavior, strategy, and global
management at Harvard Business School and is a sociology professor in
Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences. His research focuses on economic
sociology, complex organizations, and social networks, and he is best
known for bringing the sociological conception of status to the study of
market competition. Professor Podolny is a coauthor (with G. Saloner and
A. Shepard) of the textbook Strategic Management, as well as the author
or coauthor of 22 published articles, two book chapters, and numerous
case studies.

MICHAEL L. TUSHMAN, Paul R. Lawrence MBA Class of 1942 Professor of

Business Administration, serves as the faculty chair of "Leading Change
and Organizational Renewal" in Executive Education. An internationally
recognized instructor and consultant, he presently is investigating the
relationship among technological change, senior executive teams, and
organizational evolution. Professor Tushman is the author or coauthor of
50 articles and 12 books, including two recent second editions, Winning
Through Innovation: A Practical Guide to Leading Organizational Renewal
and Change (with C. O'Reilly) and Managing Strategic Innovation and
Change: A Collection of Readings (with P. Anderson). One of many
recognitions, he received the distinguished scholar award from the
Academy of Management's Organization and Management Theory Division in
2003.