Hostage at the Table

Loving the book by George Kohlrieser "hostage at the table". A former hostage negotiator he takes this as a metaphor for leadership in all kinds of organisational and leadership contexts. Learning to relate with a hostage taker turns out to be one of life's great lessons in getting people to find perspective, become effective and deliver results...so get on out there and get yourself taken hostage for some excellent leadership development. The key things so far include keeping a positive "mind's eye", the bonding cycle, the need for stables bases and conflict management. Understanding how to connect with people and then how to connect them with your organisation and its objectives is headlined by the idea of the "bonding cycle" and it is such a great chapter. It has great synergies with the ideas in tribal leadership (Dave Logan) of how we can help upgrade culture person by person.

The broken pane theory

The government's policy of zero tolerance for anti-social behaviour is apparently rooted in the work of Dr Kelling. "Dr Kelling's broken pane theory takes its name from the observation that a few broken windows in an empty building quickly lead to more smashed panes, more vandalism and eventually to break-ins. The tendency for people to behave in a particular way can be strengthened or weakened depending on what they observe others to be doing. This does not necessarily mean that people will copy bad behaviour exactly, reaching for a spray can when they see graffiti. Rather, says Dr Keizer, it can foster the “violation” of other norms of behaviour. It was this effect that his experiments, which have just been published in Science, set out to test." This idea has been significantly shaping my thinking about the behaviour of staff within the workplace and the place of culture to preserve the necessary order and discipline required for success. Is a zero tolerance approach the necessary answer eliminate the rapid deterioration of standards that quickly ensue when one or two disrupt the order? Or are there other ways to preserve the disciplines essential in organisational life? (source: the economist)