By Robert E. Quinn
I am passionate about helping people acquire the capacity to initiate organizational change. In teaching executives how to it, I often say, “Now here is a golden sentence.” A golden sentence is a simple statement, often counter-intuitive, that is packed with value. One of the interesting things about my golden sentences is that when I first introduce them, the executives just look at me with a blank stare. They see no obvious value. Read more »
By Ryan Quinn
A little over a month ago, as I finished teaching a session of a training program for a Fortune 500 company, one of the executives in the program came up to me to share some information with me. He said that he was responsible for innovation in his company, and he was struggling. He told me about a survey that had been conducted in his company. In short, the survey told them that they had no creative people in their company anymore. They had squelched people’s creativity, or driven them out of the organization. He was working hard to address that situation.
I have felt like I have had my creativity squelched out of me before. When that happens at work, it is usually because I feel pressured or stressed by deadlines, career development or other concerns. When it happens at home, it usually happens because I feel frustrated or overwhlemed by the challenges of rearing four children. It can be a dismal experience. Read more »
By Shawn Quinn, Ryan Quinn, and Robert Quinn
After the market crashed in 2008, the debt collections group of a large European company found their work to be more challenging than ever. The leader of this group had attended a course on “Leading for Total Engagement” that one of us (Shawn) taught for the company as part of a culture change initiative. In this course, the leader learned Positive Organizational Scholarship (POS) principles, and based on these principles, this leader decided to run an expriment. He noted that one of the company’s espoused values was “Concern for the customer.” He asked himself what would happen if he and his people actually lived up to that value. It was a radical idea, with a radical effect. Read more »
Guest author: Lynn Perry Wooten
Parenting has given me a new lens to explore positive leadership practices. Although I preach the same lessons to my children that I teach to my students, these lessons take on a new meaning when heard by my children. This week gives me an occasion to present a historical case study of positive leadership in action for my children by integrating the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. with Lynn-isms of positive leadership practices.
When I asked my children what are the positive leadership practices that I talk about over and over again, their long list included the following three “Lynn-isms”: Read more »
By Robert E. Quinn
I very seldom hear a sentence that haunts me. But for the last few weeks I have been wrestling with such a sentence.
A few weeks ago the family was together and we were having a discussion about the childhood experiences of some of our children. The conversation began to focus on one of their teachers. About twenty years ago, in elementary school, two of them were taught by a then new teacher named Ms. Roth. She turned out to be the most effective teacher any of our children ever had. Her influence was transformational. She supported them while holding extraordinary standards and they grew in knowledge, capacity and self-esteem.
Even though she only taught two of our children, we all had stories to tell about this extraordinary teacher. It was energizing to share accounts of a young person who made so much difference. In the midst of this celebratory discussion, my son-in-law made a simple observation.
“Of course, if an education school studied what she did as a teacher, the school would still not be able to produce others like her.” Read more »
By Ryan W. Quinn
Happy New Year from The Lift Blog!
As is common with new years, I find myself thinking about change, and thought I might begin our new year on this blog by sharing a story about change. The story is about Texas Christian University’s (TCU’s) football team and football coach, who are ranked #4 in the nation and play #6 Boise State University in the Fiesta Bowl tonight. For those who do not follow football, this is a big deal for a number of reasons. It is a big deal for TCU because (a) this is the most complete and highest-ranked team the school has ever had, (b) they are playing in a game that, technically, only teams from “big money” conferences are supposed to play in, (c) it is even possible (if unlikely) that in one of the polls they could be voted in as national champions if they win the game, and (d) if they win this game (and, frankly, even if they simply play well in this game), it could catapult their program into being perennial contenders on the national level.
All of these reasons make the game exciting, but what make this game interesting for a blog on what leaders can learn from positive organizational scholarship is the story of the personal transformation of Gary Patterson, the coach of the TCU Horned Frogs. He described this personal transformation in a news conference he gave a couple of months ago. Read more »
We are going to take a two-week holiday break from posting entries on The Lift Blog. We hope all who read our blog have a wonderful holiday season and return to read our posts in the new year. Before we sign off for this break, we have two links to share.
First, we wanted to share a wonderful review of our book Lift: Becoming a Positive Force in Any Situation, written by an award-winning leadership blogger, Michael McKinney.
Second, Ryan has an op-ed piece on culture and policy, written with Angela Manese-Lee, a former business writer with The Roanoke (Va.) Times and a student at the Darden School of Business, that appeared in The Washington Post today.
Please enjoy these links and have a wonderful holiday.
Robert E. Quinn
This week I had the opportunity of working for an hour with a group of ten high school kids. I knew they were used to being bored, expected to be bored, and planned to be bored. So I asked myself what they most cared about. I went into the room and made it possible for them to talk about the feelings of insecurity and loneliness in high school, and I asked them to consider some alternative realities. No one was bored. Read more »
By Robert E. Quinn
I have been around some interesting people lately. One was a leader in a huge global organization. He spoke about transformation. He said that a problem in the organization was that most people “view the future through yesterday’s eyes.” Read more »
By Ryan Quinn
I have a friend who is an entrepreneur and spent most of the past decade building up a company that did work in real estate financing. I probably do not have to tell you the rest of the story. Looking back, he can see the signs of the impending financial collapse of 2008, but at the time it seemed too improbable to believe. He kept running his business until circumstances forced him to shut down. Since then, he has been struggling professionally. While he is more than competent to get work of some kind in the financial industry, he does not have all of the necessary formal credentials to do so. He is mid-career, has children who are or soon will be going to college, and a mortgage to pay. And now he is trying to re-invent himself professionally.
I have had a number of conversations with this friend, and I continue to be amazed by his resilience. He has decided that he wants to go into the advertising business. He has no training and little experience in advertising, but he believes he has some skills and predilections that will help him to succeed in that business. In our most recent conversation, he updated me about his progress. Each time I meet with him, I begin the conversation by thinking, “How is he ever going to pull this off?” Then, as we talk, he tells me some of the ideas he has tried out. I think to myself, “That’s not a bad idea–I could see that working.” I throw in a few ideas of my own, and he has already thought of or even begun working on most of them. By the time we end our conversation I find myself thinking, “I’ll be surprised if this man does not succeed in the long run.” Read more »
