Speaker 1: 00:00 So we are now recording. Okay. Hi everybody. I’m here with Lynn Bell today and we are going to talk about what are some of the changes that are happening on the horizon that we’re needing to address and university graduate programs are beginning to address to really make our leaders ready for our future leaders. And Lynn Bell has spent a lot of time looking at this. She’s the head of a EMBA program located in Dallas Texas. I met her interestingly when we were both learning to be coaches using the Marshall Goldsmith methodology. And as many of you already know Marshall Goldsmith has done an incredible piece of work and it has made a tremendous contribution regarding how do we pragmatically really look at transforming our organizations. And then I got to meet Lynn again in when we were working on the or Marshall was doing his documentary for his upcoming a film that will be released in 2020. So Lynn having said that I will now let you introduce yourself.

Speaker 2: 01:30 Alright thanks Lois for having me on the program today. I’ll just a little bit of my background of how I got into all of this. You know this is you look back at your life and you wonder how did I get here? from there. And so I’ve always been interested in personal development and this whole idea of how do we grow and change. I even I think my own brain works in this way of thinking logistically how do we get from here to there? and so it’s really bits with me personally of where I am today in trying to look at this issue and say here’s the givens here’s what we have where we’re at today. And then asking the question where do we want to go? And then finally of course how do you get from here to there? So my own personal life has been like that. And I find that’s what’s happening in business today was we’re really asking those new questions about it looks different today and if we have to consider where it is we’re trying to go. so that’s really what what we’re doing in the university but also in my own personal research that I’m doing.

Speaker 1: 02:46 So Lynn one of the things we met very serendipitously the London airport. Yeah. You are coming back from a conference and I was coming back from I’m in involved in other activities and we were sitting having coffee together and talking about your research and I’m fascinated by what it is that you’re doing with your research because it’s such a timely topic. We’re so caught up in the green movement and what does social responsibility at the corporate level we’re including this more and more as part of our corporate strategy courses. And so what does that really mean? What is your research telling us in what got you started doing what you’re doing?

Speaker 2: 03:36 Yeah so it is you know if you look at where businesses today and look at all the indicators for example Edelman’s trust survey it’s done every year. Only 50% of people believe that business is interested in doing the right thing. yeah. so if you look at change initiatives only 70% I’m sorry 70% of those change initiatives in organizations fail. so if you Barbara Edelman out of Harvard wrote a book called The End of Leadership. so what is it that’s happening both Societal y but also in the business world that the big raging debate of course is between stakeholders and shareholders right? Is business responsible for all of the things that has been heaped on them today? I was really intrigued by a research piece that’s being done out of Harvard on the health of America. And essentially they laid the blame at the feet of business and said, stress is the primary factor in obesity in many of our diseases today.

Speaker 2: 04:58 And where does most stress come from the workplace they would say. And so, if you look at what business leaders have to deal with today and ask the question are they responsible for all of that? And if not what piece can they make a difference about? So the idea of corporate social responsibility has been around for a long time. but it’s become a much higher priority for constituents for stakeholders. and businesses are being asked to step up. Really the bar has been raised much higher for business leaders today. So one of the things that I in my own consulting work in my background is doing culture and values work in organizations. And they would often say to me you know well we want to start a leadership development program. And I would always ask to do what?

Speaker 2: 05:56 And often that question turns to what are the skills and a leader needs to lead a team to meet his goals for the corporation. But really what I wanted to ask is, do we need leaders to do things that are way beyond what we’ve been talking about in the last many years in organizations. So that’s what led me to look at from a research piece but also who’s doing it well right? What are the models that are out there? and because that’s often what’s missing for people is even if they want to do it differently and they’re not really sure how to do that. so that’s that’s essentially what led me here to do this.

New Speaker: 06:48 So as you’ve looked at that it’s mind boggling isn’t it? The amount of things that people have to do and then also navigate the boards of directors which are feel a tremendous pressure in from other directions largely from the shareholders right.

Speaker 2: 07:09 In order type meet their fiduciary responsibilities. What have you learned? What have been some of your conclusions relative to what are the responsibilities?

New Speaker: 07:22 Well you know first of all much of the research that’s being done is done on multinational corporations. So people that have huge organizations. I think one of the best most recent examples would be when you said you and I met in London I had just been to Oxford to a conference on the economics of mutuality which is a whole new management theory that’s been worked on now there for about the last 10 12 years. and so it is a rethinking of even the whole idea of economics. What do we value today differently than we used to value. So what is capital? and it is one of the things that we know is that in order to move an organization or society in general into a new place a new way of thinking about business and management and wealth and all of those kinds of types of things is we have to have different kinds of leaders.

Speaker 2: 08:22 and so that’s a part of what this conference was about is how do we develop leaders who think differently. but the reality is that there’s a whole a whole group of people who still hold to the tenants of that business has no responsibility to stakeholders. Their responsibility is to share holders and profit. So the the CEO of Unilever for example has been for many years now working in this area a broader responsibility of his organization and done many wonderful things throughout the world but recently stepped down because his shareholders were not happy about the the shortfall in growth that they had expected. So it’s not an easy thing to say that we’re just going to go focus on all these things because the pressures on organizations in business leaders is extreme to create profit and often short term profit right?

Speaker 2: 09:31 The quarterly profits that they’re responsible for. Absolutely. So one of the things that you know who we’ve talked that you’ve shared is that part of what we were seeing is for a leader to be able to have these skill sets there’s the certain maturation that’s required. And what does that mean? Because I we don’t really hire with maturation. in mind we talked about emotional intelligence that how’s that different?

New Speaker: 10:10 Right? So what we know in the research thus far is that to get leaders who are thinking broader who think other if you will collaboratively think about other people is that it often comes at turning points in their development. So where they’re able to broaden their perspective of not only their responsibility but just how they personally fit in the world. and so what’s happening today is millennial leaders first of all boomers are retiring at phenomenal speed. As we all know and leadership gaps that are there there isn’t sufficient either prepared or nbers of leaders in the generation after them. So millennials are being brought to leadership positions. Oster then that maturation those turning points I’ve had the ability to happen in their lives.

Speaker 2: 11:13 Excuse me. So one of the things I’ve been looking at is what does cause those turning points? and is there a way to develop that in our younger leaders? Now that’s not to say that there aren’t many millennials who are very mature in their way of thinking about the world because that would certainly be an overstatement. but I have interviewed many millennials who are saying that’s exactly how I feel. I’ve been given this new position. I’ve been promoted to a place that I don’t know that I have the maturity that I see the world in a way that I need to see it to do this job.

New Speaker: 11:54 So how have you seen that people are addressing that gap? That’s a huge problem.

New Speaker: 12:04 Yeah. And it doesn’t come by the way just at age. You can reach a certain age and still never have seen the world any broader than yourself.

Speaker 2: 12:13 Right? I mean we’ve all known leaders like that. and so one of the ways that people are looking at this is with experiential learning. and that would be both inside of universities but especially in people leaders who already are in places of responsibility and organizations. So for example many big organizations are looking at ways to kind of break through that what I will call narrow vision of of the world. And they take them to places like the streets of Brazil for example where they’re able to see what does the depletion of resources in the jungles look like. so they see it up front and close. They put them in with leaders who are leading poor urban organizations. I remember one specifically was worked with African-American orphans adoptions. and they were able to sit down with those leaders and talk to them about what they have in common how they see the world from different eyes.

Speaker 2: 13:27 so experiential learning is been probably one of the most successful ways. but what we also have seen is that it doesn’t necessarily still change people you don’t have to be ready to hear those things and not all leaders are. So then you back up and ask the question if they if that is in fact how we see our organization that we want to be other focused. How do we choose leaders? That have that kind of a mindset or do we?

New Speaker: 14:02 So how have you reshaped your EMBA program to address those issues? Because I’m seeing some pieces people trying to address the new challenges. how are you doing it in your MBA program? So first of all ours is an executive MBA program. And what that implies is that we’re not teaching accounting or marketing or performance management or those types of things.

Speaker 2: 14:32 We assume people have the skills to do those things. when they come to us what we are doing though is wrestling with these bigger issues. So for example, in our bit one of our business classes it’s called business in the city and it’s helping leaders understand that they are part of an ecosystem that they are both impacting and having an impact on. So there’ll be mapping for example their supply chain. there’s a term out there now called hybrid value chains who really is part of the value chain in your business organization. in our economics class we’ll be looking at a redefining of wealth. You know if you look at what we value today it’s not necessarily physical assets right? It is things like networks, information. So we really have to reconsider what are the definitions of some of those big terms in our leadership class again we’ll be looking at leadership as a system. the whole idea of hierarchy and someone at the top who is telling people what to do from the top is no longer the model that works in business today. But that’s not an easy transition. You know I’ve I’ve talked to leaders who are a want to move into a collaborative way but often they’ll say things to me like who will I be? Then what will my job be if I am not the one who people come to for answers? so really looking at each of the classes that were we’ll have in our in our curriculum and asking some of those hard questions. one of the top things that CEOs are concerned about is human development. How do we get more leaders? so our human capital class for example we’ll be looking at much bigger issues than just the traditional things. So that’s some of the ways that we’re doing it.

Speaker 3: 16:46 Human capital. I think that’s a big issue right now because we see that unemployment has fallen and so there’s much more competition on the workplace. And I I’m kind of enjoying that because the challenge that it’s created for us is really for the first time we’re being pushed to look at the human resource issue. What do you see so you have the corporate challenge but then you also had the board of directors who may view it differently. How do you see that coming together and how are you preparing leaders for that?

Speaker 2: 17:32 Well most of that comes back to right what is a getting very clear about what our vision and purpose is. and one of the things that I you often see with leaders is where there is misalignment between what these board of directors see as the vision that the direction of the corporation and the CEO. That’s essentially what happened with Unilever right? Is that the CEO had one vision of what they should be doing and the board of directors and shareholders had another vision. So in the human capital part of it is also in my opinion is valuing every employee not just a select number of people. So when we talk about how are we going to move towards our vision, oftentimes it’s with a few select people. And so one of the main things that I believe is not only a smart thing to do but the right thing to do is to value every person in an organization. If I go back and look at some of these models for example the turning points that we were mentioning earlier those turning points happened by very surprising places. You know somebody that wasn’t a top player in the company made a significant statement move suggestion whatever and it became a major turning point. So the whole idea of valuing our human capital beyond just a pipeline of specific people to me is one of the crucial factors.

Speaker 1: 19:12 So valuing people how do you do that when you also still have within many corporations a notion that the more competition you place amongst your employees the more productive therapy. So in order to create that competitive nature some companies had a philosophy of just turning 10% of the employee population every year or every you know couple of years.

Speaker 2: 19:48 Speak to that. Well number one a cart blank statement about that process it’s not something I’m able to do. But what I will say is that I know plenty of organizations who because sometimes that happens because they want new blood or something like that. the social impact of that longterm in an organization I think is very detrimental. there are plenty of big companies who have that. I I remember being when the telecom company that I worked for and we had to value each of we had to give a number to each of our employees one through five that rated them on where they were and then those the ones and twos were out. And I said what if every one of my people is a five, to bad assign you know a a one or two to some of them because you’re going to move some of those people out. And I remember feeling how unfair that was to people. So there are other models out there of the valuing of people. I just watched them. I think it was a ted talk on the Guy who started Chobani yogurt and how he treats people and how he valued them kept them promoted them develop them those types of things and the difference that it’s made longterm in his organization. So some of those short term methodologies I think come back to.

Speaker 1: 21:19 as you’re speaking part of what just resonated with me is if we don’t have that sense of responsibility and growing our human resources, it’s almost impossible to also have a social a real social responsibility perceptually. And yet we were at in so many places we asked people to compartmentalize what they do. And I mean if if you want to create stress that’s one way to create stresses in it.

Speaker 2: 21:54 Yeah right. Absolutely. You know there’s some great work that comes out of the neuroleadership institute in New York that talks about the biological responses of people to things like feedback. For example. we know so much more about how the body and the brain operate in these things. And so it is counterproductive in the way that we are doing much of our human development in organizations. The good thing is we know so much more today and to your point Lois to have leaders who are open to hearing those things and changing and doing things differently to be responsible to the people that they work with and then putting the tools in their hands to teach them how to do that is crucial.

Speaker 1: 22:48 You know Lynn work getting close to our time. And so before we end I just want to ask if there’s something else that you really would like to share that we haven’t talked about and give you an opportunity to do that. So please go ahead.

Speaker 2: 23:05 Yeah. One of the things Lois, that I thought about in prepping for this is that you talk a lot about legacy. and so I just wanted to share kind of a I believe that each of us leaves a legacy, either good or bad or intentional or non-intentional. But I’m doing my dissertation on the guy by the name of Ray Anderson who was the founder and CEO of INTERFACE a carpet company. and he was probably best known for sustainability in his organization. and after reading he had one of these turning points. He called it a sphere in the chest moment where he changed his leadership and he committed to a zero carbon footprint in his organization by 2020. Wow. Yeah. So but here’s the zone. Yeah. But he died in 2011 so he didn’t get to see the completion that but what I am so taken with is the legacy that he left after he died in 2011.

Speaker 2: 24:10 You would think well all of those things went to the wayside. Right. They changed direction and went some way that not true. so his company was so changed by him and his vision that they continued that process and there by 2020 I think there’ll be there. But the other thing that was amazing to me was people did a testimonial video of those who had been impacted by his life. and it brought me to tears to hear how he had changed the lives of so many people all over the world. by caring deeply about something and putting his focus and his life towards that. So that to me is legacy.

Speaker 4: 24:57 So part of what I’m hearing you say is if you really want to leave a legacy. It’s caring deeply about people. Ah so that people really want to continue on and continue your work or to continue changing other lives. Is that am I am I hearing you right?

Speaker 2: 25:19 Yeah. But I would say it’s also one step further and that is he got very clear about what that was going to be. and he had measurable results. He had a way of measuring am I changing the anything? and I think legacy sometimes is just left to good feelings rather than putting measurement putting thought behind and what will that look like and how am I doing? Am I getting there?

Speaker 1: 25:46 Thank you for that because you’re absolutely right. If you can’t measure a difference then you haven’t made a difference. Yeah. And how remarkable that he was able to understand that early on that that was a critical component.

Speaker 4: 26:04 Lynn thank you so much. For those of you who are listening we will have information about Lynn and how you can contact her if you have other questions about what it is that she’s doing and the work that she’s involved in. So just email us and we will be glad to forward information to her so that she can respond. Thank you so much for your time and for listening to us today.

New Speaker: 26:39 Okay. I’m going to shut it off now.

Speaker 4: 26:41 Wow.