What Does LeBron James Know About Leadership? Athletes learn and practice leadership. They get elected. We can learn from them. To tell an athlete to “shut up and dribble” shows profound misunderstanding of how much sports and athletics teach leadership, all the more so among leaders of champion teams. If you read Inc. to improve your leadership, LeBron James may have his flaws, as any leader does, but remains an exemplary role model. As a leadership professor,[…] Keep reading →

You Have to Say No to Many Good Things to Have a Great Life It’s a matter of priorities. If you don’t know yours, and how to act on them, you’ll end up mediocre. As a leadership professor at New York University, I see some of the world’s top students. A recent conversation reminded me that our university’s culture still misguides them. Our corporate worlds suffer the same problem as my[…] Keep reading →

Why the Environment Needs Leadership Leaders know guilt, blame, doom, and gloom don’t work. What works better? Here’s one effective way to lead: Go where the people you want to lead are–emotionally, not necessarily physically. That is, learn what they care about and connect those motivations to the task. Then the task will feel meaningful and purposeful to them. They’ll do it for themselves. They’ll thank you for leading them to work. What doesn’t[…] Keep reading →

10 Signs U.S. Universities Are Sabotaging Themselves Moody’s downgraded higher education to “negative.” S&P agreed. Finances aren’t the problem. Leadership is. S&P predicted a bleak future for higher education last week. Last month Moody’s downgraded the sector to from “stable” to “negative.” Leaders know financial issues usually aren’t root problems but point to them. Here are 10 signs pointing to problems among American universities independent of finance, from most obvious leading to the broadest and most important. 10. The most[…] Keep reading →

After some scattered posts dating to 2008, today in 2011 I wrote my first post in an unbroken daily series leading to today, with no future break planned. So today is day 1 of year 8. That’s 2,551 days in a row and 2,852 posts (I posted more than one per day), for those keeping track. It become my first sidcha, followed by burpees, cold showers, picking up garbage, and[…] Keep reading →

Should New York City Sue Mayor de Blasio? Will New York City’s mayor stop personally doing what the city is suing tobacco companies for? Last week, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio explained why the city was suing five fossil fuel companies: For decades, Big Oil ravaged our environment. They knew what they were peddling was lethal, but they didn’t care. They used the classical Big Tobacco playbook of denial, denial, denial, and all[…] Keep reading →

Snoopy, Charlie Brown, Who Are Your Peers, and What Are Your Sidchas? Want success? Compare yourself to historical greats and make them your peers, not the average. 18 years ago today, January 4, 2000, the New York Times reported: Today is the first day, after nearly half a century, that the daily comic strip ”Peanuts” will not appear. Just why it would be funny to see a young boy lean his[…] Keep reading →