I spent my first Fourth of July as an expat living in Switzerland and now I celebrated August 1 the National Holiday of my new country. As I’m at the end of my first year working as Executive-in-Residence at IMD in Lausanne and have become more immersed in my community of Lutry, I am reflecting on the many ways my personal and professional life have been enriched. While I continue to work on how best to engage internal and external stakeholders, my article “How Deeply Engaging Stakeholders Changes Everything” published by Forbes.com, ReWiring Business and Tomorrow’s Challenges was recently picked up by The Jakarta Post and Mexico’s Inversionista. On la fête nationale, after having supper with our wonderful neighbors, the new mayor of... more

On June 24 I gave the closing remarks at the UN Global Learning Managers Forum (LMF) in Turin, Italy on the social responsibility of learning, training and staff development in global organizations.  It was an absolutely stellar learning platform: the calibre of content and structure was at the very highest standards to allow for a truly great knowledge exchange among 39 Learning Managers from 35 UN Agencies globally. Before I facilitated a discussion on how they each might best engage their respective internal and external stakeholders, I observed as they shared with each other in various modules on a broad spectrum of important topics.  They are at the cutting edge of utilizing new technologies to reach staff throughout the  world. While the politics... more

Listening to international musicians improvize at the Cully Jazz Festival  I thought about the “beautiful music” made through the interactions of 28 senior executives from 19 countries representing 15 industries during the IMD program Advanced Strategic Management.  Each ASM participant entered the program determined to design the best solution to a concrete business challenge they faced.  They left not only as individuals each with his or her own finely honed action plan, but also as a team of  executives who indeed made beautiful music together through helping each other.   And, as I led my session first at ASM and then for the full IMD community on the importance of Highly Relational Engagement of Stakeholders – internal and external – for creating long-term value, I also experienced how through our engaged dialogue we too created unique and beautiful music since it is... more

I’m finding my niche, seven weeks into Executive-in-Residence at IMD: master bridge-builder; a role that has applicability in much of the executive education knowledge exchange being done here.  I‘ve begun to focus on why businesses should engage with non-market, non-traditional stakeholders for current brand value as a basis for long term value creation with Paul Strebel who leads the High Performance Boards program.  I’ll continue to develop this further with Didier Cossin who next year will take over this program.  I’m writing about creating and sustaining mutually beneficial cross-sector partnerships to support an exciting body of research by Tom Malnight and Kees van der Graaf.  And I’m finding my stride in my local village where the butcher, baker, winemaker and most... more

In my first week as Executive-in-Residence at IMD I observed and commented on executive education programs.  One was led by Dan Denison whose focus includes organizational culture, leadership and the impact they have on performance and effectiveness, and Tom Malnight whose focus includes global strategy, evolutionary organizational change, internal growth and renewal.  They guided participating executives through exercises designed to help them effectively tackle a changing and uncertain future.  Another group of executives interacted with James Henderson  whose focus includes helping companies achieve and sustain their competitive advantage, through a comparable exercise in developing strategies under times of uncertainty.  And in my first gathering of faculty and senior staff with IMD president Dominique Turpin we as an internal team explored many of... more

In these final weeks before relocating to Switzerland for up to two years, I’ve been feted by US-based friends and colleagues before departing.  And my Geneva-based as well as wider circle of European friends are planning welcome celebrations  for me upon arrival.  In recent years as many I’ve loved and admired have moved on, I’ve come to have an ever deeping appreciation for treasuring each moment I get to spend with those I cherish.  So, I’ll stay connected wherever I live/work.  My next post may come from Lausanne: voyez-vous bientôt; tout a l’heure!

I gave the closing remarks, My Leadership Journey, at an IMD program Strategies for Leadership (SL) led by Professor Ginka Toegel.  31 women executives from 20 countries participated in SL over four days during which I was a coach.  SL focused on authentic leadership and how executives must learn to balance their own unique personality qualities with certain attributes critical to be perceived as a strong leader.  Since Toegel started the program focused on natural preferences versus a fuller range of possible behaviors, with special emphasis on self-awareness of one’s innate strengths and weaknesses, I chose to delve into the latter.  I shared how knowing yourself fully – standing confidently in the power of glorious capacities while simultaneously not being... more

I was a speaker for the first class of the Women’s Media Center (WMC) 2010 Progressive Women’s Voices training, one of many WMC initiatives to advance its goal of Making Women Visible and Powerful in The Media.  I emphasized how much we not only must advocate for our own authority as women leaders but that we also have a responsibility to help promote other women to break down barriers that still exist for them to reach the top rungs of leadership.  In two weeks when I will be a coach for 30 women corporate executives from around the world at an IMD Strategic Leadership module, my message will be similar.  WMC had selected 10 women out of almost 200 applicants... more

I’ve just been invited to become an Executive-in-Residence at an extraordinary international executive education business school in Lausanne, Switzerland, IMD.   While visiting there, I met with their president, deans, program directors and faculty and am deeply impressed by the depth and breadth of their offerings.  I especially appreciate their emphasis on “real life, real learning.” In collaboration with their remarkable team, I will focus on responsible leadership and corporate social responsibility.  I welcome your input on specific issues you think I should explore and I will continue to post as this new work unfolds. Among their 100 MBA candidates, are 60 nationalities.  Similarly, the thousands of executives who participate in their specialized programs hail from myriad countries and their international faculty is comparably diverse.  IMD is ranked... more