The good news is that the race has led me to wonder about the future of leadership, generally. What it will look like, what it will take to be a truly successful leader. Want to lead? Stay with me, here.

I let my curiosity take over and dove into a variety of resources that have been studying the future of leadership: Hay Group, The Center for Creative Leadership, Google and numerous others.

In short, what I found were a bevy of attributes, which when distilled down, sorted into five major categories: Collaboration, Individuality, Authenticity, Integrity and Communication. Consider these leadership imperatives for the future.

Taken together, they got me to see that the future of leadership is all about the personalization of work as the foundation for change. In short, it’s about humanizing relationships, honoring the individual inside the employee, tapping into the whole person (beginning with you), motivating from the inside, out.

From what I learned, I believe that the personalization of work can become the ‘new efficiency,’ driving productivity and, potentially, greater employee engagement. I like that. It flips the traditional model of assembly line efficiency on its head, by celebrating the “making” of the individual rather than the making of the product.

It’s about time.

The post Want to lead? Make work personal appeared first on Larry Ackerman.

Will Facebook me-too itself out of business? Not likely. Might the company stir up confusion in the social media marketplace that hurts its image and softens customer loyalty? Not out of the question.

You don’t have to be an airline or Internet company to copy the actions of major competitors. It happens all the time. With the best of intentions, you study your competition’s best practices to see how they ‘got there.’ You track new product launches. Then, you emulate some or all of these success markers, hoping to improve your lot.

Along the way, you forget that your company’s greatest strategic advantage lies in investing in the things that set it apart from others. In short, you allow yourself to be Foogled (Foo-gal verb; to Foogle: “to be seduced into adopting strategies and tactics that blur the lines between you and your competitors.”

Who wins? No one.

Not your customers, for whom you’ve made choices harder. Not your employees, who may no longer be sure why they signed up and who they’re working for. Not your investors, who will anticipate a price war, which may erode profit margins and confidence.

Be a hero. Send a memo to your team: Don’t be Foogled!

The post Don’t be Foogled! appeared first on Larry Ackerman.

Here’s a leap: Seems that we are slowly realizing that dehumanizing the workplace, which happened with the dawn of the industrial revolution, doesn’t work; it breeds inefficiency, not productivity.

So, let’s jump ahead – way ahead. How about helping employees to get a handle on who they are – their uniqueness as individuals and the potential that uniqueness holds? Why? Simple. Because our identities defines our potential for creating value…on the job, through our work, with our families, in our social circles.

Imagine, even further, an identity-based organization, where lots of people have gone through such a process and really do bring the best of themselves to work,voluntarily and consciously, creating more “value” for the company as well as for themselves. What kind of company might lead in this effort? Which ones, specifically, might they be? Google? P&G? HP? KPMG?

I’d love to know what you think. Is a fully “humanized” workforce – one populated with “happy” people – possible? Is this a recipe for productivity or a waste of resources?

The post “Business Discovers Happiness Pays” appeared first on Larry Ackerman.