Michael Lee Stallard

Recently I was delighted to see two great case studies written by good friends of mine appeared on Gary Hamel’s MIX.  Both case studies reflect elements of the Connection Culture that I wrote about in Fired Up or Burned Out.  The first case study written by Deborah Mills-Scofield is entitled “The 160-year old Startup.” The second case study written by Drew Williams is entitled “Restoring Faith in the Institution: How Mission Shaped Communities Revitalized St. Andrews.”  I encourage you to check them out!

At the Technical Academy Awards ceremonies held in Hollywood, the Associated Press reported that it wasn’t the host, actress Jessica Biel, who attracted the most attention. Instead, it was an understated, bespectacled, computer engineer named Ed Catmull. When Catmull’s name was announced to receive an Oscar for his lifetime of work in computer animation, the crowd went wild, whistling and whooping. And rightly so. The impact Catmull and his collaborators have had on Hollywood may last for decades to come.

Ed Catmull is the president of Pixar and Disney Animation Studios. He has rejected the traditional Hollywood star system and its often toxic work environment and replaced it with an environment that emphasizes community and long-term relationships. Catmull described it this way in a Harvard Business Review article he wrote: “[Pixar has] an environment that nurtures trusting and respectful relationships and unleashes everyone’s creativity…the result is a vibrant community where talented people are loyal to one another and their collective work, everyone feels that they are part of something extraordinary, and their passion and accomplishments make the community a magnet for talented people…”

What is it about Pixar’s environment that attracts talented employees and helps them produce outstanding movies such as the blockbuster hits Toy Story, Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Ratatouille, and WALL-E that have made Pixar the envy of Hollywood? Read more »

Jason Pankau and I spoke on a webinar for Linkage about maximizing employee engagement and alignment.  You can see the 60-minute webinar at this link.  You may also be interested in other free webinars offered by Linkage at this link.

For those of you on today’s webinar and readers of the articles Jason Pankau and I write for Crosswalk.com, here is a link to sign up for our email newsletter and receive a free digital version of our book Fired Up or Burned Out. (Note: To save it on your computer you will need to click on your browser’s “file” and “save as” menu options.)

Servant leaders connect with the people they lead and create Connection Cultures that are essential to achieve sustainable superior performance. Connection is defined as a bond that exists among a group of people based on shared identity, empathy and understanding that moves self–centered individuals toward group-centered membership.  Here’s an example of a servant leader that brings the force of connection to life.

Retired CNO Admiral Vern Clark was formerly the chief of the U.S. Navy from 2000 until 2005. When Admiral Clark became the chief, first term re-enlistment didn’t meet the Navy’s goal of 38 percent. Within a little more than a year, it soared from under 38 percent to 56.7 percent and the Navy had more sailors that it needed.  Although I don’t have space in this article to tell you all of what Admiral Clark did, his actions can be summarized in three words: Vision, Value and Voice. Read more »

Last week I attended the 2010 Business Innovation Factory Collaborative Innovation Summit in Providence, Rhode Island (referred to as BIF-6).  There were so many thoughtful presentations that I hesitate to merely highlight a few.   After taking a couple days to mull it over I’ve decided to select a few presentations that will be most relevant to the themes I typically write and speak about i.e. leadership, connection, employee engagement, productivity and innovation.  Below are brief descriptions of several presentations from the conference.  For those who want to hear these or other presentations, you can access them at this link.

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The New York Times recently had an article on rising burnout among clergy entitled “Taking a Break from the Lord’s Work.”  The article was followed by a thoughtful op-ed entitled “Congregations Gone Wild.”

Effective leadership, employee engagement and employee motivation are closely linked to the alignment of behavior with personal values. In the case of clergy, putting a muzzle on pastors so they are unable to preach in a way that is consistent with their values is a sure path to burnout.

This is a very important issue that everyone should spend time thinking about. Set aside time this month to list your values.  Ask yourself, “what do I believe in and what’s important to me in the way I live my life?”  Then compare what you wrote down with how you presently live.   During the Depression, a young financial analyst working in London did this exercise. Years later reflecting on it he wrote that “people, I realized, is what I value and I had no desire to be the richest man in the cemetery.” That young man, Peter Drucker, left his well-paying job and went on to become the father of management consulting. In “How Peter Drucker Changed My Life” I wrote about how Drucker’s writings affected my own career decisions.

What if you discover there are differences in your values and how you are presently living?  My advice is to invite 2-3 people you trust and respect to meet with you, discuss your analysis and thoughts about how you might take action to close the values gaps.  You may find all that is necessary is to speak with your supervisor about making changes to your present job or something more may be required such as moving to a different job or business unit in your organization, or, in the the most extreme instances, changing careers altogether.  Whatever the case, ignoring the present stressful state is never wise because if affects your mental and physical heath, your relationships and your job performance. Having conversations with people you trust will help reduce the stress you feel and also help clarify your thinking so that you can develop a clear plan to move forward to a better state of work and a better life.

Chris Dorobek, the well-respected talk show host of Federal News Radio in Washington, D.C, recently interviewed Jason Pankau and yours truly about employee engagement and strategic alignment based on an article Jason and I wrote for the award-winning Leader to Leader Journal entitled “To Boost Performance, Connect with the Core.”  You can listen to the unedited radio interview at this link.

Some of you know that in addition to speaking and teaching leadership at organizations such at Google, NASA, Johnson & Johnson and the University of Virginia’s Darden Graduate School of Business, Jason Pankau and I frequently speak in churches about how Judaeo-Christian values lived out create what we refer to as a “Connection Culture.” To learn more, watch the following video series of Jason Pankau teaching a workshop on Connection Cultures for Churches.

Session 1 – The Case for Connection
Session 2 – Creating a Connection Culture
Session 3 – Inspiring Identity
Session 4 – Knowledge Flow
Session 5 – Committed Members and Servant Leaders

The US Navy and U2 in the same article! Huh?

That’s right.  It’s true. Check it out for yourself.

The Leader to Leader Institute just posted an article on its website that Jason Pankau and I wrote for the Summer edition of the Leader to Leader Journal. The article features the stories of the US Navy’s former Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) Admiral Vern Clark, and Bono, the lead singer of the rock band U2.  The article is about the topic of connecting with “core employees” to boost strategic alignment, employee engagement, productivity and innovation.  Here is a link to the article entitled “To Boost Performance, Connect with the Core.” Read more »