Building Resilience – In Individuals and Organizations

Paul was a successful executive whom I met a few times, and over the course of several conversations, learned his life story. Abandoned by his drug-afflicted mother, he grew up in an orphanage until he was adopted by a couple when he was five. Paul was sexually abused, and at thirteen he left home and […]

Mind the Social Distance Gap

Johan de Nysschen (previously the successful head of Audi of America) was appointed to lead the Cadillac division of General Motors in 2014. When he joined GM, one of his first decisions was to place physical and psychological distance between Cadillac and Detroit, moving Cadillac’s headquarters from Motown to Manhattan in 2015. In New York, […]

The Perils of Disruptive Leadership

The headline in one of the New York Times’ sections recently read: San Francisco Lands a Disrupter. Who was the Times referring to another Silicon Valley entrepreneur, perhaps? No, this was the well-regarded conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen, who will be taking over the San Francisco Symphony and is referred to by the paper as one of […]