Comments on: Leadership lessons from a Wall Street consultant

By: lsmith0192

lsmith0192 — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 17:55:37 +0000

I don’t know about anyone else, but whether it was in school or in the workplace, I’ve always encountered people who I’ve thought “are terrible at leading”. Some people just naturally know how to be successful and who can lead others in the same direction. But then there are some who are awful at both. I never wanted to be the latter so I’m always looking for ways to grow personally, professionally, and as a leader to be as successful as I can. A friend lent me a book she just read called “How to Avoid the Common Failure” by Michael Horton. You can find out more on his website http://www.hortonadvantedge.com and you can pick up the book at http://www.gettothepointbooks.com. She highly recommends doing both. It’s a great reference and motivational book to really give you a push in the right direction!

By: yeahyeahyeahx

yeahyeahyeahx — Thu, 31 May 2012 03:50:40 +0000

Wow this is incredible story for me . I will do my best to apply this in my everyday life.

By: mfw13

mfw13 — Wed, 30 May 2012 23:12:30 +0000

Funny how the President of the United States is able to manage the entire Executive branch of the US government for a salary of around 400K a year.

Conclusion: Most CEO’s are vastly overpaid

By: Ademanaonge

Ademanaonge — Wed, 30 May 2012 22:29:46 +0000

Felix – I think the author has a valid point. So many workers today are besieged by information overload. You may be able to track this. You’re smart, and your livelihood depends on aggregating tons of data. But many people can’t analyze and synthesize data like you. I’ve spoken with quite a few executives, and the constant stream of information is problematic. People have to learn how to turn it off sometimes.

By: TFF

TFF — Wed, 30 May 2012 20:28:47 +0000

@jomiku, am I reading you right? Are you arguing that focusing on driving makes a driver more likely to have an accident?!?

By: jomiku

jomiku — Wed, 30 May 2012 19:40:23 +0000

The real problem with the V.Tech story and its use is that it looks after the fact at accidents. It doesn’t measure how often you’re distracted and don’t crash. The study is fine but the use of it is plainly stupid: you can’t know when a problem will arise or when an accident will occur so it’s absolutely ridiculous to say “focus, focus, focus” when a) maybe focus will cause an accident by something as simple as blinkering you and b) it’s simply impossible to focus all the time. You don’t know what you need to focus on all the time. That text message may be an important business problem. You glance at it and save your business. Or you don’t because you’re focused and it’s too late. Silly gibberish idiotic prattling about focus.

By: Eericsonjr

Eericsonjr — Wed, 30 May 2012 17:37:12 +0000

Felix is against consultants (good) but he is for distractions.

Because he is a blogger.

By: Curmudgeon

Curmudgeon — Wed, 30 May 2012 17:27:39 +0000

jfruh, yeah. That’s the difference between New York and not New York.

By: jfruh

jfruh — Wed, 30 May 2012 17:01:38 +0000

Curmudgeon — you know that many, many buildings in New York higher than six floors, right?

By: jfruh

jfruh — Wed, 30 May 2012 17:01:35 +0000

Curmudgeon — you know that many, many buildings in New York higher than six floors, right?

By: thispaceforsale

thispaceforsale — Wed, 30 May 2012 16:00:50 +0000

I wonder what happened around 5/12/11 that had the hbr post rise from the grave.
But more importantly, cliffhanger!
I hope that tech ceo won the entrepreneur of the year award, he sounds like a true leader of leaders, with a touch of the common man to keep him humble and hungry.

By: StuartBuck

StuartBuck — Wed, 30 May 2012 14:52:29 +0000

OK, so the blog post misinterpreted a study and was perhaps too flattering to a CEO. But it’s a gross distortion to say that the post argues that CEOs or anyone else “should try to cut down on annoying things like paying attention to unexpected things the outside world might send their way.” The point is that way too many people are so glued to their smartphones that they forget to interact with the real human beings right around them.

Moreover, they need to hear the advice to put down their phones much more than they need the convenient fiction that to pay any attention to their friends and colleagues would be to miss out on the “glorious serendipity” of Twitter.

By: J_F

J_F — Wed, 30 May 2012 14:47:38 +0000

A lot of these vacuous HBR articles appear as trending on my LinkedIn profile and this one came along a few days ago – I’m guessing much of its popularity derives from and is reinforced from that site; consultants tend to be enthusiastic users of LinkedIn and easy targets for link-bait articles about leadership (said the consultant).

By: Curmudgeon

Curmudgeon — Wed, 30 May 2012 13:25:33 +0000

I guess that’s the difference between New Yorkers and us non-New Yorkers – the only time I’m in an elevator is when I’m traveling, and need to get up to my sixth-floor hotel room. I use stairs for anything under six floors, because I need the exercise. But I guess New Yorkers use fitness clubs for that purpose, where they can check out who else is there.

You know, sometimes even leadership consultants should just spend a little time chilling out.

By: dedalus

dedalus — Wed, 30 May 2012 12:23:22 +0000

Peter B’s credentials include not only an MBA from Columbia in “General Management,” but a BA from Princeton in . . . “Everything 20th Century.”

Hmm. I’ve got some questions about the 20th Century, maybe he could help. . . .

But there’s more: “He is [also] a Master Certified Coach and a Certified Yoga Instructor.”

SOLD!!

That’s HBR’s lineup: nuthin’ but homerun hitters.

http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id= 39139641