mind

Recently a colleague gave me an article to read from a glossy management journal, the sort of journal I wouldn't normally read. The opening was promising, it talked about how many MBA students were business graduates. In the past students would have come from industry or they were graduates. It implied that this would make them worse leaders as there would be less depth of experience. The solution apparently lies in literature, if you know where to look. It ended up being more of an advert for a book. Not that leaders and philosophers through the ages have not faced the same problems. Something is getting lost here in the tradition of education, academia, I was taught once was often learning for learning's sake. Higher education can be as much about the learning environment than the course you’re on, and learning how to lead no more lies in a book than it does in the rest of the world. Don't get me wrong, I do think you can learn things from literature, but looking to a play for a leadership to make a choice would first mean you have to choose the right play.

Recently I've been thinking about expectation. I remember working with some management consultants once and their favourite turn of phrase was: You have to manage expectations.

They kept saying this. Practically it meant they needed to know what could go wrong, allowing them to manage the situation should it happen.

Recently on British terrestrial television there was a popular psychology program and they illustrated how the expectation of reward affects children; and indeed adults. Three groups of children were asked to paint; one group was left to paint, one after a brief period was given a surprise reward for their work and the third group: were told right from the start there would be a reward for painting.