Small and large businesses have been searching for decades for the holy grail of organisational change: the perfect way to motivate employees to change their old ways for what management (or consultants!) deem to be better, new ones. The prevailing wind of change is a “top down” change of an organisation’s structure or reward system. Some experts espouse putting a “champion” in the executive suite to drive and implement change down to the lowest rung of the corporate ladder. The notion – get a big gun upstairs to push change to the organisational depths.

INSEAD professors Stewart Black and Hal Gregersen take a fresh approach in their book ‘It Starts With One’, believing that an organisation changes only as fast and as far as the front-line individuals implementing that change. Therefore, they need to be considered first, in the change paradigm.

http://knowledge.insead.edu/ItStartsWithOne080705.cfm?vid=75 »

Taking leadership research global

The global dimension of leadership is becoming a key area of interest for leadership research, says Cristina Escallon, director of the INSEAD Leadership Initiative, speaking on the sidelines of the first INSEAD-Wharton Research Conference on Leadership.

Most leadership research around the world is based on US-centric models, be it US companies or American leaders. This is because the US is where most academic developments have taken place in this field over the last couple of decades. “But the world has moved on and we need to ensure a much more representative description and understanding of leadership,” Escallon told INSEAD Knowledge.

http://knowledge.insead.edu/LeadershipResearchGlobal080707.cfm»

Mary Robinson: Human rights are good for business

Mary Robinson remains an uncompromising voice for human rights. The former Irish president and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights asserted the central importance of human rights in achieving a more just and sustainable future at the Net Impact conference here on sustainable prosperity, and explored with some 400 participants how they can help remind the world that human rights belong to all people and are their shared responsibility.

“That future can only come about through greater adherence to the rule of law within and between nations, through more effective and democratic states – and no less important, through wider participation by all sectors, including civil society and business, in meeting shared responsibilities and holding governments to account for their obligations,” she says.

http://knowledge.insead.edu/MaryRobinson080702.cfm »

What it takes to be a successful entrepreneur

When you are being hounded by the tax authorities because you can’t pay your personal taxes, and when your company has just 30,000 euros left in the bank but is burning 200,000 euros a month - you don’t really feel very successful. This was the situation Gilles Babinet experienced – many times, in fact. It’s also a common occurrence in entrepreneurship, he said during his opening keynote address at the first INSEAD Global Entrepreneurship Forum.

The company was eventually sold for more than 100 million euros. “Real entrepreneurs turn setbacks into opportunities,” he says. “So when a client doesn’t want your product, you can either think that your company is dead or that your product needs improving.”

http://knowledge.insead.edu/ToBeASuccessfulEntrepreneur080710.cfm»

What to do when everything changes: Mastering high uncertainty in start-ups

Israel has a thriving high-technology startup sector, which is based on world-class expertise and entrepreneurial talent. But nobody is perfect and even these sophisticated venture companies can improve in their management of uncertainty. When faced with risks and uncertainty, most high technology start-ups in Israel’s telecom industry carry out too much planning and then tend to adopt an insufficiently flexible stance. Conversely, the start-up companies facing low uncertainty appear to make too little diligent planning.

http://knowledge.insead.edu/UncertaintyStartUp080703.cfm »

The unreal estate

For many people around the world, property rights are not well defined, enforced or monitored; resulting in over half of the world’s population living and working on ‘unreal estate’, i.e. without the security of property ownership.

In her book Prosperity Unbound: Building Property Markets With Trust, INSEAD alumna Elena Panaritis presents a holistic approach to combating this lack of formal rights, arguing that a new thinking process, combined with successful diagnosis and determination for change, could transform society. She says informality has arisen because of the mismatch between institutions, organisations and society’s demands.

http://knowledge.insead.edu/TheUnrealEstate080701.cfm »

Setting a new youth trend

After more than 20 years as a marketing communications consultant, Bernd Gebert, who was 50 at the time, gave up a lucrative business in 2006 to start Das macht Schule in Hamburg.

Burdened by the passivity and pessimism of the generation who would be future leaders, Gebert’s vision for Das macht Schule is to motivate young people to take charge of their lives, be proactive and become responsible, caring citizens.

http://knowledge.insead.edu/NewYouthTrend080704.cfm »