Human Capital Briefs

If you’re a chief executive officer, your job is to execute. It’s written right into your title. But what does it mean, in terms of daily tasks, to be the company’s top “executer?” After all, CEOs don’t actually build factories or sell products.

Large, traditional business networking events are a time-honored institution. They have been a staple of aspiring and successful professionals for so long that most networking advice focuses not on whether you should attend, but on how to make the most of these events when you do attend. In theory, they’re one of the best ways to grow your business.

In a thoughtful review of the Affordable Care Act in The Journal of the American Medical Association, President Obama ends with a discussion of “lessons for future policy makers.” He talks about the difficulties in instituting change in the face of “hyperpartisanship” and “special interests” and makes a plea for “pragmatism.”

Decision makers, leaders, data scientists, and managers often must make quick assessments about whether they can trust a set of data, whether they can include it in an analysis, or whether they need it to take a new direction. While there are thousands of variants, their basic question is, “Do I have a data quality problem?”

An estimated 21% of carbon emissions in the United States are attributable to companies, and yet to date there is scant research on how to make firm operations more efficient in terms of reducing pollution. However, the numbers suggest that getting employees to change their behavior could significantly impact climate change.

A CEO we’ve worked with – let’s call him “Gary” – prides himself on being a collaborative leader who invests in consensus and builds relationships. Gary cares deeply about his employees and is eager to deliver. When he was first hired a couple of years ago, the board was deeply impressed by Gary’s values, trustworthy demeanor, and his collaborative approach. Unfortunately, by the time we met Gary, his habits as a “nice CEO” were about to cost him his job.

Some say our words and related acts must not be limited to that which is “politically correct.” The greater risk is that our unfiltered words and acts can inflict widespread reactive rage, nonproductive divisiveness, mistrust and public harm. We’re seeing that almost every day. I say it’s time for us to guard our words and acts to be “humanely correct.”