Leadership Development and Leadership Articles

Apart from the Leadership Library, where there are hundreds of links to top notch leadership articles available free of charge, we also have a number of articles available on this site, written by author Robert Bacal, or by guest contributors who have something significant to say about leadership, developing better leaders, or related topics. This section contains these materials.

Featured

Nailing Down The Meaning of Values - Personal AND Corporate (Part 1) By Robert Bacal

Organizational values and beliefs are tremendously important IF they are used as a basis for behavior and decision-making. Mostly they just dangle, and behavior ends up disconnected, creating huge degrees of internal cynicism. Here's the solution, and a simple method to bring espoused and enacted values (Schein) closer together.

Nailing Down Values (Part II) - Both Ends Against The Middle by Robert Bacal

Robert explains a simple technique to communicate the meaning of values to other people, or to have people collaborate to define them.

Leading When The Fog Rolls In And There's No Clear Path By Robert Bacal

Leading is easy when you can identify a clear path to follow, but hard when the future is obscured by fog, and there is no obvious path or direction to pursue. That's when the best leaders come through. Learn how.

How Leaders (and Managers) Can Make Others Better By Building Their Self-Confidence By Robert Bacal

While a part of a person's self-confidence has to do with their own personalities, part also has to do with their environment, and by extension, the manager or leader. Learn how leaders can work to improve self-confidence in others, and the valuable payoff.

Understanding Leadership

Here you'll find articles to help you further understand some of the complexities of leadership, and what effective leadership involves.

• Understanding Informal Leaders In Organizations (and Benefiting) by Robert Bacal
• Developing The Informal Leaders In Your Organization by Robert Bacal
• Benefiting From Informal Leaders In Your Organization by Robert Bacal

Leadership, Communication and Influence

Effective communication (and creating effective communication within organizations) is essential to leadership success. Scratch an effective leader and you will inevitably find a person who has well developed and used communication skills.

• Leaders Need Information To Succeed - Are You Getting It? by Robert Bacal
• The Voice of Leadership
• Assessing Our Ability to Influence Others - Leadership As Influence
• The Responsive Manager / Leader by Robert Bacal
• What Masquerades As Leadership (but is not)

Leadership, Planning, Visions and Missions

Part of leadership involves creating a climate where "followers" will understand and embrace the values, plans and missions of the organization. Here's material related to leadership and its links to planning, creating vision, and inspiring employees.

• Leadership - How To Transform Planning Into Doing by Robert Bacal
• Are You A Leader Or A Manager?
• Dream vs. Vision: A Mind-Shift For Visionary Leaders

Leadership Development -- Developing Self, Developing Other Leaders

Here you'll find material on the subject of leadership development. How do you develop yourself as a leader? How do you help others become better leaders? How can organizations build better internal leaders?

• Developing The Informal Leaders In Your Organization by Robert Bacal
• Developing The Leader Within
• Understanding Leadership - Understanding Ideologies In Leadership. Implications For Being A Better Leader by Robert Bacal
• What Leadership Was And What It Has Become
• The Qualities of A True Leader
• Your Leadership Scorecard - A Simple Way To Grow As A Leader
• Why On-Line Leadership Development Can't Deliver Sustainable Improved Performance
• Leadership Skills Development-The Six Measures of Leadership Development

Leadership and Managing Change and Crisis

Effective leadership is a critical factor in managing change and surviving crises. Material here explains the link and provides practical hints.

• The Importance of Leadership In Managing Change by Robert Bacal
• Managing Change; Balking at the Leadership Challenge
• Changing Organisational Culture Requires a Change in Leadership

Leadership Styles & Leadership Models

• Leadership Styles - Practice Effective Leadership
• What is a "Servant Leader?" You May Have More Than You Think (Greenleaf)