Bill George: Harvard’s Senior Fellow Urges Managers To Lead From The Heart

For our 100th episode – and our final episode of the 2022 season – we bring you a guest who is the true embodiment of the Lead From The Heart philosophy. Bill George is formerly the CEO of Medtronic – a Fortune 200 medical device company which has 90,000 employees across 120 countries. And, for the past twenty years, he’s been a professor at the Harvard Business School where he’s long insisted that workplace managers at all levels possess a “moral compass” to guide their actions. He believes ‘the four most important qualities of leadership are passion, compassion, empathy and courage.” It may come as a surprise that any top business school professor would so strongly emphasize a leadership philosophy tied to values, character and, heart – but George is also the author of the leadership classic, “Discover Your True North” which he’s recently revised and republished. In his new edition, he makes some stunning assertions – starting with his belief that people running large companies today have lost touch with the needs of younger workers & must step aside. In his words, “current business leaders must move the next generation of leaders to their rightful place.” George also believes business – and society as a whole – would be wise to repudiate CEOs who intentionally harm people by their actions. In no uncertain terms, he calls out Facebook founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg for being as a leader who lacks both ethics & any spiritual center. And, most remarkably, he says business has long valued intelligent, intellectual workplace managers when what leadership truly needs today is a shift to the heart. He believes this approach to managing human beings is truly reflective of the future style of leadership. And he explains why in the compelling conversation. The post Bill George: Harvard’s Senior Fellow Urges Managers To Lead From The Heart appeared first on Mark C. Crowley.