- About the Lecture
-
About the Lecture
In some organizations, vision and motivation don’t reside exclusively in the top tiers of management, but instead energize all employees, even the most ordinary foot soldiers. All staff become leaders.
At Southwest Airlines, explains James Parker, this means translating the corporate mission up and down the line. The company culture is “defined by deeds, which have to be delivered on a local level.” So you’ll see a “deadheading pilot helping flight attendants serve peanuts and stowing trash, and flight attendants cleaning up between flights -- employees doing things outside the narrow scope of their job responsibilities, to contribute to the success of overall operations.” Southwest employees have secured two goals that seem unattainable by other airlines: low fares and outstanding service, says Parker. It’s this “relational competence” that gives Southwest its cost advantage, and employees derive both personal satisfaction and good remuneration—including a profit-sharing plan— from their labors.
The vast field operations of Oxfam, as well as the nonprofit’s engagement in crises, demand that staff working in 70 countries operate very independently from Barbara Stocking. “The only way to do it is by having confidence in (staff) out there. We’re dealing with displaced people living in extreme poverty. It can’t be broken down into tasks.” One example: Oxfam field workers sought a non-medical way to contribute to the HIV/AIDS crisis in southern Africa. Workers on the ground there figured out “we could bring something special -- community support strategies,” such as mentoring older children to be parents. “The idea that I could have dreamt that up from Oxford is ridiculous,” says Stocking. Developing this kind of distributed and skilled local leadership takes years, and in the case of disasters, requires great flexibility all around. Following the Asian tsunami, Stocking had to convince her Aceh staff that helicopters were the only way to go to deliver aid. “You want imagination and initiative,” says Stocking, “but sometimes you have to bring them back.”Related Videos
-
Leading by Omission
Ricardo Semler
September 22, 2005
-
Partners in Heath-Global Health Equity
Paul Farmer
November 15, 2007
-
HIV Lymphocyte Dynamics and Implications for Therapy
David Ho
March 23, 2006
-
- About the Speakers
-
About the Speakers
Moderator: Deborah G. Ancona
Seley Distinguished Professor of Management; Faculty Director, MIT Leadership Center
Deborah Ancona researches core leadership capabilities and how teams manage both their internal and external dynamics to obtain high performance. Her book Managing for the Future: Organizational Behavior and Processes, (South-Western College Publishing, 1999) centers on the skills and processes needed in today's diverse and changing organizations.
She received her B.A. and M.S. in Psychology from the University of Pennsylvania and her Ph.D. in Management from Columbia University. She taught at the Amos Tuck School of Business, Dartmouth College, before joining the faculty at MIT in 1985.James Parker
Former C.E.O. and Vice-Chairman of the Board, Southwest Airlines Company
Before serving as C.E.O. of Southwest, Parker was General Counsel of that company from 1986 until June 2001. He previously worked as an attorney in the San Antonio, Texas law firm of Oppenheimer, Rosenberg, Kelleher and Wheatley. He also worked as Assistant Attorney General of Texas.
Parker earned a J.D. from the University of Texas at Austin School of Law, where he also completed his undergraduate work.Barbara Stocking
Director General, Oxfam, Great Britain
Barbara Stocking received an M.Sc. in reproductive physiology from the University of Wisconsin. She was a research fellow from 1974-78 at the Nuffield Trust and University of Sussex. She worked at the World Health Organization from 1979-81, and became a senior fellow at the London School of Tropical Medicine in 1981. She spent the next decade working for regional and national health services, and became director of Oxfam Britain in 2001.
- About the Host
-
About the Host
MIT Sloan School of Management
The MIT Sloan School of Management, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is one of the world’s leading business schools — conducting cutting-edge research and providing management education to top students from more than 60 countries. The School is part of MIT’s rich intellectual tradition of education and research.
MIT Sloan began in 1914 as engineering administration curriculum in the MIT Department of Economics and Statistics. The scope and depth of this educational focus have grown steadily in response to advances in the theory and practice of management to today’s broad-based management school.
A program offering a master’s degree in management was established in 1925. The world’s first university-based executive education program — the MIT Sloan Fellows — was created in 1931 under the sponsorship of Alfred P. Sloan, Jr., an 1895 MIT graduate who was then chairman of General Motors. A MIT Sloan Foundation grant established the MIT School of Industrial Management in 1952 with a charge of educating the “ideal manager.”
Video Player
Leadership in an Age of Uncertainty
- Moderator: Deborah G. Ancona
- James Parker
Barbara Stocking - October 7, 2005
- Running Time: 1:08:54
