Dan Cable, a professor of organizational behavior at London Business School and author of the new book Alive at Work: The Neuroscience of Helping Your People Love What They Do, recalls the story of how a company changed its culture – and dramatically increased its productivity – with a simple question. Instead of drilling down on data and micromanaging its drivers, which was fostering progressively poorer performance, the leaders were told to ask their drivers: “How can I help you deliver excellent service?” The incident is just one of many that Cable recounts in making the point that servant ...

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NOTE:  At the start of the year, we published a list of nine “core principles” around the notion of Leading Like Jesus. The article got a lot of reader feedback – all positive – so we decided to probe deeper by focusing on each principle individually in subsequent issues of The Catholic Leader. In this issue we focus on Core Principle 9.  By Owen Phelps, Ph.D. Director, Yeshua Institute In this day and age we like to think of ourselves as well-informed by the sciences and devoted to the scientific method. But our worldview – our perspective on reality – keeps betray...

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It’s no surprise that the last presidential election found us a very polarized American people. And that extreme polarization has persisted -- reportedly ending long and deep friendships and even shattering formerly close families. So it should  come as no surprise that the divisions – over a host of issues – would find its way into our workplaces. Karen Firestone, president and CEO of Aureus Asset Management and author of Even the Odds: Sensible Risk-Taking in Business, Investing, and Life, has four tips for team leaders who want to keep the peace and foster productivity in these argumentat...

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Beginning in June, The Catholic Leader will switch to its summer schedule of publishing only once a month. That will give both you and us more time to enjoy the summer with family and friends – and especially savor the great outdoors if you live, as we do, in an area that plays host to all four seasons. (Actually, it seems as if we will get no more than three seasons this year because Mother Nature pretty much skipped spring where we live.) We don’t have firm dates for our June, July, August and September issues yet because we’re still working out what our calendar will look like through the summer ...

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We have launched a new ministry that we hope will eventually include every reader of this e-newsletter, as well as many more people who encounter us on Facebook, Linkedin and Twitter. Why? We want to pray for you. In fact, we want to enlist a whole vast team of people who will pray for you. And we’d love to benefit from your prayers too. We address all these things with our new Yeshua Prayer Ministry – and we hope you’ll check it out right now. Power of prayer We certainly believe in the power of prayer. And we know that the history of the Yeshua Institute is nothing if not a collec...

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“Loyalty is almost always listed as a top virtue, like honesty and trustworthiness,” says Paul Sean Hill, author of Leadership from the Mission Control Room to the Boardroom. But he hastens to disagree. He says personal loyalty doesn’t belong among the top three virtues – and maybe not even in the top 10. What matters is loyalty to the mission. “Loyalty is a leadership trap. Or it can be if we’re not very deliberate about how we define and apply it,” he says. Hill tells the story of working for a boss who wouldn’t give his boss helpful feedback because he didn’...

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By Owen Phelps, Ph.D. Director, Yeshua Institute   In the course of my career, I’ve had the opportunity to give many college graduates their first professional positions. I hoped they learned from those experiences. I know I did.   If you find yourself in the ranks of Newly-Graduated and Newly-Hired (NGNH) this year – or if you know someone who is – please indulge me in sharing what I learned from them with the hope that it will make your new position less stressful and more satisfying.   Of course, no two NGNHs are alike – at least not the ones who crossed our thresholds. Each...

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NOTE:  At the start of the year, we published a list of nine “core principles” around the notion of Leading Like Jesus. The article got a lot of reader feedback – all positive – so we decided to probe deeper by focusing on each principle individually in subsequent issues of The Catholic Leader. In this issue we focus on Core Principle 8.  By Owen Phelps, Ph.D. Director, Yeshua Institute Jesus compared his relationship to himself and his followers as one of a vine and its branches (John 15:5). St. Paul described the Christian community as “the body of Christ” (1 Cor. 12...

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