Carl Oxholm is a tax partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers here in Canada, and is a friend and a client. Above and beyond his regular duties managing client and their tax planning challenges, Carl is also the national champion for the Coaching Initiative for partners within PwC. In this conversation he brings the perspective not just of somebody who is at the top of his game in a professional service firm, but also has thought long and hard about he impact of coaching and how organizations can be doing more Great Work and less Good Work. In this broad-ranging interview we look at:
- Carl’s role in championing a vision and values program within PwC – and what made it stick
- How to balance focus on the “how” and the “what” to help support behavioural change
- The importance of “presence” and self-knowledge to be able to role model Great Work
- The role of courage in Great Work
Posted on August 11, 2009
Tags: Business,
Change,
Coaching,
Corporate Culture,
Courage,
Engagement,
Goals,
PFS,
Resistance,
Right People,
Values,
Vision
Ken Petersson is the group president for Draka Industry, a company that develops, engineers and manufactures all sorts of cable solutions for customers around the world. You’ll find their products in planes, trains and automobiles and ships and elevators and windmills and televisions and movie studios… basically anywhere you need a cable, Draka probably has a hand in producing it. Ken has an engineering background, but to become the group president, as you’d expect, he’s gained experience in sales and marketing and managing in general. He’s Swedish and based out of Amsterdam, so in this conversation he brings perspectives not only from his broad business experience but also from the European perspective. In this interview Ken discusses:
- How to combine global vision with local performance
- The power of stories to inspire Great Work
- How to manage the “counter-cultural” aspect of Great Work
- The “stop, swap and share” model to help shape better business decisions
Posted on August 8, 2009
Robin Jarvis is a learning and organisational development specialist, with a particular focus on leadership development. She has spent at least twenty years working in the world of high-tech, including the last nine years working at Dell. When we spoke, she was just in the process of starting a new job within a new field, the retail sector – a move that proved a point of conversation about Great Work. In this interview we also talk about:
- How stepping into the unknown is a key part of Great Work – and a strategy for best managing that process
- Two reasons that stop Great Work from flourishing – and a tactic for counteracting those pressures
- Lessons from Dell and Disney in helping Great Work thrive
Posted on August 3, 2009
Rita was a twenty-five year old veteran at Southwest Airlines, a two-time recipient of The President’s Award for Outstanding Achievement, and in her final role at Southwest Airlines she served as director of The University for People. SWA is of course a beacon in the world of Great Work and Rita shares insights from her time there in this interview. Meantime, she continues to be heavily involved with the American Society of Training and Development, while heading her own consultancy, QVF Partners, a consulting firm committed to helping organizations create people-focused cultures. Rita is also author of Destination Profit, which makes a strong correlation between the power of employee engagement and organizations becoming more profitable.
This interview is approximately 20 minutes long.
Posted on March 19, 2009
