6 Things a Manager Can Learn From MS Dhoni Leading from the front Staying cool Sharing the due credit with fellow-men Encouraging team members to make them better performers Staying Grounded Resource Utilization No, this article is certainly not about our Indian Cricket team’s captain; but he has a lot to offer to prove my point. Yes, I was contemplating about the various leaders- both in the political and economic sectors and how their attitude and perspective has a direct effect on the followers or sub-ordinates. I thought it would be good to start from M.S.Dhoni, the all powerful leader in his own way standing tall and cool. Don’t miss this powerpoint: The powerpoint given here depicts the different leadership styles pertaining to an organization – be it business, service, non-profit or educational. The motive may differ for each of the listed organizations above but all have to function effectively to reach that ulterior motive. There can’t be a second thought or opinion on this and how the emotional quotient of a leader impacts employee motivation and engagement is something phenomenal. It is directly evident from the functioning style of the employees and their attitude even when you just enter an organization. The impact of leadership styles on employee motivation and performance from Shyama Shankar My Bad Encounter: Recently I had been to a dermatologist for a consultation and even before I could inquire about the doctor’s availability, the girl at the front desk was very particular to know if I would be willing to pay three hundred bucks. I was taken aback to know that the fee was two hundred bucks for visiting during regular hours and three hundred for late hours (It was a sunday and late hours meant visiting the doctor after 12 noon). The hundred rupees did not matter to me at all  but the way in which the man has trained his staff to put the patients into an uneasy position made me think – “Where service has to be the motto of his profession, money has REWRITTEN the ETIQUETTES in it own cruel way.” Matched Leadership: How to Use Leadership Styles Effectively Leadership style is one of the most debated topics in management which has influenced a great number of managers and employees. Leadership style extensively influences employee’s commitment and dedication. A participative and democratic kind of leader creates a positive work atmosphere, a coercive leader creates an unbalanced  and negative atmosphere; nevertheless all kinds of leaders create a serious impact whether negative or positive. Transformational leaders provide a vision and a sense of mission, inspire pride, and gain respect and trust through charisma, as opposed to a simple exchange and agreement,(Bass et al.1990) whereas Transactional leaders communicate with their subordinates to explain how a task must be done and let them know that there will be rewards for a job done well (Avolio et al.1991). Laissez-faire leadership is a passive kind of leadership style, seen as not caring about other’s issues. There is no relationship exchange between the leader and the followers. It represents a non-transactional kind of leadership style in which necessary decisions are not made, actions are delayed, leadership responsibilities ignored, and authority unused. Now it is time to enjoy some funny quotes on Leadership: Only one man in a thousand is a leader of men — the other 999 follow women. Groucho Marx First rule of leadership: everything is your fault. A Bug’s Life The problem with being a leader is that you’re never sure if you’re being followed or chased. Claire A. Murray The key to being a good manager is keeping the people who hate me away from those who are still...

Top 50 Quotes from Peter Drucker Peter Drucker is known as the father of modern management. A prolific writer, business consultant and lecturer, he introduced (rather re-invented) many management concepts that have been embraced by corporates all over the world. TOP 50 MARKETING AND SALES QUOTES This modern “Managementguru” has delivered timeless and time-tested ideas on management, leadership, change, education, motivation, marketing and what-not. A lot of companies are successfully functioning based on Peter Drucker’s management concepts. What follows is a compilation of Peter Drucker’s sayings and messages to the management fraternity. His open and result-driven thought process is what attracts me the most. “Doing the right thing is more important than doing the thing right.” “If you want something new, you have to stop doing something old.” “There is nothing quite so useless as doing with great efficiency something that should not be done at all.” “What gets measured gets improved.” “Results are gained by exploiting opportunities, not by solving problems.” “So much of what we call management consists of making it difficult for people to work.” “People who don’t take risks generally make about two big mistakes a year. People who do take risks generally make about two big mistakes a year.” “Meetings are by definition a concession to a deficient organization. For one either meets or one works. One cannot do both at the same time.” “Long-range planning does not deal with the future decisions, but with the future of present decisions.” “Management is doing things right. Leadership is doing the right things” “The best way to predict your future is to create it” “The most important thing in communication is to hear what isn’t being said.” “Unless commitment is made, there are only promises and hopes; but no plans.” “No one learns as much about a subject as one who is forced to teach it.” “Efficiency is doing the thing right. Effectiveness is doing the right thing.” “Whenever you see a successful business, someone once made a courageous decision.” “The leaders who work most effectively, it seems to me, never say “I.” And that’s not because they have trained themselves not to say “I.” They don’t think “I.” They think “we”; they think “team.” They understand their job to be to make the team function. They accept responsibility and don’t sidestep it, but “we” gets the credit. This is what creates trust, what enables you to get the task done.” “The purpose of business is to create and keep a customer.” “Business has only two functions — marketing and innovation.” “Your first and foremost job as a leader is to take charge of your own energy and then help to orchestrate the energy of those around you. “Plans are only good intentions unless they immediately degenerate into hard work.” “Innovation is the specific instrument of entrepreneurship…the act that endows resources with a new capacity to create wealth.” “Trying to predict the future is like trying to drive down a country road at night with no lights while looking out the back window. “ “A manager is responsible for the application and performance of knowledge. “ “Strategy is a commodity, execution is an art.” “The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well, the product or service fits him and sells itself.” “A person can perform only from strength. One cannot build performance on weakness, let alone on something one cannot do at all.” “Management by objective works – if you know the objectives. Ninety percent of the time you don’t. “Most discussions of decision making assume that only senior executives make decisions or that only senior executives’ decisions matter. This is a...

#Startup Quotes for Starters is an interesting compilation of the innumerable quotes strewn over the internet especially for the starters. It is always better to follow the foot steps of successful people because they would be the “Enlightened Masters” of the challenges and hurdles on the road to success. #Startups has become a “Buzz Word” in the business environment and the very word “startup” can get your tweets more favorited. The very purpose of a startup is to bring an innovative idea into reality- be it a tech or a service based startup. I hope to inspire the fresh set of startup #entrepreneurs with the following quotes right from Thomas Alva Edison to #Larry Page. Get Inspired and Keep Going… 1. “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” – #Mark Twain 2. “When you find an idea that you just can’t stop thinking about, that’s probably a good one to pursue.” – Josh James, Omniture CEO and co-founder 3. “If you just work on stuff that you like and you’re passionate about, you don’t have to have a master plan with how things will play out.” –Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook founder 4. “There’s lots of bad reasons to start a company. But there’s only one good, legitimate reason, and I think you know what it is: it’s to change the world.” –Phil Libin, Evernote CEO 5. “User experience is everything. It always has been, but it’s undervalued and underinvested in. If you don’t know user-centered design, study it. Hire people who know it. Obsess over it. Live and breathe it. Get your whole company on board.”–Evan Williams, Co-Founder, Twitter 6. “A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.”  –Winston Churchill, British Prime Minister 7. “What do you need to start a business? Three simple things: know your product better than anyone, know your customer, and have a burning desire to succeed.”  –Dave Thomas, Founder, Wendy’s 8. “Don’t take too much advice. Most people who have a lot of advice to give — with a few exceptions — generalize whatever they did. Don’t over-analyze everything.  I myself have been guilty of over-thinking problems. Just build things and find out if they work.” – Ben Silbermann, Pinterest founder 9. “We are really competing against ourselves, we have no control over how other people perform.” – Pete Cashmore, Mashable founder and CEO 10. “I knew that if I failed I wouldn’t regret that, but I knew the one thing I might regret is not trying.”  –Jeff Bezos, Amazon Founder and CEO 11. “Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.”  –Steve Jobs, Co-Founder, Chairman and CEO, Apple 12. “No matter how brilliant your mind or #strategy, if you’re playing a solo game, you’ll always lose out to a team.” –Reid Hoffman, LinkedIn co-founder 13. “If you take a good idea and great execution, you will get much farther than taking a great idea with poor execution.” – Rohini Chakravarthy, Inksedge 14. “Invest in startups. Your college network can be very effective in finding them.” – Ankit Gupta, Pulse 15. “As a startup CEO, I slept like a baby. I woke up every 2 hours and cried.” – Ben Horowitz,Co founder, Opsware 16. “Best startups generally come...

Helpful Tips for Young leaders Here’s a random list of practical advice for young leaders. If you can learn and practice these early in your career, it will help you avoid having to learn them by experience. Delegate, Trust People down the line and Take Advice: While a young business leader may have a flair for leading from the front, one should realize that limited experience is a limiting factor. People are far more likely to take a manager seriously only if he or she listens to and heeds advice. When you act as the sole proprietor of making decisions in your company, people working for you start losing faith in you. It creates what is called “NEGATIVE VIBES” which is not at all good for the overall development of an organization. It is a good practice to communicate and consult with your immediate sub-ordinates before going for big decisions. Learn to let go of control. It is but appropriate to include employees in decision making and you shall be definitely rewarded with more workable strategies. Set an Example: At the same time, one of the most effectual ways to display ability is to lead by example and work hard. A leader must be prepared to shoulder a fair share of the work-load and the #involvement and #commitment he exhibits is undoubtedly infectious and projects him a great team player. The most effective way to earn respect is to lead from the front and help others succeed. Be wary about your conduct, behavior and actions and deeply aware of how it may influence others. Show #conviction: A leader has to have conviction in his/her decisions. If the young manager has done proper ground work and research, then the decision may well be the right one and he/she might be able to stand by and justify the decisions made even when challenged by experienced people. I thoroughly go with this viewpoint “A ‘No‘ uttered from the deepest conviction is better than a ‘Yes‘ merely uttered to please, or worse, to avoid trouble.” Mahatma Gandhi A leader should learn to say ‘NO’ at the right time as indecisiveness is one of history’s greatest leadership killers. Top 25 Leadership Quotes Keep Your Cool in Crisis: Part of being a successful leader is how you handle pressure. In the dynamic business environment you may have to face more challenging and stressful situations and your employees’ judge you based on how you treat such pressure. If you are a man who can see things from the right perspective embracing rationale, your team members will feel reassured by your cool composure, which will in turn develop their trust and confidence in the leader. Manage expectations: Have you ever given a thought about what employees’ expect in you? Communication is a natural gift for leaders and you may very well notice that great leaders are excellent communicators. Here, communication isn’t just talking but a one-on-one, heart-to-heart talk as you would with your close family members. By opening the lines of communication and being accessible, a leader can build a team with people who understand the ##goals and #objectives with ultimate clarity. Present Yourself with Dignity: In Tamil language, there is an age old proverb, “Aal Paadhi Aadai Paadhi”, meaning “#Good Looks Make the Work Easy”. In this modern world, a professional look is mandatory to signify your culture and #personality. A professional, well-dressed businessperson, gives the impression that he thinks that the workplace and the people there are important.” Marilyn Monroe once rightly said “I don’t mind making jokes, but I don’t want to look like...

Best Leadership Quotes  “Only one man in a thousand is a leader of men — the other 999 follow women. Groucho Marx The Leader In You – #Dale Carnegie “Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality. – Warren Bennis Developing the Leader Within You – “You don’t lead by pointing and telling people some place to go. You lead by going to that place and making a case. – Ken Kesey Awaken the Leader in You – Mitesh Khatri “No man will make a great leader who wants to do it all himself, or to get all the credit for doing it.– Andrew Carnegie How To Win Friends Influence People – “Outstanding leaders go out of their way to boost the self-esteem of their personnel. If people believe in themselves, it’s amazing what they can accomplish. – Sam Walton The Leader in You – Peter Miller “To lead people, walk behind them.” – Lao Tzu “The best leader is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and the self-restraint to keep from meddling with them while they do it – Theodore Roosevelt “The challenge of leadership is to be strong, but not rude; be kind, but not weak; be bold, but not bully; be thoughtful, but not lazy; be humble, but not timid; be proud, but not arrogant; have humor, but without folly– Jim Rohn “Leadership is a potent combination of #strategy and character. But if you must be without one, be without the strategy – Norman Schwarzkopf “Successful leaders see the opportunities in every difficulty rather than the difficulty in every opportunity – Reed Markham “The problem with being a leader is that you’re never sure if you’re being followed or chased – Claire A. Murray “Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail – Harold R. McAlindon “Learn to see things backwards, inside out, and upside down – John Heider, Tao of Leadership “The real leader has no need to lead- he is content to point the way. #Henry Miller “A leader is a dealer in hope – Napoleon Bonaparte From Manager to Leader “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader – John Quincy Adams “The art of leadership is saying no, not yes. It is very easy to say yes – #Tony Blair “Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity – George Patton “Leadership does not always wear the harness of compromise – Woodrow Wilson “Take time to deliberate; but when the time for action arrives, stop thinking and go in – Andrew Jackson “To be a great leader and so always master of the situation, one must of necessity have been a great thinker in action. An eagle was never yet hatched from a goose’s egg – James Thomas “A good general not only sees the way to victory; he also knows when victory is impossible – Polybius “Leadership is being the first egg in the omelet – Jarod Kintz “Leadership consists of nothing but taking responsibility for everything that goes wrong and giving your subordinates credit for everything that goes well – Dwight D. Eisenhower “##management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things –  Peter F. Drucker...