Why Strategic Networks Are Important for Women and How to Build Them

Herminia Ibarra Women & Work The EVE Program

“My problem,” said Anna, a financial services executive, “is getting to know the guys two levels above, my bosses’ boss and his peers. We just don’t have many occasions to meet and when we do, we just focus on the task at hand. I’m not really getting to know him, and he certainly isn’t getting to know me.  But, to …

How to Capture Value from Collaboration, Especially If You’re Skeptical About It

Heidi K. Gardner and Herminia Ibarra Leadership HBR

Many of us recognize intellectually that we need others’ knowledge to solve big problems, yet we still lack the motivation to collaborate. Teamwork all too often feels inefficient (search and coordination costs eat up time), risky (can I trust others to deliver for my client?), low value (our own area of expertise always seems most critical), and political (a sneaky way of self-promoting to …

Work pressure demands more downtime than a fleeting week off

Herminia Ibarra Career Management The Financial Times

Sabbaticals are one sign of a need for respite but even they can be too busy, writes Herminia Ibarra The month of August, that hallowed time when Latin Europe grinds to a sunny halt, concludes with September’s good intentions to sustain the summer’s healthier habits. Rapidly we revert to form. Finnish researcher Jessica de Bloom’s analysis shows the feelings of …

5 Misconceptions About Networking

Herminia Ibarra Leadership HBR

A good network keeps you informed. Teaches you new things. Makes you more innovative. Gives you a sounding board to flesh out your ideas. Helps you get things done when you’re in a hurry. And, much more (see my recent Lean In video on how networks augment your impact). But, for every person who sees the value of maintaining a …

Intel’s Andy Grove and the difference between good and bad fear

Herminia Ibarra Leadership The Financial Times

The late CEO loved a shouting match but staff knew they could speak up, writes Herminia Ibarra Be scared, be very scared, advised the late Andy Grove. “Business success contains the seeds of its own destruction. Success breeds complacency. Complacency breeds failure. Only the paranoid survive.” Grove’s words, recalled worldwide in the wake of his death last month, are interesting …

Why strategic networking is harder for women

Herminia Ibarra Women & Work World Economic Forum

“My problem,” said Anna, a financial services executive, “is getting to know the guys two levels above, my bosses’ boss and his peers. We just don’t have many occasions to meet and when we do, we just focus on the task at hand. I’m not really getting to know him, and he certainly isn’t getting to know me. But, to …

What to do when a mentor blocks your career

Herminia Ibarra Leadership The Financial Times

Too many bosses are failing to pull up the promising people below, says Herminia Ibarra “You have to kill the mentor,” said one of my students. A murmur of agreement went round my executive MBAs class. We were discussing the case of a 39-year-old manager who had been promised a big promotion by his mentor but the new post was …

Freedom or identity crisis? The portfolio career mystery

Herminia Ibarra Career Management The Financial Times

Taking on a variety of roles is not easy, especially when young, writes Herminia Ibarra “My friends tell me I’m too young to have a portfolio career,” confessed one of my former MBA students when I asked what he was up to. Recently, he had left a lifetime career in finance to pursue a mix of things: some private investments, …

When a leader is not a manager and other modern myths

Herminia Ibarra Leadership The Financial Times

It is instructive to trace this archetype back to its origins “My job was to make everyone understand that the impossible was possible. That’s the difference between leadership and management,” reads the back cover of Alex Ferguson’s new book, Leading . It’s hard to think of a business idea that has had more sticking power than the distinction between leadership …

Why Companies Are So Bad at Treating Employees Like People

Herminia Ibarra Career Management Harvard Business Review

Few disagree that the time is ripe for reimagining complex organizations so that they are more human and more agile. But existing models for how to make the shift seem to offer a choice between a rock and a hard place. Take the thorny problem of developing people. Anachronistic annual performance appraisal systems, everyone agrees, must give way to more …