Tari's Patch

"...only if the lightbulb wants to change..." Like or hate it, Brexit will bring enormous change for businesses through transformed regulation, trade policies, labour laws, new financial management, and many other challenges.  "...while Britain and Europe are negotiating over what happens to European Union citizens who now work in Britain (as well as Britons who work in other European Union countries), no-one is sure how these ralks will go..." ( NYT Sept 18, 2017 ). Many employees' lives will be transformed in deeply personal ways. They may need to move to a different country, they may be working under a different regime or leadership. Their hours of work, pay scales and contractual obligations may change, their reporting lines and accountability shifted, their place of work reorganised. They may need to get used to a new corporate culture.  Sounds familiar? Any change in an organisation needs to be embraced, lived and supported by its most precio...

The World Health Organisation took just a little over 48 hours to revoke its appointment of Robert Mugabe as goodwill ambassador, following worldwide public, media and institutional outcry at an appointment which, at so many levels, was so blatantly wrong. The wrongs of Robert Mugabe is not what I wish to argue here. What I am astounded by is that such an established institution such as WHO, with its army of strategists and planners could make such a rudimentary blunder. This reminds me that too many of us really still don't get the fact that if we are guardians of our organisations' brands, we have the responsibility to protect our organisation against risks which threaten to attack those values and thereafter, our reputation. I have previously written about CEOs and their mistakes  here . Unfortunately, u-turns and apologies will never completely obliterate the original mistake. In the reputation management world, a right never completely erases a wrong. Corporate wron...

The world of corporate and national reputation is going through a whirlwind right now, even more so than usual. Two particular issues have rather preoccupied my mind recently. One is the relationship between business and government and the other, going back to basics on the relationship between reputation and moral authority.  Bell Pottinger has always been associated with the dark arts of public relations. Most of the industry, for decades now, have at least tried to be morally accountable in the way it communicates its clients' narrative and indeed, in selecting clients with whom it is prepared to work. Bell Pottinger appeared not to have ever been perturbed about representing clients who are morally questionable at best, and downright unacceptable at worst. It managed to weather several storms of exposure and criticism and on the way, continued to gather more and more questionable clients. Until that is, its recent South Africa debacle, made worse by a public spat  b...

Tari's LinkedIn post 28 July 2017 I city girl, I signed up to a self defence course for women decades ago. Apparently women find it hardest to scream and punch, so these were the first things we were taught to do. Reading this excellent article, it seems that we're still finding it difficult to push ourselves forward. Coupled with a number of other factors including the male game in corporate and political life with rules women are not always privy to, it is no surprise that achieving parity in the C-suite seems a long way away. But try we must. This is not a task for women, but for men and women, working together. It is not addressed in this article, but analyses after analyses demonstrates that a diverse leadership team delivers improved performance for the organisation. So keeping women out of the C-suite may make incumbent men feel better and more secure, but it is irresponsible, and shareholders should ask tough questions to CEOs and management teams.

When I started to visit and work in the Arab region back in 2006, I had a lot to learn about building and doing business in a new market. I'm still learning. Working in Jordan is not the same as working in Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia or Oman - just as working in Germany is not the same as working in Portugal or France. The Arabic language is spoken with very different dialects across the region. When I spoke a few words of Arabic to my taxi driver in Muscat he smiled warmly and said: "Ah madam, I think a Lebanese taught you Arabic?" He was right. The Arab world is full of contrasts, different cultures, different modes of behaviour and doing business, and different traditions. Governments, corporations, institutions operate and perform differently. Reading (yet another) piece of research this week that drinking coffee leads to longer life however, reminded me about one thing which is shared, in the same way, across the Arab region. Sharing a coffee together, s...

We can describe lying in as many ways as we like... I love Lucy Kellaway's FT columns, this one from February last year is a classic. I got to thinking about leaders and lies, and how lies are euphemistically described when Sir John Chilcot today described Tony Blair as "not straight with the nation" on the Iraq war when he was British Prime Minister. Sir Robert Armstrong, British Cabinet Secretary said during the 'Spycatcher' trial in 1986 that a book written by a former MI5 employee "...contains a misleading impression, not a lie. It was being economical with the truth.". More recently Kellyanne Conway introduced us to the notion of "alternative facts" http://bit.do/dySAA Is it no surprise therefore that Edelman's 2017 Trust barometer finds "that trust is in crisis around the world. The general population’s trust in all four key institutions — business, government, NGOs, and media — has declined broadly, a phenomenon not report...

Read my LinkedIn post about leaders in the age of the show-off and cultural norms here I take two main thoughts from this article. The first is that rewarding show-offs favours certain personality types, assuming wrongly that having a loud voice is a key trait for a good leader. The second is the importance of cultural norms. This chimes with my own experience in operating in Asia, North America and the Middle East for three decades. Sometimes we forget the most basic rule that business is about building relationships. Understanding national cultural norms, respecting them and blending them with your own personal culture and personality with integrity are just a few of the strands of successful international enterprise. The joy for me is working out how all this works, while making long lasting friendships - which by the way, I consider to be the biggest personal reward of doing business internationally.

Tari Lang LinkedIn post 15 June 2017 "Mr Cameron’s dismal record is fixed forever in the history books. Mrs May still has a chance to write a redeeming codicil." So says Philip Stephens in the Financial Times this week. The ultimate price for a leader who has made a gigantic judgement or strategic error is mostly a gigantic fall. For a national leader, the process is public, (often) quick and less forgiving. With support from the leader's coterie this process might be delayed but end in a fall it will be. As they say in cop shows: "you can do it the hard way or you can do it the easy way". Corporate leaders too, make blundering mistakes. CEOs have learned to apologise (with or without pressure), remember James Staley and https://lnkd.in/gXqBkEg ? Oscar Munoz's https://lnkd.in/gsBRqEK ? But eating humble pie, following up with a change of direction in the interest of the institution and stakeholders, being forgiven and surviving? Less obvious to find ...

Tari Lang LinkedIn post 3 June 2017 Two leaders, both new, both having won office by breaking political orthodoxies and appealing to the popular vote through mass communications and sustained social media. Here the similarities end. One ploughs a single path of achieving personal and tribal (aka his own business) goals, seemingly impervious to the the approval from anyone but his own supporters and tribes, while desperately seeking approval for his own personal attributes. The other opens his sphere of influence and support, works on winning hearts and minds, communicates on issues and not his own personal characteristics. Like or hate their politics, these are leadership case studies worthy of close scrutiny. At the end of their respective tenures, which goals will they each have achieved? Their own personal objectives? The country they are designated to serve? The international community around them? The safety and prosperity of the planet?