A friend, who used to be a partner at McKinsey, occasionally conducts a training exercise for team effectiveness in which one person has to perform a complicated physical task blindfolded. Everybody else on the team is given some role (e.g.,...

I was once listening to a meditation audiobook by Joseph Goldstein, in which he recounted the story of a guy who had moved into a new house where he could hear beautiful bird sounds coming from the basement. And it pleased him no end. But later, he...

During my MBA, an investment bank was visiting the campus for a pre-placement talk. After the talk, students were mobbing the visiting bankers, trying to impress them with earnest-sounding questions. So one of them asked, "What makes your bank...

To be a good manager, you need to do two seemingly contradictory things: 1. Hand-hold people, guide them, and occasionally, even show them how to do their job. 2. Give people the freedom to do their job, without unnecessarily meddling or imposing...