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Teams Rule, by Gary Mintchell
This month seems to be a leadership and teamwork month.
And it's not just because we have some changes at Summit Media and Automation World. Jim Chrzan succeeds Dave Harvey as publisher of Automation World. Jim moved the great distance of a half-dozen offices in our Chicago suite from the Packaging World side to the Automation World side. Summit Media also owns Packaging World, along with Healthcare Packaging, which Jim will continue to lead. You can read his introduction: www.automationworld.com/columns-7956.
My colleague and mentor, Jane Gerold, who plucked me out of the plants in 1997 and tried to make an editor out of me, is assuming an expanded role in our custom media and new media areas. She's the driving force behind the Webcasts you watch and some of the information we provide with several partners.
In my role, I have the opportunity to interview almost all of the leaders of automation. I've met many impressive leaders and managers over the years, and one outstanding leader is John Berra...
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ECONOMY VIEW: The QEII Has Set Sail, by Alan Beaulieu
"Clueless." That's what the Germans called the United States because Ben Bernanke and the Federal Reserve Board announced that they are going to embark on another round of quantitative easing (dubbed QEII).
Dr. Bernanke remarked in a separate article that this is a monetary tool and not just a theoretical swag (my word, not his). Who's right? Well, it really is just another monetary tool, but it is, indeed, dangerous in certain respects.
Quantitative easing refers to a monetary policy that is used when a central bank has already pushed its target interest rate to zero but wants to stimulate the economy further, and does so by purchasing government and corporate bonds or other assets with newly created money...
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» PINTO’S PROSE: Collaborative Leadership, by Jim Pinto
Competitive pressures keep forcing companies to find ways to do more with less.
Few managers have the luxury of relying only on local staff to accomplish objectives. Instead, they must work with and through people across many different locations and organizations, with different priorities, incentives and ways of doing things. Leadership was traditionally based on positional authority. Today, that style of leadership has become passé and ineffective.
The fast-moving, eclectic, global business environment demands collaborative leadership. The manager relinquishes positional authority and becomes part of the work group to provide direction, communication, group process facilitation, coordination and support. This will achieve better results, faster and more consistently than conventional boss-subordinate orientation...
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