Friday, February 24, 2006

Raytheon CEO turns lessons learned into hit booklet

When William Swanson joined Raytheon as a young engineer in 1972, he was timid and sat quietly scribbling notes at meetings. Decades of observations and wisdom have been boiled down into 33 concise leadership tips that Raytheon had printed into a 3½-by-6-inch booklet called Swanson's UnWritten Rules of Management.

By word of mouth, it is turning into one of the hottest underground leadership books in memory. So far, Raytheon has given out 100,000 copies. Swanson, 56, spoke with USA TODAY corporate management reporter Del Jones.

Read more at USA Today Money
Leader's Insight: Leaders' Top Three Mistakes
Compare your list with this one.
by Clark Cothern, guest columnist

The first big mistake I made as a leader was to fail to ask what mistakes I was making.

I was curious what Ron Potter, my friend and the president of Team Leadership Culture, would say are the top three mistakes most leaders make. After all, he has spent the last twelve years of his professional life consulting with top leaders of national and international organizations helping them recognize and correct their mistakes.


Read more at CT Leadership Journal

My Loveless Marriage
Why divorce wasn't the answer to my emptiness.
Judy Bodmer

I lay in bed staring at the darkness. My husband, Larry, was snoring softly beside me. We'd just had another fight. I could hardly remember what had started it, but I knew we'd both said ugly, hateful things. Nothing had been resolved. We'd just gotten tired. Now he slept and I lay here, feeling utterly alone.I crawled out of bed to check on our two sons. David, such a handful while awake, looked like an angel even though his face was sticky from the ice cream he'd eaten earlier. I pulled Matthew's covers back on his small body and smoothed his blond head. He needed a haircut. Working full-time, with two small sons to referee and a house to keep clean, I never had enough time to do it all.

Read more at CT Today's Christian Woman