Video Lectures for MBA

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Building Effective Leadership Skills
Creating Your Own Leadership Legacy
2007 CANE Spring Meeting
Dan Hogan
Vice President, Personal and Small Business Insurance
The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc.
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Building Effective Leadership Skills | Creating your own leadership legacy
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Background/Overview
The rate of change in the insurance industry is accelerating,
and the lengths of decision and marketplace cycles are
shrinking.
Effective leadership skills are needed more than ever to stay
ahead of the competition.
Through the examples of five leadership legends, you will
hear ideas and strategies that you can incorporate into your
personal leadership style to help drive winning results in your
organization.
Historically, the training of actuaries has underserved the leadership
component. Using effective leadership skills can help actuaries be
more impactful, and better influence the businesses they support.
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The essence of leadership is service to others
On a basic level, as a leader, you exist to:
Inspire others to strive for excellence
Ensure the work environment is safe, challenging, and fair
Teach, mentor, provide guidance
True leaders put the welfare of the group ahead of their own
self-interest
Selfless does not mean hands-off
Great leaders enhance institutional capability by driving the
actions of others to achieve greatness


Leadership is all about helping others to succeed.
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The perceived complexity of leadership arises from
its seemingly overwhelming number of duties
Create and establish strategies
Ensure effectiveness and efficiency
Communicate openly and often
Build solid relationships
Act with integrity and fairness
Provide counsel and direction
Exert influence in the absence of ownership
Foster collaboration
Motivate, coach and develop others
Produce results, meet objectives and
exceed goals
How can a leader avoid being overwhelmed by this complexity?
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Focusing on a few key qualities and incorporating
them into every action simplifies the act of leading
others, and increases leadership effectiveness
There is no standardized approach to effective leadership
Your effectiveness as a leader is directly proportional to how
well the key qualities you focus on align with your values
and your personality
My five qualities of a great leader are:
1. Maintains and demonstrates strong convictions
2. Develops and communicates a clear, winning vision
3. Creates a high performance culture
4. Convinces rather than controls
5. Continually learns

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Maintain and Demonstrate Strong Convictions
Leadership Profile: Joan of Arc
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Maintaining and demonstrating strong
convictions gives leaders their credibility
Integrity
Lead by example
Personal accountability
Strive for excellence
Play for your paycheck
Bring your A game every day
Average is defined as the best of the
worst, or the worst of the best Video.edhole.com
Building Effective Leadership Skills | Creating your own leadership legacy
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Develop and Communicate a Clear, Winning Vision
Leadership Profile: Martin Luther King, Jr.
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A clear, compelling, winning vision is the
cornerstone of building organizational success
Establish and articulate a clear vision of the future for your
business to inspire commitment from others:
Should be stretch, but not folly
Include measurable indicators of progress and success
Develop compelling long-term business strategies to
achieve the vision:
Built with a strong understanding of the external environment
Takes into account perspectives and capabilities of your
organization and those with which it interacts
Ensure broad strategies are translated into clear and
effective operating plans and tactical initiatives
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Building Effective Leadership Skills | Creating your own leadership legacy
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Create a High Performance Culture
Leadership Profile: Herbert D. Kelleher, Southwest Airlines
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A High Performing Culture engages, challenges,
and fully leverages employees, which promotes
innovation and continuous improvement
Build your team to win!
Assess, then stretch/challenge top players
Seek to Redeploy, Rehabilitate, or, if needed, Remove underperformers
Hire winners
Execute aggressive performance management as part of
your overall talent management strategy
Set clear performance objectives and expectations
Monitor and document performance; reward success, and hold people
accountable for poor performance
Provide direct, helpful feedback
Take corrective action when necessary
Pay for performance, pay for potential
Drive a culture of open and fast communication to support
rapid response to changing business conditions
Build inclusion, leverage diversity
Continually raise the bar dont get complacent
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Building Effective Leadership Skills | Creating your own leadership legacy
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Convince Rather Than Control
Leadership Profile: William Wallace - Braveheart
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Any leader can get work done by barking
orders
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But the enlightened leader convinces people to engage
in the right behaviors, gains buy-in, and gives them
choices while influencing them to perform at a high level
Clearly articulate your point of view and persuade
employees to accept your proposal and/or
recommendation
Project self-confidence without arrogance
Develop effective and constructive strategies for
influencing important decisions, sometimes
shifting the organizations direction or way of
looking at things
Use high-impact, efficient communication vehicles
to get your points across
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Building Effective Leadership Skills | Creating your own leadership legacy
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Continuous Learning
Leadership Profile: Jack Welch
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The Profession of Leadership requires
continuous learning, just like Actuarial
Regularly conduct an honest self-assessment
Initiate efforts to develop skills that will enhance
performance in current role and/or accelerate readiness
for future roles
Take full advantage of available learning and
development programs, e.g., executive development
programs, courses, professional certifications
Solicit feedback and guidance from mentors or coaches,
then genuinely listen to feedback and apply learnings
Seek challenges that provide opportunities for on-the-job
development of critical knowledge and skills
Ask questions to learn from others with different
knowledge, experience or perspective
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Summary
The essence of leadership is service to others
Dont be overwhelmed by the seemingly endless number
of tasks and obligations leadership requires
Rather, focus on a few core attributes as you practice the
profession of leadership, like these:
1. Have strong convictions
2. Develop and communicate a clear, winning vision
3. Create a high performance culture
4. Convince rather than control
5. Be a continuous learner
What qualities of a great leader would you add to this list?
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Some Final Thoughts
Your role as a leader is more critical
than ever

Identify a take-away to work on
towards building more effective
leadership skills

What will be your leadership legacy?
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Open Discussion
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