Conant, who is currently the CEO of ConantLeadership, will also bring his extensive knowledge to the conversations by discussing the vital skills to surviving as a CEO in the 21st century. He says there is a new approach that has to be taken to lead effectively in today’s corporate world.
“Leaders today have to be tough minded on standards and soft-hearted with people,” he says. They have to maintain high standards. But they have to demonstrate a nuance for all of their stakeholders. The old motto was ‘Am I going to be tough-minded or am I going to be tender-hearted?’ The answer today is that you have to embrace the genius of the interim.”
As CEOs try to find middle ground, they also have to learn to communicate effectively in every conversation they have with an employee. This is why Conant and Blount agree that the “soft stuff is the hard stuff” when it comes to being a senior leader.
“… The only way you can lead is how you conduct every single conversation that you have,” Blount says. “… It’s all about how you are communicating. There’s this unbelievable pressure for you to be a source of positive energy for people, while also being tough and holding people to high standards. It’s a nice edge that leaders have to walk on.”
Despite this tricky balance, Conant is confident that KELI can be a place where CEOs gain the expertise necessary to confront this changing corporate climate. He cautions that if today’s CEOs don’t grow into 21st-century leaders, the consequences could be detrimental.
“The reality is the CEO’s life is very Darwinian,” he says. “You either grow or die. There’s no in between. And what we want to do is create opportunities for CEOs to grow and prosper around issues of substance that they’re facing everyday … And CEOs are hungering for a place that is organized to help them grow, and I think KELI can be that place.”
KELI will join the ranks of similar programs suck as Yale’s Chief Executive Leadership Institute — the world’s first school for CEOs. However, Blount says they hope to differentiate themselves from their competitors by focusing on what makes Kellogg unique.
“ … We’ve always been about people who are passionate about leading, people who are passionate about thinking differently through corporate America. And that’s the type of student we’ve always attracted and that’s the type of leader that comes out of Kellogg … And so I think that people who really want to engage in this kind of deep or self-reflective conversation, I think Kellogg is a unique environment for that. There’s a depth and groundedness to how we develop leaders that I think is unique among our competitors.”
While KELI won’t kick off until 2014, Conant and Blount are already looking ahead to decide which ideas to run with first. Conant is currently considering offering personal mentoring and coaching, similar to what he did for his former employees at Campbell’s. They’re also collaborating with Kellogg’s faculty on other new programs that will take place within the institute. Blount says that despite all of the work ahead, her team is hopeful KELI will become the primary place for the world’s top CEOs to come for leadership development.
“I think the dream that Doug and I and our team members have is that we want it to be a place that convenes conversations that matter for some of the most dynamic and visionary corporate leaders today,” she says. “We know in the long run that we will have succeeded when we are considered a go-to place for some of the most interesting, ambitious, and self-reflective senior leaders.”
DON’T MISS: The New Kellogg Path to Leadership or In The Classroom: Berkeley’s Executive Leadership Program
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