Our Philosophy: Ideas into action into ideas

The Center is an educational institution engaged in a continuous and fruitful cycle of turning ideas into action, and action into ideas. We teach, and as we teach, we learn. Then we act on what we learn, developing new views of leadership, new assessment techniques, programs and strategies that respond to the evolving challenges faced by leaders and their organizations.

We believe that self-knowledge is the single most important factor in the practice of leadership. Becoming more acutely aware of one's strengths and weaknesses is a type of "unfreezing" which leads to setting goals and taking action to improve. As a result, rather than teaching how to manage or analyze or strategize, we help leaders "learn how to learn" from their colleagues, their organizational and competitive contexts, and most importantly, from their own experience. Individuals rarely have the opportunity to receive extensive feedback in the workplace – to understand how others perceive them. Center programs provide leaders with the time, tools and environment needed to gain a comprehensive, accurate view of themselves, and to set personal development goals and begin working toward them. In fact, the Center's extensive use of assessment and honest, productive feedback is frequently cited as the most valuable part of our programs.

Typically, the Center's leadership programs are built on a developmental model of assessment, challenge and support. We combine 360-degree feedback, individual assessment, personalized attention in a safe, confidential environment designed to encourage candor, self-examination and experimentation with new behaviors vital to development. Participants are pushed to explore their strengths and identify their development needs in special activities, breakout sessions and simulations that replicate real-world challenges without the real-world consequences for failure. The result is creative exploration, insight and experiential learning that has time and again helped to inspire executives and managers and to revitalize and focus their organizations.

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