Visionary Leadership, November 10, 2009

By	Jim Abbey (Lakewood, Colorado) - See all my reviews

Yes, there is something new on the bookshelf in the management category. John provides insight into the new future for leaders and organizations based on a leadership of love not fear. John is the founder and CEO of HOPE, America's first nonprofit social investment banking organization. The book is filled with wisdom nuggets from a variety of leadership interviews and John's own hands on experience creating and leading HOPE. I love the five laws of love leadership: loss creates leaders, fear fails, love makes money, vulnerability is power and giving is getting. The content is rich and a great reader for new and old leaders alike.

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¥ Abrahamson, Eric and David H. Freedman. "A Perfect Mess: The Hidden Benefits of Disorder; How Crammed Closets, Cluttered Offices and On-the-Fly Planning Make the World a Better Place." New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2006.

¥ Bacon, Terry R. "What People Want: A Manager's Guide to Building Relationships That Work." Mountain View, CA: Davies Black Pub., 2006.

¥ Baum, Herb. "The Transparent Leader: How to Build a Great Company Through Straight Talk, Openness, and Accountability." New York: Harper Business, 2004.

¥ Bennis, Warren G. and Robert J. Thomas, "Geeks and Geezers: How Era, Values, and Defining Moments Shape Leaders." Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 2002.

¥ Bennis, Warren, "On Becoming a Leader." New York: Addison-Wesley, 1989.

¥ Bolman, Lee G. and Terrence E. Deal. Leading With Soul, An Uncommon Journey of Spirit. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1995.

¥ Brogan, Chris and Julian Smith, "Trust Agents: Using the Web to Build Influence, Improve Reputation, and Earn Trust." New York: Wiley and Sons, 2009.

¥ Bryant, John Hope, "Love Leadership: The New Way to Lead in a Fear-Based World." San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2009.

¥ Burns, James MacGregor, "Leadership." New York: Harper and Row, 1978.

¥ Cashman, Kevin. "Leadership from the Inside Out: Becoming a Leader for Life." Provo, Utah: Executive Excellence Publishing, 1998.

¥ Cleveland, Harlan, "Nobody In Charge: Essays on the Future of Leadership." San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2002.

¥ Cloud, Henry, "9 Things a Leader Must Do." Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2006.

¥ Colvin, Geoff, "Talent Is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class Performers from Everybody Else." New York: Penguin Group, 2008.

¥ Covey, Stephen M. R. "The Speed of Trust: The One Thing That Changes Everything." New York: Free Press, 2006.

¥ Covey, Stephen R. "Principle-Centered Leadership." New York: Summit Books, 1991.

¥ De Pree, Max, "Leadership Is an Art." New York: Doubleday, 1989.

¥ Denhardt, Robert and Janet V. Denhardt, "The Dance of Leadership: The Art of Leading in Business, Government, and Society." New York: M.E. Sharpe, 2006.

¥ Friedman, Thomas L. "Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution and How It Can Renew America." New York: Farrar, Strauss, and Girroux, 2008; and "The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century." New York: Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux, 2005.

¥ Fulton, Roger, "Common Sense Leadership: A Handbook for Success as a Leader." New York: Barnes and Noble, 2001.

¥ Gardner, Howard, "Leading Minds: An Anatomy of Leadership." New York: BasicBooks, 1995.

¥ Gardner, John, "On Leadership." New York: Free Press, 1990.

¥ Garten, Jeffrey E. "The Politics of Fortune: A New Agenda for Business Leaders." Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 2002.

¥ George, Bill, "Authentic Leadership: Rediscovering the Secrets to Creating Lasting Value." San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2003.

¥ Greenleaf, Robert K. "Servant Leadership: A Journey Into the Nature of Legitimate Power and Greatness." New York: Paulist Press, 1977.

¥ Greitens, Eric, "Strength and Compassion." Washington, D.C.: Leading Authorities Press, 2008.

¥ Hallowell, Edward M., M.D. "Crazy Busy: Overstretched, Overbooked, and About to Snap! Strategies for Coping in a World Gone ADD." New York: Ballantine Books, 2006.

¥ Heifetz, Ronald A. "Leadership Without Easy Answers. "Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1994.

¥ Helgesen, Sally, "The Female Advantage: Women's Ways of Leadership." New York: Doubleday, 1990.

¥ Iacocca, Lee, "Where Have All the Leaders Gone?" New York: Scribner, 2007.

I hope this proves useful. Read on lead on.

Dr. Joel Jones is President Emeritus of Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colo. He can be reached at jones_joel@fortlewis.edu

I just left Borders at Reagan Airport in Washington, DC where I just signed a new batch of books, which they keep up front. They tell me the autographed copies go quickly, so tell a friend.

Onward with HOPE

John Hope Bryant

I was honored to sign copies of my new book, LOVE LEADERSHIP: The New Way to Lead in a Fear-Based World, for my fellow members of the U.S. President's Advisory Council on Financial Literacy, including my friend Dr. Tahira Hira, pictured here.  Also pictured is my friend and Council Chairman Charles Schwab, who is also featured in the pages of Love Leadership.

Onward with HOPE

John Hope Bryant

"I try to live my life 8-10. Let me explain.

1-5 is mediocrity. Even the Bible says 'be hot or be cold, but if you are lukewarm I will spat you out.' Translation: even God doesn't like mediocrity. Never be mediocre.

5-7 is entertainment. Ladies, that's the guy you date but you don't marry.

But 8-10 is excellence. Not black excellence, or brown or white or Asian or Indian excellence. Just excellence. This I where I try to live. You should try it too. This is where passion, purpose and life's higher meaning -- the 'order of things' -- is found."

John Hope Bryant.

"Life is 10% what life does to you, and 90% how you choose respond to it. What is your response going to be?"

John Hope Bryant

"This is not an economic crisis, but a crisis of virtues or values."

John Hope Bryant, author of Love Leadership

"We want to build a community of ''Externs' who are recruited not to work just in corporate America (versus traditional Internships), but in and for our larger community. Service leadership."

Lyn Cason, Peter F. Drucker School, where John Hope Bryant spoke today on service and love leadership.

John Hope Bryant

"In a world obsessed with only one question, which is 'what do I get,' your question to yourself and to the world today shoud be, 'what do I have to give?'"

John Hope Bryant

Here at the Drucker Institute at the Claremont Graduate University, preparing to speak as part of the Drucker Centennial Week, on "Love Leadership."

John Hope Bryant

Speaking at a conference, Financial Services Roundtable President and CEO Steve Bartlett said that the future of banking was all about trust with consumers, legislators and shareholders. "It's all about trust," Mr. Bartlett said. Mr. Bartlett also called for better education in finance in the schools. "We want financial education taught in all schools from K-12," Mr. Bartlett insisted.

Operation HOPE is honored to have entered into a 5-year framework agreement around financial literacy integration with he Financial Services Roundtable

The Chicago Tribune this week featured Love Leadership in "Top 25: What Corporate America is Reading." 

Find Love Leadership here.  Purchase bulk copies at a discount through CEO Read here.

On the heels of growing support for the new leadership philosophy of Love Leadership, the book by John Hope Bryant, entitled LOVE LEADERSHIP: The New Way to Lead in a Fear-Based World (Jossey-Bass), once again joins the list of best selling leadership books on Amazon.com, landing at #34 today. 

Let's keep the momentum for Love Leadership growing.  Tell your family and friends to pick up their copy today at Amazon.com, and to also think about purchasing several copies as holiday gifts.  Purchases made through the website for Operation HOPE, benefit Operation HOPE.

This book is the best gift for anyone going through tough and challenging times in their life, and making critical life decisions.  Get your copy today, and share it with a friend who needs it.

As I was preparing to travel to Chicago earlier this week to speak at the American Bankers Association (ABA) annual conference as their luncheon keynote the following day, I heard of a series of explosive news stories describing pickets and picketers that had succeeded in disrupting the banker conference on the day prior.  But even as I preparing to board my flight to Chicago for the conference, I found myself more outwardly confused-than inwardly concerned. 

As founder of an organization that has served more than one million low-wealth individuals in 69 urban, under-served communities across America, I completely understand, empathize, and in some ways even side with the frustrations  of the assembled picketers, as they represent the frustrations and latent anger of millions of misled and otherwise deeply pained consumers, presently dealing with a great deal of very real economic pain in their lives; from imploding predatory mortgages, to ballooning credit  cards, to stories of bailouts for bankers. Consumers who don't believe they have a voice.  I get that, and I feel their pain, every day.  Our Mortgage HOPE Crisis Hotline (888-388-HOPE) has amended, modified or restructured more than $250 million in mortgages, and fielded more than 75,000 consumer calls since 2008. Our services are free to anyone who calls us.  All this said, I believe the picketers were picketing the wrong group. Let me explain.

One press release representing the picketers concerns noted emphatically,  "...banks (need to) end their over-reliance on greed and profits and commit to using their taxpayer bailouts and backstops to help America's economy recover."  100% Agreed, and I have even written about these abuses, referencing them as examples of greed, short-termism and laziness, and leading by fear, in my bestselling book LOVE LEADERSHIP: The New Way to Lead in a Fear-Based World, as well as in my writings for the Huffington Post.  The only problem here is that 99% of the members of the ABA, the group picketed on the day prior, are community bankers that "received no federal bailout funds."  In fact, I would imagine that many members of the ABA are actually pretty angry themselves, inasmuch as community bankers not thought to be "too big to fail," they were basically left out of any substantive first round federal support from TARP, or any other federal so-called bailout program for banks.   The decision was made early on that community bankers did not represent systemic risk, and would basically have to fend for themselves.  I hear that my friends at Treasury may be relooking at the important role that community banks play in the marketplace, and this would be a good thing if it happened.  Back to the story. 

Another conference protestor angrily noted, "If we don't stop these foreclosures we're not going to have a country left."  Once again, they were essentially right, and I agree, but most of these disastrous, predatory mortgage products were cooked up somewhere on Wall Street, not Mayberry Street, and subsequently sold on your and my street, by mostly under-regulated and unregulated mortgage companies, financial firms, and some of the worst offenders of all, mortgage brokers.  As I said in an Economist interview on financial literacy and the growing mortgage crisis last year, "it is harder to be a pimp on a street corner in Harlem than a mortgage broker anywhere, because at least a pimp needs references." 

Yes, we are angry, and frustrated, and rightly so, but in so many instances we are pointing that anger and frustration in the wrong direction, and getting nothing for it.  Worse still, we are not channeling those painful emotions into productive passions that ultimately get us pointed in the right direction as a country, and moving again. I have always said that "passion is emotion made intelligent, and properly focused."

Getting us moving again will require, amongst other things, bankers making loans again; bankers like the community bankers attending the ABA conference.  We have lost our story line as a country, and we need to get it back.

Here are the facts.

Most of the members of the ABA are small town community bankers, with approximately $150 million in bank assets or less, and around 300-400 employees.  Take the word "bank" from their name, and this is also a basic description of an averaged-sized small business in America, which is also the heart beat of America, and the source of most of the country's jobs (and not a description of the so-called financial fat-cats that drew down billion dollar paydays, all the while fleecing hard working Americans who lacked financial sophistication). 

Let's face it people, we really don't understand money, maybe worse so when we are angry. 

We don't differentiate IndyMac (a not so good former subprime lender) from Freddie Mac or Fannie Mae (both publicly chartered, quasi-public financial institution with an honorable mandate to insure housing finance reaches the "least of these God's children," even if in recent years they veered horribly off track), but there is a big difference. 

We don't differentiate Countrywide (a horribly bad, greed-centered mortgage player) from Nationwide (a great insurance company), but there is a difference.

And we don't differentiate responsible subprime lending from the predatory lending practices that have put so many Americans in a bad place, but there is a big difference.

I keep telling all of my passionate and committed (and necessary) advocacy friends, "stop demonizing all mortgage subprime lending."  I continued, "...responsible subprime mortgage lending has done more to lift poor people out of poverty than anything else over the past 50 years.  The problem is predatory subprime lending, greed-based subprime lending, fraud-based subprime lending, and massive levels of borrower financial illiteracy.  People, including middle class people, that 'asked what's the payment, and not what's the interest rate,' and you never ask what the payment is when there is an interest rate attached." 

If we keep on like this, banks and other mainstream lenders might just do precisely what we ask, and stop making less than prime loans, and then we are all truly toast.  I don't know about you, but I don't have many of my friends with a perfect 800 credit score. Hello.

We shouldn't be picketing those folks at the ABA convention not only because they were not the principal offenders in this crisis, but frankly, because in the short and mid-term many of them, along with my credit unions friends, may become our last, best hope at reasonable mainstream credit and capital access.  In some cases and communities today, they are the only institutions still making loans.

Ghettoized financial services represented a $10 billion (a year) industry two years ago, and was roughly equal to the amount made on mergers and acquisition fees on Wall Street.  If we are not careful, this example of bad capitalism could easily morph into a $100 billion industry, because now middle class folks cannot seem to get a loan, and mainstream financial players have all backed up to something north of "sub-prime." 

To quote my friend and Operation HOPE member Richard Hartnack, vice chairman of US Bank, "John, this crisis has three phases;

(1) Help those in the financial soup to get out, without rewarding speculators, investors, those who simply 'bought too much house,' fraud and providers of capital. 

(2)  Insure that credit continues to flow on some reasonable basis to individuals with less than an 800 credit score, and finally;

(3) make sure a crisis like this never happens again." 

Rick Hartnack is right on point.

Picketing and protesting is as uniquely American as apple pie and bar-b-que, and play an important role in our democracy, but we have to also figure out is what we for, and not simply what we are against.  We must define for ourselves what good capitalism looks like, and then we need to defend that.  We have to get out story line back. 

Part of that story line includes encouraging those ABA bankers to re-double their efforts, and to return to their core roots of passionate, relationship-based community banking; effectively taking some measureable risk of banking not just on collateral, but on the personal character and big ideas of local entrepreneurs, in small towns and big cities clear across this great country. We need to spark a new generation of young entrepreneurs and self-employment projects in this country, because corporate jobs are not going to save us.  Entrepreneurship is where the jobs are going to come from.  It is where they have always come from. 

Finally, yes, we desperately need a rewrite of our consumer protections framework, and the Obama Administration and my friends and colleagues in the U.S. Treasury Department have some good ideas about how to do it, particularly their focus on regulating the under-regulated and unregulated sectors of our economy, as well as tightening up on the abuses within the traditional sector. 

That said, legislation and regulation, no matter how well conceived, intentioned or intended, are simply not going to solve this problem alone.  America is financially illiterate, and with a $14 trillion economy, the largest in the world today and 70% driven by the consumer, that is simply not smart fiscal planning. 

What we can do.

Let's picket with our pens, asking Congress to pass comprehensive silver rights legislation requiring all children, K-12, or even K-college for that matter, to be required to take a well designed course in financial literacy, and in so doing teach an entirely new generation the "language of money." 

Let's challenge the ABA and its members to do more; taking  up financial literacy as their newest, highest, most serious priority, and in so doing, mobilizing tens of thousands of their employees to serve as role models, and to teach financial literacy in local schools, non-profits, houses of faith, and wherever else we find kids. 

Community bankers and big banks alike already do some of this financial literacy work (and the ABA does a lot as an organization too), but they could do so much more, and they need to. Furthermore, this sort of "walking community streets with conviction," will actually change things, for the better.  It will also help to insure that this crisis never happens again.

If you want to make a difference in your community, become one of Operation HOPE's nearly 10,000 HOPE Corps volunteers (www.operationhope.org) teaching dignity, financial literacy, hope, entrepreneurship and opportunity. 

Help us reach, teach and touch 5 million young people, through 5 MILLION KIDS (www.5mk.org), and to "make smart sexy again," because we sure have made dumb sexy over the last 20 years. Let's make sure this crisis never happens again.

Rainbows, after storms.  You cannot have a rainbow without a storm first.

John Hope Bryant is the founder, chairman and CEO of Operation HOPE, vice chairman of the U.S. President's Advisory Council on Financial Literacy as well as chairman of the Council Committee on the Under-Served,  financial literacy advisor to the World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council, a Young Global Leaders for the World Economic Forum, and author of LOVE LEADERSHIP; A New Way to Lead in a Fear-Based World (Jossey-Bass), which debuted in August, 2009, #8 in the CEO Reads Top 10 Best Seller List.

One teenager drops out of high school every 26 seconds.

U.S. Department of Education

"7% of what people listen to are the words. "

Jennifer McCrea, Sarvada Consulting

"...You don't need leadership when you have certainty."

Jennifer McCrae, Sarvada Consulting at Quincy Jones Musiq Consortium session

"I believe that music and water are last two things that will be left on the planet."

Quincy Jones

"I come from jazz, and I started with orchestra. That means you have different instruments and different experts, all focused on achieving the same goal; creating beautiful music in and for our world. Today we have assembled a beautiful orchestra of people - experts - that comprise a new orchestra to save our children."

Quincy Jones, at opening of Quincy Jones. Musiq Consortium, Manhattan

My friend and mentor Quincy Jones knows how to "set off" a sleepy early morning meeting in Mahattan. This is how to start a business meeting! Here for the launch of two day's worth of meetings of the Quincy Jones Musiq Consortium at thr Time Warner Center, led by my friend Madelyn Bonnot, executive director, Quincy Jones Foundation.

Quincy Jones is national co-chair of 5MK, along with my other personal hero and mentor, civil rights icon Ambassador Andrew Young. One person can make a difference. Today that person is Q.

Let's go...

With HOPE

John Hope Bryant, blogging from my iPhone

The week starts with the first official meeting of the U.S. President's Advisory Council on Financial Literacy under the Obama Administration tomorrow morning at the U.S. Department of the Treasury, where I serve as vice chairman of the Council and chairman of the Committee on the Under-Served.  

Tomorrow morning U.S. Senator Majority Leader Harry Reid's office will host a Senate staff briefing for me and Operation HOPE around the full range of Senate financial literacy bills making their way through the Senate presently.

In the evening I will join my friend Michael Blake from the White House at a special screening of the HBO special on the Obama march towards the Presidency.  Michael, who  am very proud of, is prominently featured in the film as I understand, so I am looking forward to honoring his and President Obama's dream and vision made real.

From there I am on to New York City, where I will join my mentor Quincy Jones, and then on Saturday I am the Drucker Centennial Day speaker, on the topic of my new bestselling book LOVE LEADERSHIP: The New Way to Lead in a Fear-Based World, at the Peter F. Drucker & Masatoshi Ito Graduate School of Management at Claremont Graduate University, Claremont, California.

Okay, let's go... To whom much is given, much is required.

With HOPE,

John Hope Bryant

Last Monday,October 26th, 2009, Operation HOPE and I were honored to be recognized for our work to advance financial literacy and silver rights, both here and around the world by the Ambassador of Australia.  

Australian Ambassador Dennis Richardson, and his wife Betty Richardson, graciously honored me and the Operation HOPE family at a private dinner at their official residence in Washington, D.C.  Included in this special, intimate gathering included Stephen Ryan, Esq. of McDermott Will & Emery LLP and former Mid-Atlantic board chairman for Operation HOPE, Ted Carter, executive managing director, CB Richard Ellis, R. Edward Ingle, managing director, Microsoft, Brian Longe, president and CEO, Wolters Kluwer Financial Services, Margaret Miller, senior economist, The World Bank, Stephanie Mudick, executive vice president, corporate responsibility, JP Morgan Chase, Esther Silver-Parker, senior vice president, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., Barry Wides and Mrs. Wides, Hon. John Fernandez, assistant secretary for the U.S. Economic Development Administration, along with Bill Walbrecher, president and COO, Operation HOPE and Jena Roscoe, senior vice president, chief of government relations and public policy, Operation HOPE, and of course myself.

Specifically, the dinner was in recognition of the recent HOPE Global Financial Literacy Summit, which drew 850 delegates from 40 countries and 6 continents, for the first time ever in an American inner-city, and specifically, Anacostia. Ambassador Richardson was amongst the distinguished list of delegates in attendance at the first ever global summit.

A very special thank you to Ambassador and Mrs. Richardson for their graciousness and recognition.  It inspires all of us at Operation HOPE to "do more."

Onward with HOPE,

John Hope Bryant

"Ignorance of the language of money in the contemporary world reduces people to being economic slaves."

John Hope Bryant

"The government is not going to solve our problems. We have to think creatively."

Bishop Eddie Long, on Black Men's Panel on CNN

 LOVE LEADERSHIP: The New Way to Lead in a Fear-Based World, was highlighted in The Baltimore Sun, The Sacramento Bee, The Lexington, Kentucky Herald Reader, The Bandenton Herald, Forbes.com,The McClatchy-Tribune and Macon News, CNBC, CEO Read, Businessweek.com, The Straits Times, Singapore, Tri-City Herald, and The Leadership Playlist for The Washington Post, amongst others.

If you haven't already, purchase a copy for you and your family, colleagues, you boss (smile), and friends today at CEO Read or Amazon.com.  Write a review at Amazon.com, Borders.com, Walmart.com or  
Barnes & Noble.

Thank you, all.  Let's start a movement....

Bestselling author(and my friend) Bill George and I were honored to be hosted by my personal hero and HOPE Global Spokesman, icon Ambassador Andrew Young, at his Andrew Young School of Policy Studies at Georgia Stat University, on October 16th, 2009, as we convened "A Conversation on Leadership" featuring my book bestselling book LOVE LEADERSHIP: The New Way to Lead in a Fear-Based World, and his newest bestselling book "7 Lessons for Leading in a Crisis," in Atlanta, Georgia.

Check out the the inspiring photo gallery for this event from the Andrew Young School here. Share with friends, and become a part of the solution in our communities, and our world.

"It is easier to be a mortgage broker than a pimp on a street corner, because at least a pimp needs references."

John Hope Bryant, from interview in the Economist Magazine.