Leaders of political advocacy organizations are faced with the challenge of motivating their employees past frequent obstacles, shortcomings, and failures. Anne Ladky, the Executive Director of a non-profit political advocacy organization called Women Employed, developed a leadership style to help her employees tackle this demanding line of work. Her leadership approach attends to the vital role human energy plays in her organization and emphasizes the importance of focusing on opportunities. This case describes how Anne’s leadership cultivated an opportunity-driven organizational culture that ultimately helped Women Employed overcome bureaucratic resistance against their initiatives to improve education and job training for low-income women.

This case was designed to facilitate understanding, reflection, and discussion of the important role that attending to human energy often plays in leadership. Teaching objectives include:

• Illustrating how leaders can attend to, create, and replenish positive energy in organizations, as well as avoid and release negative energy.
• Inspiring thought about how, why, and when being opportunity-driven can energize individuals and organizations.
• Exploring the benefits and challenges of energy and opportunity-driven leadership.

NOTE:
A companion DVD for Anne Ladky: An Energy Approach to Leadership, featuring an interview with Anne Ladky, will soon be available for purchase. Please contact Janet Max at (734) 647-8154 or jmax@bus.umich.edu.