Purpose – Against the background of current leadership theory, this research paper analyses and compares the leadership approaches of two outstanding leaders: Daniel Vasella, chairman of the leading Swiss pharmaceutical organization Novartis and Ricardo Semler, owner of the Brazilian conglomerate Semco. In contrast to many rather abstract, unpractical and pointlessly theoretical papers on leadership this analysis provides a more applied view of leadership by means of the life history approach delivering insight into both leaders’ development and leader personality. Methodology/approach – First, this paper locates the ideas and practices associated with the term “leadership” as a concept through theories that have developed over time and shows how the practices of leading can be derived and understood through chosen theories. Based on this, the specific characteristics and career paths of both leaders are presented and compared so that a final analysis of their leadership approach can be done. The paper is based on secondary sources such as peer-reviewed business journals and literature on leadership. Information about both leaders and their approach to leadership is gathered mainly from published interviews with them. Additional information on Semler is taken from his autobiography. Conclusions – It is difficult to identify an “essence” of leadership, whether that takes the form of personality characteristics or traits, charisma, the ability to transform people or organizations or a brain function. All presented theories of leadership seem to have their raison d’être. Both Vasella and Semler apply a combination of different attitudes and behaviours that characterize their leadership style containing elements of transformational, charismatic, ethical, servant and authentic leadership.
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Background: Working in the perioperative context is complex and challenging due to the impact of ageing and innovations, making new ways of working and collaborating emerging. The continual evaluation in this environment underscores the need for adaptability to technological advancements, and requires substantial allocation of resources for training and education. Educational programs for nurse anesthetists and surgical nurses should prioritize candidates through their unique personality traits and their ability to adapt evolving technologies. Objective: To explore personality characteristics of perioperative healthcare professionals that are instrumental for sustainable employability in technologically advanced environment. Methods: Personality characteristics were identified with the Big Five Inventory, which consisted of 60 items answered on a five-point Likert scale (strongly disagree to strongly agree). 823 perioperative healthcare professionals (360 nurse anesthetists and 463 surgical nurses) and 827 participants of the normative Dutch population completed the online survey. Findings: Specific personality traits were found for nurse anesthetists and surgical nurses when compared to the normative Dutch population. Traits of nurse anesthetists differed significantly on all domains of the Big Five Inventory, with the largest differences found within the dimension negative emotionally (F=3532.39, df=2, p<0.001). The same applied to surgical nurses, in which the largest differences were also found within the dimension negative emotionally (F=4051.66, df=2, p<0.001). Conclusion: This study highlights the role of specific personality traits in maintaining employability among Dutch perioperative healthcare professionals within the rapidly evolving and technologically advanced landscape of healthcare. It contributes to an understanding of sustainable employability in technologically advanced environments and emphasizes the relationship between individual traits and professional excellence, being crucial educational strategies and overall improvement in healthcare.
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A journalistic memoir of the author when she traced the path of human migration from Africa to Asia, telling stories and revealing the immense diversity of cultures. "I am a donkey" was published in 2013. It is the first book in Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Phuong Mai's series "On the road with a naked heart’’. The book is about a backpacking trip around the world of a donkey who not only likes heavyweights but also… "finds herself a way to plunge her head into a puddle to be recognized as a donkey with personality".
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DISTENDER will provide integrated strategies by building a methodological framework that guide the integration of climate change(CC) adaptation and mitigation strategies through participatory approaches in ways that respond to the impacts and risks of climatechange (CC), supported by quantitative and qualitative analysis that facilitates the understanding of interactions, synergies and tradeoffs.Holistic approaches to mitigation and adaptation must be tailored to the context-specific situation and this requires a flexibleand participatory planning process to ensure legitimate and salient action, carried out by all important stakeholders. DISTENDER willdevelop a set of multi-driver qualitative and quantitative socio-economic-climate scenarios through a facilitated participatory processthat integrates bottom-up knowledge and locally-relevant drivers with top-down information from the global European SharedSocioeconomic Pathways (SSPs) and downscaled Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs) from IPCC. A cross-sectorial andmulti-scale impact assessment modelling toolkit will be developed to analyse the complex interactions over multiple sectors,including an economic evaluation framework. The economic impact of the different efforts will be analyse, including damage claimsettlement and how do sectoral activity patterns change under various scenarios considering indirect and cascading effects. It is aninnovative project combining three key concepts: cross-scale, integration/harmonization and robustness checking. DISTENDER willfollow a pragmatic approach applying methodologies and toolkits across a range of European case studies (six core case studies andfive followers) that reflect a cross-section of the challenges posed by CC adaptation and mitigation. The knowledge generated byDISTENDER will be offered by a Decision Support System (DSS) which will include guidelines, manuals, easy-to-use tools andexperiences from the application of the cases studies.
