Leadership Skills

Make your own luck: Ben Lerer, co-founder and chief executive of Thrillist Media Group, which manages men’s shopping websites, describes his company’s culture: “One thing that we preach at work all day long is ‘don’t hope.’ ”

Like many senior executives, Donald Keough makes clear-cut decisions. But sometimes—as when he was president of The Coca-Cola Co. in 1989—his snap judgments have made him appear too bossy ...

Wake up meetings ... Fill a need ... Kill your darlings.

If you want to learn something new, you can ask an expert to explain it to you. But there’s no guarantee you’ll understand, much less retain, what you hear. Here’s a smarter way to gather new in­­formation: Unlock your curiosity.

Here are guidelines to make the most of LinkedIn:

Men who reach the top engage in rituals of initiation introducing up-and-comers to key players. “I think we can use them as a model,” says Carol Johnson, a member of the first generation of women on Wall Street.

When Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang hired Terry Semel in 2001 to rescue his web portal, eyebrows arched. Semel had barely used a computer. What he had done was prove himself as a dealmaker and people person. Semel even claimed his lack of technical knowledge was good because it made him a “typical user.”

Billy King, general manager of the Brooklyn Nets basketball team, thought it was pretty cool the first time minority owner and hip-hop mogul Jay-Z emailed him. Even cooler: Asked what Jay-Z typically wants to know, King says, “How he can help.”

Most historians say that Robert E. Lee’s decision to head the Confederate army was inevitable. Not true. Lee was almost equally devoted to the United States and to his home state of Virginia. Two trunks of recently retrieved family papers show how hard he suffered in choosing sides ...

Navigate change by first explaining the consequences of the status quo to your team. Help them understand the cost of not changing.