In 2005, when Warren Bennis, the author of several best-selling management books and a professor at the University of Southern California, gave a talk at Harvard Business School, he asked the audience how many knew what the blogosphere was. One third of the audience raised their hands to acknowledge their familiarity with the term.

In his latest book, Transparency: How Leaders Create a Culture of Candor, Bennis takes on the world of social networking and the world of transacting business across virtual borders. His premise is simple: if companies are going to succeed today, they must be as transparent as possible. Whether companies like it or not, blogging is here to stay. Bennis says that the CEO of Starbucks tunes into blogs to learn what employees in the company's 15,000 stores are feeling, thinking about, and doing. He says, "If companies can't handle transparency, then someone else will come out with the news ahead of them, or offend them, or surprise them."

He adds that there has to be enough trust in the organization with people working at distances from one another. He says, "The only way organizations can succeed in building alliances with other companies or having a geographical disperse workforce is to have crystal clear terms of engagement. The need for transparency is going to become more monumental than ever before." In this podcast, Bennis talks about the challenges C-level executives face today in a creating a culture of candor that must co-exist with social networks.

Bio
Warren Bennis is the Distinguished Professor of Business Administration at the University of Southern California. He also serves as the chairman of the advisory board of the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard University's Kennedy School and is the Thomas S. Murphy Distinguished Research Fellow at the Harvard Business School. He is Visiting Professor of Leadership at the University of Exeter and a senior fellow at UCLA's School of Public Policy and Social Research.

He has written or edited 26 books, including the best selling Leaders and On Becoming a Leader, both translated into 21 languages. The Financial Times named Leaders as one of the top 50 business books of all time. His book, An Inverted Life: Reflections on Leadership and Change, wasnominated for a Pulitzer Prize. His most recent books include Geeks & Geezers, Judgment, and Transparency.

Bennis has served on the faculty of MIT's Sloan School of Management where he was chairman of the Organizational Studies Department. He is a former faculty member of Harvard University and Boston University, former provost and executive vice president of State University of New York. He has received 12 honorary degrees and has served on numerous boards of advisers, including the Salk Institute. He has served on four US Presidential Advisory Boards and has consulted for many Fortune 500 companies, including G.E., Ford, and Starbucks.

The Wall Street Journal named him as one of the top ten speakers on management in 1993 and in 1996, Forbes magazine referred to him as the "Dean of Leadership Gurus."

Resources
Slacker Manager - Warren Bennis - Still Valid After All These Years
The Wall Street Journal - Judgment Trumps Experience

Production Credits
Elizabeth Ferrarini, Executive Producer
Tom Parish, Host and Audio Producer
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