Joseph
Badaracco
Author and John Shad Professor of Business Ethics
Harvard Business School

Managing in the Gray: Five Timeless Questions for Resolving Your Toughest Problems at Work

Change is ambiguous, and we find those who adapt the best to constant change are comfortable working with uncertainty – managing in shades of gray.  Indeed, the hardest part of being a manager is handling the "gray areas” problems - the situations where analysis and frameworks don’t show you what to do and your judgment is critical. Gray areas test not only your skills, but your humanity. You have to choose, commit, and act to live with the consequences. Harder still, you have to be able to explain yourself and your decisions to others. How do you get these calls right, as a manager and as a human being?

In this session, bestselling author Joseph Badaracco will share insights from his new book Managing in the Gray: Five Timeless Questions for Resolving Your Toughest Problems at Work (Harvard Business Review Press, 2016).

You will learn:

  • A powerful framework for analyzing gray area problems
  • Practical guidelines for applying the framework to specific problems
  • Practical guidance for stepping back from these problems and reflecting on them personally