Instead of studying leadership, why not spend some time studying leaders and strategies in the wild? You can learn a lot from leadership experts, but you always see the leader and what he or she does through the expert’s personal lens. Supplement that learning with studying real leaders in real life situations and draw your own conclusions. The posts in this series will help you.

Every week I’ll point you to articles by and about real leaders in real situations and to articles about how real companies are faring in the marketplace. Read them. Think about them. Draw your own lessons and conclusions from them. Then try to apply those lessons in your own real life.

This week I’m pointing you to articles about Dave Cote, Ed Bastian, Arnold Donald, Roger Lee, and Warren Buffett.

From Laura Rittenhouse: The CEO Who Succeeded In Making Employees Millionaires

“Dave Cote was named CEO of Honeywell in 2002 when the company was facing a tsunami of problems. To restore investor confidence in the company’s prospects, Cote told analysts what they could expect him to do:”

From David Gelles: Delta C.E.O. Ed Bastian: ‘Leadership Is Not a Popularity Contest’

“Mr. Bastian worked in accounting and big food before joining Delta, and he speaks about his employees with uncommon reverence. He backs up that sentiment by sharing a large portion of annual profits with employees. Last week, Delta paid out $1.3 billion in bonuses to front-line workers.”

From Miami Heat: Q&A with Arnold Donald

“Arnold Donald currently serves as President and Chief Executive Officer of Carnival Corporation & plc. Prior to starting his role as CEO in 2013, Donald was President and Chief Executive Officer of The Executive Leadership Council, a professional network of African-American executives of major U.S. companies. He also served as President and Chief Executive Officer of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International from 2006 to 2008. Donald has served in a wide variety of executive roles since 1997 that illustrate his rich history of leadership.”

Thanks to Smartbrief on Leadership for pointing me to this story

From Karen Gilchrist: Why the CEO of this global family business refuses to take his dad’s advice

“When Roger Lee became CEO of one of the world’s largest fashion manufacturers in his late-thirties, he had several role models to emulate.”

From the Economist: What four decades of correspondence from the Oracle of Omaha reveal

“WHEN FUTURE generations want to study today’s capitalists, a good place to start would be Warren Buffett’s annual letters to the shareholders of his firm, Berkshire Hathaway. Unfortunately, any economic insights from the world’s most celebrated investor are woven in with lots of corny jokes about golf and fast food. Mindful that readers may not have the intestinal fortitude to stomach the Oracle of Omaha’s unique sense of humour, The Economist has performed a textual analysis of 40 years’ worth of Mr Buffett’s letters to see what his language reveals about his thinking.”

For some ideas about how to get more from this series of posts, check out “Studying Leaders in the Wild.“