Elizabeth R. Thornton

Elizabeth R. Thornton is an author, speaker, professor of management practice, Babson Executive Education and adjunct lecturer in entrepreneurship at Babson College. Her first book: “The Objective Leader: How to leverage the Power of Seeing Things As They Are,” is based on a curriculum she developed and teaches to graduate students, entrepreneurs and corporate executives. “The Objective Leader” is centered on the premise that we are all subjective—it’s human nature. We overreact to situations; we judge people too quickly and unfairly; we take something personally when it was not really meant that way. As a result, we lose relationships, reputation, money and peace of mind. And in our ever-more-complex world, leaders must make decisions faster and with more conflicting information; widespread insecurity makes people territorial and risk-averse; and the consequences of every action are played out on a disproportionately large stage. “The Objective Leader” teaches people that to succeed, we must consciously seek to increase our objectivity—seeing and accepting things as they are without projecting our mental models, fears, background, and personal experiences onto them. This way, we not only avoid costly cognitive errors, but also open ourselves to greater clarity, better decision making, new opportunities and greater happiness!