sutton039

Eric Schultz The annual review can be an uncomfortable event, but a 360-Degree Performance Review (the “360”) is one of the more harrowing proceedings that can befall a professional, business or academic. In a 360 you are asked to grade yourself against a series of attributes, everything from ethics to leadership to Gilbert Stuart's 1797 portrait of George Washington listening skills and coaching. Then, everyone in your “ecosystem” gets a crack at you, sometimes anonymously. This means your boss, often your boss’s boss or peers, your own peers and subordinates, and then some sampling of customers and vendors. Scores are averaged, and then you’re ready (or not) to talk with your boss about why you think your “collaboration with others” is an “8” while the 360 consensus shows it’s a “4.” A good 360—and there is such a thing, when done well—will reinforce your positives and give you additional incentive to fix the things you generally knew were broken anyway. A traumatic 360, however,...

Randall Stephens The following excerpt is from Michal Jan Rozbicki's review essay in the June 2013 issue of Historically Speaking .  Rozbicki uses Jon Meacham's Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power (Random House, 2012) to delve into "the cult of great individuals," which even in the present, does not lack enthusiasts.  Rozbicki is professor of history and director of the Center for Intercultural Studies at Saint Louis University. He is the author of Culture and Liberty in the Age of the American Revolution (University of Virginia Press, 2011). One would be hard pressed to find a dull period in Thomas Jefferson’s life. Mindful of that, I began devouring Jon Meacham’s 800-page Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power anticipating a gourmet biographical feast. It started off as an enjoyable and well-paced story but it was not long before the taste of syrup began to take over. By the time I reached page eight I had already been informed that “Jefferson was the most successful ...

Heather Cox Richardson Message boards and blogs are full of angry people calling for Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev to be tortured or killed. Or both. Immediately. After all, it’s pretty clear he’s guilty, A Gilbert Stuart portrait of John Adams, ca. 1821. right? Why waste tax dollars on this guy with a long, expensive trial? And anyway, who ever said a terrorist who murders Americans should get a fair trial? Well, Founding Father John Adams , for one. Right here in Boston. Adams was a rising lawyer in Massachusetts during the infancy of the American Revolution. On March 5, 1770, eight British soldiers opened fire when someone in a taunting mob threw a rock at them. When the shooting was over, five Americans were dead and others were wounded. Within weeks, a grand jury indicted the soldiers, along with their commander, Captain Thomas Preston.  It seemed all Boston was inflamed against the murdering foreign soldiers. The “Boston Massacre” became a rallying cry for th...