Postcards

This week: Leadership lessons and Dimon's mystery execs revealed

Happy Friday! At least we have an auto bailout -- some reassurance to end another rough week.

As I've monitored the page views on Postcards (way up this week!), I've noticed a pattern: lots of interest in good news and lessons in leadership -- maybe because this is so hard to come by these days. Thursday's post on Execution dispensed management advice from successful CEOs like IBM's (IBM) Sam Palmisano and MORE

Execution, execution, execution!

I'll say it again: Execution! It's always been the No. 1 reason why CEOs fail, as my colleague Geoff Colvin and management guru Ram Charan have preached over the past decade. But particularly right now, as growth is so hard to come by and countless bosses are blowing it, there's a rising appreciation of this most critical thing.

At least among the really smart bosses. I noticed it at last week's MORE

Guest Post: How to land a great job

By Jim Citrin, senior director, Spencer Stuart

Are you looking for a new job in this maelstrom of rising unemployment and hiring freezes? Here are six steps to help you jumpstart your career:

1. Identify your broad areas of interest. Is it so surprising that people are happier and more productive working in an area that they're genuinely interested in? It shouldn't be. Career success highly correlates with inherent interest in the MORE

How to thrive in turbulent times

"A crisis is a terrible thing to waste." Have you heard that line lately? Rahm Emanuel, President-elect Barack Obama's new chief of staff, recently used it. So did Merck (MRK) CEO Dick Clark, noted management guru Jim Collins, who used the line as the centerpiece of a talk at the Fortune 500 Forum in Washington, D.C. on Monday.

Collins delivered a mega-dose of passion and pragmatic ideas, starting with the message that "good MORE

Where will the bailouts end?

As the government commits more and more money to its multitudinous rescue efforts--of Bear Stearns, then AIG (AIG), then Citigroup (C) and its bank rivals, then Citigroup again, and now more money for Fannie Mae (FNM) and Freddie Mac (FRE)--we wonder: Where, oh where, will these bailouts end? In Detroit, with General Motors (GM), Ford (F)and Chrysler securing their desperately needed billions? Alas, the road to shore up capitalism will MORE

Random bits of hope

It's hard to be hopeful. Turmoil in the financial markets is spreading geographically and psychologically. The Dow closed down 508 points today. At last week's Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit, we heard plenty about stress and sleep deprivation -- starting with Warren Buffett's comments on a clearly exhausted Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson. Sallie Krawcheck, who is leaving her high-level post at Citigroup (C), and Barclays Capital (BCS) vice chairman Barbara Byrne MORE

Power Point: Embrace your cell phone

"We used to say that you only needed three things when you left the house: your wallet, your keys and your cellphone. Pretty soon, all we'll need is the cellphone, a universal remote for life."

--Verizon (VZ) Chairman and CEO Ivan Seidenberg, at Fortune Brainstorm Tech. His comment is self-serving. But it's probably not far wrong given the intense interest in mobile technology at this week's confab in Half Moon Bay, California.