Mission Statement
Business Leadership & Strategic Performance Training/Enhancement
"Our objective is to assist individuals, companies and organizations reach optimal performance using innate skills and strengths within the larger framework of circumstance, workplace and community. Relevant and stimulating programs are customized to client requirement".
-Rodger Harding
Founder

Harding International and Associates Inc.
E-Mail
Telephone: +1 (416) 962 6700
9836 Keele Street
Vaughan, L6A 3Y4
Ontario, Canada
Client Comment
Selected Comments
"This seminar far exceeded expectation - Rodger is poised, articulate, respectful- He was dead on with his presentation and I would recommend him without hesitation." - S.M. Canadian Women in Communications (CWC)
"Your participation in our International/Asia Pacific FS Conference helped make it one of the best and more relaxed conferences we've ever had. Very effective facilitation! Thank you." - Paul Masse, Manager, Bombardier Aerospace
" I want to congratulate you on a job well done. A room full of lawyers is not the easiest audience to appear before, yet you ruled the room. You have that unique ability (gift?) to teach ideas without it being hard work. I found your personal style very relaxing yet challenging". - David Clarke, Chair, YLD Division, The Canadian Bar Association of Ontario
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Corporate Intelligence

CIA Harding International and Associates Inc.

Publication:
"In this compelling book by a former diplomat, you will learn the secrets (step by step) to developing an intelligence strategy by effective information gathering and analyzing, and then to delivering credible intelligence to senior management."|more...

Available from bookstores and online:
Amazon
Borders
Leadership Training
The Essence of Business Leadership Training -
Be the leader you are meant to be!

Toronto based Rodger Harding, applying leadership savvy learned from military, legal, diplomatic & business consulting experience has a proven record of enabling full leadership potential in scores of business folk. His clients range from start-ups to Fortune 500 companies, national not-for-profit organizations & learning institutions.

The Harding Leadership training program raises awareness, validates and empowers the true essence of leadership. We enhance your ability to identify, strengthen and take full advantage of core leadership competencies, instilling legitimate confidence rather than reinforcing a preoccupation with outward presence. | more...
Training/Coaching
Training Program Design and Development
All Harding International and Associates Inc. programs are designed to:
  • Access existing innate and learned competencies/experience.
  • Enhance individual/team ability to meet current organizational requirement.
  • Accommodate changing environment and circumstance.
Our customized programs are built from scratch and will accurately reflect the unique context of corporate operations and identity. Training products that utilize the Harding Model are limited to one company per industry. This commitment ensures that training initiatives will result in strategic and competitive advantage - We encourage clients to safeguard our techniques and methodology as part of their intellectual property.| more...

LATEST NEWS/COMMENT

Year-End 2013 - Message from Rodger Harding

by Administrator 29.Nov.2013 06:46:00

 

 

Dear Clients & Friends,

 

As the Holiday Season draws nearer, I am preparing somewhat earlier than usual for my annual recharge period. The office will be closed from 1st – 30th December 2013.

 

As always, this is an opportune time to take stock/share my impressions of our operational activity. In addition to our popular Leadership Series

  • The Edward Snowden saga stirred renewed interest in our Corporate Intelligence Awareness Program this year. We were able to provide realistic context to the realities of covert surveillance, spying and eaves-dropping etc., as well as to assist diverse organizations streamline/reinforce their own Intelligence Awareness programs  - Procuring & Safeguarding critical information predicates effective corporate strategy!
  • Career Transition Coaching maintained its steady pace. I have been really fortunate to have been so often engaged by like-minded individuals – The intensity of discussion, on so many different levels, keeps me humble and in awe of the uniqueness of the individual mind!
  • It was our Relationship Building Program that proved, surprisingly, to be the most requested item this year. It is heartening to see organizations placing increased importance on authentic and sustainable interaction/relationships     

The frequency of the Relationship  workshops/seminars allowed me to reflect anew on my firm standpoint that, whatever we might think, personal and professional persona oftentimes cannot, and should not, be totally separated. This balanced approach has served me well. In a fast paced, and oftentimes mercenary, business world I have been blessed by so many of you who, without being asked, anticipate and provide the support/sustenance, so vital in managing the vicissitudes of entrepreneurial life. My heartfelt thanks to all of you!

 

I wish you well over the Holidays … And a happy, prosperous and safe 2014!

 

Warm regards,

 

Rodger

The Edward Snowden Saga in context: Part III - Spying vs Intelligence Gathering!

by Administrator 26.Oct.2013 11:43:00

The recent brouhaha around the U.S spying on the Germans and French (inter alia), as well as the Canadians spying on the Brazilians, brought about by the Edward Snowden revelations is surprising when one considers that spying is, and always has been, a normal part multi & bi-lateral relations. 

It is being caught that provokes the scandal! It is perhaps useful to put the inter-nation spying revelations in context:

  • Most embassies and diplomatic missions have declared (to the host country) intelligence agents under the cover of traditional diplomatic roles. Their supposed function is to gather raw intelligence, or clues that might predict future policy or events. This data is used by government to formulate strategy that will secure the competitive edge!
  • Multi-national corporations depend on intelligence gathering to stay ahead of the game – A forward thinking company will anticipate industry and corporate change evolution to ensure they are not left behind…
  • Intelligence gathering is the art of seeing what other have missed or what others do not wish us to know… This data/information is usually hidden in plain sight.. available for astute eyes/ears to uncover!
  • Spying crosses the line into a covert and often unethical/illegal discovery of what lies hidden…
  • Both intelligence gathering and spying are everyday occurrence – The objective is not to be caught. This is not only embarrassing to the perpetrators, but also reveals their intention/strategy direction. Once discovered other countries are obliged to make a diplomatic fuss – Inherently for public consumption. They are probably engaged in the same type of activity!
  • The worldwide Intelligence/Security family or network is a constant – Governments on the other hand come and go – As a sort of power behind the throne influence, these agencies brief incoming governments post election as to world state of play - This would account for oftentimes astounding about turns by politicians once they attain power.  Pres. Obama’s policies post attaining office would perhaps serve a perfect illustration of this phenomenon.
  • It is important to remember that intelligence agencies share/trade information,internally/externally as a matter of course!

Former Booz Allen employee Edward Snowden shattered the calm that supports these everyday activities – Many of us are indignant because we believe this is an unusual state of affairs… others resent having to deal with the knowledge that personal details are under scrutiny or at least recorded…

Ongoing AWARENESS of what we let/might let walk out the door is the only real protection individuals and companies have! Conversely, AWARENESS of what other carelessly reveal is of great value in securing the Competitive Edge … nationally, industry wise, corporately & on individual levels!

For my money Edward Snowden did us a favour in heightening our awareness as to what goes on behind the scenes!

Call (416) 962-6700 for more information about our Corporate Intelligence training programs

Or

http://www.amazon.com/Corporate-Intelligence-Awareness-Securing-Competitive/dp/1895186420

 

Leadership:The Edward Snowden Saga in Context - Part II

by Administrator 25.Jul.2013 18:32:00

To safeguard privacy in the context of the post below would then appear to be an impossible task!


For more than decade Harding Intelligence Programs have heightened awareness of diverse organizations to the importance of managing the people role in the gathering and protecting of information. The Snowden saga serves as a reminder that prompts me to revisit the our basic approach to safeguarding privacy. 


With regard to managing technology our approach is inspired by Marshall McLuhan, a forward thinking Canadian who wrestled with the influence of technology in the modern times… albeit before the advent of  the internet and the digital era: “any technology that ... creates extensions of the human body and senses” (McLuhan 1995, 239). In other words extends rather than replaces human capacity!

McLuhan highlighted the importance of managing new technology:More...

Leadership & the Right to Privacy: The Edward Snowden Saga in Context

by Administrator 22.Jul.2013 15:53:00

Since WW2 and the coming and passing of the Cold War, technology advances have allowed governments and corporations in most of the developed world to gather and store vast amounts of information just because they can. This is not a secret!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/mar/01/menwith-hill-eavesdropping-base-expansion

In the nineties the NSA reportedly spent approximately $28 billion per annum on sophisticated information gathering procedures. Satellite surveillance and monitoring/eavesdropping facilities such as that at Menwith Hill in the UK gathered and stored tons of raw information. (reportedly every telephonic/electronic communication in the Western hemisphere.) In contrast, in the corresponding period, only $2 billion per annum was allocated to process this information. (Interestingly the latter figure represented the entire budget allocation of the CIA at that time.)

So gathering and storing as best intelligence practice has long been fait accomplis … We know from the post 9/11 tragedy and the recent Boston Marathon attack, that intelligence agencies have the ability to produce, with huge time/quality efficiency, information about people post events. The big question then became: What about the pre-emptive use of information to forestall undesired outcomes?

This brings us to the Edward Snowden saga! The nuance that pre-emptive processing is taking place seems to have escaped most press reports. Spying on friends and foe alike is not new… Rather it is that people are being looked at as potential suspects even before they act! Governments this far, have access to enormous detail about countries/organizations/corporations/people, but have been inhibited by law as to how they can use what they know.

Think of how in recent months how many governments have floated cases in the public showing the benefit of surveillance as a tool to nab people before they act. Are we being prepared for more security legislation?

We average citizens, fearful of our safety, and that of our children, shrug off concerns as necessary evil. Wikileaks, Anonymous, and other hactivist movements/individuals, including Mr. Snowden, in their frustration at our nonchalance, have tried to underscore how vulnerable the average citizen is to privacy invasion. How futile are any concerns we might have? At present:

  • Any electronic communication is fair game for analysis; this includes banking, medical, automobile, telephone and of course our supposedly private internet activity/history; in some countries service providers are compelled by law to open records to diverse intelligence/security agencies;
  •  Cell/smart phone activity is monitored across borders. For example, the UAE protested a few years ago that the Blackberry Platform was impenetrable to security surveillance. Would this mean that they were looking at all other instrument activity? What business secrets were open to surveillance? 
  • Urban/private video surveillance/data storage is permanent and lasting
  • Corporate data management and client/consumer profiling is a major industry. (Loyalty programs may even allow calculation of something as banal as household bowel movements by analyzing the quantity of toilet paper consumed)
  • At a stretch, an intelligence agency owning Norton’s, McAfee, Facebook, Skype et al,(not altogether an impossible consideration) would be invited into the nerve center of individual/organizational activity; More...


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