Students might be interested to read about Prologis, profiled in a Wall Street Journal article. The communication lessons are useful for future company leaders.

Although not well known, the 2700-employee real-estate logistics company ranked seventh on the Drucker Institute’s Corporate Management Top 250 (shown in this clear but boring bar chart). Evaluating customer satisfaction, innovation, social responsibility, employee engagement and development, and financial strength, the index discovered model practices at Prologis. Here are a few that relate to business communication course content, mostly inspired by the chairman and CEO, Hamid Moghadam:

• Risk-taking. Risk is encouraged at Prologis, and Moghadam reflects on his experience: “I’ve never been told no.”

• Speaking up. “It’s safe,” he says, to offer suggestions.

• Initiative. Prologis ranks particularly high on these questions: “I have the authority I need to do my job” and “I’m empowered to make decisions to best serve my customers.”

• Regular meetings. Moghadam describes Monday Investment Committee meetings, which sound intense. He speaks last, and the VP of communications says, “He’s direct, and people love it.”

Students might relate these principles to their own experience. Reflecting on my experience in the academy, I wouldn’t use any of these descriptions. Other positive principles were at play, but not these.