Achieving Inertia – A Pathway for Effective Business Management

This brief note discusses the importance for a business leader to achieve a state of “Inertia” for the organization she represents. The note borrows examples from the lives of some historical figures to make the case that if a leader or manager is at ease with herself and her surroundings, she can accomplish great successes for her business. First, I describe what I mean by Achieving Inertia, then this note reflects on some of the characteristics of Nelson Mandela, Ronald Reagan and the HP duo of Dave Packard & Bill Hewlett before concluding with an analysis of what connects these remarkable leaders of the twentieth century with effective modern day business management.

When I say inertia I mean achieving a state of being when a company is in equilibrium with its surroundings and gliding almost friction-free towards its goals. The manager in such a state would have a definite vision in mind of where the company is heading towards and she would have communicated this to the subordinates clearly. Personally, she would be at ease with the work and the strategy that she has employed. She would be secure within and satisfied with the work and act as a facilitator for the team which would play the role of actually motioning the company towards the desired goal. This all seems very bright and rosy but anyone who has worked in a business setting would acknowledge the conflicts that arise and how easy it is for the team to get derailed. That is where the leader steps in and ensures the focus of the team is on the goal and to guide it on the right path if the team falls astray. In order to achieve this state of equilibrium, the leader has to exhibit certain qualities. These are to firstly understand herself and identify a role that makes her comfortable with the surrounding. Secondly, she must understand the individuals who make-up her team and ensure that they are at their most productive. And lastly, she needs to realize a sense of responsibility towards all the stakeholders.

It is imperative for a business manager to undergo an inner analysis of her needs and desires before forming any strategy for her team. This is crucial because in order to achieve professional success, she would need to define it what professional success is for her and set a benchmark for her career. In his autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, Nelson Mandela (1995) goes at length at describing why he chose the difficult life of a freedom fighter over one of a regular ‘colored’ South African during the apartheid. Even though Mandela was not a business manager, his rationale for making the choices that he made is, in my opinion, helpful in making all sorts of decisions. Mandela explains in his autobiography that the struggle began from being annoyed that he did not have personal freedom. He wanted to live a life where he would not be personally discriminated against, a life where he could get an opportunity to succeed. But then he realized that it was not only Mandela’s lack of freedom but absence of it in his people’s lives as well that bothered him. He could not enjoy life as long as his fellow colored South Africans were oppressed and therefore, the focus of his life became working towards achieving freedom for his people. And this caused him to change his life drastically. He lost his home and sacrificed time spent with immediate family owing to his participation in the African National Congress. Later on in his career, his objective got refined into working for the freedom of all humanity – both the oppressed and the oppressor (p. 624).

Just as it was important for Mandela to understand what he really needed to do to be satisfied in life, it is imperative for every business manager to identify what sort of a professional career would enable her to enjoy life in general. If you are not satisfied out of working hours, then more often than not that would impact productivity during office hours. Furthermore, when we select our careers, we should try to get an idea of whether that particular line of business fits-in well with our values and principles or not. If the line of work is in harmony with our core beliefs, we would feel a sense of fulfillment and the professional life would seem whole. Mandela’s example also teaches us that the target is not rigid and undergoes consistent refinement. His hunger for freedom broadened from a personal desire into a universal agenda. The first important step towards achieving corporate inertia should be a manager’s inward assessment of whether she feels secure about her role in the organization and whether the focus of business resonates with her values. We cannot deliver at our best if we do not enjoy what we do.

“It was said of Reagan that he never had to take the pulse of the country; he was the pulse” (Gergen, 2000, p. 200).

Once the manager is satisfied with her role in the organization, then the next step should be to ensure that the people working with her are also secure professionally and that they believe in her ability to lead them. David Gergen’s (2000) Eyewitness to Power provides a very insightful analysis into the management style of four US presidents but it is his analysis of Ronald Reagan which is of relevance here. Gergen explains that Reagan developed an emotional connection with his audience because he could understand how they felt about various issues. He achieved this by enabling himself to read people and by creating a feeling of empathy towards them. This enabled him to inspire trust of other people (p. 199 – 200). Gergen further explains how some presidents do not appeal as leaders because they keep a perpetual focus on themselves. Reagan’s style was unique because he was excellent at maintaining focus away from himself and towards others (p. 228). Reagan enabled people to think themselves worthy of great accomplishments by identifying “ordinary Americans” from amongst the people and showering praise on them (p. 229).

These abilities are essential in a leader if she wants her team to achieve inertia. Managers need to put themselves in other’s shoes and establish an emotional connection with the entire workforce. The role of a modern day manager should be to serve as a facilitator to the organization, making sure that every employee has the opportunity to work towards achieving the company’s goals. If there is a disconnect between the leader and the followers, then the company would not be able to function at its most efficient level. The manager’s role is to provide the best environment for each single employee to reach his or her potential and this would result in the organization’s potential becoming higher than the sum of individuals’. The manager must strive to understand the employees and their needs and show this appreciation to them. This would prevent them from second-guessing her intentions and vision. If she maintains a Reagan-like emphasis on focusing on others, then this would surely be possible. Such a company would automatically attract the best talent in the market, further increasing its overall performance.

“It is not the man who has little, but he who desires more, that is poor.” – Seneca (Tribes & Nations)

A crucial stage in a company’s life is the point when it has just started doing well and beginning to earn a healthy return. That is where the mangers need to decide how to efficiently allocate surplus capital. What we have seen so often is that greed takes control and the short-term focused leaders try to individualize these profits. This creates a divide between the ranks of the company and breaks up the momentum. Clever managers see beyond that.

Michael Malone describes an incident in Bill & Dave (2008) when Dave Packard, one of the co-founders of HP, attended a meeting of corporate leaders in 1948. During that meeting, one of the topics that the business leaders of the time discussed was of corporate responsibility. Packard, who at that time was not as experienced as some of the other leaders, was amazed by the thinking of the mangers who considered profit as the sole motive of the corporation. When Packard openly disagreed with the rest and shared HP’s viewpoint of a company bearing responsibility to its employees, customers and vendors as well as the owners, he was laughed at. Malone goes on to note that almost a decade later, most of the companies present in that meeting had adopted HP’s style (p. 117-118).

As early as the 1940s, HP was pioneering in personnel management by offering health insurance and pension plans for its employees (p. 101). Another inspiring incident is when HP needed its first line-of-credit. It was the owner of a small Palo Alto National bank that agreed to give HP the $500 loan at that nascent stage. HP never forgot this kindness and continued to do business with Palo Alto until the time it got too big for the small bank. Even then, it shifted business to an associate bank of Palo Alto (p. 85).

This gives a measure of how one of the greatest companies of the last century did business. It was the sense of responsibility that Dave Packard and Bill Hewlett felt towards each other and the stakeholders that enabled the company to survive a demanding industry where failure of continuous innovation could bring about a quick end. If a manager acknowledges this responsibility then it would automatically eradicate the natural conflicts that arise between a corporation and its stakeholders. If a manager maintains good relations with a company’s suppliers and helps them out in troubled time then the suppliers would more often than not reciprocate because a healthy relationship is mutually beneficial. If a company adopts environment friendly and employee friendly policies, then the goodwill generated would surely add value to the company over the long-term. This harmonious state of existence with the all parties involved goes a long way in ensuring the ability of a company to make generate lucrative returns over an extended timeframe.

Above, I have discussed the concept of achieving inertia and how it would benefit a company to be in such a state. Some characteristics and steps to reaching this state are also described from a corporate leader’s perspective. The manager firstly needs to understand herself and feel secure about her role in the organization. Secondly she needs to understand her employees’ needs and earn their trust. These would enable the manager to provide a vision and for the employees to set a direction and choose a path towards achieving the goals. Once the company is on the right track, the manager needs to acknowledge the roles of various stakeholders involved with the company and always have an eye on their interests. These three aspects would go a long way in enabling the company to achieve a state of equilibrium with the external and internal forces at play. These are surely not exhaustive but just some features that modern day managers should internalize in their leadership. I believe peaceful co-existence of all parties in the present business world is possible. We just need to learn a little humility.

Bibliography

Gergen, David. Eyewitness to Power : The Essence of Leadership: Nixon to Clinton. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2000.

Malone, Michael S. Bill and Dave : How Hewlett and Packard Built the World's Greatest Company. New York: Plume, 2008.

Mandela, Nelson. Long Walk to Freedom : The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela. New York: Back Bay, 1995.

Murray, Grant, and Mignonne Murray, comps. "Empowering Quotes." Tribes & Nations - A Global Store Empowering Lives. Tribes & Nations. 12 Dec. 2008 .

Quotes from the M&A Coursepack

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man." - George Barnard Shaw


"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident." - Arthur Schopenhaur


"Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen." - Sir Winston Churchill


"It is much easier to be critical than to be correct." - Benjamin Disraeli


"Continous effort - not strength or intelligence - is the key to unlocking our potential." - Sir Winston Churchill


"It's not enough that we do our best; sometimes we have to do what's required." - Sir Winston Churchill


"Pain is only weakness leaving the body." - US Marine Corps


"However beautiful the strategy. you should occasionally look at the results." - Sir Winston Churchill


"Life is far too important a thing ever to talk seriously about." - Oscar Wilde


"Success is going from failure to failure without losing your enthusiasm." - Sir Winstom Churchill


"Success is never found. Failure is never fatal. Courage is the only thing." - Sir Winston Churchill


"The only guide to man is his conscience; the only shield to his memory is the rectitude and sincerity of his actions. It is very imprudent to walk through life without this shield, because we are so often mocked by the failure of our hopes and the upsetting of our calculations; but with this shield, however the fates may play, we march always in the ranks of honour." - Sir Winston Churchill


"An optimist sees an opportunity in every calamity; a pessimist sees a calamity in every opportunity." - Sir Winston Churchill


"The nose of the bulldog has been slanted backwards so that he can breathe without letting go." - Sir Winston Churchill

Sun Tzu and The Art of War

The universality of The Art of War is remarkable. I found it to be applicable in various aspects of life and will always keep it handy as a guidebook. For I feel this is one of those texts that would give different insight with every read. Some of the themes that jumped out and struck me were creating an understanding of our selves and the environment, preparation and discipline.

Sun Tzu states that the general should know himself and the enemy in order to be victorious (Page 19). I believe that holds true for most roles that we play in our professional and personal lives. As a manager in a business, we need to have a deep understanding of our organization’s strengths and weaknesses. Only then will we be able to devise an appropriate strategy. It is equally imperative to understand the strong and weak points of our competitors. The Art of War also discusses the knowledge of Terrain (Page 55) as essential for any endeavor. We so often hear about companies in the business world making decisions of venturing into an unknown territory without going into detailed analysis of the market dynamics. Ikea made some hasty decisions early on to enter some European countries only to back-track later. Nokia’s exit from the Japanese cellular-phone industry is a recent example. Even in our personal lives it is crucial for us to base our decisions after careful analysis of how the various choices fit in with our goals and objectives. I find myself engaged in such deliberation these days and The Art of War among other books in this seminar have strengthened my resolve that in order to be successful, we need to do something that we have the skill-set for and with which we are at peace internally.

Another important take away from this text for me was the belief that we can never emphasize enough on preparation. A lot of the battles are won even before the fight starts. In business situations, we may find are selves in an unknown environment without adequate preparation. It is less favorable to have a ‘reactive’ strategy and with any situation, be it business or personal, sufficient preparation enables us to be two-steps ahead of the rest.

Related to the theme of preparation was the importance attributed to discipline throughout the book. The book goes into alarming examples of discipline that some of the Chinese generals held for their armies (the one on Page 55 stands out) and how they ensured that their orders were carried out. It is very important that the subordinates hold a certain degree of respect for the leader. The leader should make an attempt to befriend his followers but at the same time she should ensure that the respect and belief that they have for her is not compromised. It was interesting to read that the principles of people-management during those times were extremely similar to what gets taught in management programs these days. Something that really struck me was the crucial principle for a leader to be impartial. Having the experience of working in a developing country, I can vouch that nothing lowers morale in a team than a display of nepotism by the leader. The leader creates (in some cases) and protects the system. If the people working under her supervision believe that their performance will be awarded and they will not be unduly treated then they will be extremely loyal to the leader and the organization’s cause. This is how the team will become better than the sum of individuals and the leader would be able to move forward with her plans. All in all The Art of War was a thoroughly insightful read and I have feeling I will be referring to it on numerous occasions in future as well.

Every Second Counts by Donald McRae

Every Second Counts is a very fascinating book and has made a profound impact on the way I think about my personal and professional lives. It made me think about the goals in my life and how I was preparing myself to achieve them. Furthermore, it forced me to think about the legacy that I want to leave behind. Donald McRae does a phenomenal job in painting the intertwined lives of four people and how these played out according to each individual’s personality. This book is not a story of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ guys. There are numerous positive takeaways even from the likes of Christiaan Barnaard. McRae rightly points out that there might have been flaws in his character but he did contribute immensely to his profession.

First lesson learnt from the book was that every person needs to develop short-term and long-term goals in their professional lives. Shumway, Lower, Kantrowitz and Barnaard developed a focus to their careers – achieving and perfecting human transplant. This focus was important because all eventually contributed massively to the field and had successful professional careers. It was also interesting to know that Shumway, who was the greatest amongst the lot, seemed to enjoy his work the most. It was not that he was trying to prove a point to the world like Barnaard. He had genuine interest in his job. So I believe that a person has a greater chance of achieving professional greatness if he/she chooses a job that he/she enjoys the most.

Another aspect of this story that impressed me was Christiaan Barnard’s belief in himself. This is a characteristic that we have seen in most great leaders. As soon as he saw Lower perform the dog transplant operation in Richmond, Barnaard knew in his mind that he could also do it. The lesson learnt here was that we need to develop a confidence in our abilities. Of course it is important to develop and hone our skills as well but I am if Barnaard did not have the faith in his skills, he would not have achieved what he managed in the end. One could very easily relate to the emergence of doubt in Barnaard’s mind when he was in the scrub room before Washansky’s transplant (Page 205). Fear of failure often lets people down. But at that time it is important for him to have a belief in himself. An able aid in Marius Barnaard was also helpful and highlights the importance of surrounding yourself with a smart team to support you in the most critical moments.

Every Second Counts, I feel, is about defining “success” in life. The fame and glory Chris Barnaard achieved was short-lived because he could not overcome the flaws in his characters. It reminded me about David Gergen’s analysis of Nixon in Eyewitness to Power. Barnaard let his darkness get the better of the intelligent doctor. He lost respect of both his peers and his family. He won the race to the first transplant but lost so much more. In contrast Shumway, Lower and Kantrowitz were revered by their peers. Shumway especially was extremely magnanimous when he could have easily hopped on to the band wagon and criticized Barnaard. He still chose to identify Dr. Barnaard’s contributions when asked to comment on him. That is the kind of person I would like to be. The story of Dr. Shumway is evidence that you do not have to brag about yourself to the world to prove that you are a big-shot. Good work gets recognized and pays off. Another valuable lesson underlined through Shumway’s description is that a leader should be gracious in giving praise to subordinates. It was no wonder that Stanford became a world-class research institute on heart-transplantation under Shumway because he was so eager to give credit to his team. This, along with finding a focus in profession; developing self-belief and defining “success” in life are few of the important lessons I learnt from this book.

Colin Powel's American Journey

I had a bias against this guy because of his involvement in the Iraq Invasion in 2003. Even though he did speak out against it later on and resigned from office, I don't believe he has come out of it clean. But there are some good aspects of his life that he brings out in this book and that is what this note is about.

It is very impressive how Colin Powel has maintained a connection with his roots at the Bronx in spite of all his accomplishments. My American Journey to me was an admirable story of a man who was pitted to contest for the position of the most powerful office in the world and I believe his sense of humility had a large part to play in his successes. Colin Powell was brought up in a fashion not to take anything for granted and did not have qualms about work which might have hurt other people’s ego. In one of his earlier jobs, he mopped the floor of a bottling plant with the belief that all work is honorable. As can be seen from his career later on, such an attitude pays dividends in positions of leadership. It enables the leader to connect with his subordinates. Like the time when he underwent training for tanks even though he was not required to. It is natural to develop respect for a leader who comes down to the assembly line or runs the 4-mile jog with the subordinates. My primary take-away from this book is that a leader needs to earn the trust of her subordinates and in order to do this, she should break all redundant bureaucratic layers and lead from the front without letting her ego come in the way.

My favorite passage in this book was the description of Hank “The Gunfighter” Emerson’s farewell parade in which he concluded by commanding his officers (Colin Powell included) to salute the soldiers. This is another theme that I picked up from this book. That in order to maintain a winning team, it is important for the leader to have a genuine sense of responsibility for the team. This was evidenced in Powell’s description of leading the Perishing Rifles in his high-school days to the time he spent in West Germany as Commanding General and his tenure as the Chairman of Joints Chief of Staff in the White House. It was impressive to read how Powell threw support behind Norman Schwarzkopf, the CINC during the Gulf War and took the heat from Dick Cheney and other senior White House officials. Lesson learnt from Powell’s experience was that a leader should first get the best people on board, work hard on getting the team ready in meeting the target and back the team in front of her peers and superiors.

Optimism is something that comes across as a pre-requisite in every effective leader we have studied so far. The most inspiring aspect about Powell’s achievements was the fact that he accomplished those in an era in which he could easily have been discouraged due to the treatment meted out to the African-American community. Great leaders take strength from positive energy and radiate optimism themselves. Powell tended to see the good in the society and the individual and I thought this was very important in achieving the level of success that he did. The mood of the leader makes a huge difference to the team and this is a vital lesson for any budding manager.

This book gives hope to the readers, whether they are American or not. Not only is it a story of a person who did not let a humble background or his skin-color interfere with his path to glory, it holds valuable lessons in working with and managing people.. As a business student, I have found it particularly enjoyable for the lessons of people-management that it holds. Furthermore, the emphasis to family was an important aspect of this book. Powell is a man content with himself and his surroundings and aware of his responsibilities and position in a society. He had an opportunity to contest the President’s office but he chose not to. That forced me to think about a balance in life which I believe is very important in the fast-paced world of today.

Nelson Mandela's Long Walk to Freedom

Other than being an incredibly inspiring story of one man’s determination for a cause, Long Walk to Freedom contains tremendous leadership insight. Nelson Mandela was an excellent judge of people and that was one of the fundamental reasons for his success. Other themes of his leadership that leapt-out to me were the importance of emotionally-detached decision making, selflessness and relentless optimism.

A leader needs to use her/his understanding of the people to make them feel comfortable around her/him. This ensures winning the trust of the team and that the concentration of the entire unit is in achieving the common goal. In this respect, I think there was a similarity between Ronald Reagan and Nelson Mandela. Both possessed a unique talent of keeping attention away from themselves and focusing it on their teams. This made the people around them feel valued and inspired faith in the leader’s judgment. There is evidence of this throughout the book but the passage that struck me most was when Nelson Mandela reacted to President Botha’s call to trade his freedom from imprisonment for renouncement of violence (Pg 522). Mandela’s message that was read out to the ANC supporters began by praising and endorsing Oliver Tambo’s leadership of the ANC. Acts like these strengthened the bond at the top of the organization which was essential for a united effort. Before taking any major decision, Mandela consulted with his ANC team and incorporated their feedback. Even when he took the crucial decision of initiating dialogue with the government, he mandated that the ANC Executive Council was ultimately responsible for holding the actual negotiations with the National Party representatives.

Another valuable take-away from this book from a leader’s perspective was that it is very important to avoid making decisions influenced by pride or embarrassment (Pg 218). Mandela was very tactful in handling the negotiations of ANC and the National Party. When President de Klerk’s inclination towards progress seemed insincere and ANC members were persecuted by state-sponsored acts of violence, the ANC leadership was outraged and called for resuming armed resistance. Mandela realized that it would not fulfill the strategic purpose of the negotiations and attempted to channel the anger through mass rallies, a means that would not wash away the progress made through negotiations (Pg 604).Nelson Mandela’s achievements also were made possible by his outlook towards life. He was fundamentally an optimist and chose to see the good in every person he interacted with. This is a major lesson that the future generation can learn from him. I have often noticed that a large number of people tend to be negative about life and identify flaws in everything they come across. It is not only a difficult task to work alongside such an individual but it is extremely discouraging to have someone like that as your manager or leader. By opting for a life of a freedom fighter, he sacrificed his desire to be a family-man and went through periods of grief owing to this. He easily could have moved away from his objectives during the decades he spent in prison but maintained an unwavering belief in his cause and remained optimistic about emerging victorious. These are the traits that we all can benefit from in both our professional and personal lives.

The Status-quo Trap

The text below is taken from a friend's facebook profile who googled it.

"The source of the status-quo trap lies deep within our psyches, in our desire to protect our egos from damage. Breaking from the status quo means taking action, and when we take action, we take responsibility, thus opening ourselves to criticism and to regret. Not surprisingly, we naturally look for reasons to do nothing. Sticking with the status quo represents, in most cases, the safer course because it puts us at less psychological risk."

Bill & Dave by Michael Malone

Among the numerous qualities of Dave Packard and Bill Hewlett described in Michael Malone’s book, humility is the one that resonates the most with me. I was most impressed in learning how humbly HP conducted its business under the leadership of its founders. Michael Malone’s analysis of the importance of Charlie Litton in polishing Packard’s view on the way to live a successful life was a delight to read (page 65). It made me re-think on how to define “success in life” and strengthened the resolve that it does not necessarily derive from material wealth. The founders’ spirit of enjoying their livelihoods and finding happiness in simplicity of lifestyle went a long way in enabling them to devise policies which translated into the long term success of HP.

Another important leadership characteristic that I discovered to be extremely important is to develop a sense of loyalty towards the company’s stakeholders. The relationship between HP and Ernie Schiller, the company’s first cabinet maker (page 83) was awe-inspiring. For me, this is a lesson of a company having its feet firmly on the ground and trying to collaborate with all its stakeholders and ensuring they move on the path of success in unison. One of the key factors in HP’s long-term success was that it attracted and retained the best talent in the industry. The founders viewed their employees as equals and felt responsible for them. For a leader it is very important to ensure that her company is living in harmony with its environment. And it seems it seems a pre-requisite for this is that a genuine feeling of loyalty should come from within the leader.

Bill & Dave is abundant in effective management insight. The examples of Fred Truman’s lab in Stanford to the immediate post-war steps taken by HP’s founders prove that it is always wise to surround yourself with the smartest talent. The manager should set a general direction but always take input from those below her in the company hierarchy. Once a future course is set, the manager needs to refrain from exercising absolute control should focus on empowering the workforce and entrusting the employees with the company’s specific path towards the goal. HP also teaches us that the victories and progress along the way should be celebrated with the employees. The HP picnics, handing-out of Christmas bonuses and coffee-breaks all of which involved direct contact of the CEOs with the entry-level employees in my opinion were excellent techniques of inspiring the employees to lead HP in an increasingly competitive industry.

I feel grateful about reading this book at this particular point in my life. I am about to embark upon a professional career and am choosing between various alternatives. From what I understood from this book, HP achieved greatness because it began with two people starting something that they enjoyed doing. Both Packard and Hewlitt had an interest in their profession. They did not build HP into a multi-billion dollar company because they enjoyed making money, they built it in spite of that. Enjoyment, passion and desire emanate from HP’s story. I understand from Mike Malone’s book, that there was a deeper purpose as well, which was to benefit society. The greatness of Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard, in my opinion, was in their modesty and humbleness. The world would be a much better place if business students like myself emulate people like Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard.

Takeaway from Eyewitness to Power by David Gergen

One of the major themes that struck me while reading this book was how important it is for leaders to understand themselves. My favorite part was the analysis Gergen performs on President Clinton’s regime and how he went astray. He describes how Bill Clinton lacked an Inner Compass and gauged himself by the way he was perceived by others (Page328). I think it is very important for a leader to be at ease with herself for that enables her to focus on the job at hand and how to inspire others in getting it done. This is the primary insight that I drew from this book.

Gergen praises Ronald Reagan’s emotional intelligence and how he used it to his advantage. Three (self-regulation, self-awareness and personal motivation) of the constituents of emotional intelligence deal with knowledge and control of one’s own aspirations, emotions and feelings. A very interesting quote attributed to Winston Churchill acknowledged the perpetual internal struggle of light and darkness which prevails in all political leaders. And that good leaders are effective in overcoming their dark sides. I believe this is true for every individual. If a person in a position of power is at peace within, then she would feel secure about her being in that designation. My impression from working with some corporate managers and supervisors was that they still had not come to terms with the fact that they held a position of higher responsibility. They felt a need to assert their power and prove a point. We can compare that with Gergen’s analysis of President Clinton and how he drew attention to himself as opposed to Ronald Reagan, who diverted attention away from himself. It is thus easy to imagine how the latter could have inspired the people around him.

Another interesting aspect of the book was the preference of management and reporting amongst the US presidents. From the spokes-of-the-wheel concept adopted by Gerald Ford to the triple-headed structure during the Clinton Presidency, Gergen was very effective in identifying the shortcomings. The idea that an organization cannot afford to have multiple decision makers at the top resonated with my beliefs. At the same time it is important for a manager to have a flat organizational set-up with effective delegation and empowerment at play. It is important for a leader to recognize that the position of responsibility requires taking blame for wrong decisions and ultimately she needs to be the one endorsing everything. The leader should ensure that his organization is inclusive and process flows are smooth without being overwhelmed by unnecessary information. This was one of the major shortfalls of President Ford’s earlier years in office. The best structure is one of inclusion and delegation but contains a hierarchy placing information filters in the form of reliable aides which pass on the relevant information to the leader who ultimately takes sole responsibility of the decision made.

Lastly, I would like to discuss a good quality common in most of the US Presidents analyzed by Gergen in his book. Almost everyone realized the importance of learning from history and having historical figures as their idols. I was most impressed by President Nixon’s extensive reading of history and developing a foresight by reading about the past. I believe this applies to people leading corporations as well as to those who lead countries. Historical events bear a tremendous amount of insight to be taken away and the lessons learnt can help tackle complex situations in the present and future. A classic example is the financial crisis that we are witnessing now. If the present financial and economic leadership had learnt the lessons from the US financial crises in the 1980s and the Asian ones of the 1990s, we might not have been in as deep a pit as we find ourselves presently.