Management Information

By EM Sky

If I asked you what leadership looks like, what would you say? I like to think that we've grown beyond the superficial image of the 1950's--the handsome white male with the strong chin; the tall, athletic build; the thick yet well-manicured mane of dark hair, contrasting so dramatically with the piercing blue eyes. Maybe today the images are a bit fuzzier, allowing for leadership qualities in both sexes, in all races, even in unassuming short people with problem skin.

Maybe.

But even if that's true, even if most of us have moved beyond such limited ideas of leadership, we are still the prisoners of other mythologies--ideas far less visual and far more ancient, and ultimately just as debilitating.

Nine years ago, I learned this truth in a profoundly personal way.

I was working at the time for a small company that was owned by a megalithic monstrosity. I was still in my twenties, and entry-level managers were a dime a dozen. To the seven-figure executives, I should not have been so much as a blip on the proverbial radar screen. But as it happens, an unusual confluence of events catapulted me into the limelight.

First, I was hired by a man who had been diagnosed with terminal cancer.

Bill was to become both my mentor and my champion in the world of corporate intrigue, and in my opinion he remains one of the finest men who ever walked this earth. He is, to this day, sorely missed.

Because of his fading health, he had been forced to turn down an offer to head our division. In name he headed the marketing department as a vice-president, but in truth he had far more clout than that with the high muck-a-mucks of the day. Reporting directly to him put me in a much higher position of "authority by association" than I would normally have merited as an entry-level manager.

Second, the project I happened to be assigned to was a web development project, back in the earliest days of the now mighty WWW. No one except Bill--myself included--had any inkling how fast this "new computer thing" was going to explode. He asked me one day whether I had any Internet experience. I told him that I had used the university computers to send an e-mail or two while I was in grad school.

"Well congratulations," he laughed, "that makes you the most Internet-qualified manager here. As of today, you're responsible for the Internet development project."

"I didn't know we were doing anything on the Internet," I said, surprised.

"We're not," he replied, "so you'd better get to work."

The executives had no idea what the Internet was and probably would have been dragged kicking and screaming into the technological age if it weren't for one simple fact: their competitors were working on an Internet project too, and they were well ahead of us. Suddenly, everyone was intensely interested in what we were doing, and executives who had never stepped foot into our building began to show up on a regular basis.

* * *

The story of that project's development is an odyssey in its own right, but it will have to wait for another day. The lesson about leadership came right at the end of my tenure with the company, so we'll have to skip ahead in the narrative about three years.

Bill's health was rapidly deteriorating, and we all knew he wouldn't be with us much longer. It was a somber time, to say the least.

Despite the emotional turmoil, business continued, as it always does, and the executive team was starting to think about the future leadership of the Internet business. The project had grown from a gleam in Bill's eye to a million-dollar-plus venture in just three years, and the decision had been made to split the venture off as a separate entity. One day the call came down from on high--executive muckety-muck number three wanted my opinion on the subject.

I had a couple of days to prepare, and I spent that time buried deep in numbers and strategic analysis. When the time came, I knew I was ready. In a plush office on the "executive floor"--a large room with a desk the size of my entire cubicle and a wall of windows overlooking the well-manicured grounds below--I carefully laid out my views on the management needs of the new business.

I told Mr. Muckety that the head of the company should have extensive experience in sales because the company would be relying on the existing corporate sales force for its success. The sales staff was a tight-knit group and would never respect an "outsider."

I also recommended experience in creating advertising and promotional campaigns. The parent corporation was counting on extensive growth over the early years of the venture, and good advertising would be critical to achieving that goal.

I suggested operations experience because the company structure would include a large data-entry staff. My list went on, each point thought out carefully, backed up by sound logic regarding both the numbers and the "human factors" of the ongoing operation.

When I was finished, I sat back in my leather visitor's chair, pleased with my presentation. I had remembered every figure. I had rolled every observation off the tip of my tongue with no need to refer to my notes. I nailed it. But I was not prepared for what came next.

"Why didn't you recommend yourself for the position?" he asked me.

"I'm sorry?" I found myself suddenly and profoundly confused. "What position?"

"To head up the company," he replied smoothly. "A lot of people have been watching your work, thinking about your future here. You're an excellent manager, but I'm concerned about your obvious lack of confidence."

"My lack of confidence?" I still didn't get it. I'd been sitting there feeling like the cat who just ate the canary. What lack of confidence?

"I wouldn't recommend myself for the position because it wouldn't be in the best interest of the company at this time. The business needs someone with all of the skills I laid out. I've never worked in sales, I have no experience with advertising, I don't have the kinds of contacts yet that the president of this company should have to maximize our growth potential.

"If you want to offer me the job, I'll be glad to accept it. But you asked me for my honest opinion, and this is it. I'd like to head up the marketing department and report to the president of the company. I enjoy marketing, I'm good at it, and reporting to the president would give me an opportunity to learn these other aspects of the job.

"If it were my decision, I would appoint someone who has the experience already and then groom the directors--myself included--to head up their own operations within a couple of years. With the growth we're going to experience, this will be a tremendous training ground for launching new ventures."

I looked at him expectantly, but he was already shaking his head.

"See, that's what I mean," he repeated. "You're not reaching for the brass ring. You're not showing me that you want it. You need to be hungry to make it in this world, and you need to be confident in yourself."

He finished with a condescending smile and another shake of his head, standing up to signal that our conversation was over and dismissing me with the words, "We'll have to work on that."

* * *

I walked out of his office feeling angry and frustrated and entirely misunderstood. I knew I could do the job, but I also knew that someone with the qualifications I had laid out could do it better--at least for today. Why couldn't he see what I was saying?

I had put myself in his shoes and thought about what would be best for the business. I had shown him that I was a team player. I had shown him that I was willing to put the good of the company ahead of my own ambitions. I had acted with the highest integrity. So what the heck had just happened?

I came to realize later that I had run up against his own personal leadership mythology. In his mind--at least on that day ten years ago--leaders were cocky, even arrogant. Leaders were pushy. Leaders were driven by ambition. Leaders grabbed at what they wanted with no regard for the consequences.

I suppose he felt that these traits equated with a certain fearlessness, a certain stubborn perseverance that could pull a company through hard times. But maybe I'm giving him too much credit. Maybe he was just exhibiting a knee-jerk reaction to a picture of leadership that didn't fit the one in his own head--the picture of leadership that his own experience of the world had drilled into him over the course of the years.

In the end, they hired someone with exactly the qualifications I had laid out that day, which I had to laugh about. As for me, I turned down the offer to head up the data entry team--the marketing director had already been chosen, which is another story unto itself--and I left the company.

I didn't leave in bad blood. I didn't have the heart to stay at the firm knowing that Bill would be gone soon, and he recruited Supreme Muck-a-Muck Number One--a wonderful man and nothing like Muckety number 3--to help me win a fellowship to go to law school.

It was a sad day when I finally packed up my things. Bill and I hugged each other, despite office protocol. It was the first and only time we were to express our friendship in that way. His assistant gifted me with a dictionary and thesaurus set that I use proudly to this day, inscribed with my name and the date: nine years ago yesterday.

What can I say about these people who nurtured me through the early days of my management career, supporting me and caring about me and teaching me everything they knew? They touched my heart with their patience, their laughter, and their compassion, and they will live in my heart forever. Such people always do.

* * *

Bill lost his life to cancer during my first semester at law school. I attended the funeral, of course--to honor Bill's memory and to say goodbye--and that was the last I saw of Mr. Muckety. Sitting here tonight, I wonder whether his image of leadership has changed during the intervening years. While it is not for me to say how anyone else should feel about anything, still I hope it has.

I think there are many, many different forms of leadership in this world--maybe as many unique forms as there are human beings, and I think it's important to honor that, especially as a manager.

Today, whenever I see someone who doesn't look like a leader to me, I understand that I have come up against my own leadership mythology, and I strive to expand that mythology to include the new image. Everyone is a leader, in their own time and in their own way. Rather than impose my personal style of leadership on others, I make a conscious effort to understand theirs and to help them cultivate it in their own natural direction.

The aboriginal peoples of Australia believe that to embrace the fullness of the human experience, everyone must practice being a leader, and everyone must practice being a follower as well. They understand that leading and supporting are both necessary roles in any group endeavor, and they value both equally. I like to ponder how a modern corporation might be structured to embrace this philosophy.

Would we rotate the leadership within each work team? Would we split up projects so that each team member was a leader on one project and a follower on others? Or would we simply expand our understanding of leadership until we could see the ways in which every individual provides different forms of leadership at different times and under different circumstances?

I don't have the answers to these questions yet, but I intend to keep asking them until I do.

Posted by EM Sky, on business, life, and society for the whole human being.