the contrarians guide to leadership

8/15/2019 The Contrarians Guide to Leadership

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In this issue:

Boost...your personal effectivenessby learning the seven lead-ership principles that bring better results than following conventional wisdom.

Improve...your ability to analyze yourchoices independently andcreatively by developing theskills for “thinking gray”and “thinking free.”

Master...the leadership skill of “lis-

tening artfully” to acquirenew ideas and gather andassess information.

Maximize...the value you get out of experts by discovering howyou can use them to youradvantage without being used by them.

Make...better decisions by following two rules: (1) Never make

a decision that can be dele-gated, and (2) Never makea decision today that can beput off to tomorrow.

The Contrarian’s Guide toLeadership

by Steven B. Sample

A summary of the original text.

If you want ordinary resultsin your business, you might

succeed with the convention-al approach to leadership.But if you want truly excep-tional results — highemployee morale and loyalty,lower costs, and recordprofits — you need to take acontrarian view.

Contrarian leadership isbased on the following seven

principles:

1. Think gray.

2. Think free.

3. Listen artfully.

4. Use experts withoutletting them use you.

5. Put off making decisions,and delegate as many of them as possible.

6. Know which hill you’rewilling to die on.

7. Work for those who workfor you.

In this summary, we'll dis-cuss how you can use each of these principles to improve

your effectiveness as aleader.

THINKING GRAY AND

THINKING FREE

Contrarian leaders thinkdifferently from the peoplearound them. In particular,such leaders are able tomaintain their intellectual

independence by thinking gray, and they enhance theirintellectual creativity bythinking free.

Conventional wisdom consid-ers it a valuable skill to beable to make judgments asquickly as possible. Butcontrarian wisdom arguesthat, for leaders, judgmentsabout the truth of informa-tion or the merits of newideas should be arrived at asslowly as possible, and inmany cases not at all.

Instead of leaping to a con-clusion, often the smartestthing that you can do is tothink gray. Thinking grayis an extraordinarily uncom-mon characteristic thatrequires a good deal of effort

Volume 12, No. 1 (2 sections). Section 1, January 2003

© 2003 Audio-Tech Business Book Summaries 12-01.

No part of this publication may be used or reproducedin any manner whatsoever without written permission.

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to develop. But it is one of the most important skills youcan acquire.

Many people are binary andinstant in their judgments.In other words, they immedi-ately categorize everything as good or bad, true or false,

black or white, friend orfoe. A truly effective leader,however, needs to be able tosee the shades of gray in asituation in order to makewise decisions as to how toproceed.

The essence of thinkinggray is this: Don’t form anopinion about an importantmatter until you’ve heardall the relevant facts and

arguments, or until circum-stances force you to form anopinion without access to allthe facts.

F. Scott Fitzgerald oncedescribed something similarto thinking gray when heobserved that the test of afirst-rate mind is the abilityto hold two opposing thoughts at the same time,while still retaining theability to function.

Thinking gray is not a natur-al act, especially for peoplewho see themselves as lead-ers. Our typical view of great leaders is that they arebold and decisive people whoare strongly governed bytheir passions and preju-dices. Who could imagine aTeddy Roosevelt or a Vince

Lombardi thinking gray? A black-and-white binaryapproach to thinking may infact be a successful strategyfor some leaders, especially if they must deal daily withfight-or-flight situations.But even many of the world’smost noted military leaderswere skilled at thinking grayon the battlefield. Napoleon,

Washington, and Rommelall knew the value of sus-pending judgment aboutimportant matters until thelast possible moment.

The fact is that you don'tneed to classify everything you hear as true or false,

good or bad, right or wrong,useful or useless. In manycases, you will never have toreach a conclusion at all.

But most people give in tothe natural compulsiontoward binary thinking.For leaders, this can bedangerous for three reasons:

• You can form opinionsbefore it is necessary to

do so, and close yourmind to facts and argu-ments that come to yourattention later.

• You can "flip-flop" fromone argument to another.First you hear one argu-ment, and decide it mustbe true. Then you hearan opposing argument,and decide the firstargument must be false.

• You can give in to thetendency to believe whateveryone else believes,even if it isn't true.

Thinking gray is only neces-sary for the weightiest of issues. If you were toattempt to think gray abouteverything, your brain wouldbecome a jumbled mess.

Decisions about clothes, food,and so on are usually madein an off-the-cuff binary way,and that’s perfectly fine.

A close cousin of thinking gray is thinking free —free, that is, from all priorrestraints. It’s popular thesedays to talk about "thinking out of the box" or "brain-storming," but thinking free

takes that process of inven-tiveness to the next level.The key to thinking free isfirst to allow your mind toentertain really outrageousideas, and only then applythe constraints of practicali-ty, legality, cost, time, andethics. As with thinking

gray, thinking free is anunnatural act.

Improbable though it mightsound, thinking free can leadto novel ways of addressing some of the competitive,political, legal, policy, andbureaucratic challenges youmust confront as a leader.The key is to break free for

just a few minutes from theincredibly tight constraints

that rule your thinking almost all of the time, evenwhen you dream or engage inso-called free association.

The author, Steven B.Sample, is an electrical engi-neer and inventor whosepatents in the field of digitalappliance controls have beenlicensed to nearly everymajor manufacturer. He hasobserved that most newinventions are new combina-tions of existing elements tosolve a problem in a way noone has thought of before.His favorite way to stimulatethis kind of thinking is toforce himself to contemplateoutrageous and impossibleways to address a problem.

For example, in 1967, he wasstruggling to invent a

replacement for the clock-motor timer that controlled adishwasher. He lay on thefloor and forced himself toimagine various things con-trolling a dishwasher.

Among the possibilities heconsidered were hay bales,elephants, planets, ladybugs,sofas, microbes, newspapers,French horns, electrons, andtrees.

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Before long, he saw in hismind's eye an almost com-plete circuit diagram for adigital electronic controlsystem for a home appliance.This system was unlike any-thing he or others had evercontemplated before, and hisinvention was eventually

used in hundreds of millionsof home appliances aroundthe world.

The same approach to think-ing free can lead to new waysto address the challenges youface as a leader. It allowsyou to imagine differentorganizational combinationsin your mind, and to see howthey will play out. It enablesyou to move people around in

your mind, and grasp howthey would respond to newsituations. It lets you moveresources and budgetsaround, and discern howthose moves would affect thebottom line.

But really thinking free ishard work, and it usuallyrequires a good deal of effortand determination beyondsimple daydreaming or men-tal freewheeling. It’s toughto break out of the deep rutsin which our minds normallyrun.

Of course, elephants and haybales never found their wayinto the invention of the newway to control a home appli-ance. The solution to theproblem involved a simplecombination of standard

electronic components — sosimple that it is surprising that no one had ever thoughtof it before.

But that's the way it is withso many innovations. Theyseem so obvious once they'vebeen discovered anddeployed. Prior to thattime, they are anything butobvious. Thinking free lets

you discover them.

It’s well known amongengineers that the mostimportant inventions in aparticular field are oftenmade by people who are newto that field. Newcomers aretoo naïve to know why some-

thing can’t be done, and aretherefore able to think morefreely. The same is true of the leadership of companies:It’s often a fresh perspectivefrom the outside that canturn an ailing organizationaround.

A RTFUL LISTENING

To think gray and thinkfreely, a leader must beskilled at listening. Mostpeople, including many lead-ers, are terrible listeners.They make the mistake of thinking that talking is moreimportant than listening.But contrarian leaders knowit is better to listen first andtalk later. And when they dolisten, they do so artfully.

A contrarian leader is an art-ful listener because it is anexcellent means of acquiring new ideas and gathering andassessing information.

If you listen attentivelywithout rushing to judgment,you will often get a freshperspective that will helpyou to think independently.

You must listen carefully

to your official advisers,especially those in yourinner circle. You must alsooccasionally listen to self-appointed advisers, even themost obnoxious among them.

And you need to continue tolisten to your inner voice,which reflects your own per-sonal experience and creativeimpulses.

Artful listening is impor-tant for maintaining yourintellectual independence. Itenables you to see thingsthrough the eyes of yourfollowers, while at the sametime seeing things from yourown unique perspective,a process we’ll refer to as

"seeing double."

Artful listening meanshearing what others have tosay about important issues,without surrendering yourprinciples or creative judg-ment. It means avoiding becoming immobilized byconflicting points of view, andnever letting others beresponsible for fashioning your own unique vision.

Listening artfully goesbeyond merely listening pas-sively. Instead, you becomeintensely interested in what’sbeing said, and draw out theother person. In the process,you gain not only additionaldetails, but also valuableinformation on the filtersand biases of the personpresenting the information.

Active listening, with rele-vant and probing questions,can help you find out if thespeaker is being slipshod ormeticulous in his reporting,and can create an atmos-phere of accountability inwhich the speaker realizeshe has to be able to supporthis argument with data.

Beware when an adviser tells

you that "Our customerswant this," or "Our employ-ees are upset about that."The contrarian leader nevertakes such counsel at facevalue; the first question heasks is, "Who is saying whatto whom?" It's important toknow whether the persongiving the advice is commu-nicating the opinions of twopeople or 200, and whether

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he heard those opinionsdirectly or indirectly.

An important part of artfullistening is to know when tostop listening. At somepoint, you must either makea decision yourself or dele-gate it to someone else, and

then move on. The goodnews is that listening care-fully and intensively at thebeginning can save you a lotof time at the end.

Earlier we discussed thevalue of thinking gray. Butit’s also possible to "listengray." An important part of thinking gray is listening gray by absorbing stories,reports, complaints, and so

on, without immediatelyoffering a definitive response.

Moreover, you are in aposition to hear thingsdifferently from how they’reheard by followers closer tothe front lines, who may feelcompelled to protect theirstaff or their own policies.Because you are likely tobe more detached from asituation, you can riseabove defensiveness andacknowledge concernswithout making judgments.

Just as you can think graywithout ever needing toreach a conclusion, you canlisten gray without everneeding to deliver aresponse. Sometimes aresponse is not really neces-sary, and sometimes no

response at all is the bestresponse.

One final aspect of listening gray is that you shouldn’tmake up your mind aboutpeople’s credibility unlessand until it is necessary.Many failed leaders felt theyhad to decide right awaywhether someone was worthlistening to. They tended to

write off apparent fools, onlyto find that inarticulate peo-ple sometimes have the mostvaluable things to say. Manywould-be leaders are takenin by glib, highly educatedidiots, while dismissing deepthinkers who find it difficultto put their thoughts into

words. The key is to notrush to a conclusion, eitherabout what you hear, or fromwhom you hear it.

E XPERTS: S AVIORS AND

CHARLATANS

Artful listening demandsthat you listen not only towhat is being said, but to

consider who is saying it andwhy. Among the people youmust listen to artfully arethe experts.

It would be difficult toimagine a modern leaderpracticing his craft withoutthe help of experts. Can weeven conceive of someoneleading a complex organiza-tion today without employing a gaggle of lawyers, scien-tists, architects, accountants,engineers, and consultants?Of course not.

But what may be less obvi-ous is the large number of leaders who have beenbrought low by the well-intentioned assistance of experts. So the question is,how can you use experts toyour advantage without

being used by them?The philosopher Eric Hofferonce said that a leadershould pay close attention toexperts but never take themtoo seriously, and never trustthem completely. Manyexperts are more interestedin serving their own egos, oradvancing their own reputa-tions, than in serving their

clients. They get around thisethical dilemma by convinc-ing themselves that theyknow what’s good for theirclient far better than theclient knows what’s good forhimself.

For example, one client of a

graphic design firm wantedto use large type in thesection headings of abrochure because many of itscustomers are elderly andfind it difficult to read fineprint. The graphic designersinsisted that the type had tobe small to preserve the"artistic integrity" of thebrochure. They were appar-ently more interested inimpressing their colleagues,

and perhaps winning anaward, than they were incommunicating their client'smessage effectively.

It isn't just graphic designerswho are capable of this kindof behavior. Architects,interior decorators, businessconsultants, engineers,accountants, lawyers, soft-ware designers, and surgeonscan demonstrate it as well.

Thus, it’s essential for anexpert to be a "deep special-ist" and for a leader to be a"deep generalist." Theexpert’s role is to offergreater insights than theleader has in one area, whilethe leader’s role is to inte-grate the advice of severalexperts into a coherentcourse of action.

Here are three tips for work-ing with experts effectively.

• First, know preciselywhat your goals are, andhow you think a particu-lar expert might help youachieve those goals. Theimportance of knowing what you hope to get outof an expert before you

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call him cannot beoverstated.

• Second, recognize thatthe natural sciences andtheir technologies play anincreasingly importantrole in every aspect of modern life. Therefore,

you need to be sufficient-ly conversant with theseareas so you can chooseyour scientific and tech-nical experts wisely anduse them profitably.

• Third, be suspiciouswhen a lawyer or anyother expert says aconcept is just too compli-cated to explain. Theexpert must be able to

explain to you, in termsyou can understand,everything he’s doing orplans to do.

To sum up, you will getthe most out of an expertif you never become toodependent on the expert,maintain your intellectualindependence, and above all,never delude yourself thatexpertise can be a substitutefor leadership.

THE CONTRARIAN A PPROACHTO M AKING DECISIONS

Decision-making is a majorelement of leadership. Mostleaders exercise a significantfraction of their power andauthority through making

decisions. One of the tests of a leader’s importance iswhether anyone is reallyaffected by, or cares about,the decisions he makes. Anda leader’s legacy is oftendetermined by the long-termeffects of his decisions.

When it comes to decision-making, the vast majority of us have been brought up

with a clean-desk mentality.That is, never put off totomorrow a decision you canmake today. This bit of con-ventional wisdom may begood counsel for managersand bureaucrats, but it’sterrible advice for leaders.

By contrast, the contrarianleader’s approach todecision-making can be sum-marized in two general rules.Let’s talk about each in turn:

The first rule is to never make a decision yourself that can be reasonablydelegated to a lieutenant.The vast majority of deci-sions can be delegated to alieutenant, provided you

have excellent lieutenantsand are able to choose theone among them who is inthe best position to decide aparticular issue. But justbecause you can delegate themaking of decisions to lieu-tenants doesn’t mean you canavoid taking responsibilityfor those decisions, especiallyif things turn out badly as aresult.

This is one of the conun-drums that prevent mostpeople from becomingeffective leaders: Theybelieve that if they have theauthority to decide a certainissue, and if they will be heldresponsible for the decision,then they must personallymake that decision.

But the essence of strong

leadership is the abilityto let subordinates makedecisions. Why? The firstreason has to do with timeconstraints. Making agood decision is hard, time-consuming work, and noleader can make many gooddecisions in a month’s time,much less in a day or a week.So you need to make only themost important decisions,

and delegate the rest.

A second major factor infavor of delegation is that ithelps develop and nurturestrong lieutenants. You can’texpect your lieutenants togrow unless you give themthe opportunity to make

real decisions that will havereal consequences for theorganization.

Finally, if you delegatealmost all decisions to lieu-tenants, you can build amuch stronger and morecoherent organization thanthe leader who tries to makeall the decisions himself.This assertion is counterintu-itive, because one would

think that strength andcoherence would be on theside of the absolute dictator.But here’s the key: Theleader who delegates isforced to build coherence byputting together a team of lieutenants who have sharedvalues and common goals. If he’s successful, his companycan survive the loss of theleader himself, which willalways happen eventually.

Now let's discuss the secondrule of decision-making: Never make a decisiontoday that can be put off to tomorrow. When a staff member presents you with adecision that needs to bemade, the first questionshould be, "How much timedo I have?"

Even then, you can’t take thestaff member’s estimate of the time available at facevalue. It’s often necessary tosharply question a subordi-nate to learn how much timeis really available.

The timing of a decision canbe as important as the deci-sion itself. A long lead timeopens the door for extensive



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consultation and discussion.What’s more, the extra timemight open up many moreoptions than might have ini-tially been available. If youcan delay a decision for a fewmonths, an adversary mightretire, a competitor might gobankrupt, or any number of

other advantageous thingsmight happen.

Once you have chosen a par-ticular decision to makeyourself, and you know bywhat date you must make it,the question remains: Howshould you make it?

It is almost always advanta-geous to consult with yourprincipal advisers and chief

lieutenants. If the decisionis a really tough one, thechances are high that yourkey advisers will be deeplysplit over the issue. In suchcases, you may have anopportunity to use the deci-sion-making process to buildconsensus among your innercircle.

At the very least, you may beable to frame the issue sothat no lieutenant is leftirretrievably humiliatedshould the final decision becontrary to his advice. Thislast point is important,because if a lieutenant is onthe losing side among youradvisers too often, he maysuddenly be excommunicatedby his peers, even thoughyou may wish to retain himas a member of your team.

By contrast, it’s perfectlyacceptable to go againstthe unanimous advice of yourchief lieutenants. In suchcases, the members of yourinner circle may grumble abit, but they will rarely rebelagainst you for deciding notto act on their collectiveadvice.

Another important elementin decision-making is chance,or more accurately, probabili-ties. Machiavelli in The

Prince and the great militarytheorist Karl von Clausewitzin On War repeatedly makethe point that a leadershould always take luck and

probabilities into carefulaccount when making majordecisions. This maximapplies to financial and per-sonnel decisions as well asthose relating to warfare.

In a very real sense, then,decision-making becomes agame of chance in which youare betting against an oppo-nent, or against some set of phenomena over which you

have no direct control, oragainst behavior you cannotpredict.

Most would-be leadersare horrified to think of deci-sion-making as a form of gambling. They prefer tobelieve that, when facedwith a difficult decision, theleader should search forthe single best answer thatwill lead with certainty tosuccess. But such amateurleaders delude themselves.

As Machiavelli points out,slightly more than halfthe outcome of any boldundertaking is due to luck.

A close cousin to chance indecision-making is judgment.Judgment is often the keyelement of effective leader-ship in a broad range of

human endeavors. Of course, judgment shouldalways be informed by factand analysis. But, in mostdecision-making situations,the facts and analysesavailable to you are at bestincomplete, and at worstout-and-out wrong. In theend, you must often rely onyour own good judgment andthat of your advisers.

In most instances, you willbase your decisions on infor-mation and analyses that areprovided by subordinateswho are pretty low on thetotem pole. Occasionally, youshould gather some informa-tion or supervise a particularanalysis first-hand.

It’s amazing how often you’llfind that the allegedly factu-al information you’ve beenreceiving for years about aparticular matter is com-pletely erroneous, notbecause the person gathering the information is incompe-tent, but simply because hemisunderstood what it washe was supposed to count.

Another contrarian disciplinewith respect to decision-making is to completelyignore any sunk costs thatare related to costs incurredor mistakes committed in thepast. Consider the CEO whohas spent $100 million of hiscompany’s capital to acquirean asset that has provento be very unprofitable, andwho now has the opportunityto sell this asset to someoneelse for $25 million.

Rationally, this CEO shouldsell. But time and again,CEOs in this position haveretained the bad asset inorder to avoid having toadmit to themselves andtheir shareholders thattheir initial investment wasa mistake. And more oftenthan not, the asset continues

to depreciate in value.Ignoring sunk costs isextremely difficult. And yetthat is exactly what youmust do to make the bestpossible decision in a givensituation.

Decision-making bringstogether many of the finesttraits of contrarian leader-ship. When it is done well,



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the result is a thing ofbeauty and a powerful toolfor effective leadership.

LEARNING FROM A

LEADERSHIP CLASSIC

One of the prerequisites tobeing a leader is to be famil-iar with the ideas of NiccolòMachiavelli, author The

Prince, the seminal work of leadership. There is a greatdeal we can learn fromMachiavelli, especially afterwe clear away a few of themyths and misconceptionsabout his advice.

Machiavelli’s primary contri-

bution was not a static set of leadership principles, butrather his painfully honestobservations about humannature. Although he lived inItaly from 1469 to 1527,many of his ideas are rele-vant today for leaders of

American businesses. Hereare 10 of Machiavelli’s mostcogent and controversialpoints:

1. Machiavelli was not animmoral man; he hada strong set of moralprinciples. But he wasdriven by the notion of ahigher good: an orderlystate in which citizenscan move about at will,conduct business, safe-guard their families andpossessions, and befree of foreign interven-

tion or domination. Anything that couldharm this higher good,Machiavelli argued,must be opposed vigor-ously and ruthlessly.

2. No policy is without itsperil. A really talentedleader first discerns thepitfalls of each optionand then chooses the

best among them, recog-nizing that there isno perfect or perfectlypopular solution.

3. Men must either becajoled or be crushed, forif you do a person aslight injury he will sure-

ly avenge himself, but if you crush him he cannot.

4. No leader should submitto evil to avoid a war.For example, NevilleChamberlain's failure toconfront Hitler prior toWorld War II didn't pre-vent a war with NaziGermany; this mistakesimply allowed theenemy to build its

strength.

5. Fortune or luck playsthe greatest role indetermining the successof any leader, andfortune favors the bold.

6. In order to achieve thegreatest good, it is some-times necessary to dosomething that is bad.During World War II,when the U.S. droppedatom bombs on Japan,hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians werekilled. Yet the act was

justified by many peopleas a way to prevent evenmore bloodshed if thewar continued. On alesser scale, CEOs wholay off employees to savea company from bank-

ruptcy are following thisprinciple.

7. In newly conquered terri-tory, the leader shouldimplement his harshestacts all at once, butstring out benefits andmercies, so that thepeople might come toappreciate him overtime.

8. The major responsibili-ties of a good leaderinclude: appearing to bea lover of virtue, encour-aging the vocations andtalents of the citizenry,letting men keep theirpossessions, maintaining incorruptible and ethical

ministers and judgesand, above all, defending the principality fromforeign domination.

9. It is all right for a leaderto be either loved orfeared, but not hated.The very best course forany leader is to be fearedand loved at the sametime. But if he mustchoose between the two,

it is better to be fearedthan loved. The reasonfor this is simple: Peopleare more likely to takeadvantage of a leaderwho is only loved thanthey are one who isfeared.

10. Never humiliate anopponent unless you’resure you are able toeliminate him altogeth-er. Over the course ofa successful leader’scareer he will "defeat"many other people,perhaps by buying outanother company, trans-ferring a difficult subor-dinate, or leapfrogging over a set of rivals. A leader can impose a widerange of harsh decisionson his followers and not

be hated by them. But if he humiliates them inaddition to dealing harshly with them, theywill not forgive him, andthey will not rest untilthey have found a way toget revenge.



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KNOW WHICH HILL Y OU’RE

WILLING TO DIE ON

Most people confuse goodleadership with effectiveleadership, but there is anenormous difference betweenthe two.

For example, Hitler was anextraordinarily effectiveleader, but few would callhim a good leader. In fact,most of us would say he wasa monstrously evil one.

It’s relatively easy forpeople to agree on the char-acteristics of an effectiveleader: He has a clear andcompelling vision, inspirestrust among his followers,

chooses capable lieutenants,keeps his eye on the goal,and pushes himself andothers relentlessly.

But it is impossible to assesswhether a leader is goodwithout entering the area of moral values. Consider anold army ethics test. You're asoldier driving a bus down anarrow mountain road. A five-year-old girl suddenlyruns out in front of your busand you can't stop to avoidthe impact. You can eitherdrive off the cliff, killing yourself; or keep going, andkill the girl. Most of thearmy recruits who took thistest said they would go overthe cliff to avoid hitting thechild.

The recruits were then

asked to consider the samescenario, but with 19 othersoldiers in the bus with thedriver. Here the obvious eth-ical choice is to sacrifice thegirl's life to save 20 lives.But many of us could notbring ourselves to actually dosuch a thing.

Such questions are so toughthat most people simply

refuse to address them. Butfacing up to difficult moralchoices is the essence of goodleadership, and often of effec-tive leadership as well.

This kind of moral choos-ing can be summed up as"deciding which hill

you're willing to die on." The "hill" represents the corevalues that you refuse to vio-late under any circum-stances.

This raises some of the mostimportant questions that youmust ask yourself as aleader: How much groundcan you yield and still betrue to your moral core?How far can you be pushed

before you need to walk awayfrom your duties? And whatare the values from whichyou will never retreat, and indefense of which you arewilling, if necessary, tosacrifice everything?

As counterintuitive as it maysound at first, once you havearrived at the answer tothese questions, you should

keep them to yourself. If youreveal to everyone the areasof moral behavior on whichyou are absolutely unwilling to compromise under any cir-cumstances, your adversarieswill almost surely use thisknowledge to ensnare orundermine you.

Most people would beinclined to dismiss thisadvice as reprehensible, or

worse. But the reality isthat a bit of discretion aboutyour inner self is always thebetter part of valor. It’s fineto reveal, or even trumpet,your core values, but be care-ful about telling the worldthe exact location of the hillyou’re willing to die on.

And how do you know whichhill you're willing to die on?

Knowing requires you to beconsciously aware of yourown moral beliefs, and whatthe basis is for those beliefs.The author asserts that if your core moral values arenot religious, or at leasttranscendental in origin,those values may prove very

unreliable in a clutch.

Furthermore, the author con-tends, a leader may be ableto run from his true feelingsabout God, but it is very dif-ficult to hide from them inthe long term. Thus, it isprobably to your advantageto discover and confrontthose feelings sooner ratherthan later. Doing so willalmost certainly help you to

locate your moral center and,in the process, help you tobecome a better leader.

WORK FOR THOSE WHO

WORK FOR Y OU

When it comes to managing employees, it helps toremember the following con-trarian rule of leadership:"Work for those who work for you." In other words,spend about 10 percent of your time hiring your directreports, evaluating them,and either rewarding or fir-ing them. Devote the other90 percent of your time tohelping your direct reportssucceed.

This means that, if you’re not

currently in the process of getting rid of a lieutenant,bend over backward to helphim get his job done. Returnhis phone calls promptly,listen carefully to his plansand problems, help himdevelop strategies for reach-ing his goals. It's not enoughto be a staff person for yourlieutenant; you should be hisbest staff person.



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Leadership is not aboutglamour. It's about getting results. If you want to makean impact, roll up yoursleeves and be prepared toperform a series of choresthat may seem beneath you,but will inspire your lieu-tenants and enable them to

do great things.

Since so much of effectiveleadership involves bringing in the best talent possible,you should be aware of analmost universal humantruth: Most people tend tohire people who are weakerthan themselves. In an idealworld, strong leaders wouldhire people who are superiorto themselves.

Of course, there is always atrade-off between whomyou’d like to have as a lieu-tenant, and who can actuallybe recruited within the timethat’s available for making the appointment. In particu-lar, if the pickings are slim,you must ask whether youcan delay filling the positionbeyond the time originallyallotted, in the hopes thatsomeone better becomesavailable.

One of the worst things youcan do is to rigidly define theresponsibilities of a position,and then try to find a personto match this job description.

You are often better servedby recruiting a really compe-tent lieutenant, and thentailoring a set of responsibili-

ties to fit the strengths of that particular person.Contrarian leaders knowthat it’s great people, notgreat job descriptions,who make an organizationsuccessful.

A primary challenge forleaders is to surround them-selves with people whoseskills make up for their own

shortcomings. Most leadersare more comfortable being surrounded by people whoare similar to themselves. Inparticular, it is seductivelyeasy for an entrenchedleader to chose and retainonly lieutenants who alwaysagree with him and never

seriously resist his initia-tives. But the long-termsuccess of any organizationdemands that the leadernot surround himself withyes-men.

A related factor in the choos-ing of lieutenants is age.Many successful leadersbelieve that between tworoughly equal candidates,one should always choose the

younger. The reason is thatyou can benefit from thefresh perspective that theyounger candidate is likely tobring with him.

Another dilemma is choosing between inside and outsidecandidates. You should notgive the job to an outsidecandidate simply becausehe or she appears to beslightly better than theleading inside candidate.

After all, you already knowthe insider's flaws and short-comings, while most outsidecandidates know how to hidetheir weaknesses during interviews. For this reason,the advice of Derek Bok,the distinguished formerpresident of Harvard, isespecially relevant: An out-side candidate must be at

least two notches above theleading insider to be a goodrisk.

Again, hiring and other per-sonnel decisions should takeonly one-tenth of your time.The other nine-tenths shouldbe used to work for thosewho work for you. One of thegreatest benefits you cangive your managers who

have direct responsibility forrunning the organization isprotection from your supportstaff. Whenever a staff per-son is empowered to act as abuffer between a leader andhis line officers, the resultscan be truly disastrous.

There is a simple solution tothis problem: Instruct yourassistant that whenever amanager calls your office, theassistant should volunteer tointerrupt you and get you onthe phone immediately. Of course, your staff will rarelyavail itself of the opportunityto interrupt you. But what’simportant is that they,and not the assistant, willdecide that the matter they

are calling about can wait.

Every senior lieutenantdeserves a complete andfrank evaluation at leastonce a year. It should beclear that you have spent agood deal of time thinking through the evaluation,and that you have takenpains to identify his or herachievements and failures asmeasured against the goalsthat you set together at thepreceding evaluation.

To a large degree, leaderslive and die through theactions of their chief lieu-tenants. Choosing thesepeople, motivating them,supporting them andevaluating them are among the most important things aleader does. When a leader

carries out these duties well,his cause or organization hasa good chance of flourishing.But if he fails at theseessential tasks, he and hisfollowers are almost certain-ly doomed to failure in thelong run. As a result, theadvice that a leader shouldbe the first assistant to hischief lieutenants is not justsentimental nonsense; it's



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sound advice in your ownself-interest.

FOLLOW THE LEADER

In this portion of thesummary, we’ll examine the

relationships between lead-ers and followers, and howit is that leaders have cometo have power and authorityover the latter. We’ll dothis by examining the 10fundamental realities ofleadership:

The first reality is that beforea person can lead, he mustacquire a set of followers.Sometimes a person is

appointed to a position, likebeing the CEO of a corpora-tion, which comes completewith ready-made followers.

At other times an individual,such as a civil rights leader,must build a set of followersfrom scratch. And quiteoften, in democratic societies,a would-be leader mustconvince a group of potentialfollowers to choose him astheir chief. However, in allthree cases, the individual'spersonality and reputationare often more importantthan his leadership skills indetermining whether or nothe gets the opportunity tolead.

The second reality is that thecontrarian leader knows thatan effective leader must sellhimself first, and his vision

or policies second. Once aleader builds trust in him-self, his ideas are more likelyto be embraced.

The third reality is that evenin inside well-defined hierar-chies such as the military, theability of a leader to entertainhis constituents is important.

After all, effective leadersmanage people’s attention,

and that requires somedegree of entertainment skill.

The fourth reality is that aleader needs to tell a crediblecreation story or myth for theorganization he’s leading.Many effective creation sto-ries are simply myths that

are only partially groundedin reality. A story does notnecessarily have to be 100percent true to be effective,but it must appeal stronglyto the leader’s followers andto those whom he is trying torecruit. Furthermore, mostgood stories will embody theconcept of change. After all,leadership is all about get-ting followers to move in newdirections.

The fifth reality is that effec-tive leaders are able to create,manipulate, and exemplifynot only stories but symbols,

slogans, and mantras aswell. All of these help definein the minds of followers theessence of the leader’s visionand his character. Moreover,the leader often becomes asymbol in and of himself.

The sixth reality is that the great majority of effectiveleaders have an excellentcommand of language, either

spoken or written or both.The spoken word is by farthe most powerful form of communication between aleader and his followers.There's a reason for this:Humans have been commu-nicating orally for hundreds

of thousands of years, whilethe widespread use of thewritten word as a timelymeans of communication isonly a few hundred years old.The human brain is prewiredat the deepest levels in favorof the spoken word; if youwish to really inspire yourfollowers, you must speak tothem.

The seventh reality is that effective leadership almostalways involves a symbioticrelationship between theleader and the led. If thegoals and directions that theleader chooses to emphasizedon’t resonate with his fol-lowers, he won’t be their

leader for long.

The eighth reality is that themetaphor of war is one of themost powerful tools that aleader has for attracting andmotivating followers.Creating a sense among fol-lowers that they are underattack from outside forces,and that they must sticktogether and fight to survive,is the best technique for com-

bating complacency in anyorganization.

The ninth reality is that froma practical standpoint, mutu-al interest between the leaderand his followers often takesthe form of tangible rewardsand punishments, which theleader metes out to recruitand motivate people. Of course, the most popularmedium for dispensing bothrewards and punishments inthe world today is money.However, when used alone,money is not always a veryeffective tool for inspiring people to achieve extraordi-nary goals. You also need toappeal to their pride, andtheir desire to beat out thecompetition.

The tenth reality is that a

contrarian leader of a largeorganization is always searching for ways to inspireand motivate those of his fol-lowers whom he’ll never cometo know personally. One of the most effective ways to dothis is by establishing multi-ple "people chains" thoughwhich the leader’s goals,vision, and values are trans-mitted orally and personally



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to every follower. You maynot be in a position to pro-vide individual attentionyourself to each of your fol-lowers, but it’s essential thatsomeone in your organizationdoes so.

Leaders don’t really run

organizations. Instead, lead-ers lead individual followers,who collectively give motionand substance to the organi-zation. The contrarianleader never loses sight of this fact, which is often amajor reason for his success.


simply decides he’s notcut out to have power andauthority over, andresponsibility for, a largenumber of followers.

Many people aren’t awareof the fact that leadersmust frequently subordi-

nate the things whichthey’re most interested in,or which they feel aremust important, to theurgent and sometimestrivial demands of others.

In fact, based on hispersonal experience, theauthor estimates thatunder ideal conditions amere 30 percent of aleader’s time can be spenton really substantive mat-

ters, and no more than 70percent of this timeshould be spent reactingto, or presiding over,trivial or routine matters.

Newly minted CEOs oftenstep into their new roledetermined to spend mostof their time working onthe substantive issuesthat really count, whiledelegating all the trivial

parts of their job to theirstaff. But the reality isthat most of a topleader’s time must neces-sarily be spent dealingwith the details of the jobif he wants to survive andmaintain his effectivenessover the long haul.

In fact, the real danger isthat the 30 percent of aleader’s effort devoted toimportant matters may

shrink as the press oftrivial and routine mat-ters ultimately consumesall of his time and energy.It requires enormous dis-cipline for the top leaderin an organization tomaintain the substantivecomponent of his job nearthe 30 percent level.

Conventional wisdom

talks incessantly aboutthe pursuit of excellenceat any cost. Such max-ims often make goodsense for followers andmanagers. But the verynotion of perfection isalmost the opposite ofeffective leadership.

Leaders in the real worldare almost always forcedto make trade-offs amongcompeting priorities. If,in a quest of perfection, aleader is willing to allowone of these priorities totake too much of his timeand attention, all theother priorities will surelysuffer and the leader’sorganization will almostsurely fail. Thus, the con-trarian leader’s rule in

this arena is: Anythingworth doing at all isworth doing just wellenough. The tricky job isdeciding what "just wellenough" means in eachparticular situation.

Some people have anexcellent personal radar.These people areextremely sensitive to thethoughts, feelings, and

wishes of others. Otherpeople are gifted with agood internal gyrocom-pass. Such people canstay steadily on course nomatter how many distrac-tions may impinge onthem from every side.

The problem is that nei-ther a good personalradar nor a good internalgyrocompass is sufficientto make a person an

effective leader. Trueleaders need to haveboth. If they’re notblessed with both frombirth, they must eitherwork to develop theattribute they lack, orrecruit a lieutenant whohas the particular propertythat the leader lacks.

B EING PRESIDENT VERSUS

D OING PRESIDENT

One of the hardest thingsto accept about leader-ship is that there’s a bigdifference between being president and doing presi-dent. In other words,many people are disap-pointed when their aspi-rations for high-level lead-ership are finally satis-fied, but then they find

out that they don’t reallywant to do what being aleader really requires.

Leadership is a peculiarkind of calling. Majorleadership roles, particu-larly at the level of a chiefexecutive, aren’t appropri-ate for those who haveachieved distinction inpositions that may be, ina hierarchical sense,lower on the totem pole.

Nor should such personsnecessarily want to takeon positions of leadershipin the institutions ofwhich they are a part.

For example, the bestphysician won’t necessar-ily make a good hospitaladministrator or medicaldean. There is nothingwrong with a person who


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By now, it should be clearthat there is no step-by-

step formula for becomingan effective leader, and cer-tainly not for becoming agood leader. But the sevencontrarian principles we'veexplored in this summarywill help you to break free of

conventional wisdom:

1. Think gray. Try not toform firm opinions aboutideas or people unlessand until you have to.

2. Think free. Trainyourself to move severalsteps beyond traditionalbrainstorming by consid-ering really outrageoussolutions and approaches.

3. Listen first, and talklater. When you listen,do so artfully.

4. Remember that experts can be helpful,but they’re no substi-tute for your owncritical thinking anddiscernment.

5. Never make a decision yourself that can rea-

sonably be delegatedto a lieutenant, andnever make a decisiontoday that can reason-ably be put off totomorrow.

6. "Know which hill you’re willing to dieon" — that is, under-stand which core valuesyou will defend at anycost.

7. "Work for those whowork for you." In otherwords, recruit the best

lieutenants available andspend most of your timeand energy helping themto succeed.

Above all, recognize that youcan’t copy your way to excel-lence. Rather, true excel-lence can only be achieved

through original thinking and contrarian leadership.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Steven B. Sample became the tenth president of the University of Southern California in March 1991. He is anelectrical engineer, a musician, an outdoorsman, a professor, and an inventor. In 1998 he was elected to theNational Academy of Engineering for his contributions to consumer electronics and leadership in interdisciplinaryresearch and education.

Sample is the author of numerous journal articles and published papers in science and engineering and higher edu-cation. His patents in the field of digital appliance controls have been licensed to practically every major manufac-turer of microwave ovens in the world; over 200 million home appliances have been built using his inventions.

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