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Leading a company or organisation is a service

May 14, 2023 Melanie Hawken

by Lionesses of Africa Operations Department

“We’ve placed over time so much emphasis on notions of assertiveness and strength that we have assumed it means you can’t have those other qualities of kindness and empathy.” – Jacinda Ardern.

Having run New Zealand as Prime Minister for many years, Jacinda Ardern knows a thing or two about assertiveness and strength. She also led from the front in kindness and empathy during some very tough times. Indeed many believe that her ability to marry these two seemingly diverse (for some) groups, made her the global leader that she absolutely was and is still to this day.

What many don’t recognise is that it is entirely possible to marry assertiveness and strength with kindness and empathy in business. Indeed as we move further from Milton Friedman’s  famous saying of “The business of business is business" and deeper into the triple bottom line of People, Profit and Planet, it is almost essential.

So why do Boards with the control to hire and fire CEOs often fail to recognize this essential marriage in attributes, skills and strengths, but concentrate instead almost exclusively on assertiveness and strength, especially as these can easily slip into arrogance. Yet another decision goes well, the results are spectacular, the Board celebrates, shareholders cheer…Ego rises!

“He is a charismatic leader who inspires people to follow him. A strategic thinker who can master the details. A tireless worker with incredible focus and problem-solving skills. He is well-liked by his employees but is also able to make and execute unpopular decisions. Above all, he is an exceptional communicator who can convey a vision to any audience, from Wall Street to the most junior employee.” - the perfect CEO, but according to Forbes (here), this is actually a ‘portrait of a corporate psychopath, provided by a law enforcement official’.

Psychopath? The numbers are astounding - with 1% of the general population and up to 15% within prisons, the number of psychopaths or those exhibiting psychopathic behaviour amongst CEOs are considered to be closer to the prison rate of 15%! Given the ‘Psychopathy Checklist’ as devised by Cooke and Michie (2001) (here) we are actually surprised it is not larger:

“Arrogant and deceitful interpersonal style: impression management or superficial charm, inflated and grandiose sense of self-worth, pathological lying/deceit, and manipulation for personal gain.

Deficient affective experience: lack of remorse or guilt, shallow affect (coldness and unemotionality), callousness and lack of empathy, and failure to accept responsibility for own actions.

Impulsive and irresponsible lifestyle: impulsivity, sensation-seeking and risk-taking, irresponsible and unreliable behavior, financially parasitic lifestyle and lack of realistic, long-term goals.”

Go on admit it - you could recognize a few CEOs in that list!

“I would say that psychopaths or people with psychopathic traits, thrive in chaos and know that others don’t, so they will often create chaos at work for this reason,” according to Tara Swart, a neuroscientist and faculty member at the MIT Sloan School of Management. As if by magic and following nicely on from last week, Elon Musk (hmmm…not quite sure why his name suddenly sprung to mind) just brought in a woman as the new CEO of Twitter, some might say almost the definition of chaos since Elon took over. As we wrote: “Christine Lagarde (President of the ECB) has often said: “I have a theory that women are generally given space and appointed to jobs when the situation is tough…In times of crisis, women eventually are called upon to sort out the mess…”. Chalk up another one Christine!

So how can we change any of this? If as we highlighted from the FT (here): “Bad cultures are often created by senior leaders…if the CEO believes in a way of behaving, that’s what will happen”, a CEO has incredible power for both good and for bad. How do we ensure that our CEO (if we have appointed one) or ourselves if we own the company and are still in that position, uses power wisely?

“Power tends to corrupt, absolute power corrupts absolutely”, is the saying by Lord Acton a British historian and this has often turned out to be true, but only if one sees your role as running an organisation as your organisation, that you own it and not how it should be, as a service to the organisation, for the customers, for the employees, for the shareholders, for the local community and of course for the planet. Even if you do ‘own it’, your responsibilities are to so many others, first.

If one looks at the CEO’s role as a service, then all things change. A service, has limits. You cannot just do what you want, you would not employ unqualified relatives, you would not misuse company money, you are not there to make friends, you would not allow drunken and debauched actions to take place on company property or during company time, you would instead ensure that the company is at all times a safe space for all employees building the company for the future, not your future. This is especially true when it is actually your company as well.

The ones who see running a company as a service are most often attracted by things other than power. They also say when they are wrong. As the Harvard Business Review state (here): “If a leader cannot admit being wrong in a timely fashion, he or she can never correct mistakes, change direction, and restore success. The consequences get worse the longer denial prevails…The arrogance of success is well-known. Powerful people start to believe that they are above the rules.” Take a look at the reactions of the CEOs in the terrible cases we have highlighted recently - their knee-jerk reaction has always been it was someone else’s fault. Almost like parents who do not buckle up their children in cars “Oh, it’s so difficult to get them to comply.” Seriously - who is the adult here?!

There is no doubt that admitting mistakes is a start, then one can rectify them quickly.  One does not even have to clamber to the top of a mountain and yell: “I was wrong, please forgive me!”, simply admitting to oneself that one is human is a start. One must also remember that others are human and so even your employees can make mistakes. If your role is of a servant you will be far less likely to come down on them like a tonne of bricks, ensuring not only that mistakes can be quickly rectified, but also that future ones will not be hidden.

As the poet Alexander Pope, wrote (here):

“Good nature and good sense must ever join;

To err is human; to forgive, divine.”

This does not show weakness, this does not mean that you are not assertive and strong. True power does not come from using power, but from holding back. As Jim Kilts, the former Gillette CEO, said of himself: “often wrong, never uncertain.” A powerful yet at the same time, strangely humble statement. In this day and age with so much uncertainty, one must be nimble, able to change and certainly able to admit errors AND most importantly, we must carry our employees with us. They will feel, understand and believe in your and their providing of a service to the organisation for the future. Leaders lead their employees along with them, through balancing assertiveness and strength with the powerful kindness and empathy. This is why it is called Leadership, not ‘Pushership’ or ‘whip-them-into-linership’.

By understanding our role as one of a servant to the company, there are no wrong decisions, only ones taken at the time with the available information and coming from a true place for the good of the company. All decisions will be (as we suggested last weekend), guided by your values, will be delivered with kindness and empathy, yet assertively made and strong, and most importantly, will be received openly and honestly by all. Yes your decisions might be wrong, but then (thankfully) one’s ego will not be part of the solution.

Go to the people.

Live with them. Learn from them. Love them.

Start with what they know.

Build with what they have.

But with the best leaders, when the work is done, the task accomplished, the people will say

“We have done this ourselves.”     

― Lao Tzu

This is our Leadership.

It is a service.

Stay safe.

In Team Lioness Tags Leadership
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