April 7, 2008

The Importance of Potential Leaders’ Personal Qualities for Our Country

 

Much public political discussion, and certainly private reflection, concerns personal qualities of presidential candidates. Is Barack Obama tough enough? Can Hillary Clinton be trusted? Is John McCain really the high-integrity guy he appears to be?

 

Are personal qualities really important to one’s capacity to be an effective president? Perhaps not regarding the complex conceptual tasks of this impossible job. But for the nature of our country, they mean everything.

 

Leaders exercise great influence over their organizations’ cultures – in ways we understand, and in other ways whose connections are less clear. I remember being surprised during a diagnosis of Boston schools, at how much each school took on the personality of its principal, and how much all the schools took on the personality of the superintendent. This is true of organizations of all sizes at many levels. The personality of an automotive CEO can influence even the nature of the company’s dealerships all over the world.

 

Some sources of this influence are clear. Others are less evident. Individuals interact with the leader, then interact with others, who themselves interact with others, ultimately affecting thousands throughout the nooks and crannies of their organization. This process can seem instantaneous and almost magical.

 

The change management literature discusses the importance of change leaders in large organizations modeling the desired changes. A leader who promotes higher integrity, but cannot act that way until the system allows, is putting energy into maintaining the status quo. To be effective at encouraging change, leaders must be that change in everything they do.

 

In these days of media-created celebrity, where anyone who reaches many people via the airwaves or Internet assumes superhuman persona – even a Britney Spears or Anna Nicole – a president becomes an even more powerful personal influence over the country.

 

Historical periods often reflect a president’s personal qualities. The Kennedy age was one of doing anything we set our minds to do. The Reagan period was one of national pride, but also national greed. It’s OK to make and show-off a lot, whatever is going on around us. This current period may be known as the “Enron age”, with deception in vogue.

 

It is likely our great country will take on some personal qualities of whoever becomes president next January. I wonder what the three possibilities portend for our country

 

John McCain brings an aura of patriotism, war heroism, authenticity and traditional American values that served our country well during much of its history. This image has taken some hits – a banking scandal some years ago and doubts brought about as the Straight Talk Express turned into the Conservative Pander-Wagon during the recent primary campaign. McCain’s focus on the military as the symbol of our strength, including Iraq, scares many.

 

What might an auto dealership look like with McCain as company CEO? I imagine American flags, salesmen telling customers the real bottom line earlier in the negotiations, and generally high integrity, as long as some conservative group isn’t pushing auto-related issues. Stock favors older Buicks and Oldsmobiles over newer, zippier models. Rumors exist of plans for small high-integrity militias to protect dealerships from unethical practices of other companies.

 

Hillary Clinton’s persona represents applying analytical intelligence to important problems, an appealing change after seven years of ideology and negation of facts in decision-making. She also reflects an obsession about winning at any cost, inspiring concerns regarding integrity, honesty and transparency that could have strong negative cultural impact on her overall impact.

 

What about the dealerships with Hillary as CEO? Brilliant solutions are found to endemic problems in inventory control and record keeping. Competition for salesperson and dealership of the year is intense, amid periodic questions about the veracity of sales reports. There are concerns about low trust and conflicts among dealerships and accusations about salespeople hiding car specs and price information from each other. Ads had to be pulled when false claims of dealerships under gunfire from anti-automobile demonstrators became public.

 

Barack Obama has made himself about changing the culture of spin and self-interest that has come to drive Washington politics. He works at behaving in ways consistent with these values of honesty and transparency in a very competitive campaign context. He is about inclusion and process. He proposes ensuring opposing views are at the table, with the entire discussion available on C-Span.

 

What of the dealership under Barack? Real cost figures are available to customers. Salespeople object at first about limits on their negotiating power and short-term profits, but come around as sales and long-term profits of the dealerships and company as a whole reach record levels. Relationships among staff are stronger than ever, resulting in creative new forms of collaboration, among salespeople, dealerships and even other companies.

 

There are concerns about rumors of proposals from the CEO about publicizing all internal memos and data. Fortunately his executive assistant has significant influence on these issues.

 

We voters need to be fully aware of our choices. They go far beyond details of health plans or 3 a.m. phone answering skills. The choices are about what kind of country we want to be and leave for future generations, and the qualities of our leaders that will bring it about.