Does fact-free leadership have to be a common fact of life?

I am a scientist at heart. Being curious all my life, I have pondered big questions and small. For example, if the universe did not exist, would there be nothing? But, what is nothing? Stephen Hawking and many other physicists have enlightened me somewhat but the nature of the universe still seems highly mysterious to me.

OK. That’s a little deep. Nevertheless, I get pretty riled up if it’s obvious that our leaders, particularly those in the political realm, fail to be like a scientist exploring all relevant facets of a situation.

For example, I watched an interview of Lawrence Martin recently about his book Harperland. He could hardly contain his exasperation at the extent to which under Stephen Harper’s leadership facts in any realm are routinely ignored, unless they align with his view. The foundation of Martin’s training in journalism is to seek the truth as it is currently understood and verify with multiple sources. Although knowledge is always in flux, looking for the best of what we know is a fairly good strategy for anyone, including those in leadership and management positions. Otherwise we risk going down pathways that can come back to haunt us.

Lawrence’s bottom line is that democracy is weakened when our political leaders do not pay attention to evidence when shaping policy and strategy. Since organizations in which we work are of necessity becoming more democratic in order to manage risk, innovate and survive, “fact-free” leadership at the political level let alone in an organization can cause unnecessary problems. Not being democratic in approach as a leader seems odd and out of synch with the prevailing view that leaders and managers benefit from being “adaptive” in light of “swampy” problems.

Much has been written on the role of personal bias in decision-making. It plagues us all and is particularly dangerous in organizations as numerous management researchers have documented. While we have some companies that are hundreds of years old, such as The Bay, Stora and Twinings, most fail in 50 years or less (Aries de Geus, The Living Company). Poor decision making is at the root of most failures.

Our cultural upbringing, education and experiences over time all conspire to blind us. To make good decisions requires hard work and time usually though teamwork. As we perpetually live in time-constrained environments and are faced with a vast universe of conflicting knowledge, it is easier to fall back on conventional wisdom until something disrupts it.

So, how do we test conventional wisdom before it boxes us in? How can we challenge our biases when we are not even sure what they are?

Richard Neustadt and Ernest May in their classic book, The Uses of History for Decision Makers offer a methodology:

1. What do you know?

2. What is unknown?

3. What are you presuming?

4. What is the situation like (from past history)?

5. How does the situation differ from others in the past?

6. What is the action supposed to accomplish?

After studying decisions both good and bad made by American Presidents in the 20th century, Neustadt and May concluded that past conditions can offer clues to future possibilities. Look back to look ahead, so to speak. A little bit of critical thinking can go a long way towards better decision making.

The ability to do critical thinking and problem-solving is one of the seven basic skills most often cited by educators for students to succeed in the knowledge economy according to Tony Wagner, a Harvard-based education expert and author of The Global Achievement Gap. Two others are collaborating across networks and curiosity with imagination. These apply equally well to the desired skills for people in the workplace especially for managers and leaders.

Fact-filled leadership with imagination will certainly help fill the global achievement gap. Einstein was right when he said that “the formulation of a problem is often more essential than the solution”. But this cannot happen without an open mind which counterbalances “fact-free” leadership.

It turns out that such openness can enlighten us, educate us and, as a consequence, change our minds. Such a journey is transformative or in Nelson Mandela’s words, “Education is the most powerful weapon with which you can change the world”. It is also a daily endeavour.

The "Tender Beast" in Stephen Harper---His "Big Shaggy"---Isn't Being Felt Much

You can’t understand twenty-first- century politics with an eighteenth century brain.

---George Lakoff, The Political Mind

Descartes’ theory of humans wasn’t quite right. We use emotion to reason and we can’t always be reasonable. How we emote and reason---about 98 per cent--- happens unconsciously. Seasoned political and non-political leaders know this well. But, it can backfire.

As a presenter at the 20th World Conference on Disaster Management on the interplay of charisma, character and confidence in defining a leader’s impact, I conducted an informal survey of my audience. I asked participants to rate on a scale of ten the charisma of ten well-known political leaders, six men and four women, eight of whom are still alive.

Although I flashed a PPT slide of Harper smiling and holding a cuddly kitten, he came in dead last with an almost unanimous rating of zero. Well a couple of people gave him a 1. All others were rated four or better no matter their political persuasion. What’s going on?

George Lakoff in The Political Mind argues that “conservatives” generally operate in a strict parent mode: obedience, authority, discipline and punishment. They value order and don’t like ambiguity. On the other hand, “progressives” on the whole appeal to the nurturing parent model: empathy, responsibility for oneself and empowerment to carry out those responsibilities. They don’t mind chaos and see complexity a lot. Of course there are many who are in-between too. Prime Minister Harper comes across more “conservative” than “progressive”. This despite having implemented what some believe on both sides to be “progressive” policies in certain areas.

In this “Contextual Age” in which we now live, as coined by Daniel Pink where collaboration reigns supreme out of necessity, Stephen Harper’s mindset and subsequent style appear to be out of synch. Sometimes, striking the fear of reprisal into the hearts of people is necessary, especially in an emergency. But, as a daily default, “Big Shaggy” style---not effective.

The participants, from a variety of disciplines, were adamant: Harper is rigid, cold, inflexible, controlling and so on. If charisma is about being “inspiring”, “passionate”, “visionary” and “having a cause”, Stephen Harper simple does not rate.

I don’t think he’s worried either. But, maybe he should be. The management literature is replete with failed leaders who did not connect with people on a positive emotional level. Like damaging the environment, in the long run, it is unsustainable.

Related resources and Blog:

David Brooks (June 7, 2010). “History for Dollars”, New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/08/opinion/08brooks.html 

Daniel Pink (2005). A Whole New Mind.

Linda Pickard. (July 29, 2009). “The Jen Ratio: A More Nuanced View of Emotional Intelligence for Leaders”. http://nkleadership.blogspot.com/2009/07/jen-ratio-more-nuanced-view-of.html

Michael Ignatieff is Appealing to the Wrong Part of Our Brains

If the media reports are any indication, the “get rid of Michael Ignatieff” sounds are becoming louder within the Liberal party. Bring in Bob Rae is the refrain. Will this fix the Liberals dismal showing in the polls?

In that Bob Rae is more “warm and cuddly” than Michael Ignatieff, this might work. Our brains prefer such warmth. But the cost to the Liberal party could be worse. Changing leadership three times in as many years does not sit well with the electorate (“Do these guys know what they are doing?”).

A better strategy would be to work on Ignatieff’s emotional messaging before giving up the ship. He’s not tugging at our hearts enough. That stern look and holding the government accountable for a report card don’t appeal to issues that are at the heart of our evolution like survival, the care of our children and extended families and the well-being of our local communities.

Too much reason from Michael Ignatieff, not enough emotion. He’s little different from Stephen Harper who, in fact, is warming up his image and delivery and distancing himself further from the opposition. We now have a strong image of Harper “letting his hair down” playing a Beatles song on the piano with some decent singing. The Liberals have been outmaneuvered by the Conservatives on reaching the right part of our brains first---that which appeals to our emotions.

From an evolutionary perspective, we reason with our emotions first then make choices based on facts, and figures. “Emotions provide a compass that leads us toward or away from things” as psychologist Drew Westen explains in The Political Brain: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation.

“Feelings” according to Westen are millions of years older than “reason” or conscious thought processes. They are hard-wired into human brains across all cultures. The evolution of our species has predisposed us to being moved by leaders with whom we feel “an emotional resonance”.

There is a caveat. We can easily become turned off by “bad” governance---again an emotional action supported by evidence (or quasi-evidence). The morality of not having the electorate’s best interests in mind eventually costs a political leader. So too in any organization.

Comedian-in-Chief, Fly-Swatter Extraordinaire: Obama Raises the Stakes

I have a cartoon from one of the newspapers showing President Barack Obama responding to a request from Prime Minister Stephen Harper: “Well, I’ll cough on you if you insist, but I don’t think charisma is contagious. Now with additional Obama feats such as swatting a fly successfully within the tenth of a second required and charming the press corps with skillfully delivered good jokes, the bar just keeps rising higher. Harper will need to go to improv school to crack the Obama leadership ceiling.

There’s a spontaneity within President Obama not well-developed in Harper. Comedians know how important that quality is to connect with an audience. That’s why they take improv, or responding and creating in the moment, very seriously. Deep down, it’s a control and trust of oneself issue. Loose or tight. Acting into thinking rather than planning into acting. Tough to do if a leader wants to have everything figured out and never look silly.

Yet, we warm to anyone, let alone a leader, who shows he’s just like us. He has to battle some of the ordinary things in life like swatting annoying flies and not taking life too seriously all the time. When we engage in these day-to-day activities, we don’t always win. The fly gets away because we were not fast enough or the joke goes over “like a lead balloon”.

It could have gone either way for Barack Obama. But, would it have really mattered? Negative results would most certainly have given his critics more reason to doubt his abilities. But, those with a gentler, kinder view would have applauded his efforts because he tried. “No guts, no glory”, as the saying goes.

Plato argued that we are “sitting in a chariot drawn by two horses: reason and passion”. Researchers who study how good decisions are made have found, not surprisingly, that we use both horses to do so. Interestingly, emotions usually lead the way as they make a direct unconscious connection with our actions just as our breathing does. Reason takes a little more work. From an evolutionary perspective, as Joseph LeDoux from New York University describes in The Emotional Brain, connections in our brains from the emotional to the cognitive systems are stronger than connections from the cognitive to the emotional systems.

Given the automatic precedence of emotion over reason in our brains, President Obama has a significant advantage over those leaders who muffle their fun and passionate sides. Like many aspects of leadership, much can be learned. If Prime Minister Harper spent some time with our Second City folks, I’ll bet we’d see a slightly more spontaneous and funny side of him. It would be good for his ratings. His rational, highly competitive nature might just buy into that!