Know and Practice the Eight Universal Laws of Leadership
photo: wikipedia
Peter Drucker recommended a 2000 year old book to his PhD students. He described it as “the first systematic book on leadership, and still the best.” The book was written 2000 years ago by Xenophon, an Athenian-born, military general, a writer, and a student of Socrates. The book was entitled Kyropaidaia and its subject was battle leadership.
Drucker’s recommendation of Xenophon’s book was not a complete surprise. As a veteran with battle experience in several wars I had used and applied my own experiences in industry and in academic organizations and they worked!
I was also familiar with a large study of several hundred thousand combat participants accomplished under U.S. government sponsorship during WWII by leading academics at well-known universities including Harvard, Yale, Princeton, the University of Chicago, and many others. They had analyzed questionnaires, on combat leadership and its effectiveness from American soldiers in battle.
As a West Point graduate, the focus on leadership there had been primarily on preparation for combat. Still, even West Point could not supply the answers to questions I was asking myself at the time regarding whether leadership techniques from battle could or should be adapted for use in industry even though what was taught was both ethical and effective. Because of the environment and dangers, it had to be.
Later, West Point established a Chair of Leadership, and the first occupant was Ms. Frances Hesselbein who was not only Drucker’s friend but had co-authored a book based on the Army’s leadership methods with General Eric Shinseki, a former Army Chief of Staff, and had established a leadership Institute for non-profit executives which is respected and still exists based on Drucker’s principles. Later, when I was president of the California Institute of Advanced Management, I appointed Frances to my Board of Directors.
After gaining my PhD from Drucker I wrote several books based on Drucker’s theories. After reading one, Senator Barry Goldwater wrote me that he agreed that all successful leadership was based on a foundation of basic honesty. This was also a central belief of both Drucker and West Point. Drucker taught that without integrity a leader would fail eventually, while West Point taught that integrity must be scrupulously observed and is critical.
The Combat Leader Research Project and Civilian Leadership
I read an article published in one of the major newspaperswhich proposed that the decline in the number of military veterans who were serving in major government institutions and large corporations was the reason for a decline in those organizations’ effectiveness. If true, I wondered to what extent practices learned by leaders through battle experiences were applied after leaving the military in civilian careers as suggested by Drucker and whether it was necessary that leaders have these actual experiences.
To answer these questions, I developed the Combat Leadership Research Project. The basis of my research was a written survey that I sent to former combat leaders now successful in the civilian pursuits, including government and both profit and nonprofit institutions. I also had conversations and interviews with many others. I asked whether they had applied leadership experiences from battle in their civilian pursuits. Responses I received in the initial phase, included generals and admirals as well as sergeants and junior officers. I asked all whether they had learned ideas from leadership in battle which they had applied in their civilian pursuits. If so, I asked them to identify the three most important actions and what had been the results.
Their responses demonstrated that there were general concepts that successful leaders followed to dramatically boost productivity under stress and achieve extraordinary success in all types of organizations in whatever civilian jobs they had undertaken.
Some Surprising Results
With each respondent identifying three concepts, I expected an encyclopedic list of ideas. The Emperor Napoleon published a list of 115 maxims on the conduct of war. If one combat leader could identify 115 maxims, how many hundreds of different leadership principles would I uncover after analyzing and tabulating the input from so many respondents? I thought that a thousand or more concepts was likely.
In this, I was mistaken. I discovered that about ninety-five percent of the responses I received pertained to only eight basic insights which were significant. However, all respondents had followed one or more of only eight actions which helped them achieve remarkable results in later in civilian careers.
In a latter phase of my research, I interviewed other successful senior business leaders and reviewed dozens of corporate situations and the actions taken by these civilian executives. Some had military backgrounds; most did not. Many had developed their own lists of principles over the years. While their lists frequently differed, they almost invariably included one or more of the eight ideas from my surveys. I also looked at history for further confirmation. Seven thousand years of recorded history gave me an abundance of evidence supporting only eight principles.
The Eight Universal Laws of Leadership
The strength of the results of my investigation motivated me to rename these the universal laws of leadership. I published the results in several books and articles and discussed them over lunch with Drucker. Of course, there were more than eight ideas that were identified, but these eight were those most frequently noted. They were:
1. Maintain Absolute Integrity
2. Know Your Stuff
3. Declare Your Expectations
4. Show Uncommon Commitment
5. Expect Positive Results
6. Take Care of Your People
7. Put Duty Before Self
8. Get Out in Front
Most Frequent Action
There was one action that West Point, Peter Drucker, and Senator Goldwater spoke of – and it was the most frequently noted by combat leaders: maintain absolute integrity. A significant majority of responses included this principle, and many respondents wrote me additional letters or notes expressing the opinion that without basic trust between leaders and followers, the leader would probably have difficulty even if he or she applied other leadership principles properly. Integrity means doing the right thing no matter how difficult. Moreover, lack of integrity can have very bad consequences for any organization and any endeavor that involved trust.
Why Doing the Right Thing is Important
Organizations have succeeded, sometimes against all odds, simply because their leadership maintained absolute integrity. Lands End, Inc., a billion dollar catalog giant, was in trouble several years ago. Paper prices had doubled, and apparel demand collapsed at the same time as a significant postal hike. This was long before the pandemic. Still, third quarter profits were down 60% and falling. Advisors told the CEO, then 34-year old Michael J. Smith, that he should think about laying off employees to improve his bottom line. That would please stockholders.
To Smith, that was an integrity issue. Laying off employees simply to look good was not doing the right thing. So, he did the opposite. He added benefits. What kind of benefits? He added an adoption assistance service and mental health referrals. And even part time employees received full health care benefits. He refused to lay anyone off. “If people feel squeezed, they won’t treat the customer as well,” explained Smith. Results? The following year first quarter profits more than tripled to $4.4 million compared to the previous year. Sales rose 2.3%. Stock price of Lands’ End shares increased 85%.
Even absolute integrity cannot ensure a leader’s success or guarantee a happy ending for himself or the organization. Four years later when competitive pressures and other problems caused sales to again decline, Smith was asked to resign, so there’s no guarantee about anything, but integrity is about doing the right thing or what you believe to be right whether you live happily forever after or not.
Starbucks had problems when President Harold Schultz was establishing his brand in China. He discovered that his employees were concerned about taking care of their parents as they grew older than in the U.S. At company expense he funded insurance policies for his employees enabling the care of their parents in the future when the employee retired or left the firm. Company consultants advised against it, saying that it would cost the company too much. However, Schultz knew it was the right thing to do and did it. It was expensive, but it worked!
When I hear that eventually the leader suffered, I remember what the combat leaders found: integrity, the truth and doing the right ethical action, is more important regardless.
Do Leaders need to be Combat Veterans?
My investigation found that they do not – not so long as they know and practice the eight principles.
* illustration: Xenophon leading his Ten Thousand through Persia to the Black Sea. 19th century
*הכותב ד"ר ביל כהן הנו מומחה בתורת המנהיגות. ד"ר כהן הינו מייג’ור גנרל בדימוס בחיל האויר האמריקאי, בעל תואר דוקטור בניהול מאוניברסיטת קלרמונט. כתב למעלה מ- 50 ספרים שתורגמו ל- 22 שפות בנושאי ניהול ומנהיגות. ביל כהן שימש כיועץ בעמדות בכירות וכמרצה באוניברסיטאות הטובות בארה”ב בינהן ביה”ס לניהול באוניברסיטת קלרמונט וב-UCLA. בנוסף, הוא מעביר הרצאות וסמינרים בנושא מנהיגות בכל זרועות הצבא האמריקאי ובאקדמיה הצבאית וזכה בפרסים על הרצאותיו בעולם. מעבר להיותו גנרל בצבא ארה”ב, ד”ר כהן הנו בעל דרגת רב סרן בחיל האויר הישראלי והשתתף בקרבות אוויר במלחמת יום כיפור. שימש בתפקידי ניהול בכירים במספר חברות וכיהן כנשיא של שתי אוניברסיטאות פרטיות. ביל כהן היה חבר דירקטוריון במספר מועצות מנהלים ומועצות סחר עירונית, ממשלתיות ושל תאגידים שונים.ביל כהן היה תלמידו הישיר לדוקטוראט של פיטר דרוקר אבי תורת הניהול המודרנית שאמר עליו בין היתר כי ” ביל כהן היה סטודנט אשר אני והקולגות שלי למדנו ממנו לפחות כפי שיכולנו ללמד אותו”.
ד"ר ביל כהן הוא נשיא המכון לאמנות המנהיגות, מייסד ונשיא לשעבר של המכון ללימודי ניהול מתקדם בקליפורניה CIAM וחבר בצוות המומחים של קבוצת ד"ר עדנה פשר שות'
קבוצת ד"ר עדנה פשר ושות' היא הנציגה הבלעדית של תוכנית CIAM בישראל
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