The lack of courage in corporate America is frightening. From CEOs and Board Directors to Senior leaders and middle management, the lack of courage to do the right thing and make the hard decisions is a sign that we, as a society, are firmly in decline. Yet I personally see this as an opportunistic environment to step up and take action, speak up and be heard, and, most importantly, to stand tall and lead when so many others fail to do so.
Its not hard to site examples of every part of corporate America lacking courage. Extreme cases like the failures of Board of Directors at Enron, Tyco and Worldcom back in the early 2000s to protect their shareholders come to mind. Or more recently, the demise of financial service firms who were once the toast of the town but are now frowned upon from Los Angeles to Edinburgh.
When you dig deep into these examples you find numerous cases of individuals seeing the pending train crash but failing to take action to prevent it. The RBS story is a prime example of senior people failing to stand up to then CEO Sir Fred Goodwin as he pushed the bank further into risk. I worked for years on a program under Sir Fred, he is a fine human being who surrounded himself with too many ‘Yes Men’, and that ultimately brought him and thousands of people down.
No, as you read this text I have no doubt all of you can think of one or two personal experiences where someone, perhaps even yourself, lacked the courage to speak up, say what everyone was thinking, and ultimately do the right thing. No one likes to rock the boat, especially when they are in it.
While with my experience I shouldn’t be surprised about how much cowardice we have in our system, what really disappoints me is how we are teaching our young professionals coming from the education system on how to be cowards. Of course we don’t call it that, but that’s exactly what it is. A lack of courage that results in individuals playing along with the group as opposed to challenging it.
I recently judged the annual Fellows Program at The Coro Center for Civic Leadership where I serve on the Board. If you are not familiar with Coro and specifically its prized Fellows Program (a national program across several major cities including Pittsburgh), I strongly encourage you to get in touch with the Coro office closest to you and ask to be invited to judge next year’s interviews. It’s a great experience and you’ll enjoy it.
About 350 applicants around the country show up to one of the Coro locations on the same day and go through a national interview process that is judged by public, private and non-profit leaders in the community. In Pittsburgh we had approximately 80 judges participate this year, and 40 applicants. The applicants are hoping to be one of the 64 chosen nationally, so its really about demonstrating, through a well structured process, that you are the best candidate for one of these 64 spots. Its about competing with your peers, who are also very talented and accomplished individuals in their own right, all of whom have graduate degrees.
But hence the problem. These youngsters didn’t seem to get the memo that this is a competition and you are supposed to compete.
The first part of the day they are put in teams of 6 and go through 4 team exercises where they are judged by a mix of “stationary” judges and “following” judges. As a following judge I got to follow my 6 candidates and watch them participate in all 4 exercises. My fellow stationary judges got to see all the candidates participate in a single exercise. The afternoon is spent conducting individual interviews with the 6 candidates and then you add up the scores and provide a total score for each individual.
I was really disturbed by the failure of all 6 candidates to take a strong position in the exercises they did. They basically sat on the fence when it came to the team exercises and failed to impose their individual leadership, initiative, creativity or beliefs, even as the judges pressed them in each exercise. It was extremely disappointing. Its as if everyone wanted to show they can play nice on a team when what we were looking for was individual character and strength.
It leads me to believe that our education system is not only failing our kids in terms of developing world class skills and capabilities, but its teaching them that its more important to play nice and get along with everyone than stand up and challenge for what you believe in.
When I asked one candidate in particular who was extremely talented but holding back in each exercise why she took a certain position she replied she didn’t want to go against the team even though she would have opted differently. Really?
Everyone is entitled to their view on this, but I have no patience for people who lack the discipline to do the right thing no matter how hard. Seek the truth, tell it like it is, and don’t worry about hurting someone’s feelings. It doesn’t matter as long as you bring out the truth.
I treat my customers this way and believe it’s a key reason why they are loyal to me. They want to hear my views on what works in their business and what doesn’t. That’s why they hire me in the first place. So if the baby is ugly then we tell them the baby is ugly. And we deal with the consequences. That’s courage. That’s discipline. That’s how you make a difference.
When you dig deep into these examples you find numerous cases of individuals seeing the pending train crash but failing to take action to prevent it. The RBS story is a prime example of senior people failing to stand up to then CEO Sir Fred Goodwin as he pushed the bank further into risk. I worked for years on a program under Sir Fred, he is a fine human being who surrounded himself with too many ‘Yes Men’, and that ultimately brought him and thousands of people down.
No, as you read this text I have no doubt all of you can think of one or two personal experiences where someone, perhaps even yourself, lacked the courage to speak up, say what everyone was thinking, and ultimately do the right thing. No one likes to rock the boat, especially when they are in it.
While with my experience I shouldn’t be surprised about how much cowardice we have in our system, what really disappoints me is how we are teaching our young professionals coming from the education system on how to be cowards. Of course we don’t call it that, but that’s exactly what it is. A lack of courage that results in individuals playing along with the group as opposed to challenging it.
I recently judged the annual Fellows Program at The Coro Center for Civic Leadership where I serve on the Board. If you are not familiar with Coro and specifically its prized Fellows Program (a national program across several major cities including Pittsburgh), I strongly encourage you to get in touch with the Coro office closest to you and ask to be invited to judge next year’s interviews. It’s a great experience and you’ll enjoy it.
About 350 applicants around the country show up to one of the Coro locations on the same day and go through a national interview process that is judged by public, private and non-profit leaders in the community. In Pittsburgh we had approximately 80 judges participate this year, and 40 applicants. The applicants are hoping to be one of the 64 chosen nationally, so its really about demonstrating, through a well structured process, that you are the best candidate for one of these 64 spots. Its about competing with your peers, who are also very talented and accomplished individuals in their own right, all of whom have graduate degrees.
But hence the problem. These youngsters didn’t seem to get the memo that this is a competition and you are supposed to compete.
The first part of the day they are put in teams of 6 and go through 4 team exercises where they are judged by a mix of “stationary” judges and “following” judges. As a following judge I got to follow my 6 candidates and watch them participate in all 4 exercises. My fellow stationary judges got to see all the candidates participate in a single exercise. The afternoon is spent conducting individual interviews with the 6 candidates and then you add up the scores and provide a total score for each individual.
I was really disturbed by the failure of all 6 candidates to take a strong position in the exercises they did. They basically sat on the fence when it came to the team exercises and failed to impose their individual leadership, initiative, creativity or beliefs, even as the judges pressed them in each exercise. It was extremely disappointing. Its as if everyone wanted to show they can play nice on a team when what we were looking for was individual character and strength.
It leads me to believe that our education system is not only failing our kids in terms of developing world class skills and capabilities, but its teaching them that its more important to play nice and get along with everyone than stand up and challenge for what you believe in.
When I asked one candidate in particular who was extremely talented but holding back in each exercise why she took a certain position she replied she didn’t want to go against the team even though she would have opted differently. Really?
Everyone is entitled to their view on this, but I have no patience for people who lack the discipline to do the right thing no matter how hard. Seek the truth, tell it like it is, and don’t worry about hurting someone’s feelings. It doesn’t matter as long as you bring out the truth.
I treat my customers this way and believe it’s a key reason why they are loyal to me. They want to hear my views on what works in their business and what doesn’t. That’s why they hire me in the first place. So if the baby is ugly then we tell them the baby is ugly. And we deal with the consequences. That’s courage. That’s discipline. That’s how you make a difference.
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Have been thinking about this recently too, in the context of higher education... Nobody has any spine.
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