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Avoid the Faults of Leadership |
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Flaws in the personal character of the commander will cause opportunities to be lost. |
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Chainsaw Al Dunlap got his reputation by staging massive cutbacks in personnel at Scott Paper. When the same approach didn't work at Sunbeam, he tried sales and accounting gimmicks to bolster results. Soon he was asked to exit. |
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Jim McCann, as president of 1-800-FLOWERS, tells about the lesson he learned from General Electric CEO, Jack Welch. He had to fire a senior person that everyone knew wasn't right for the job. The guy was a friend, and the prospect of action was brutal. He met Welch at a dinner party and told him about the situation. Welch's response was, "When was the last time anyone said, 'I wish I had waited six months longer to fire that guy?'"
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Peers and subordinates will discover the ineffective manager long before his or her seniors do. The interactions resulting from the discovery will reduce this person's effectivenessand the effectiveness of the organization. |
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Here are business parallels to Sun Tzu's character flaws: |
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Reckless (no forethought): The reckless manager does not understand how to use data. He shoots from the hip. When he wins, it is simply because he did something rather than because he did the right thing. |
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Cowardly (self-protective or afraid): The person who is afraid to take risks, takes the greatest risk of all. He or she is like McClellan in the Civil War who was so fearful of losing he could not win. |
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Quick-Tempered (too easily angered): Reference has been made to the importance of a cool head. Managers who have a reputation for shooting the messenger don't get much bad information and don't know what is really going on. |
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Delicate Honor (exaggerated sensitivity): The issue here is one of being too easily embarrassed, taking things personally, or letting ego get in the way. |
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Too Compassionate (too concerned): Those who have this fault are so concerned about the reactions of people, they make short-term decisions to keep harmony and end up with a long-term disaster. In their compassion they leave people "twisting slowly in the wind" when the kindest thing they could do is to make the hard decision. |
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