‘Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way.’ General George Patton
Strong leaders come in a variety of shapes and sizes and are often larger than life. Not all strong leaders are good leaders and not all good leaders are strong. I am, for the main part, talking principally about CEOs, but equally this piece could apply to any senior leader whose personality or reputation marches into a room about 20 minutes before they do. These leaders can be enigmatic, charismatic, maternal, paternal, macchiavellian, mercurial, democratic, autocratic, humble, egocentric, self-effacing, narcissistic, charming, sociopathic and the list goes on. Regardless of their style, reputation or track record, when their time in office is done, they can leave organisations in a state of disequilibrium with a significant vacuum to fill. This story then, is really about the upsides and downsides of leaders that are forces of nature.
I enjoy current affairs and I have always loved business. Recently I have been following the unfolding events that have followed the departure of one famously strong leader: Nicola Sturgeon, leader of the Scottish National Party (SNP). It seems - atleast to the casual observer - that Nicola Sturgeon’s resignation was something of a surprise. Certainly it does not appear to have been a prominent conversation topic in the weeks or months preceding her announcement. Naturally, this does beg the question, ‘how well prepared was the party for the departure of this strong leader?’ Given some of the cracks that have appeared it does not look like the SNP was ready at all - and that’s not a party political comment - the soundbytes that point to suppressed internal divisions are numerous.
First of all, it’s important to state that these types of leaders can, depending on circumstance, be just what an organisation needs. Strong or autocratic leaders often prove invaluable during times of corporate crisis or instability. Those organisations might, temporarily, be unhappy places with high levels of tension and stress, yet those conditions - often perpetuated by overly strong leadership - might be a price worth paying if the alternative is mass redundancy or insolvency. Yet, strong leaders come in a variety of shades - on a scale that ranges from effective admiration to demotivational terror.
To assess whether a strong leader is providing ‘complete’ value to an organisation it is up to the Board to look beyond the balance sheet. A great balance sheet may well tip its hat to the effectiveness of the CEO’s leadership, but it’s the sum of other organisational indicators that truly reflect its health. Company surveys are often the real barometers of the state a company is really in and frequently provide frank opinion on ‘company culture’. Here a link can be made between competitive attributes and deficits and leadership styles. At the more problematic end of the spectrum, companies that have strong leaders who are, for example, vigorously autocratic may create oppressive work environments with little room for innovative thinking. Equally, businesses with heavy management hierarchies may find that top leadership is so far removed from general staff that they can be blind to operational reality (a condition referred to as ‘the emperor’s new clothes’).
Why exactly should we care how a strong leader achieves results? That’s another question that is really worth thinking through. If you like analogies you could think about good strong leadership and bad strong leadership like the comforting exteriors of 2 well-finished buildings. On the face of it they both look impressive. Yet when good strong leaders leave, you could peel off the exterior and expose a robust frame with neatly running wire and pipe work - everything functioning smoothly. When bad strong leaders depart, imagine stripping off that exterior and finding cracks in the framework, bodged fixes, sub par utilities and a team frantically keeping things going, despite having raised issues that have fallen on deaf ears for months. And there’s the point, it’s often only when strong leaders leave, that companies become fully aware of their impact on longer-term organisational success - for better or worse of course.
Let’s take a look at the story of Leona Helmsley, who built the Helmsley Hotels empire in the 70’s and 80’s in the US. Helmsley was dubbed the ‘Queen of Mean’ and was famous for her harsh and authoritarian leadership. She was often harsh and unsympathetic, yet her demanding and authoritarian style at the time seemed to create success for Helmsley Hotels. Unfortunately, Leona’s reputation had a darker side. Not only did she seek the best for her customers but for herself, too. Eventually, it caught up with her and she was prosecuted for evading $1.2 million in federal income taxes. It took a criminal trial to reveal the true nature of her leadership; during the proceedings a stream of former employees came forward with stories about how she’d belittled, harassed, and insulted them. In 1997, after spending 21 months in jail, her entire estate was put up for sale as convicted felons could not hold alcohol licenses.
But this tale on leadership doesn’t just relate to CEOs. Consider the case of RIM (you may know it better as BlackBerry). RIM’s early success is often put down to its unorthodox structure - unorthodox in the sense that it had two CEOs. Mike Lazaridis looked after product management, engineering and supply chain whilst Jim Balsillie took responsibility for sales, finance and other corporate functions. Individually, Mike and Jim appeared collaborative, but that did not always translate at the divisional level where decision-making was notoriously slow and accountability unclear. For a period these inter-divisional strains were brilliantly managed by the strict disciplinary approach of COO Larry Conlee. Things began to unravel in 2009 when Conlee retired. An oft quoted and excellent account of the fall of Blackberry (Canada Globe and Mail Article in 2009, Silcoff, McNish & Ladurantaye) stated: ‘Many insiders agreed that after he left, a slack attitude toward hitting targets began to permeate the company. "There was a gap" after Mr. Conlee's departure, Adam Belsher, a former RIM vice-president, told The Globe last year.’ Other than its obvious failings to keep pace with market trends and keep management hubris in check, it has been frequently argued that one of the company’s biggest mistakes was a catastrophic lack of effective succession planning.’
It is human nature to allows ourselves to become too comfortable, to assume that the good times will always roll and that the status quo will never change. Our world of business is however, by its very nature, a competitive sport. It pays to be prudent, paranoid and disciplined - ‘hope for the best and expect the worst’ isn’t such a bad mantra to repeat to yourself in the washroom mirror a couple of times a week. Ultimately, leaders are human beings and either through their own volition or other circumstance they will sometimes move on. When they do, it pays greatly to put into place ‘Plan B’ - whatever Plan B happens to be. Far better to manage your own destiny, than have destiny manage you.
Good boards and management teams know that when a leader leaves it inevitably creates a period of vulnerability. Pace can slow, people reflect on their own positions and options, competitors look to steal a march and opportunists will seek to fill vacuums. It is just after a strong leader’s exit that organisations are most exposed to the potential risks that can come with the inevitable gap that appears. Is the top team truly united? Will previously unvoiced strategic differences bubble to the surface? Will the cracks appear or, is the company ready to transition smoothly to the planned stewardship of the new leader? Effective succession planning whilst far from easy, should be an integral part of ensuring long-term organisational success.
As I drew this longer than usual article to a close I found a number of connected threads inevitably converging - should we beware of overly strong leaders?; is autocratic leadership a style we should consign to history?; what happens when they leave and is democratic leadership really better than autocratic leadership? I had hoped that I might be able to find a good example of those connected threads in business, but increasingly I became doubtful that I would. And then, of course I did, and yet again Apple came to my rescue. I’m not going to write up the full account of how Steve Jobs created the most famous brand in technology yet whose management style was so hated that he was fired - only to be brought back to save Apple from collapse, before handing over the reigns to democratic visionary, Tim Cook, who took Apple to the virtiginous heights of a $trillion valuation. That story is fascinating, and provides a great case study to conclude my tale. You can read a fabulous version of it here (Forbes Sept 2 2021 ‘How Steve Jobs Helped Guarantee Tim Cook’s Success At Apple).
In summary then there are always periods when nothing other than strong leadership will do. During periods of organisation stress and crisis it rarely pays for the leader to have a slack grip on the reins. Whatever your views on leadership style, my counsel is this: know what style suits your companies’ situation best at any given moment, preferably have a leader who can adapt and whatever you do, ensure that you have adequately planned what you will do when it is eventually time for them to move on and that seat is left empty.