Authors: Colin Powell
It Worked For Me (8 page)
I
n the early days of George W. Bush’s presidency, the State Department began planning for the President’s first trip out of the country, a meeting with the new president of Mexico, Vicente Fox, at Fox’s ranch. There were important issues to discuss, among them immigration, border control, drugs, and trade.
In preparation for the trip, I asked President Bush to visit the State Department to be briefed on Mexico-related issues. It would be his first visit to State since becoming president, and I knew it would give my troops a boost. He readily agreed.
At my staff meeting the next morning, I explained how I wanted the briefing to be handled. The two junior Mexico desk officers were going to brief the President. The young Foreign Service officers at the boiler room, desk officer level should know more about what was happening on the ground in Mexico than anyone else. When the time came for the President to be briefed, I would merely introduce them. No senior officials would speak, no assistant secretaries or deputy assistant secretaries. The staff gave each other skeptical looks. “When would you like the rehearsal?” they asked after a pregnant pause. “When would you like to check the slides they’ll use?”
“I don’t want a rehearsal,” I told them. “And I don’t need to see slides.” Frankly, I didn’t want slides. No PowerPoint. The two junior officers would just sit across from the President at the conference table and tell him what they knew and what he needed to focus on and remember.
I had little concern. I had never met the two officers; I didn’t even know their names, but I was sure they’d be ready. They would spend the days from now until the briefing working like dogs, consulting with their bosses and the embassy in Mexico City, reading everything they could, and getting ready for their big moment. They might lose a little sleep. They might feel more pressure and excitement than they were used to; and their spouses were doubtless calling every living relative to share the news.
In fact, the whole building was buzzing. I expected that. I wanted it.
The day came; the President and his party entered the conference room and took their places on one side of my large conference table. The table was historic. It had been used at the 1983 G7 Summit in Williamsburg, Virginia; a plaque at each place identified the head of government who had sat there.
I welcomed the President, introduced my key leaders, and then introduced the two action officers and turned them loose. Of course, I had briefed the President about my plans, and he was eager to play his part. The two officers took off, and their performance totally met my expectations. They provided the President with all he needed to know before he flew down to Mexico. The President asked penetrating questions and got solid answers. When it was over, he expressed his satisfaction, thanked everyone with a handshake and a smile, and swept out, assistants in his wake. I’m sure the two officers rushed back to their phones to call home; all their office mates must have then clustered around for a debriefing.
Here was the real payoff. Word went around the department at the speed of light: “It was great! The new Secretary trusted us. So did the President.” Over the past ten years, dozens of State Department officers have reminded me of that story.
I believe that when you first take over a new outfit, start out trusting the people there unless you have real evidence not to. If you trust them, they will trust you, and those bonds will strengthen over time. They will work hard to make sure you do well. They will protect you and cover you. They will take care of you.
This isn’t a fairy tale of confidence building. If the briefing had gone wrong, I would have known immediately that I had more serious problems than I had so far recognized, and that I might have to take drastic action. However, my style is not to expect trouble when I take on a new outfit. I like to go in believing that the leaders who were there before me were smart and had done their best. I’d learned long ago not to go in swinging a samurai sword like John Belushi in a
Saturday Night Live
skit. All that does is put people on guard, and make them anxious and afraid. The sword swinger is seen as an infection, and bureaucratic white corpuscles will race to attack it.
During those same early days at the State Department, I asked my principal line officials, my Assistant Secretaries, if they were reluctant to go up on Capitol Hill to deal with members of Congress. Hands went up: no one liked to go up to the Hill. I could understand that. I didn’t relish it either. But I still had to do it, I told them, and it was too heavy a load for me to lift alone. I needed them to carry more of it. Their reluctance stemmed from concerns that they might say the wrong thing; get in trouble, both up there and back at the department. I told them I would make sure they knew the administration positions, and I would expect them to defend those positions. I trusted them to do so. They didn’t need to check in with me beforehand—just go up there and see what the member or the committee wanted. Always approach congressional questions with a “Glad you asked!” attitude. They are the people’s representatives and we are the people’s servants. And if you get in trouble, we’ll work together to get you out of trouble. We’re a team.
There will be times when you need to take up a sword.
When the Iran-Contra scandal shook the Reagan presidency in 1986, Frank Carlucci, Howard Baker, Ken Duberstein, and I were brought into the National Security Council and the White House Chief of Staff’s office to cut out the infection and stem the bleeding. We did that, and in the process we fired lots of people. But we embraced those who remained, and the new people we brought to the team worked well with those we kept on the basis of mutual trust and a commitment to making the last two years of the Reagan presidency a success. We achieved that goal.
When I first entered the Army I was sent to Fort Benning, Georgia, for my basic officer training. At the end of the course, a wise old sergeant said to me, “Well, Lieutenant Powell, you are off to a good start. You might make it in the Army. But let me tell you something about leadership. You’ll know you are a good leader if your troops will follow you if just out of curiosity. The day will come when they are facing life-or-death danger, they are scared and unsure. Yeah, you’ve trained them and they’ve got the weapons and equipment to get the job done. They are curious as to how you are going to get them out of this mess and will stick with you to see.”
The sergeant was not really talking about curiosity, but about trust. They will follow you because they trust you. They will follow you because they believe in you and they believe in what they have to do. So everything you do as a leader has to focus on building trust in a team. Trust among the leaders, trust among the followers, and trust between the leaders and the followers. And it begins with selfless, trusting leaders.
L
eaders have legal authority over followers. They can demand and expect obedience on the job and have the power to take action against followers who do not obey or meet expected standards of performance. They can fire them. They can dock their pay. They can demote them. In the military we have severe punishments for disobeying orders.
Obedience alone may get the job done, but it probably doesn’t inspire commitment to the job. It doesn’t necessarily inspire pride in the work or the product or a passion for excellence. These come when followers feel they are part of a well-led team. And this comes when they respect their leaders, and when they, in turn, believe that they are respected by their leaders. It comes when they trust their leaders, and when they believe they are trusted by their leaders. They have to know they are valued.
You may be able to run an assembly line without having the respect of the workers on the line. They meet the quota, they get paid by the hour or by piecework, and that is the deal they have with their leader. In exchange for pay they agree to become part of the machinery.
Even on factory assembly lines respect and trust between leaders and followers may inspire line workers to exceed design expectations and motivate them not to slack off.
Respect for leaders by followers can’t be mandated; it must be earned. It has to be given to leaders by their followers.
You gain their respect by knowing and respecting them and through your own competence and personal example. Yet leaders must maintain a certain distance; they can’t get too close. Followers want leaders who are selfless, not selfish. They want leaders who have moral and physical courage, who always do the right thing, and will risk their careers in so doing. They want leaders who are tough but fair, and never abusive. Leaders who not only are role models, but also inspire followers to be their own role models.
When such an environment exists in an organization, it hums, and you can feel it. The followers will take care of you and will see to it that you and the organization succeed. They will internalize that passion to succeed.
One miserable day in Korea in 1974 my battalion was called on to assemble in the post theater
right now
to listen to a speech from a visiting Pentagon official. With no prior notice we were expected to fill the theater in twenty minutes. The unit was spread all over the post. I complained briefly, but was told I was wasting time, get on with it!
The theater was locked. We had to knock the lock off with an ax. Troops were dragged in from all over; wanderers from other battalions got scooped up. We even dragged in a soldier on his way to the stockade and his two MP escorts. We filled the theater just in time. The Pentagon official arrived, gave a ten-minute speech on race relations, and was gone.
The bewildered troops staggered out of the theater wondering what the hell that was all about. I felt miserable and imagined the troops mumbling about military dumbness and their idiot battalion commander. As I walked to my office, one of my company first sergeants came alongside and announced cheerfully, “Hey sir, it’s another great day to be a soldier.”
“I don’t think so,” I said. “I just jerked the whole battalion around for a dog and pony show.”
“Hey sir, no problem,” he replied. “The troops are fine. They know you needed them there and you would never have come up with such a nutty thing. They are with you.”
I brightened instantly. No recognition I ever received has meant more to me than his.
If you want to respect your followers, you have to know them. When I was starting out as a lieutenant, I was taught to learn all I could about the few dozen soldiers I was responsible for. I kept a pocket notebook with a section for each soldier, listing his name, birthdate, serial number, rifle serial number, family members, hometown, education, specialty, date of rank, and my initial and subsequent observations about his performance, conduct, appearance, ambitions, strengths, and weaknesses.
As I moved up into larger organizations, and was no longer in daily contact with all my followers, a small notebook no longer worked. I used direct reports from my staff to keep me informed about everybody under me. I didn’t just want formal reporting and report cards. I wanted naked truth. Who was being naughty, who was being nice? Who was inspiring his followers? Who had a family problem or an emotional problem? I tried hard to find out what people didn’t want me to know. I needed to know if such things affected their performance, and I needed to make sure they were doing what I wanted done and expected them to do. Were they operating in harmony with me?
During my four years as Secretary of State I tried to get to know each of our ambassadors, the President’s principal representatives to other countries. I made a point of swearing in every one of them at a formal ceremony with a large audience of family and friends (I was unable to do this only when I was out of the country). I presided at 145 such ceremonies. I considered it a laying on of hands, cementing a bond of trust and respect between the ambassador and me. I made it clear to all the ambassadors that they were free to call me directly anytime, seven days a week, at the office or at home. I am never too busy for you.
After they took their posts, I closely monitored their performance. My regional assistant secretaries of state knew to let me know how they were doing, especially if trouble was brewing. In turn, I kept the President informed about their performance. On three occasions ambassadors had to be quietly removed before formal channels woke up to the problem, because of information I had received through informal channels.
Another attribute necessary to gaining respect is competence. If you don’t know your job and can’t do it well, there is no reason why followers should respect you. I am sure that just as I was writing a page about each of my soldiers those many years ago, they were all in their own way writing their own page in their mental notebook about me. Does the lieutenant look sharp? Can he keep up with us at PT? Can he shoot a rifle or drive a tank almost as well as we do? Does he take care of us? Does he listen to our problems? Does he ever try to con us? Is he tough or soft? Does he trash talk his boss or other lieutenants? Does he protect us? Does he accept blame and share credit? Do we like him?
I have no doubt that my assistant secretaries of state had even longer lists that they constantly exchanged with each other.
A leader needs to know his followers, and he must be competent; but he is also an individual; he needs to preserve a zone of privacy, a place for himself that his followers can’t enter. They need to be kept at a distance. There is an old expression attributed to Aesop: “Familiarity breeds contempt.” It might be better said that too much familiarity brings everyone down to the same level. The leader is with the troops, but above them. He should always maintain an aura of unpredictable mystery.
Though every leader wants his followers to like him, and followers want to like their leader, liking is not necessary. It helps the organization run more smoothly. But if respect is lacking, the organization will probably run badly. Liking has to come from respect, not from the leader trying to be a nice guy or a buddy to the followers. They don’t need you to be easy on them.
A certain air of separateness is essential. Followers are not your buddies; they are your followers, your subordinates. If you aren’t different from them, if you don’t provide them with what they can’t do for themselves, then they don’t need you.
I’ve often heard blowhard leaders boast, “My outfit is so good, it could function well without me.” Hmm, then why do they need you? The leader is always above, but never beyond, the followers. So a leader can socialize with his followers, but not to the point of hanging out with them. Friendliness is fine, short of familiarity. Never let a follower mistake liberty for license.
Finally, real leadership and unfailing respect are a retail issue. They happen on the ground, where the troops are. They don’t come out of directives from on high.
One night back in the 1970s, I was driving home to my quarters at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, where I had commanded the 2nd Brigade of the 101st Airborne Division for about a year, when I saw in the dark a soldier walking along the road heading for the gate. He probably lived with his wife in the trailer park just outside the gate. I stopped and offered him a ride.
“Why are you going home so late?” I asked him as we drove along.
“My buddies and I’ve been working hard to get ready for an inspector general inspection coming up,” he answered. Then he looked at me. “Sir, who are you?” he asked.
“I’m your brigade commander,” I told him, taken aback.
“How long have you been in command?” he asked.
“Over a year,” I said.
“Is it a good job?” he asked.
“Yes, great,” I replied. Jeez, after a year of being all over the brigade area, here is a soldier who doesn’t recognize me. Something’s wrong.
“How do you think you guys will do in the inspection?” I then asked.
“We’ll do great,” he answered. “We’ve been working hard for weeks, and my captain, lieutenants, and sergeants have been pushing us. They’ve been telling us how important the inspection is; they’ve been working just as hard as we have.” Then he said simply, “We’re not going to let them down.” Something’s right.
I was the brigade commander, but it was his buddies, sergeants, and officers who were his family, who trained him and provided for him; who took care of him. And, in turn, that care and family feeling would flow up, and they would take care of me. Mission accomplishment starts at the bottom.
What moved me the most was his saying, “We’re not going to let them down.” As a leader, you will never receive a better compliment from your followers. You will never have a better report card showing how you are doing. You’ve created a winning team. A team that rests on a solid foundation of mutual trust and respect. They will never let you down as long as you never let them down. The troops will always get it done and take care of you. Make sure that every hour of the day you are taking care of them.
