I have a bit of negative reaction to this. The talk sounds like business pop psychology. "The libertarians profit and benefit off of the freedom and liberty and the dynamics that make their individual entrepreneurial genius possible without giving credit to all of that institutional rigor and value. But at the same time, the institutions can be corrupting to the individuals, because they become a focus, a North Star to kind of conform identities or to shape identities, individual identities that is. "
The implication is that Elon Musk is a libertarian, with a "you didn't build that" retort baked in by Mr. Eggers. I presume that's what he means by the use of "institutional rigor." I'd call it bureaucracy or the administrative state, but institutional rigor definitely sounds like it is doing good work.
Musk may display or utter libertarian sentiments, but the founder of Tesla and SpaceX, who has benefited from vigorous government support, should hardly be characterized as a libertarian as implied. Mr. Eggers uses the word "pathology" a couple of times. Specifically, "outlying pathology." There's a subjective value judgment being applied to the word as it's used here that seems intellectually lazy. Great for speeches by someone in a military think tank, but incomplete.
So Leutze's depiction of Washington crossing the Delaware is a lie. I didn't realize anyone who understands the physical world thought it was an accurate depiction. The painting is intentionally mythic. I think we all understand that leaders are complex people who are often reduced to two-dimensional characters by history. And, to draw something from this piece, many leaders embrace the "greatness" myth while still alive. In any case, I'm not sure we needed the reminder.
Hi Jim, I think it's fine if you don't need the reminder, but I think plenty of people do. ...Regarding the use of "pathology," I had a similar reaction to that word — not in real time, but when I was going over the transcript. I didn't see it as my place to edit, though. I do think, though, that Jeff did not mean it in the diagnosis sense of the word; but I wouldn't use it that way myself. And I actually think he was implying your point about the libertarian "say versus do" kind of dichotomy there. In any case, I appreciate your critique here. Thank you for sharing it.
What a wonderful, complexity-inspired conversation. Context, balance and the sort of both/and thinking (rather than either/or thinking) that's required to navigate competing tensions are fundamental: https://www.richardhughesjones.com/polarities/
Interesting duck/rabbit framing Richard! Thanks for sharing this, and I look forward to reading more of it...reminds me of the idea of "Janusian thinking," if you've come across that.
Thoroughly enjoyed this and the way you went from the problems of cult of personality to the value of collaboration to the idea of institutional change. You tied together a number of interesting ideas in a way that encourages me as a reader to remember that anything I want to do will be better, easier to accomplish, if done with help, in collaboration, in co-creation. There are so many terms to tumble over, trip up on, test out. As an "authenticity" sceptic, it's nice to see someone questioning the idea of "authentic" leadership. Too often, in business speak in particular, the words "authentic" and "story" have become substitutes for consistent or thorough. I'm thinking of how some people write about authentic storytelling in particular. I love how you dig into topics and draw others into your conversations. Thank you, and range on! (that's the T-shirt, for sure)
Christine, I really appreciate this. I'm sometimes a little nervous about allowing my penchant for rambling to show on this newsletter...but then I figure: that's partly what this newsletter is for! So I'm glad moving across a lot of topics was appealing, and not just confusing. And that "authenticity" point that Jeff raised is the one that has stuck most in my mind. ...Lastly: that's a great t-shirt slogan, and I'm not sure how I hadn't thought of it yet;)
Also, it's weird and weirder that "authenticity" became a buzzword. When did that happen? What's the history of that word?
It reminds me of my high school English teacher, Mr. Locke, who could recite chunks of Shakespeare and enjoy it, who asked us to think again about using the word "awesome." Awe inspiring.
The concept that people gravitate toward simplifying complex issues really resonates with me. That oversimplification is the foundation of division. Sustainable solutions to complex issues requires serious attention to the nuances of different perspectives.
Mark, thanks for this comment. I completely agree. ...I think there are of course domains where simplification is useful, rather than divisive — like the famous quip about how physicists approach a milk-production problem with simplifying assumptions: "First, let's start with a spherical cow..." But with human dynamics, I think that urge to simplify for the sake of ease or comfort or whatever it is can be really nefarious. I try to think of this sort of like how cognitive bias researchers like Kahneman and Tetlock write about the "outside" and "inside" view. The inside view means focusing on all the little details of our own particular issue, rather than gathering information and wisdom from the very many similar situation around us or in history, and adding that "outside" view to our inside view. They show that combining makes for better judgment, but that our instinct is to just start and end with the inside view. The remedy is to stop yourself and start with the outside view before progressing to the inside view. (Sorry if I'm being opaque here...just thinking out loud, quickly.) I feel like the simplification reflex may be similar. Our instinct is to start and end with that, whereas perhaps we can learn to stop ourselves, and start with complexity first, and only later consider what can be simplified.
Good Morning David - Thank you for your thoughtful response. My hunch is that we're genetically programmed to over-simplify as a survival tool. In the animal kingdom ( or war for that matter) snap decisions are life or death determinants. Only parts of us have evolved to step back - "let's think about that for a minute". Your comment - "the remedy is to stop yourself and start with the outside view before progressing to the inside view" - makes all the sense in the world, especially if your goal is to solve problems. If I were to paraphrase I might say - first get past our emotional responses and personal talking points, so we can consider the big picture, including the historical context of any given issue. I dream of the day when our elected leaders will do just that, as a path toward addressing complex issues. I also agree that over-simplifying and dumbing down are used at times as a convenience, but all too frequently, as part of an agenda. The goal of my blog is to expose people to different perspectives on that which divides us. If we could collectively step back and start with the "outside views," suspending our own views for just a moment, I strongly suspect we would have more productive discussions and fewer reasons to detest our neighbor.
This is so deliciously complex and nuanced thanks, David! There's a lot to think through, and I'm excited to read his book. The only Isaacson book I've read is Jobs, but he sure paints Jobs as the exact sort of transcend-all-boundaries leader when he talks about Jobs' reality distortion field. And I think Isaacson would agree he didn't have the other voice in his first Apple tenure and at NeXT Computer.
Anyway, reading this one I was wondering if this is a topic you're thinking of addressing in your next book. If so, it was interesting to read the comments, which had some praise and some pushback. I remember you mentioned that you might use this newsletter as a way to float out some ideas you're thinking of writing more about. In this case where you get a little pushback, does that change how you think about writing about these topics at all? Does it push your research or writing in a different direction? Thanks again!
(Ps - from the moment I saw this post's headline, I spent the entire time waiting for the inevitable War & Peace reference. The kicker has me so excited for the future newsletter!)
Matt! I know I still owe you a "master thought list" response. (That's the one, right?) Let's make a deal: if I haven't provided that in response to one of your comments by two posts from now, then I'll make it a post to force myself to do it! Then I'll have accountability...
Great point about Isaacson. I know one reason there was another bio ("Becoming Steve Jobs") is that some of Jobs's confidantes felt that Isaacson's book didn't portray the late-stage Steve when he'd learned some serious leadership lessons. Now, loved ones of someone who is the subject of a biography like that are probably never going to be content with a complex portrayal, so I don't think that means anything about Isaacson's book. Only to say that, from reading the other bio and talking to some folks who worked with Jobs, I do get the sense that he came back a different leader from his "years in the wilderness." Like he had this incredible success early on just by being a visionary and pushing really, really hard, and that can work in certain scenarios, but not many others. Everyone I've talked to who was around Jobs said he still pushed hard later on, but he learned how to trust his team more. Supposedly Ed Catmull really had a big impact on his leadership style. In any case, seems like he definitely could've fit in the section with Disney and Chanel! One of the craziest things in the Chanel story, to me, was that during WWII she basically tried to use political situation to steal the part ownership of her company that was held by a Jewish man that invested in her. Apparently he'd seen it coming or something, and set up a non-Jewish holder. Despite all that, they ended up working together again after the war! Pretty amazing...
In terms of floating topics, indeed I might do that, and indeed there was a bit of that here, particularly about institutions. I'm just starting to think about that, but it is something I may write about. As far as testing it out, I think push back has the potential to change how I'd write about something. Mostly in the sense of just alerting me to aspects I'd want to address. If push back exposes some blind spot I didn't know I had, or if I'm hearing some theme in feedback, it tells me that a natural questions arises that I didn't appropriately address, and I need to think about that if I cover the topic. Is that the kind of push back you're thinking about? ...Given that my books deal with a bunch of issues that are perfectly answerable, I'm very conscious of trying not to gloss over the most obvious questions that should arise from whatever I'm talking about. I can't get them all, but I don't want to leave readers feeling like I don't at least recognize an obvious next question, if you know what I mean. Doesn't mean I can answer it, but good to be aware. There are also instances where maybe I'm just framing something in the wrong way, or in a confusing way, and I definitely want and would take seriously that kind of feedback. ...One different kind of feedback I might use: occasionally, there's a topic that I think is a bit of a throw-away, or something I find fun but don't expect much from, and the reader response is better than I expect. So that might highlight things I decide to look more into.
P.S. Since I like to respond to your excellent questions with long answers, but want to do so quickly, I hope we have an unwritten contract at this point that you release me from editing and excuse my typos;)
Haha you most certainly don't owe me anything, but the terms of that deal (and the ps unwritten contract) sound pretty good to me. I'd love to hear about it! That's interesting about Jobs and his loved ones. Catmull/Pixar have come up as examples of good leadership in enough books at this point that I believe it. It sounds like you've read both Jobs biographies... would you recommend reading the second one after having read the first? And that Chanel story is so hard to believe that I have to learn more. (A podcast I enjoy just released a 2 episodes about her called "The Nazi Who Invented Fashion"... that might be where I go next https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/part-one-coco-chanel-the-nazi-who-invented-fashion/id1373812661?i=1000606269684)
That's interesting to hear. Yeah I think that is the pushback I was thinking about. I think I heard someone (maybe Tim Ferriss?) once say something like any book should first be a speech, which should first be an article, which should first be a lot of conversations, and at each point you can get a sense of how interesting it is to others and iterate accordingly. And I remember Gladwell once saying that one nice thing about a podcast compared to a book is the feedback loop is infinitely faster. So it's cool to hear you're seeing the value in people who have constructive criticism.
I should say, I think there's a balance. I would have written a lot more of first book in the pages of SI if some editors and readers hadn't given me the impression that it wasn't interesting enough for SI. (But honestly, they were right in a way. Some of the topics probably didn't have mass enough appeal to fit for a magazine that size with that general of a readership, but then it can work as a book.) The trouble for me with following the speech/article strategy is that it's often only after a lot of grappling and attempting to write that I start to untangle my own thoughts. The conversations, though, I agree. Despite everything I just said, the seed of my first book was an article — which I then completely contradicted in my book. That was a real lesson! For Range, I'm not even sure what a seed article would have looked like, although there was definitely a seed in my conversations with Gladwell. Among writers, I'm definitely on the lower end of putting out small pieces and getting feedback, but I do think it's a good idea and am trying to do more of it. At the same time, I find books to be so much work that I'll give a ton of weight o whatever keeps me engaged, and I'm willing to use my curiosity as a proxy (to some degree) for the interest of others. Maybe it's trite to say that listening to my instincts plus finding ways to get some regular feedback probably makes for better judgment. And I have found conversations really crucial, since it's close to writing in a way, trying to explain why I'm interested to someone else. I didn't realize how critical conversations of that nature with my wife were until we both got busier. So, no kidding, I actually schedule them like dates on occasion now.
Haha that bit about scheduling them like dates is amazing. I've never written a book, but I think I have a sense of what you mean about conversations. When I'm trying to write something for a class or a newsletter and I'm not sure how to start, it helps me to explain it out loud and suddenly things start to click.
I really enjoyed this conversation about holding paradoxical tension, many good points :-) Thanks! Will certainly get the book. Individuals can hardly be understood as individuals only since we are being born into groups, but rather as individuals in groups at the same time (according to the sociologist Norbert Elias) hence the necessity of holding the I/we simultaneously. What struck me was the wish for finding some sort of optimized outcome of this (necessary) tension between individuals and institutions ... it would be very hard to know what that would be as complexity is the science of unpredictability. What an optimized outcome would look like depends on your ideology, the power relations that we all are in that are shaping human daily activity, what will emerge as overall institutional patterning depends on the relationship, the situation and the context.
I'd be delighted to: the murmuring starlings and ant stacks etc is a natural science perspective which we can make analogies from, but only analogies. In order to get into complex interactions and complex responsive processes (as human activity is the most complex there is) we need to turn to social sciences as well: "Complexity - A key Idea for Business and Society" by Chris Mowles and "Tools and Techniques of leadership and management - meeting the challenge of complexity" by Ralph Stacey both published by Routledge. Routledge very recently published three books in a Complexity and Management series, as well, titles: "Complexity and Leadership", "The Complexity of Consultancy" and "Complexity and the Public Sector". All excellent.
My first exposure to McChrystal and Eggers was in my reading of A Promised Land by Obama. I've done little foreign policy reading, but I did read a little more about the war in Afghanistan. All of it made me doubt their sound judgment regarding a healthy outcome of any of the Middle Eastern conflicts, specifically Afghanistan. Your term "mission creep" seems apropos. But I enjoy being mistaken. Maybe they were people like those leaders they wrote about, receiving too much adoration or criticism and holding much less control than I'm giving them credit for.
I appreciate the historical and literary references sprinkled through the article. War and Peace is on my reading list for this year!
Paul, I think questioning leadership judgment is part of what this is all about! I do, though, fall in that camp of thinking the leaders get too much credit whether things go well or poorly...and that's actually a major theme of War and Peace. The one general who comes off as a hero is the one who realizes how little control he really has. Not to lump more reading on you already, but Isaiah Berlin's "The Hedgehog and the Fox" essay is a fascinating piece stemming from W&P. I was going to say "read it after," as I did, but honestly, since I wouldn't be concerned about W&P spoilers, I'd probably read it before if I could do it over again.
Excellent article which required reading it more than once due to the complexity of the subject of trying to delve into the minds of some of these great leaders. The “industry” of startups comes to mind where it would be very beneficial for the VC/PE firms to be able to gauge the core leadership teams of these startups. When we see the We Work, Theranos etc stories as well as the many failures of startups, it begs the question of whether any personality testing tools can be useful in trying to identify the type of person(s) one is investing in. Existing personality tests tend to split people into somewhat four broad categories of (for instance) DISC. Can the “institutional” issues be measured in any way in addition to the standard broad categories?
As a side note, one of the reasons I reread the article was the numerous uses of the terms “kind of” and “sort of”. Over the last decade or so the use of these terms when making factual statements. For instance, “ You know, Elon Musk would be harder to kind of categorize in that way.”, “ We celebrate as Americans individual freedom and liberty and hold that up while generally kind of taking for granted the importance of the institutions that make all of that possible.” When I reread the article and skipped over all of the “kind of” and “sort of” statements the article was much more clear since my mind didn’t need to deal with the ambiguity of those terms. Maybe picky, but in my last years before retirement I became amazed at statements made by people such as, “We are kind of looking at what went wrong in the construction of…..”, “Our staff is kind of deciding which direction to take.” Well are you or aren’t you?!!
Steve, first, I appreciate the comment on "kind of" and "sort of." Perhaps I'll edit those out next time, since they may come off as much more intrusive in writing than they did in real-time listening. I'm never quite sure if it's my place to edit any language, so while I do edit out certain answers for length, I don't touch the actual language. I probably should, though, when it comes to "umm" "kind of" "sort of" and the like. I did notice it, but also felt that since Jeff was very much "thinking out loud," perhaps it helped convey that sense. But in retrospect I think you're right, and I'll keep this in mind next time.
As far as institutional measures, that's a great question. I'm actually just getting into this issue, so don't know at this point. But I can tell you that, so far, the book Why Nations Fail by Acemoglu and Robinson has a fascinating and very provocative opening that differentiates the development of good and bad institutions. Not sure what I think yet, but finding it very stimulating.
I have a personal theory on the increased use of “kind of/sort of” and it has to do with fear of retribution due to the rise of social media. If we kind of/sort of feel or think a certain way, maybe we won’t get jumped by the masses. I very recently found an interesting post which supports that theory:
As this points out people muck up their written/spoken words with this vagueness and in doing so inadvertently decrease their real feelings and/or expertise.
Possibly part of our professional training ought to include flushing this terminology from our vocabularies; especially in leadership roles. Get back to say what we mean and mean what we say.
Thanks, Steve. Helpful to be made more aware of this verbal filler habit. I agree with your (below) theory that this moderating tendency is real (for some of us anyway), and not helpful.
Jeff, thanks so much for weighing in here! I apologize if it's annoying that I left those in, but to me they are indicative of the atmosphere of thinking out loud that we were employing, and that I tend to use for this newsletter in general. I think it's more natural for speech than to read in a transcript, though. Anyway, that was my take, but I'd love your feedback as a partner in creating this post.
Filler is naturally more common in verbal comms than written. But Steve is pointing to a particular distortion of that effect spurred by the punitive disincentives in our info-driven environment, which is interesting and likely very real.
Believe me, I catch myself from time to time with this so not completely innocent. But I do think it’s important as we lead and mentor others. I focused on that the last couple of years when younger execs were presenting in a board room. Would count how many times the used these terms and feed it back to them. It was eye opening for sure.
Another excellent and thoughtful interview. I read Leaders about two years ago and I was struck by your exact comment, it is NOT a leadership by checklist that we see so much of. The amount of research and thinking that the authors did was remarkable, and challenging to my own mindset. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
The dichotomies that you brought up is very interesting: about the balance of the lone wolf, great men, visionary versus the unassuming by the book, work within the system leader; about the corrupting versus enabling institutions; and the balance within one person is worthy of a serious study.
I had wondered about the authors, I believe two were products of the leadership training within the military. I wonder what it was within that education that made them write what they wrote, how much was it something within the training? How much was it their experience in a very constrained and black and white leadership role within the military? How much was it due to their own temperament. I know those are impossible questions to answer, but I am interested in knowing what they thought.
I thoroughly enjoyed Leaders, and I thoroughly enjoyed this article.
I am now thinking about how I can make these points with my students and athletes.
Hey Pete, so glad it struck you the same way! ....And that's a really interesting question about the authors and their own backgrounds. I know for my own work, the older I've gotten, the more cognizant I've been of the "me-search" aspect of my research — exploration coming out of something that surprised me or didn't fit my expectations in some area of my life. If I chat with Jeff again, perhaps I'll relay these questions.
The hagiography of Robert E. Lee was in service of the Lost Cause project to recast the Civil War in terms of the brutal suppression, not of slavery, but of a “Southern way of life.” Lee the Noble was a soldier-patriot who was the benevolent lord of the manor whose trusted retainers and contented agricultural staff adored him. The reciprocal demonization of Ulysses Grant, the Butcher, a cigar-smoking drunkard, showed the the Union would never had prevailed in a fair fight. The scaffolding erected by two manikin leaders kept the Solid South in legislative power with only brief interruptions until the Southern Strategy extended power into the Executive Branch. The Great Man model remains a central political theme in Presidential politics, which is one of the things that make President Biden such an anomaly.
I appreciated the reference to Douglass North and the role of institutions, but I think you need to be more specific about what you mean by "institution." It tends to be a nebulous term that people use to mean different things. Did you mean it as North used it? "...humanly devised constraints [both formal and informal] that structure political, economic, and social interaction." It seemed like some of your references to "institutions" could be interpreted as almost synonymous with "organization" (which is how it is often used popularly).
Hi Evan, fair point, and appreciate the critique. I did mean it as North used it — the constraints or "rules of the game" he sometimes mentions that have the effect of providing some measure of regularity to interactions, and of distributing power. As it sounds like you probably know, North writes some about the path dependency of these constraints, and in thinking about Jeff's writing on Iraq, it seemed to me that perhaps US strategy didn't account for that path dependency, and didn't respect the value of those "rules of the game" that people had become used to, and that provided some measure of predictability for interactions. ...I appreciate your point about my lack of specificity, and I'm taking it to heart. And since it sounds like you know this area, and I'm interested in it, I'd love to hear you expand a bit more on the difference between the Northian institution and how the term is often used popularly. Thanks for this comment!
I really appreciated the example of the US strategy in Iraq that didn't account for the role of institutions as social structures that increase certainty in human interactions. I am not an economist, but I read some of North's "Institutions" in grad school. I just remember trying to wrap my head around what an "institution" was, because I was stuck with the idea that institutions are just big organizations (e.g., institutions of higher education, a research institute). Certainly, large organizations can be/have institutions within themselves while also being "players" in higher order institutions. But it is possible to reorganize the structure of an organization without altering the constituent institutions (rules), which I think is basically your/Jeff's point about what happened in Iraq (or maybe it's the opposite).
Maybe readers of your newsletter are all familiar with North's definition, but I just thought that when writing for a lay audience it would be good to be explicit about a term like "institution" to ensure readers aren't thinking about something else when you use it. Thanks for your thoughtful response.
Evan, great points. I think you're right, I should've been more explicit. Next time maybe I'll included a bracketed aside, or at least a relevant link. Really appreciate this input.
Very glad that complexity finally showed up in this newsletter! I had a feeling it would show up somehow since it's very related to the wicked environment, and there were a few close calls like the one on War and Peace and the false ideals of individual heroism. I selfishly hope that we can see more posts on this topic. My interests in college are mainly in how collective behavior outperforms the sum of the parts in wicked environments (collective intelligence). It's a fascinating topic.
Ha, you're reading very carefully! I like that "close calls" comment, and that's a fascinating area of interest you have. You reminded me of an anecdote I read about the moon-landing, although now I can't remember where I read it. In any case, it was something to the effect of one person saying: "Incredible, I can't believe people landed someone on the moon." And the response was something like: "People didn't, NASA did." The point was that the feat seemed impossible until you viewed the collective as something much more powerful than just a sum of individuals.
I have a bit of negative reaction to this. The talk sounds like business pop psychology. "The libertarians profit and benefit off of the freedom and liberty and the dynamics that make their individual entrepreneurial genius possible without giving credit to all of that institutional rigor and value. But at the same time, the institutions can be corrupting to the individuals, because they become a focus, a North Star to kind of conform identities or to shape identities, individual identities that is. "
The implication is that Elon Musk is a libertarian, with a "you didn't build that" retort baked in by Mr. Eggers. I presume that's what he means by the use of "institutional rigor." I'd call it bureaucracy or the administrative state, but institutional rigor definitely sounds like it is doing good work.
Musk may display or utter libertarian sentiments, but the founder of Tesla and SpaceX, who has benefited from vigorous government support, should hardly be characterized as a libertarian as implied. Mr. Eggers uses the word "pathology" a couple of times. Specifically, "outlying pathology." There's a subjective value judgment being applied to the word as it's used here that seems intellectually lazy. Great for speeches by someone in a military think tank, but incomplete.
So Leutze's depiction of Washington crossing the Delaware is a lie. I didn't realize anyone who understands the physical world thought it was an accurate depiction. The painting is intentionally mythic. I think we all understand that leaders are complex people who are often reduced to two-dimensional characters by history. And, to draw something from this piece, many leaders embrace the "greatness" myth while still alive. In any case, I'm not sure we needed the reminder.
Hi Jim, I think it's fine if you don't need the reminder, but I think plenty of people do. ...Regarding the use of "pathology," I had a similar reaction to that word — not in real time, but when I was going over the transcript. I didn't see it as my place to edit, though. I do think, though, that Jeff did not mean it in the diagnosis sense of the word; but I wouldn't use it that way myself. And I actually think he was implying your point about the libertarian "say versus do" kind of dichotomy there. In any case, I appreciate your critique here. Thank you for sharing it.
Thanks, Jim. This is good feedback. You're right that the word "pathology" wasn't appropriate here. "Personality type" would have been better.
Hi David, great to see you on Substack! I’m a newbie so working my way through your archive, (which you might call your “Home on the Range”?! 😂)
Haha...I'm mad I didn't think of that;) Great to see you here Daniel!
What a wonderful, complexity-inspired conversation. Context, balance and the sort of both/and thinking (rather than either/or thinking) that's required to navigate competing tensions are fundamental: https://www.richardhughesjones.com/polarities/
Interesting duck/rabbit framing Richard! Thanks for sharing this, and I look forward to reading more of it...reminds me of the idea of "Janusian thinking," if you've come across that.
How had I not heard of Janusian Thinking? Thank you for briging it to my attention!
Thoroughly enjoyed this and the way you went from the problems of cult of personality to the value of collaboration to the idea of institutional change. You tied together a number of interesting ideas in a way that encourages me as a reader to remember that anything I want to do will be better, easier to accomplish, if done with help, in collaboration, in co-creation. There are so many terms to tumble over, trip up on, test out. As an "authenticity" sceptic, it's nice to see someone questioning the idea of "authentic" leadership. Too often, in business speak in particular, the words "authentic" and "story" have become substitutes for consistent or thorough. I'm thinking of how some people write about authentic storytelling in particular. I love how you dig into topics and draw others into your conversations. Thank you, and range on! (that's the T-shirt, for sure)
Christine, I really appreciate this. I'm sometimes a little nervous about allowing my penchant for rambling to show on this newsletter...but then I figure: that's partly what this newsletter is for! So I'm glad moving across a lot of topics was appealing, and not just confusing. And that "authenticity" point that Jeff raised is the one that has stuck most in my mind. ...Lastly: that's a great t-shirt slogan, and I'm not sure how I hadn't thought of it yet;)
(yippee David Epstein replied to my comment!!)
Just sayin...
Also, it's weird and weirder that "authenticity" became a buzzword. When did that happen? What's the history of that word?
It reminds me of my high school English teacher, Mr. Locke, who could recite chunks of Shakespeare and enjoy it, who asked us to think again about using the word "awesome." Awe inspiring.
The concept that people gravitate toward simplifying complex issues really resonates with me. That oversimplification is the foundation of division. Sustainable solutions to complex issues requires serious attention to the nuances of different perspectives.
Mark, thanks for this comment. I completely agree. ...I think there are of course domains where simplification is useful, rather than divisive — like the famous quip about how physicists approach a milk-production problem with simplifying assumptions: "First, let's start with a spherical cow..." But with human dynamics, I think that urge to simplify for the sake of ease or comfort or whatever it is can be really nefarious. I try to think of this sort of like how cognitive bias researchers like Kahneman and Tetlock write about the "outside" and "inside" view. The inside view means focusing on all the little details of our own particular issue, rather than gathering information and wisdom from the very many similar situation around us or in history, and adding that "outside" view to our inside view. They show that combining makes for better judgment, but that our instinct is to just start and end with the inside view. The remedy is to stop yourself and start with the outside view before progressing to the inside view. (Sorry if I'm being opaque here...just thinking out loud, quickly.) I feel like the simplification reflex may be similar. Our instinct is to start and end with that, whereas perhaps we can learn to stop ourselves, and start with complexity first, and only later consider what can be simplified.
Good Morning David - Thank you for your thoughtful response. My hunch is that we're genetically programmed to over-simplify as a survival tool. In the animal kingdom ( or war for that matter) snap decisions are life or death determinants. Only parts of us have evolved to step back - "let's think about that for a minute". Your comment - "the remedy is to stop yourself and start with the outside view before progressing to the inside view" - makes all the sense in the world, especially if your goal is to solve problems. If I were to paraphrase I might say - first get past our emotional responses and personal talking points, so we can consider the big picture, including the historical context of any given issue. I dream of the day when our elected leaders will do just that, as a path toward addressing complex issues. I also agree that over-simplifying and dumbing down are used at times as a convenience, but all too frequently, as part of an agenda. The goal of my blog is to expose people to different perspectives on that which divides us. If we could collectively step back and start with the "outside views," suspending our own views for just a moment, I strongly suspect we would have more productive discussions and fewer reasons to detest our neighbor.
This is so deliciously complex and nuanced thanks, David! There's a lot to think through, and I'm excited to read his book. The only Isaacson book I've read is Jobs, but he sure paints Jobs as the exact sort of transcend-all-boundaries leader when he talks about Jobs' reality distortion field. And I think Isaacson would agree he didn't have the other voice in his first Apple tenure and at NeXT Computer.
Anyway, reading this one I was wondering if this is a topic you're thinking of addressing in your next book. If so, it was interesting to read the comments, which had some praise and some pushback. I remember you mentioned that you might use this newsletter as a way to float out some ideas you're thinking of writing more about. In this case where you get a little pushback, does that change how you think about writing about these topics at all? Does it push your research or writing in a different direction? Thanks again!
(Ps - from the moment I saw this post's headline, I spent the entire time waiting for the inevitable War & Peace reference. The kicker has me so excited for the future newsletter!)
Matt! I know I still owe you a "master thought list" response. (That's the one, right?) Let's make a deal: if I haven't provided that in response to one of your comments by two posts from now, then I'll make it a post to force myself to do it! Then I'll have accountability...
Great point about Isaacson. I know one reason there was another bio ("Becoming Steve Jobs") is that some of Jobs's confidantes felt that Isaacson's book didn't portray the late-stage Steve when he'd learned some serious leadership lessons. Now, loved ones of someone who is the subject of a biography like that are probably never going to be content with a complex portrayal, so I don't think that means anything about Isaacson's book. Only to say that, from reading the other bio and talking to some folks who worked with Jobs, I do get the sense that he came back a different leader from his "years in the wilderness." Like he had this incredible success early on just by being a visionary and pushing really, really hard, and that can work in certain scenarios, but not many others. Everyone I've talked to who was around Jobs said he still pushed hard later on, but he learned how to trust his team more. Supposedly Ed Catmull really had a big impact on his leadership style. In any case, seems like he definitely could've fit in the section with Disney and Chanel! One of the craziest things in the Chanel story, to me, was that during WWII she basically tried to use political situation to steal the part ownership of her company that was held by a Jewish man that invested in her. Apparently he'd seen it coming or something, and set up a non-Jewish holder. Despite all that, they ended up working together again after the war! Pretty amazing...
In terms of floating topics, indeed I might do that, and indeed there was a bit of that here, particularly about institutions. I'm just starting to think about that, but it is something I may write about. As far as testing it out, I think push back has the potential to change how I'd write about something. Mostly in the sense of just alerting me to aspects I'd want to address. If push back exposes some blind spot I didn't know I had, or if I'm hearing some theme in feedback, it tells me that a natural questions arises that I didn't appropriately address, and I need to think about that if I cover the topic. Is that the kind of push back you're thinking about? ...Given that my books deal with a bunch of issues that are perfectly answerable, I'm very conscious of trying not to gloss over the most obvious questions that should arise from whatever I'm talking about. I can't get them all, but I don't want to leave readers feeling like I don't at least recognize an obvious next question, if you know what I mean. Doesn't mean I can answer it, but good to be aware. There are also instances where maybe I'm just framing something in the wrong way, or in a confusing way, and I definitely want and would take seriously that kind of feedback. ...One different kind of feedback I might use: occasionally, there's a topic that I think is a bit of a throw-away, or something I find fun but don't expect much from, and the reader response is better than I expect. So that might highlight things I decide to look more into.
P.S. Since I like to respond to your excellent questions with long answers, but want to do so quickly, I hope we have an unwritten contract at this point that you release me from editing and excuse my typos;)
Haha you most certainly don't owe me anything, but the terms of that deal (and the ps unwritten contract) sound pretty good to me. I'd love to hear about it! That's interesting about Jobs and his loved ones. Catmull/Pixar have come up as examples of good leadership in enough books at this point that I believe it. It sounds like you've read both Jobs biographies... would you recommend reading the second one after having read the first? And that Chanel story is so hard to believe that I have to learn more. (A podcast I enjoy just released a 2 episodes about her called "The Nazi Who Invented Fashion"... that might be where I go next https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/part-one-coco-chanel-the-nazi-who-invented-fashion/id1373812661?i=1000606269684)
That's interesting to hear. Yeah I think that is the pushback I was thinking about. I think I heard someone (maybe Tim Ferriss?) once say something like any book should first be a speech, which should first be an article, which should first be a lot of conversations, and at each point you can get a sense of how interesting it is to others and iterate accordingly. And I remember Gladwell once saying that one nice thing about a podcast compared to a book is the feedback loop is infinitely faster. So it's cool to hear you're seeing the value in people who have constructive criticism.
I should say, I think there's a balance. I would have written a lot more of first book in the pages of SI if some editors and readers hadn't given me the impression that it wasn't interesting enough for SI. (But honestly, they were right in a way. Some of the topics probably didn't have mass enough appeal to fit for a magazine that size with that general of a readership, but then it can work as a book.) The trouble for me with following the speech/article strategy is that it's often only after a lot of grappling and attempting to write that I start to untangle my own thoughts. The conversations, though, I agree. Despite everything I just said, the seed of my first book was an article — which I then completely contradicted in my book. That was a real lesson! For Range, I'm not even sure what a seed article would have looked like, although there was definitely a seed in my conversations with Gladwell. Among writers, I'm definitely on the lower end of putting out small pieces and getting feedback, but I do think it's a good idea and am trying to do more of it. At the same time, I find books to be so much work that I'll give a ton of weight o whatever keeps me engaged, and I'm willing to use my curiosity as a proxy (to some degree) for the interest of others. Maybe it's trite to say that listening to my instincts plus finding ways to get some regular feedback probably makes for better judgment. And I have found conversations really crucial, since it's close to writing in a way, trying to explain why I'm interested to someone else. I didn't realize how critical conversations of that nature with my wife were until we both got busier. So, no kidding, I actually schedule them like dates on occasion now.
Haha that bit about scheduling them like dates is amazing. I've never written a book, but I think I have a sense of what you mean about conversations. When I'm trying to write something for a class or a newsletter and I'm not sure how to start, it helps me to explain it out loud and suddenly things start to click.
I really enjoyed this conversation about holding paradoxical tension, many good points :-) Thanks! Will certainly get the book. Individuals can hardly be understood as individuals only since we are being born into groups, but rather as individuals in groups at the same time (according to the sociologist Norbert Elias) hence the necessity of holding the I/we simultaneously. What struck me was the wish for finding some sort of optimized outcome of this (necessary) tension between individuals and institutions ... it would be very hard to know what that would be as complexity is the science of unpredictability. What an optimized outcome would look like depends on your ideology, the power relations that we all are in that are shaping human daily activity, what will emerge as overall institutional patterning depends on the relationship, the situation and the context.
Åsa, so well put. And given what I gather from your bio is your expertise, I'd love a reading recommendation or two on these topics!
I'd be delighted to: the murmuring starlings and ant stacks etc is a natural science perspective which we can make analogies from, but only analogies. In order to get into complex interactions and complex responsive processes (as human activity is the most complex there is) we need to turn to social sciences as well: "Complexity - A key Idea for Business and Society" by Chris Mowles and "Tools and Techniques of leadership and management - meeting the challenge of complexity" by Ralph Stacey both published by Routledge. Routledge very recently published three books in a Complexity and Management series, as well, titles: "Complexity and Leadership", "The Complexity of Consultancy" and "Complexity and the Public Sector". All excellent.
My first exposure to McChrystal and Eggers was in my reading of A Promised Land by Obama. I've done little foreign policy reading, but I did read a little more about the war in Afghanistan. All of it made me doubt their sound judgment regarding a healthy outcome of any of the Middle Eastern conflicts, specifically Afghanistan. Your term "mission creep" seems apropos. But I enjoy being mistaken. Maybe they were people like those leaders they wrote about, receiving too much adoration or criticism and holding much less control than I'm giving them credit for.
I appreciate the historical and literary references sprinkled through the article. War and Peace is on my reading list for this year!
Paul, I think questioning leadership judgment is part of what this is all about! I do, though, fall in that camp of thinking the leaders get too much credit whether things go well or poorly...and that's actually a major theme of War and Peace. The one general who comes off as a hero is the one who realizes how little control he really has. Not to lump more reading on you already, but Isaiah Berlin's "The Hedgehog and the Fox" essay is a fascinating piece stemming from W&P. I was going to say "read it after," as I did, but honestly, since I wouldn't be concerned about W&P spoilers, I'd probably read it before if I could do it over again.
That's gold. I love all the contextual reading recommendations. Thanks!
Excellent article which required reading it more than once due to the complexity of the subject of trying to delve into the minds of some of these great leaders. The “industry” of startups comes to mind where it would be very beneficial for the VC/PE firms to be able to gauge the core leadership teams of these startups. When we see the We Work, Theranos etc stories as well as the many failures of startups, it begs the question of whether any personality testing tools can be useful in trying to identify the type of person(s) one is investing in. Existing personality tests tend to split people into somewhat four broad categories of (for instance) DISC. Can the “institutional” issues be measured in any way in addition to the standard broad categories?
As a side note, one of the reasons I reread the article was the numerous uses of the terms “kind of” and “sort of”. Over the last decade or so the use of these terms when making factual statements. For instance, “ You know, Elon Musk would be harder to kind of categorize in that way.”, “ We celebrate as Americans individual freedom and liberty and hold that up while generally kind of taking for granted the importance of the institutions that make all of that possible.” When I reread the article and skipped over all of the “kind of” and “sort of” statements the article was much more clear since my mind didn’t need to deal with the ambiguity of those terms. Maybe picky, but in my last years before retirement I became amazed at statements made by people such as, “We are kind of looking at what went wrong in the construction of…..”, “Our staff is kind of deciding which direction to take.” Well are you or aren’t you?!!
Steve, first, I appreciate the comment on "kind of" and "sort of." Perhaps I'll edit those out next time, since they may come off as much more intrusive in writing than they did in real-time listening. I'm never quite sure if it's my place to edit any language, so while I do edit out certain answers for length, I don't touch the actual language. I probably should, though, when it comes to "umm" "kind of" "sort of" and the like. I did notice it, but also felt that since Jeff was very much "thinking out loud," perhaps it helped convey that sense. But in retrospect I think you're right, and I'll keep this in mind next time.
As far as institutional measures, that's a great question. I'm actually just getting into this issue, so don't know at this point. But I can tell you that, so far, the book Why Nations Fail by Acemoglu and Robinson has a fascinating and very provocative opening that differentiates the development of good and bad institutions. Not sure what I think yet, but finding it very stimulating.
Thanks David
I have a personal theory on the increased use of “kind of/sort of” and it has to do with fear of retribution due to the rise of social media. If we kind of/sort of feel or think a certain way, maybe we won’t get jumped by the masses. I very recently found an interesting post which supports that theory:
https://www.artofmanliness.com/character/advice/a-kind-of-sort-of-eulogy-for-the-declarative-sentence/
As this points out people muck up their written/spoken words with this vagueness and in doing so inadvertently decrease their real feelings and/or expertise.
Possibly part of our professional training ought to include flushing this terminology from our vocabularies; especially in leadership roles. Get back to say what we mean and mean what we say.
Thanks, Steve. Helpful to be made more aware of this verbal filler habit. I agree with your (below) theory that this moderating tendency is real (for some of us anyway), and not helpful.
Jeff, thanks so much for weighing in here! I apologize if it's annoying that I left those in, but to me they are indicative of the atmosphere of thinking out loud that we were employing, and that I tend to use for this newsletter in general. I think it's more natural for speech than to read in a transcript, though. Anyway, that was my take, but I'd love your feedback as a partner in creating this post.
Filler is naturally more common in verbal comms than written. But Steve is pointing to a particular distortion of that effect spurred by the punitive disincentives in our info-driven environment, which is interesting and likely very real.
David and Jeff,
Believe me, I catch myself from time to time with this so not completely innocent. But I do think it’s important as we lead and mentor others. I focused on that the last couple of years when younger execs were presenting in a board room. Would count how many times the used these terms and feed it back to them. It was eye opening for sure.
Appreciate this, Steve. I really hadn't though of it this way, but now I will.
Another excellent and thoughtful interview. I read Leaders about two years ago and I was struck by your exact comment, it is NOT a leadership by checklist that we see so much of. The amount of research and thinking that the authors did was remarkable, and challenging to my own mindset. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
The dichotomies that you brought up is very interesting: about the balance of the lone wolf, great men, visionary versus the unassuming by the book, work within the system leader; about the corrupting versus enabling institutions; and the balance within one person is worthy of a serious study.
I had wondered about the authors, I believe two were products of the leadership training within the military. I wonder what it was within that education that made them write what they wrote, how much was it something within the training? How much was it their experience in a very constrained and black and white leadership role within the military? How much was it due to their own temperament. I know those are impossible questions to answer, but I am interested in knowing what they thought.
I thoroughly enjoyed Leaders, and I thoroughly enjoyed this article.
I am now thinking about how I can make these points with my students and athletes.
Hey Pete, so glad it struck you the same way! ....And that's a really interesting question about the authors and their own backgrounds. I know for my own work, the older I've gotten, the more cognizant I've been of the "me-search" aspect of my research — exploration coming out of something that surprised me or didn't fit my expectations in some area of my life. If I chat with Jeff again, perhaps I'll relay these questions.
The hagiography of Robert E. Lee was in service of the Lost Cause project to recast the Civil War in terms of the brutal suppression, not of slavery, but of a “Southern way of life.” Lee the Noble was a soldier-patriot who was the benevolent lord of the manor whose trusted retainers and contented agricultural staff adored him. The reciprocal demonization of Ulysses Grant, the Butcher, a cigar-smoking drunkard, showed the the Union would never had prevailed in a fair fight. The scaffolding erected by two manikin leaders kept the Solid South in legislative power with only brief interruptions until the Southern Strategy extended power into the Executive Branch. The Great Man model remains a central political theme in Presidential politics, which is one of the things that make President Biden such an anomaly.
Richard, very eloquently put. Thank you for this comment.
I appreciated the reference to Douglass North and the role of institutions, but I think you need to be more specific about what you mean by "institution." It tends to be a nebulous term that people use to mean different things. Did you mean it as North used it? "...humanly devised constraints [both formal and informal] that structure political, economic, and social interaction." It seemed like some of your references to "institutions" could be interpreted as almost synonymous with "organization" (which is how it is often used popularly).
Hi Evan, fair point, and appreciate the critique. I did mean it as North used it — the constraints or "rules of the game" he sometimes mentions that have the effect of providing some measure of regularity to interactions, and of distributing power. As it sounds like you probably know, North writes some about the path dependency of these constraints, and in thinking about Jeff's writing on Iraq, it seemed to me that perhaps US strategy didn't account for that path dependency, and didn't respect the value of those "rules of the game" that people had become used to, and that provided some measure of predictability for interactions. ...I appreciate your point about my lack of specificity, and I'm taking it to heart. And since it sounds like you know this area, and I'm interested in it, I'd love to hear you expand a bit more on the difference between the Northian institution and how the term is often used popularly. Thanks for this comment!
I really appreciated the example of the US strategy in Iraq that didn't account for the role of institutions as social structures that increase certainty in human interactions. I am not an economist, but I read some of North's "Institutions" in grad school. I just remember trying to wrap my head around what an "institution" was, because I was stuck with the idea that institutions are just big organizations (e.g., institutions of higher education, a research institute). Certainly, large organizations can be/have institutions within themselves while also being "players" in higher order institutions. But it is possible to reorganize the structure of an organization without altering the constituent institutions (rules), which I think is basically your/Jeff's point about what happened in Iraq (or maybe it's the opposite).
Maybe readers of your newsletter are all familiar with North's definition, but I just thought that when writing for a lay audience it would be good to be explicit about a term like "institution" to ensure readers aren't thinking about something else when you use it. Thanks for your thoughtful response.
Evan, great points. I think you're right, I should've been more explicit. Next time maybe I'll included a bracketed aside, or at least a relevant link. Really appreciate this input.
Very glad that complexity finally showed up in this newsletter! I had a feeling it would show up somehow since it's very related to the wicked environment, and there were a few close calls like the one on War and Peace and the false ideals of individual heroism. I selfishly hope that we can see more posts on this topic. My interests in college are mainly in how collective behavior outperforms the sum of the parts in wicked environments (collective intelligence). It's a fascinating topic.
Ha, you're reading very carefully! I like that "close calls" comment, and that's a fascinating area of interest you have. You reminded me of an anecdote I read about the moon-landing, although now I can't remember where I read it. In any case, it was something to the effect of one person saying: "Incredible, I can't believe people landed someone on the moon." And the response was something like: "People didn't, NASA did." The point was that the feat seemed impossible until you viewed the collective as something much more powerful than just a sum of individuals.
Great insights...a lot to chew on.
Thanks for reading, John!