In April I spoke to a large group of senior managers of a national organisation. Their Forum was held over two days and the general theme was ‘Lead with Attitude’.
I entitled my presentation Leadership – Beyond C2 – meaning beyond command and control, and opened with the quote by Ferdinand Foch; “A leader is above all things an animator. Their thought & faith must be communicated to those they lead. They & the leader must form as one at the moment of executing the plan. That is the essential condition of success”.
Foch was a French soldier, military theorist, and writer who lived 1851 –1929. Shortly after the start of the Spring Offensive, Germany's final attempt to win the war, Foch was chosen as supreme commander of the Allied armies, a position that he held until 11 November 1918, when he accepted the German request for an armistice. He advocated peace terms that would make Germany unable to pose a threat to France ever again. His words after the Treaty of Versailles, “This is not a peace. It is an armistice for twenty years", would prove prophetic; World War II started almost twenty years later.
It was a little ironic that I should start a presentation with the words of a militarist from a vocation those in the audience might associate as a master of the art of Command and Control. Or was it?
Was it a coincidence that when I began my management life quite a few years ago there wasn’t the huge abundance of management and leadership texts as exists today? When asked what I looked to for leadership learning back then, I answered, “A book called Montgomery of Alamein”.
Bernard Montgomery, was the hero of the Battle of El Alamein, a major turning point in the Western Desert Campaign and one of the most inspirational military commanders of World War Two. Unlike many senior officers of the day, he went out of his way to meet the soldiers under his command. He lived a lifestyle that was not typical of a general. Though his command base was a large and luxurious North African house, Montgomery lived in a caravan in the garden. Strictly teetotal and anti-smoking, he made sure that his men had a reasonable access to cigarettes. There is no doubt that he was popular with the men in the Eighth Army.
It was said of Montgomery that he was, ‘uncompromisingly single-minded. The most conspicuous of all his attributes was his unshakable confidence in himself, an infectious quality which rapidly spread throughout all ranks in the armed forces and among the general public.’ Also that, ‘His outstanding characteristics were his professional thoroughness in planning set-piece battles and the projection of his self-confidence so as to arouse enthusiasm among his troops.’
You cannot command people to be enthusiastic, nor can you command them to fully engage in the plan.
My next point to this group of manager/leaders was made by a Malcolm Kent, and whilst I don’t particularly know of the chap who said this, what he said was really my point, “one of the greatest failings of today’s executive is their inability to do what they are supposed to do’. Reminiscent of Dr.Edward Deming saying that managers need to get out of the way of their peple so they can get on and do a good job.
Whilst I was consulting I conducted some research prompted by something similar out of the States. What that research showed and my small sample of 250 across the country confirmed was that having a good boss was the exception not the rule!
And what made great bosses and leaders? Well a good place to start would be with Montgomery and Foch. Not because they were Generals who fought wars, but because of their ability to bring people together to execute the plan.
I concluded my session with a question. "When your meeting ended; When the interaction concluded; When the crisis was averted and When your team went home at day’s end; How would they describe their experience of you?"
