A really nice and thoughtful post. Many thanks for picking up the interview with Laura, and expanding on the themes into the realm of management.

I couldn’t agree with you more about the root causes of lack of candor. It represents, as you put it, a desire to protect something, and something in the short term. I think that’s dead right, and to extrapolate it a step or two further, it’s fear. Fear of losing something we don’t have, or not getting something we want.

Fear drives us dangerously into trying to control things, particularly things that are often not within our control. One manifestation of this, as you suggest, is a focus on the short-term, rather than confidence in letting things sort out over the longer term.

Another manifestation is in specificity–that is, thinking we have to succeed at every transaction, rather than letting things average out.

Trust has a paradoxical quality: we tend to get better results by working over a longer time period, and by giving up the attempt to control specific events. And yet of course fear is such a powerful force, it’s hard to escape the gravitational pull of it. Even when, as you point out, any rational analysis of it would suggest it’s counter-productive.

Love to hear more of your thoughts on this subject. I’ll post this on Twitter too, and would urge you, Keith, to be more active yourself on Twitter in promoting your own and and that of others you view as fellow travelers.

Thanks for a very thoughtful and productive post.

The NBA is projecting at least a $400 million revenue loss. How is there “record growth?” Furthermore, television ratings are down.

One player brought a gun into a locker room, a referee was found to be guilty of throwing a game, and the game’s biggest star stabbed his hometown in the back.

How can anyone say Stern has been a “remarkable” leader?

I appreciate your post in pointing out the very unremarkable leadership expressed by BP’s CEO in relation to this disastrous situation. What irks me more deeply is the perceived need to protect BP legally or ethically, and how that may be diminishing true leadership. Are leaders held back by the laws they must abide? The oceanic life being destroyed cannot take BP or Transoceanic to court over this. So how would a true leader step forward? What kinds of risk would they face?

Thanks Keith! I look forward to your response.

Cherie

Regards,
Cherie