Leadership

I rarely get political in my daily blog, but this is a rare time. I wanted to share some wisdom with our two leading Presidential contenders, but - more importantly, to those of us who have not just the right to vote in the U.S., but have the right to advocate for better choices. Do what you will with these quotes, but just remember Abe Lincoln’s guidance, “Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.”

Thirty years ago, when I was a young, inept CEO of my boutique hotel company and we were about to take over our fourth San Francisco boutique hotel, I surmised that the only way Joie de Vivre could grow into a successful enterprise is if we invested in our culture. I defined culture as “what goes on around here when the boss is not around.” And, I realized as we grew the number of our hotels, I couldn’t be everywhere.

Is your monkey mind keeping you up at night? Frustrated about your relationship with a work colleague? Your pet project feels like it's going sideways? You're on a dysfunctional team? The company feels financially unstable? The list is endless, and when it's stuck in your head, it just grows longer.

When I started studying Carol Dweck's theory of growth mindset over a half-dozen years ago, I asked folks at the Growth Mindset podcast (https://bit.ly/48mGeVy) what companies or leaders most invest in a growth mindset. They said, "Microsoft. Their relatively new CEO Satya Nadella believes this could be their strategic competency."

Hans Christian Anderson must be laughing in his Danish grave. He wrote the fairy tale about a vain emperor who is hoodwinked by a couple of grifting tailors who get him to spend a fortune on stylish clothes that are invisible to those who are uneducated. They’re also invisible to the emperor, but not wanting to look foolish, he convinces himself that his new wardrobe is divine and leads a procession through the city stark naked. The townsfolk try to go along with this pretense, not wanting to look stupid, until a child states the obvious: the emperor is wearing no clothes. The emperor shuts the kid up and proudly struts through town like a naked peacock. We are faced with this same predicament in America today: how to speak truth to power, especially when those closest to the powerful often have the most difficulty stating the obvious.

Prioritize Return on Wisdom (ROW) over traditional knowledge. Learn from seasoned leadership, and collaborative learning. Essential for success in evolving markets.

You’re probably familiar with the acronym ROI, also known as Return on Investment (or Ripples of Impact in the MEA world).

One of my modern-day heroes is Bayard Rustin, the African-American activist who was pivotal in a variety of mid-20th-century social movements for civil rights, economic empowerment, nonviolence, and gay rights. I'll never forget seeing the documentary of his life, "Brother Outsider," (https://bit.ly/3Np1xhC) at the Sundance Film Festival two dozen years ago. I don't know if I've ever been so inspired by one man's story. He used the term "angelic troublemaker" to describe the people he admires; of course, it's an apt description for himself.

How is it that Americans believe 81-year-old Joe Biden is too old to be President, yet 93-year-old Berkshire Hathaway founder and CEO Warren Buffett had to recently reassure investors that the day his named successor steps in is many years off? His right-hand man and vice chairman, Charlie Munger, still clocks in for duty at age 99.

At the beginning of the holiday season, transitions seem particularly difficult. What we are exposed to and learn at MEA is how the “messy middle" is a challenge that we are often not prepared for.