I find it curious that people want to be indispensable; that they would want to be so important, so key to any organization that, should they leave, that organization’s survival would be in jeopardy. Not only is it short sighted, it runs contrary to how our nation itself developed, both politically and industrially.
Imagine, if you will, the difference in direction our country might have taken based on the choices of two men:
First, in the political realm, let us consider George Washington. He was in the unique position to help define forever more the direction our country would grow and evolve and he recognized this. To his friend James Madison he wrote “To the first of everything, in our situation will serve to establish a Precedent. It is devoutly wished on my part that these precedents be fixed on true principles.” He knew that every step he made, every decision, every act would be looked at hence as the baseline and foundation for every future step, decision, and act. Imagine, if you will, if President Washington, or any of the other founding fathers felt like he needed to be indispensible. I think it unlikely that the new democracy would have flourished. In that day and age, our representatives in congress felt a duty and a desire to serve the greater good. It was not about serving their own good. It was not about being the lynchpin, that once removed, caused the system to collapse like a house of cards. Their intent was to forge a lasting government that would survive the test of time, long after they were dead and gone. That was their legacy.
Now that we have the country well and truly built on sound principles, let’s look at another man. He was not a politician, but along with his contemporaries, he gave us the foundations for industry and several inventions that dramatically changed lives. Thomas Edison spent a good bit of his time building companies around his inventions. His research and development complex in West Orange New Jersey became a vast industrial complex manufacturing and working in tandem with Edison’s laboratory. At its peak, the facility employed as many as 10,000 people. As time went on, he left more and more of the day to day work of running the businesses to others as he pursued other interests, including other inventions. He had built a company that could run without him babysitting it every step of the way. He had built a legacy.
It was in George Washington’s nature to lead. It was in Thomas Edison’s nature to invent. When I look around now at industry leaders, I don’t see any similarities. I see a need to be indispensible, whether as a football player, CEO, or political servant. I see a hunger for money, power, and notoriety at the expense of everyone else.
I see politicians, wrapping themselves in the flag while spending ungodly sums of money, insulting those of us who put them there (and are supplying the funds they’re spending), collecting salaries and retirement that only the privileged few can come close, and telling us that without them, we will descend into anarchy.
I see iron-fisted CEOs, company owners, managers, team “leaders” ( a term which I use quite loosely here) who micromanage every decision, every step, every aspect of their companies. These hard-driving individuals are driving their organizations right into the ground at an astonishing rate.
In recent times, I’ve seen very few, most notably Richard Branson and Herb Kelleher, who seemed to defy this trend. They, I believe, understand the fundamental basics: create a sound business model, hire the best people you can find to run it, pay them a fair wage, and then get the hell out of their way and watch success happen.
I grow increasingly weary of political and corporate claims about how we would all be lost without them leading the way out of the darkness, all while they are hoarding the matches. Maybe they could just light a candle and pass it on – like so many strong and successful leaders before them.
