"Commentary"-Reel Life Lesson
Thursday, April 17, 2008SUZANNE PRATT: Tonight's commentator says corporate leaders could learn a thing or two from the big screen. Here's Bill Baker, executive in residence at the Columbia University School of Business and author of the new book, "Leading with Kindness."
BILL BAKER, EXECUTIVE IN RESIDENCE, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF BUSINESS: One of my favorite movies is "Glengarry Glen Ross," a film about four salesmen who work for a sleazy real estate company. One day, the company announces its starting a new sales contest: first prize is a Cadillac El Dorado, second prize is a set of steak knives, and the third prize is you're fired. Sound familiar?
What concerns me is that some managers think this is the best way to run a business. In the movie, the four salesmen are driven to desperate measures and end up stealing from the company. But is this really so far from reality?
I have spent the last year researching management literature, particularly scholarly works by industrial psychologists. What I have found is what I've observed from a lifetime in business myself, that the best leaders set realistic goals and then encourage their employees to work as a team, searching for innovative ways to reach them. If they fall short occasionally, a good leader considers this part of the price to pay for moving forward and mines the failure for valuable lessons.
Maybe this is a lesson being forgotten by many of today's business leaders and it may be the cause for meltdowns of some companies. Despite the incredible short-term pressures markets place on corporate managements and their boards, the longer view of allowing employees to have their heads and to take risks, even to fail, make for ultimately better and more successful businesses.
That lesson might even go for us, the individual stockholder, stick with the companies whose leadership espouse these values. In the long term, they are the likely winners. I'm Bill Baker.
