Liz Mellon
Financial Times
$21
Reviewed By Tom Button, CG Editor
We see them step out of their Lear jets or shake hands with presidents. We see them share champagne with movie stars, or open new office towers. But really, how different from you and me are the CEOs at the world’s top corporations?
If we had their jobs, couldn’t we basically do as well as they do?
Liz Mellon’s new book is the quickest way to answer that question, and it’s probably the quickest way too to wrestle with the much more interesting question: If those CEOs were in charge of your farm, what would they do that you aren’t?
Read Also
Ground rules for farm family communications
Establishing meeting ground rules can help your family find ways to communicate that work for your farm. Here are some…
Liz Mellon moves in different circles than you and I. That’s why she knows. Mellon is executive director at Duke Corporate Education, a spin-off from Duke University. Before that, she was on faculty at the London Business School.
Now, she is ranked among the world’s top leadership trainers. Her clients include PricewaterhouseCoopers, Credit Suisse, Rolls Royce, GlaxoSmithKline, Unilever, and many, many others.
Even better, when she is working with these clients, she is working with them at the most senior levels.
In other words, Mellon’s job is to teach leadership to some of the most successful leaders in the world.
They do breathe rarefied air, Mellon agrees. They make a lifetime of decisions in a single morning. Critically, too, they make decisions where there is no obvious right choice to make, such as when there are six options on the table, each of which has its advantages and its dangers.
They’re the ones who need to choose just one of those six, and then live with their choice.
Does it sound like farming yet?
Importantly, Mellon’s client list also includes some of the world’s most successful head-hunting and talent-search firms. These are the companies that know a company with 100,000 employees will be lucky if it has 10 individuals who could do the big job, and that there’s only one who should get it, and these scouts think Mellon gives them a big hand to find that person.
If Mellon helps them, could she help you decide whether your farm’s next generation has actually got what it’s going to take to manage the farm for the next 30 to 40 years?
Mellon finds five key traits in great leaders.
1. No safety net: This is where it all starts, Mellon says. Leaders aren’t foolish risk takers, but they know that without risk there is no progress, and without progress there can only be the biggest failure of all. These leaders reduce risks not by going down paths that they know are safe, but by knowing more about their business than anyone else, and also by understanding the business positioning of everyone in their community better than those businesses understand it themselves.
These business leaders believe that if you’re afraid to fail, you can’t succeed.
The leader’s job is to push boundaries, Mellon says. Without a willingness to work beyond the safety net, their business can never be great.
2. Comfortable in discomfort: Everyone else might want clarity and certainty. Great leaders are exceptional at living in a world where everything is grey, not black and white. Business schools put enormous energy into teaching decisiveness, Mellon says. But great leaders focus on judgment, not decision making. Sometimes it simply makes more sense not to make a decision at a particular point — which is basically deciding not to decide.
Executives further down the chain start to lose focus when there doesn’t seem to be a clear direction. Great leaders, by contrast, are happy people in periods of transition. They sleep well, they have a great sense of humour, and they keep other people believing in them.
3. Solid core: Call it an internal compass if you wish, or even a soul. Great leaders are in touch with their values. They understand instantly whether a strategy aligns with their vision.
Great leaders are also authentic, and have almost always been raised by parents who have emphasized values.
Employees — including family members — are expert at smelling insincerity. They can pick out an acting job when you may think you’ve got them in your grasp. The message, says Mellon, is to know yourself, know your role, and know that the fit is exactly right.
4. On my watch: These leaders do know what’s important. On average, they spend 80 per cent of their time making sure the ship stays afloat. The farm is not going to fail on their watch. They focus on cost control, employee efficiency, marketing programs and the like, because the number one job is to not fail. Then they devote 20 per cent of their time to thinking about the future, which means at least a day a week of hard work, not some vague day dreaming.
5. I am the enterprise: This may be hardest of all, says Mellon. If things go wrong, great leaders don’t start with the excuses, they start by taking responsibility.
Because of that, great leaders also know they need to invest in themselves. They know they need to treat themselves well in order to keep their energy up, because when they are on the job, they are fully on the job.
So, how much like a senior CEO are you? My bet is, you share something with such leaders. The difference, I can hear Mellon saying, is whether you’re satisfied with “something” versus “all.” CG
