Why Smart People Can Be The Worst Leaders
Screen shots from YouTube - World War One Western Front
Today's second topic is Data Literacy.
Word Count: About 1,100, approximate reading time 5 to 7 minutes. Please share your thoughts in the comments. Please be kind and subscribe to my newsletter.
Two articles on the same subject appeared in two of my subscriptions. Psyche published Why some of the smartest people can be so very stupid. Scientific American distributed Why Do Smart People Do Foolish Things? Both articles came to the same basic conclusions. Smart people do dumb things when their critical thinking skills fail. They become trapped in old paradigms. They are unwilling to change their minds when new information becomes available or desired results are not achieved.
This same weakness is a contributing factor that makes capable people terrible leaders. Critical thinking failures combine with two other behaviors to sabotage leadership. The first weakness is hubris. As people move through the ranks and achieve success, their confidence grows. Many reach a level where they simply believe they cannot be wrong. They look elsewhere for reasons. A lack of empathy is another major reason. When leaders cannot see the negative effects of their decisions on their teams or customers, they lose the ability to course-correct. Eventually, they lose any support they had.
The Psyche article has a picture of British Field Marshall Douglas Haig in their banner. World War One provides a good case study. The headline picture of this article includes several maps of the western front from 1914 to 1918. (I encourage you to watch the YouTube video. I pulled screenshots to create the banner image.) War was declared in late July 1914. Troops on both sides moved into position in August. Germany had early success, but by November 1914, the front stabilized. It remained virtually unchanged for four years. There were offensives, counter-offensives, and counter-counter-offensives. More than four million men died. The generals on both sides were trapped in 19th-century battle planning that did not reflect the realities of 20th-century military capabilities and technology. They could not change their way of thinking. And they were unable to comprehend the suffering of their soldiers.
In January 2023, Harvard Business Review wrote about the need for leaders to be open about their flaws. Leaders must be willing to be less than perfect. When things do not go as planned, one of the vital assessment questions leaders need to ask is, "What if I am wrong?" This question jumpstarts the critical thinking process and opens the door to empathy.
How Leaders Can Become Data Savvy
MIT Sloan published two articles on data analytics - Data literacy for leaders and Try this data framework for analytics advantage. To take full advantage of data analysis, leaders must understand how their teams gather, process, and present data. Understanding the data frameworks enables leaders to ask penetrating questions to bring clarity to the story the data is telling. Data collection is, by definition, both imperfect and dated. Imperfection results from the samples gathered and the quality of the source. Nothing is ever perfect. All data collected is, by definition, old. To be collected, the event that created the data has to have passed. In some cases, Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle (sometimes called the Observer Effect) comes into play. When you survey customers, in the process of completing the survey, attitudes may shift.
One way to become more comfortable with this ambiguity would be to analyze data using the hurricane projection model. Hurricane specialists use multiple sources of data and computer models to make predictions. The gathered data is run through several models multiple times. Each time a model is used, one or two variables are adjusted. By doing this hundreds and thousands of times, they can begin calculating averages and means. These become the projections used for storm warnings and civil response preparation.
M&A planning is an excellent use case for this type of modeling. Multiple studies, including one from the Harvard Business Review, show that more than 70% of all M&A transactions fail to meet their expectations. If deal teams ran multiple scenarios, adjusting key variables such as sales growth, synergy savings, interest rates, customer retention, etc., they would be able to provide much more realistic projections to leadership.
What I'm Up To
We attended the Ft. Worth Stock Show and Rodeo. A Texas tradition since 1896.
I read The Revolutionary: Samuel Adams. He is not the most remembered or revered of the Founding Fathers, but his role was essential. Adams wrote about the fundamental issues that led to American independence as early as 1743 while studying at Harvard.
I started taking golf lessons. Everyone needs a coach. Before signing up, I took the time to find a person I was comfortable with.
We watched Devotion on Paramunt+. This movie tells the story of Ensign Jessie Brown and Medal of Honor recipient Lieutenant Thomas Hudner.
Chips and Salsa: Snack-sized news and posts
Embracing discomfort is essential to growth. We must always try to do things we have not done before.
Medium - Comfort is the secret killer of happiness (and progress)
I still get up early every day. It gives me a chance to think about what I want to accomplish. Somedays, I write. Others I play golf or exercise. It is always a deliberate choice. I do not drift with the tides; I sail with the wind.
Medium - Why a Stoic Wakes Up Early
Buy Now, Pay Later platforms like Klarna and Affirm failed to understand why department store layaway programs worked. (When department stores were still a thing.) Layaway worked because the product was not delivered until all payments were received. BNPLs are simply high-risk microloans.
https://observer.com/2022/07/buy-now-pay-later-cant-grow-its-way-out-of-a-recession/
We are not stories because we cannot write what comes next. Upon reflection, we can look at our past and tell the story of how we arrived where we are today.
Aeon - Let's Ditch the Dangerous Idea That Life is a Story
In an earlier newsletter, I wrote about leadership's responsibility to balance shareholder and stakeholder value to create sustainable organizations. Points 2, 3, and 4 in this article are all about stakeholder value.
SmartBrief - What are your leadership big 5
Find a place where you can thrive. Do not settle for just getting by.
HealthShots - Focus on quiet thriving rather than quiet quitting.
People want the freedom to work remotely and without close supervision. As long as morons continue to pose stories that brag about how little they work, that freedom will be a distant dream.
Business Insider - TikTokers explain how to waste time at office jobs
Too much debt makes your business fragile. Too little debt makes your business inflexible.
Inc - Why debt makes your business fragile
From El Arroyo – "Nachos are just tacos that don't have their life together."
Quotes
“Stay committed to your decisions, but stay flexible in your approach.”
- Tony Robbins
“There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.”
- Mark Twain
The Leader With A Thousand Faces is available on Amazon.
My goal is to make this newsletter as interesting and valuable as possible. Please share your thoughts and suggestions for improvement. If there are specific topics in leadership you would like me to focus on in future issues, please send them my way.
