Lincoln on Leadership: Effective Strategies for Tough Times – Parts III & IV

In the author’s words, “Why are there so few leaders in today’s business community? The answer seems to be that most managers don’t understand or know enough about the nuts and bolts of skilled leadership. It’s a difficult subject to master because there are no specifics that can be taught. And it is even more arduous to implement because doing so often involves trial and failure, pain and discomfort.” Further, “Leadership is an elusive concept that, at times, can be vague and ambiguous. As a result, there are no set rules or formulas for leaders to follow. There are only guidelines and concepts, perceptions and ideas, abstractions and generalities. This is why the art of leading people is so difficult to master and teach and why there is such a need for roles models.”

“We must study individuals who are recognized as successful leaders, those who have demonstrated their abilities with tangible results. In short, we must look to our heroes. For it is only by examining individuals such as Abraham Lincoln that we can ever hope to understand how effective leadership really works.”

The following is a collection of some of the “Principles on Leadership” found at the end of each chapter in the book and, yes, the author did elect “to place” some of Lincoln’s statements in today’s vernacular. Inasmuch as there was a plethora of statements, I’ve taken the liberty of picking those I felt most relevant. You might want to buy the book in order to enjoy them all.

PART I / PEOPLE

Chapter 1: Get Out of the Office and Circulate Among the Troops

• Seek casual contact with your subordinates. It is as meaningful as a formal gathering, if not more so.
• Take public opinion baths.
• Be the very embodiment of good temper and affability.
• Remember, everyone likes a compliment.
• You must seek and require access to reliable and up-to-date information.

Chapter 2: Build Strong Alliances

• Wage only one war at a time.
• Spend time letting your followers learn that you are firm, resolute, and committed in the daily performance of your duty. Doing so will gain their respect and trust.
• Etiquette and personal dignity are times wisely set aside.
• Invest time and money in better understanding the “ins and outs” of human nature.
• Remember, human action can be modified to some extent, but human nature cannot be changed.
• Showing your compassionate and caring nature will aid you in forging successful relationships.

Chapter 3: Persuade Rather than Coerce

• Use force only as a last result.
• Remember, that your followers generally want to believe that what they do is their own idea and more importantly, that it genuinely makes a difference.
• Seek the consent of your followers for you to lead them.
• Delegate responsibility and authority by empowering people to act on their own.
• On issues that affect your entire organization, conduct full and frequent consultations with the heads of your various departments.
• A good leader avoids issuing orders, preferring to request, imply, or make suggestions.

PART II / CHARACTER

Chapter 4: Honesty and Integrity are the Best Policies

• When you make it to the top, turn and reach down for the person behind you.
• You must be consistently fair and decent, in both the business and the personal side of life.
• Stand with anybody who stands right. Stand with him while he is right and part with him when he goes wrong.
• If you once forfeit the confidence of your fellow citizens you can never regain their respect and esteem.
• You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time. But you can’t fool all of the people all of the time.

Chapter 5: Never Act Out of Vengeance or Spite

• Never crush a man out, thereby making him and his friends permanent enemies of your organization.
• People will be more willing to seek an audience with you if you have a good reputation.
• Remember: Your organization will take on the personality of its top leader.
• You should be very unwilling for young people to be ruined for slight causes.
• Have malice toward none and charity for all.

Chapter 6: Have the Courage to Handle Unjust Criticism

• It’s not entirely safe to allow a misrepresentation to go uncontradicted.
• Remember that truth is generally the best vindication against slander.
• Do the very best you know how – the very best you can – and keep doing so until the end.
• If you yield to even one false charge, you may open yourself up to other unjust attacks.
• If both factions or neither shall harass you, you will probably be about right.

Chapter 7: Be a Master of Paradox

• Make consistency one of the main cogs in the machinery of your organization.
• Try to correct errors when they are shown to be errors; and adopt new views so fast as they appear to be true views.
• You must come to grips with the paradox of providing employee security while also encouraging an environment for risk-taking.
• When you are in deep distress and cannot restrain some expression of it, sit down and write out a harsh letter venting your anger. But don’t send it.
• Make no explanation to your enemies. What they want is a squabble and a fuss; and they can have if you explain, and they cannot have if you don’t.

PART III / ENDEAVOR

Chapter 8: Exercise a Strong Hand – Be Decisive

• An entire organization is never wisely sacrificed to avoid losing one or two small parts.
• Take advantage of confusion, desperation, and urgency to exercise strong leadership.
• Seize the initiative and never relinquish it.
• When making a decision, understand the facts, consider various solutions and their consequences, make sure that the decision is consistent with your objectives, and effectively communicate your judgment.
• Remember that all compromise does not mean cowardice.

Chapter 9: Lead by Being Led

• If you are a good leader, when your work is done, your aim fulfilled, your people will say, “We did this ourselves”.
• Let disputing parties work out their difference by bringing them together and guiding their dialogue.
• Always let your subordinates know that the honor will be all theirs if they succeed and the blame will be yours if they fail.
• Write letters to your subordinates making the personal acknowledgment that they were right and you were wrong.
• The greatest credit should be given to those in your organization who render the hardest work.

Chapter 10: Set Goals and Be Results-Oriented

• Unite your follows with a “corporate mission”.
• Set specific short-term goals that can be focused on with intent and immediacy by subordinates.
• Sometimes it is better to plough around obstacles rather than to waste time going through them.
• Leave nothing for tomorrow which can be done today.
• Your war will not be won by strategy alone, but more by hard, desperate fighting.

Chapter 11: Keep Searching Until You Find Your “Grant”

• Choose as your chief subordinates those people who crave responsibility and take risks.
• If employees gripe about one of your chief supervisors, and the complaints are true, do not be afraid to remove him.
• Give your followers all the support you can, and act on the presumption that they will do the best they can with what you give them.
• Provide your managers a three-to- five month grace period to see if they will take action and perform adequately.
• If they don’t perform adequately, ease them out of power gradually, always giving them ample time to turn it around.

Chapter 12: Encourage Innovation

• When the occasion is piled high with difficulty, rise with it. Think anew and act anew.
• Don’t lose confidence in your people when they fail.
• Let your subordinates know that you are always glad to have their suggestions.
• If you never try, you’ll never succeed.
• Surround yourself with people who really know their business and avoid “yes” men.

PART IV / COMMUNICATION

Chapter 13: Master the Art of Public Speaking

• Be your organization’s best stump-speaker with droll ways and dry jokes.
• Use a variety of body language when you speak.
• Prepare yourself thoroughly for your public speaking engagements.
• Never consider anything you write to be finished until published or, if a speech, until you deliver it.
• Try not to make mistakes when you speak publicly. Everything you say is intently heard. If you make a mistake, it doesn’t merely affect you but the organization as well.

Chapter 14: Influence People Through Conversation and Storytelling

• When you meet with an individual, try not to part with any unpleasant impression on either side.
• Speak in simple and familiar strains with people, without any pretension of superiority. Leave people with the feeling that they’ve know you all their lives.
• Don’t forget that humor is a major component of your ability to persuade people.
• A good laugh is good for both the mental and physical digestion.
• Remember that people are more easily influenced through the medium of a broad and humorous illustration than in any other way.

Chapter 15: Preach a Vision and Continually Reaffirm It

• Provide a clear, concise statement of the direction of your organization and justify the actions you take.
• Everywhere you go, at every conceivable opportunity, reaffirm, reassert, and remind everyone of the basic principles upon which your organization was founded.
• Effective vision can’t be forced on the masses. Rather, you must set them in motion by means of persuasion.
• When you preach your vision, don’t shoot too high. Aim lower and the common people will understand you. They are the one you want to reach – at least they are the ones you ought to reach.
• When effecting renewal, call on the past and relate it to the present and then use them both to provide a link to the future.