#118:From my unlocked diaries: Leadership Lessons from Alexander – Part 4

Here is my concluding part (Part – 4) of the series – Leadership Lessons from Alexander

In case you have not read the first 3 Parts, here is the link below ….

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/116from-my-unlocked-diaries-leadership-lessons-from-part-r-balu-/

Leaders often create an aura around them, a sense of invincibility and fearlessness to ensure followership. Few Leaders do that by performing seemingly impossible deeds, courageous acts or make bold decisions.?Sometimes such acts go down the ranks as amplified ‘folklore’ merely by word of mouth. Such amplified versions often create a ‘Cult’ following. If used well, it often creates loyal followership, ultimate faith & belief in their leadership abilities.

Alexander by his carefully orchestrated actions built his own invincible image in the eyes of his troops. Often stories about his invincible deeds reached enemy ranks, which in turn spread a sense of fear among them. This sense of invincibility about him ensured half his battles were won in the mind, even before it began.

One such symbolic deed was Alexander cutting the Gordian Knot

The kingdom of Phrygians (in ancient Persia) was without a King for many years. When Alexander entered this Persian province, he heard about the Prophecy of an Oracle who had decreed that anyone who would untie the complicated Gordian Knot tied to an Ox Cart, would eventually rule Asia.?The knot was very tightly entangled and presumably unsolvable by any man.?

As soon as Alexander heard about this challenge, he decided to take it on.

He made several attempts to unfasten the knot carefully, but all of them failed. Angry and frustrated, Alexander took out his sword and hacked the knot into pieces, even as people around him watched in awe.

Though Alexander had not really succeeded in untying the Gordian Knot, the message that went out was that Alexander succeeded in untying the famous Gordian Knot, and he would be the future King of Asia ! ?That infused confidence among his troops. Such folklore travelled to far off lands, making his enemies fearful about Alexander’s abilities.

As Alexander took on kings and armies much larger in size and experience as compared to his own, often his troops would get extremely nervous just before the battle.

It was the night before the Battle of Issus with the mighty King Darius with an army of 100,000 men. Alexander realised his commanders and soldiers were extremely nervous and feared a total route the next day.?Sensing this lack of confidence in his ranks, Alexander did the unthinkable; though he himself was nervous, he pretended to sleep peacefully in his tent, and only woke up extremely late the next morning just to indicate to his troops that he was not really worried about the enemy and the steep challenge on hand.?

That gesture sent a positive message to his troops and how confident he was of a win.?Win, he did. The next day, Alexander and his troops routed and massacred Darius and his troops, which finally led to total victory in the days to come.?

During his 12-year long conquest Alexander’s troops made immense sacrifices. Many gave their lives, fought fierce battles, knowing fully well that they may not survive. They had immense trust in Alexander.

But how did he gain their trust, especially when whatever food he consumed had to be first tasted by a randomly picked food ‘tasters’, before he consumed it? He had even survived an earlier attempt to poison his food by one of his disgruntled Commanders.?

Alexander once fell terribly ill and had to be treated by his Physician – Philip.?Without any hesitation and fully trusting his Physician, Alexander just grabbed the bowl of herbs from Philip, and in front of his troops … and just drank it.?

He did take a grave risk in doing that, but that act ensured unflinching trust and faith from his troops, for he had visibly demonstrated that he fully trusted them.?

There are many such examples of using similar acts of valour, conviction and symbolic acts that often other Leaders have used.?Here are a few examples.

Salt Satyagraha and Spinning the Charaka by Mahatma Gandhi were both symbolic acts, but millions of Indians followed it.?It became a symbol of our Independence struggle, got everyone together in our fight for freedom … of course in a non-violent way.?

In the early 1980’s at a time when IBM was competing with Apple to establish itself in the PC business, IBM realised it’s biggest weakness was its - size.?While Apple was rapidly expanding, IBM being a multi-national product company struggled, since it was too large.?Its bureaucratic corporate culture put brakes on IBM to be nimble and quick to compete with Apple.

At that time IBM did something symbolic – it created a separate PC business unit, physically located it in a very laid-back location outside of New York.?The PC unit even abandoned the IBM uniform, and adopted casual wear in office.?By this symbolic act, IBM was able to inculcate a culture, nimble enough to compete with Apple.

During 1981 when Jack Welch took over as the CEO of GE, its global revenue was just about $ 25B, most of which came from making lighting and electrical equipment.?That’s when Jack Welch launched his grand vision - to make GE a $ 100 B company by the turn of the century.?That symbolic vision eventually led to GE becoming a multi-product & services multi-national, with a significant presence in aerospace, medical systems and financial services and several other areas.?

Though many in the company initially felt that such a grand vision is impossible to achieve, eventually with Jack Welch leading from the front, that grand symbolic vision of achieving $ 100 B in Revenues did occur in 1999, just before the turn of the century !?

That’s the power of symbolism and conviction, just what Alexander did several thousand years ago…

Alexander was just 32-years when he died on his return to Mesopotamia.?He was a ruthless conqueror no doubt.?But some of his leadership practices find resonance in current day corporate & political Leadership & strategies.

But in his death, Alexander became philosophical ...

Before he died, he just had 3 desires to be fulfilled:?

-???????My physicians alone must carry my coffin; for he wanted people to know that even physicians cannot cure a human body and save him from the clutches of death

-???????The path of his coffin when carried to his grave be littered with gold, silver and precious stones which he had collected during his conquests; for he wanted to repent that he spent all his life earning riches, but could take nothing along in death

-???????My hands to dangle out of the coffin, facing the sky; for he wanted people to know he came empty handed into this world, and left empty handed …

Balu

October Dec 6, 2021

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