Modern leaders can learn a lot from past turbulence

American presidents are getting a bad rap thanks to the behaviour of the encumbent but the records of some are a powerful  model for any leader.

The best historian of the American presidency, Doris Kearns-Goodwin, has been adroit in picking which commanders-in-chief to write about.

Her towering biographies of the lives, times, challenges and achievements of Presidents Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson are all absorbing reads in their own right.

And now she has looked back on her life’s work for the must-read, Leadership:  Lessons from the Presidents for Turbulent Times.

In this volume, she picks through the lives of her subjects to identify the influences that formed them, the challenges they each faced and overcame as young men and then how they used their acquired strengths and skills to  overcome specific challenges in office.

Abraham Lincoln came from poverty and had to fight depression so severe that sharp objects had to be hidden before leading the nation through a civil war that laid the ground for its 20th Century dominance.

Theodore Roosevelt fought childhood illness and then lost both his mother and wife through childbirth in the same day before leading the nation through a period of technology and social upheaval comparable to current times.

Franklin Roosevelt was raised in a household with an invalid father and then was crippled by polio in his late 30s before leading the nation out of the Great Depression and through World War II.

And Lyndon Johnson recovered from a heart attack to reshape his own politics to a commitment to equality before unexpectedly becoming President after the assassination of John F. Kennedy and then delivered the most substantial social equity program the US has seen.

Four Presidents. Each with different characteristics and different challenges.

The beauty of Doris Kearns-Goodwin’s latest book is its styling of history as a management guide book. She builds the narrative (as the title suggests) around the lessons to be learnt from each of the Presidents’ approaches.

The most valuable among them include: the willingness to immerse in detail when it mattered (as Lincoln did in calculating how to legislatively free slaves); the willingness to take time to contemplate the correct course (as all did in their challenges); the willingness to build alliances (as all did by including rivals in their decision making). And the willingness to communicate to win people over to their argument rather than just echo their listeners’ concerns.

We’re not all going to be Presidents but many of us are leaders or aspire to be leaders. All the skills Doris Kearns-Goodwin describes are valuable and readily attainable within ourselves.

That’s not to say that any of these leaders were flawless. All were pig-headed (as leaders often have to be) but they matched their pig-headedness with intellect that justified their actions.

You might think some of these notions are old-fashioned in a political world dominated by instant and social media. I would argue they are even more relevant and leaders following these principles might be less inclined to preside over the loss of trust in major organisations that I’m chronicling in my next book,  Has the luck run out? (Hachette in March). But that’s another story.

I recommend Doris Kearns Goodwin’s latest work to anyone with leadership aspirations. It’s an engaging read  – and you can even count it as part of immersing yourself in detail and the quiet contemplation that can save your day.