Friday, May 30, 2008

Leadership Reflections on Stephen Harper

I think there's a lot to be learned this week from some of the recent happenings among Canada's Conservative party minority government and Prime Minister Stephen Harper. BTW, I am generally supportive of the Conservative party and PM Harper. I don't claim to be a political analyst... but here's my observations...


1) Balance newcomers and experience - Just like in sports, if you have a lineup full of rookies... no matter how talented they are, once you are in the big leagues, you are gonna make some pretty horrible rookie mistakes and the old pro's are gonna make you look pretty silly. For so long the Conservative party has been the opposition... the "easy" role... but now that they are the party in power, they suddenly look pretty "dumb" themselves. It seems its not so much stupidity or lack of character/honesty, as much as it is not understanding how being "the one" under the microscope 24/7 in everything makes things different.


Obviously former Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier made some mistakes... but this is not the only "how stupid can you be?" activity that has happened amongst Harper cabinet ministers or senior staff. Yesterday there was also a press secretary who reportedly spoke to quickly about the PM's conversation with the Italian PM in regards to the caveats in their involvement with NATO in Afghanistan... and then had to retract the "private conversation report" to the media. And there were previous blunders in the past months that one knows are simply "rookie mistakes."


Its an especially tough challenge for Harper to surround himself with a mix of "experienced" personnel because the Conservative party has been out of power for so long. But to have so many rookie mistakes... and at a time when you are trying to prove your capability to lead so that they can hopefully get a majority gov't in a future election...yikes!


On Sunday May 25, CBC analysts brought out the next two "critiques" (not that I very often find CBC analysts to be very insightful but... they were on these two points)

2) Balance "political astuteness" with talent - the CBC analysts pointed out that in trying to make sure that there was a cabinet member, esp with a significant portfolio, from key areas where the Conservative gov't has lacked support... namely Quebec and Ontario... Harper appointed people to key cabinet posts that had average "talent." He could have appointed a number of Western Canadian MPs to key posts... people Harper probably knew more closely and were more aligned with his perspectives and were more familiar with working with him... and yet this was deemed to be a poor and unwise choice politically. However, in appointing ministers based on geographic/regional alignment, some suggest Harper has not appointed the most talented MPs and thus, in a way, he has created some of these nightmares for himself. The CBC analysts also mentioned the lack of women in significant cabinet posts.

In an era when political correctness seems at times to be the decisive factor in decisions, it was interesting to hear a negative critique of this strategic manuevering. Personally, I believe it is vitally important for a government or any organization to have diversity (of gender, race, and geographic background) on a leadership team. One must be very intentional in order to accomplish this and most of our North American "selection" systems work against us bringing diverse people into our organizations. Yet at the same time, the Harper governments experiences remind us that diversity is not and should not be an antonym for "quality." If you have a choice in an organization to select an excellent person or a good person, you choose the excellent individual. And if you have the choice between an excellent man and an excellent woman or an excellent Caucasian and an excellent First Nations person, select the excellent person that gives your organization diversity.

3) Balance "organizational mission" with individuality - Harper has been fairly consistently criticized for his centralization of power... and yet he does not strike me as a power-hungry man. The negative view of this is that "everyone has to tow the party line." Or to put it positively, the government wants to communicate one, consistent message. In leadership language, we want to focus on the mission or "speak with one voice." Yet rightly or wrongly, when an organization tries to centralize the message too much, it comes out as one power-hungry, controlling individual and a bunch of his/her little robots or "yes people." While being mission focused is important, it should never be so important that people lose their individuality or that a person feels or is treated as insignificant.

Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Some new pics of Caleb

Just posting some new pictures of Caleb on the blog. As you can see he was quite happy yesterday in his Calgary Flames outfit... though I must confess that making him wait a few minutes while we took these pictures and before he had his bath and then ate his bedtime snack resulted in him sharing his dissatisfaction and impatience with daddy for a few (loud) moments... but then mommy came and made everything all right.

Caleb will be celebrating 12 weeks out in this world on Saturday and he is growing steadily, thank the Lord. The last few nights he has been sleeping fairly well (6-7 hours) and has been awake, lying calmly in his crib, when his daddy wakes up. It is so amazing just to see him so alert in the morning and to visit with him... and it is actually "difficult" to pull myself away from just admiring him and head to the office. Oh Lord, why have you have been soooo good to us to entrust us with this precious bundle of joy who is so sweet, strong, healthy, and adored. Oh thank you!

Thursday, May 15, 2008

Mother's Day

A family picture on Mother's Day!









Caleb "wrote" the following message for his mommy on the message board on our refrigerator:

Happy Mother's Day!

Some moms are Smart,
some moms are Attractive,
some moms are Responsible,
some moms are Articulate, and
some moms are Holy.
My mommy is all of these!
I love you! Caleb xo xo xo

Sunday night (Mother's Day) was also the season finale of "Survivor Micronesia: Fans vs Favorites" and so while enjoying our traditional Survivor potluck celebration, we also got a picture of Caleb (right) with his friend Levi (Ewert).

Monday, May 12, 2008

Book Review - Tough Choices by Carly Fiorina

In watching Bill Hybels interview with Carly Fiorina at the 2007 Leadership Summit, I learned that Pastor Hybels was so impressed with this book that he purchased it for all his staff and made it required reading. While I appreciate Bill Hybel's perspective and the interview at the Leadership Summit, I can't say I found the book to be so amazing that I would make it required reading. I've read lots of good books on leadership... and a few that were not so good... and this memoir is somewhere in the middle... a good book with some challenging perspectives on leadership.. but not a great book, or even a very good book.

A couple of the highlights for me were:
*In chapter 18 there's a great section on how "the HP way had been corrupted in some important aspects. Respect for the Individual had come to mean being courteous and noncombative even when candid, serious disagreement and debate was what the business really required." The bottom line - people did not confront issues!
*Chapter 24 " Big Ideas and Small Details" - a good reminder that while a leader needs to be big picture person, there are some small details that simply cannot be missed or it can be catastrophic for a leader/organization.

Thursday, May 08, 2008

Caleb is two months old





Caleb's proud daddy wanted to post a few new pictures today anyway...

And then Caleb got a special present from his Auntie Lois in the Philippines!



Monday, May 05, 2008

Beyond All One could ask or imagine

I'm sure I've mentioned this Scripture verse a couple times, but it is must be mentioned again today. Ephesians 3:20-21 says, "Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen."

As Sarah and I celebrate our one year wedding anniversary today, this verse summarizes my/our life so perfectly. First, all glory goes to God! He is the one that has done incredible and amazing things for us, in us, and (we trust) through us. Second, this past year has been "immeasurably more than all we could ask or imagine." From our wedding day where God seemed to oversee every detail and made the day go so smoothly, to the overwhelmingly generous outpouring of wedding gifts, to our trip to India, and then the blessing of being able to get pregnant so quickly, and to have our precious little boy Caleb arrive on March 8, and now again to continue to be showered with gifts and so many expressions of kindness and love with our son... Thirdly, it is clearly HIS power that is at work in our lives, in our marriage, in our family, and in our activities/work.

Yesterday, our dear friend Pastor Tim continued the series on "God, Money and You" and the message was "How Much is Enough?" Along with being another excellent message, our friend Peter Mal and the music team led in some great songs that tied in with the message. The Chris Tomlin song, "Enough," is one I sang many times over the past five years, sometimes hoping it would be true in my life, even though I didn't feel like it was... thinking, Lord, I so much want a wife and yet I want You to be more than enough. And now to be on the "other side" of the fence, not longing particularly for someone or something, but realizing how incredibly God has blessed me, not just with an amazing wife but also with a healthy, growing, handsome son, I hope that Christ is still the One I look to as "enough." Another song was "I'd Rather Have Jesus than anything..." and I hope that is/will be true of my life, not just in the cumulative/retrospective sense but in the daily living of being a man, husband, father, employee, church elder, friend, etc.

Oh yeah, and how does this apply to leadership? I believe it was Max DePree who said, the last job of a leader is to say "Thank You." And so as I reflect on one year of marriage to the MBWA (most beautiful woman around), I can only say thank you to God for his incredible grace to me.

One last thought: Caleb has a busy week since it is Mom & Dad Anniversary today, then on Thursday he turns two months old, and then on Sunday it is Mother's Day... and he wants to make sure to get something really special for the most amazing mommy in the world! Any ideas?