Good leaders do what?

During these politically divisive times, one of the major ways people attempt to degrade Trump is to accuse him of being pathetic, if not absent, as a leader. His opponents claim he is the "worst President (leader of our nation) in history." Now, this blog is not about politics and certainly not about Trump. It's about what we can learn to recognize and to be an effective leader.

At the center of the criticism is Trump's results in controlling infections and deaths from CV-19 along with an equally critical view of his handling the economy. When looking at a single result to determine the merits of a leader, we miss the complexities in which any leader must lead. For instance, most sensible people, when not being seduced by politics, understand that aggressively shutting down social activity to halt the spread of the virus simultaneously destroys the economy. On the other hand, if commercial activity were allowed to continue as usual (and the US had a great economy going into the virus period), then the virus would likely have dire consequences on public health.

Putting various biases of Trump aside, what would a good leader do? Pick one outcome and let the other create a disaster? If so, which one?

When I was a young man, just getting started in my career, I witnessed something I will never forget. I worked at Vanity Fair (the garment company) as a systems analyst.

There was an interesting business problem Vanity Fair was trying to solve. If they dyed big batches of cloth, the dying and finishing productivity was good, but in-process inventory in sewing plant was too high. To reduce the problem with inventory in sewing, they would dye smaller batches. But then, productivity in the dye plant would suffer.

This went on and on for months and I watched. Being a math geek I pondered, "why don't they optimize the conflict instead of bouncing back and forth trying to accomplish a single objective?" I was getting my first taste of what it meant to balance two significant opposing forces. I was beginning to see what leadership was and was not.

Today I heard financial analysts interviewing business people about the Presidential debate. The mostly liberal media were trying to corner successful business people to support their claim, "Trump is a bad leader and bad for our country." Ironically, the first person they interviewed was Robert (Bob) Johnson, the founder of BTN.

BTN is the first successful TV network designed for Black Americans. Bob is black. Bob is very successful and respected by all business professionals. What do you think he said about Trump and leadership?

Basically he said that the true test of a leader comes from how he/she deals with trade-offs between two conflicting and difficult outcomes. No leader wants people to die, as they have with CV. Nor does a leader want the economy to tank and create hardship for many.

His focus on evaluating a leader is not picking one outcome and judging whether it alone should have been better or worse. He said the leadership issue should be more about how the leader addresses the trade-offs between two opposing forces. 

In other words, how a leader balances and finds the best middle ground determines a leader. In the case of Trump, Johnson knows how Trump is trying to deal with the trade-offs. It may not be perfect. No one can agree what is the right trade-off. But Trump is predictable in seeking trade-offs, and that is what counts in business.

You can agree with Johnson or not on Trump vs Biden, but his point about leadership is important. In fact, I pondered the very same thing 50 years ago and felt the same way.....