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Jack Welch, for two decades head of General Electric, was one of America’s best-known chief executive officers ever. When he retired, in 2001, he was anointed by Fortune magazine, the “Manager of the Century,” which, given his reputation at the time, was a plausible plaudit. For the twenty years during which Welch reigned were a time of seemingly unbounded success for the company into which he poured his extravagant energies.  

But whatever his triumphs during his tenure at the top, once it was over, it was game over. Few great companies anywhere in the world have fallen so far so fast as did General Electric in the two decades after Welch’s departure. In a soaring market its stock price is a fraction of what it was. The company has been kicked out of the Dow. Its current assets are puny compared to its former assets. And its failed leadership cadre has been an unarticulated rebuke to the man who invented, or at least popularized, routinized in-house corporate leadership trainings.       

Welch’s obituaries took note of his different levels of skill as they applied to two different skill sets. Skill set number one was successfully to lead a large organization in the present. Skill set number two was successfully to lead a large organization into the future – to leave a strong legacy by smart succession planning. Welch did wonderfully well at the first. He failed badly at the second.

The Financial Times noted that “Welch’s departure as chief executive marked the high point of his – and arguably GE’s – reputation.” The New York Times’s obituary cited James Stewart, who commented a few years ago that, “hardly anyone considers Mr. Welch a role model anymore.” And the Wall Street Journal concluded that GE’s troubles during the decades after his exit “raised questions about Mr. Welch’s management methods.” Again, each of these obituaries paid their respects, citing Welch’s accomplishments. But, at the same time, each made clear that though he had been tagged manager of the twentieth century, by the second decade of the twenty-first century his previously stellar reputation was visibly tarnished.    

For students of leadership the trajectory of Jack Welch career raises important questions. These include:

1. What were the traits and behaviors that allowed him for so long so spectacularly to succeed?
2. Why did these same traits and behaviors lead him astray when they involved his own succession planning?
3. Exactly why did his team serve him outstandingly well for twenty years – but then badly let down not just him but his company?
4. How did GE’s corporate culture – a culture that Welch created – contribute to GE’s steep descent?
5. What was it about the context within which GE itself was embedded that contributed to its success for two decades – and then for the next two decades contributed to its decline?

Exceptional is the leader for all seasons. Whatever Welch’s strengths, turned out he was not exceptional. As a leader he was the rule – excellent at executing some tasks in some situations but far from excellent at executing other tasks in other situations.   

It’s a trick difficult to pull off. Very difficult. Not many can do it. Only a few even try. Only a few even try to follow and to lead simultaneously because not only is it difficult, it’s distasteful. Dreadfully distasteful.

Most people who want to lead want only to lead. Nothing else – as they see it, nothing less – will do. They do not want to follow, have no intention of following, not even for a moment, especially when that moment is hard on the heels of them trying hard, desperately hard, to be a leader not a follower.

The former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, Pete Buttigieg, is, then, an exception in more ways than one.

• In the 2020 presidential campaign he was relatively young while most of his competitors for the Democratic nomination were relatively old.
• In the 2020 presidential campaign he was from the Midwest while most of his competitors for the Democratic nomination were from the East.
• In the 2020 presidential campaign his political experience was limited and at the local level while most of his competitors for the Democratic nomination had extensive experience at the national level.
• In the 2020 presidential campaign his background was relatively broad – he was, for example, a Rhodes Scholar and Navy Officer – while the backgrounds of most of his competitors for the Democratic nomination were relatively narrow.    
• In the 2020 presidential campaign he at every turn had a first-class temperament while most of his competitors for the Democratic nomination clearly thought they had to scream to be heard.
•  In the 2020 presidential campaign he was demonstrably a man of faith while most of his competitors for the Democratic nomination eschewed all displays of faith.   
• In the 2020 presidential campaign he was an openly gay man, happily married to another gay man while most of his competitors for the Democratic nomination were presumed to be straight. In fact, in this Pete Buttigieg deviated from every other presidential contender ever. He is gay and proud of it.
• In the 2020 presidential campaign he was able to act in his own self-interest and in the national interest simultaneously, while most of his competitors for the Democratic nomination were reduced to seeming narcissists.
• In the 2020 presidential campaign Buttigieg got that in order to lead he had to follow. He had to follow – to all appearances Joe Biden who in the wake of his blowout win in South Carolina emerged the only viable alternative for the Democratic nomination for president to Bernie Sanders.

Buttigieg claimed that all he did was the math. That he calculated that after his loss in South Carolina there was no path to his becoming president. That’s true. But if math were the only calculus the rest of the field would also drop out – now. So, obviously, this is about much more than math. Obviously, folks like Bloomberg and Klobuchar and Warren still feel driven to lead not because they do not know that two plus two equals four.* But because they cannot bear the idea of being a follower. They cannot bear the idea of following one or the other party leader until they are forced by circumstance into compliance.

Mayor Pete on the other hand – by proving it’s possible to follow and to lead simultaneously – has positioned himself supremely well for his political future. Whether sooner or later the remaining candidates for the Democratic nomination for president – that is, those other than Biden and Sanders – will follow his lead and drop out. Whether sooner or later Buttigieg, still only in his thirties, will leave them all in the proverbial dust.    

*Technically Tulsi Gabbard also remains still in the race.

I rarely revisit one of my own blogs. Today is an exception.

Just over two weeks ago I posted a blog titled, “Mike Bloomberg – My Hero for Good Reasons.” My reasons were two. First, Bloomberg correctly foresaw that none of the contenders for the Democratic nomination for president were likely to “confidently challenge Trump.” Second, Bloomberg had committed to supporting with his limitless resources whoever became the Democratic nominee – even if the nominee was other than he.

Between then and now the political ground has shifted. Why? Because twice over Bloomberg performed so woefully wretchedly on the debate stage that he effectively removed himself from contention as Democratic standard bearer.

Joe Biden meantime has staged a modest, a very modest, political comeback. But, if he racks up a considerable and therefore convincing win on Saturday in South Carolina, overnight he will be the only Democratic candidate credibly to challenge for the Democratic nomination the Democratic Socialist, Bernie Sanders.   

This then has gone from being a game of checkers to being one of chess. If you are Pete Buttigieg, or Amy Klobuchar, or Tom Steyer, or Mike Bloomberg, and you really care about what you say what you really care about – preventing President Donald Trump from securing a second term – you must, you must, get out of the race. You must get out of the race if in South Carolina Biden racks up some very good numbers – in which case he becomes the only viable alternative to Sanders. And, therefore, possibly if not probably, the only viable alternative to Trump.  

For Bloomberg, Buttigieg, Klobuchar and Steyer to imagine themselves elected president in November is delusional. If, therefore, they want really to lead, they must follow. They must follow the candidate they conclude has the best chance of defeating the incumbent president. They must follow – the sooner the better.  

Of the candidates for the Democratic nomination for president of the United States left standing (if precariously) after the caucuses in Iowa and Nevada and the primary in New Hampshire, two were women. Amy Klobuchar and Elizabeth Warren. Klobuchar was at no point in the process a serious contender. Though she had a few good moments, never did she come close to be the Democratic nominee.  Warren is a different matter. She did come close. At least she appeared to. During most of last fall she seemed, along with Joe Biden, to be at or near the head of the pack.

Warren’s strengths were apparent:

• She had energy and integrity.
• She had experience and expertise.
• She was a strong retail politician.
• She had a solid staff and a good ground game.
• She had an enthusiastic band of vocal supporters.
• She had policy positions that were carefully conceived and well crafted.
• She had policy proposals that were clear and cogent.
• She was plausible as the first woman president: neither too young nor too old; neither too diffident nor too strident; neither too ingratiating nor too off-putting; neither too feminine nor too masculine.

What then happened? How did her campaign go from being strong, self-confident, and successful to being weak, unpersuasive, and unsuccessful? (As I write, Warren is projected to get 8 percent of the vote in the primary in South Carolina, five days away.)

In hindsight were several theories, such as one focused on the specifics of her plan on health care, which made clear the high cost. (Bernie Sanders, in contrast, has avoided providing any hard numbers.) This though makes little sense. First, most of us have not the slightest memory of whatever the figures she gave. Second, even if this was a misstep, close observers would be hard-pressed to find another. Another theory focused on strategy: her claim to the lane dangerously close to Sanders’s. But would her becoming more of a centrist have helped – given the too large number of centrists already competing?

It’s a tad early for post-mortems. But only a tad. Though we have heard nearly nothing about the relationship, if any, between Warren’s being a woman and her fading campaign, I suspect that when this is over the issue of sexism will surface. I suspect that it will emerge the most important single explicator of what happened to Elizabeth Warren.

We don’t at this point in the process know much. But we do at this point in the process know this. First, that many if not most Democrats have wanted nothing so much come November as to defeat Donald Trump. Second, that many if not most Democrats who have voted so far remained undecided until almost the last moment. Third, that part of the reason for their indecision was their uncertainty about whether a woman could effectively take on a man – specifically this woman, Warren, this man, Trump.   

No doubt about it: Warren effectively eviscerated Michael Bloomberg in the debate in Nevada. But Bloomberg turned out a pushover. At least on that occasion he was a hapless opponent who seemed nothing so much as visibly to shrink from her tongue-lashing. But I don’t doubt for one moment that in their mind’s eye those who voted so far saw on some distant debate stage the large, looming, and seemingly supremely self-confident Trump versus the inordinately intense and probably excessively professorial Warren.

Does this make me a sexist? Or a realist?       

Most of the world has stood by and done nearly nothing other than watch since 2011 – since the civil war in Syria started. We have not in any significant way intervened to prevent the widespread suffering or even to alleviate it, despite the regime of President Bashar al-Assad being directly responsible for:

• Some 500,000 Syrians dead.
• Some 5 million people forcibly displaced within Syria.
• Some 6 million people forced to flee Syria.

Now, as I write, is unfolding what the United Nations has described as the worst humanitarian catastrophe since the beginning of the war: a vicious offensive – backed by the Russians and Iranians – intended to force the still renegade province of Idlib back into the clutches of the government. Back into the clutches of the president.  

Let there be no mistaking. The United Nations emergency relief coordinator, Mark Lowcock, has described the military advance on Idlib, which has already forced the flight of nearly a million people, as “the biggest humanitarian horror story of the 21^st century.”   

Meantime, the United Nations itself is hamstrung because Russia continues to use its veto to block the Security Council from taking meaningful action. And the United States and Europe are precluded by their own indifference from doing anything significant to staunch the suffering.

What is a bystander? What is a follower? What is a bystander follower? For the answers to all three of these questions, see above.

Every group has a purpose. Whether a small unit or a large organization, whether situated in government or business, whether located in China or Canada, members of groups affiliate with each together to fill a function. These functions range from accomplishing certain tasks to providing community and comity. The point is that groups are not random collections. Their members are joined for a reason.

The six people who are the leading candidates for the Democratic nomination for president of the United States constitute a small group that has two purposes particularly. The first, in sequence, is to select someone to be the Democratic standard bearer between the party convention in mid-July and Election Day in early November.  The second is to preclude the Republican standard bearer, President Donald Trump, from winning a second term.

As I write, in late February 2020, the small group in question is fixated on its first purpose while ignoring nearly entirely the second. Though Democratic experts and pundits have pleaded for the candidates to spend most of their time taking on Trump, by and large these pleas are ignored, so busy are the contenders taking on each other. One could argue in fact they are obsessed with the less important task – being the standard bearer themselves – while neglecting the more important task, doing everything they can to preclude the incumbent president from winning a second term in office.

Why is this? Why are their priorities screwed up? Well, the obvious answer is that each of them wants to be the leader. Joe Biden, Michael Bloomberg, Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar, Bernie Sanders, and Elizabeth Warren (and even Tom Steyer, still in the race though not recently on the debate stage) all want to lead, none of them wants to follow. Each wants to be president of the United States and, at least at this point in the process, nothing short of being at the top of the heap will suffice.

From a distance, for each of the candidates to cling to this position has little logic. While some have a crack at becoming the Democratic candidate, others clearly do not. For example, two who during the last debate turned on each other with special venom, Buttigieg and Klobuchar, have no chance whatsoever at winning the Democratic nomination. On the contrary, one could argue that at this stage of the process they would gain public support, not lose it by pulling out of the race and, instead, throwing their weight behind another candidate more likely than they to be the Democratic nominee. It would not hurt their future in electoral politics, and it would help their chance to have a positive impact on this one.

Still, they run. Still all six of them prefer to pick at each other instead of picking at the president. Which brings us to the next level of analysis. Why exactly do they want to lead? Why are they so extremely averse to following?  If you asked each of them this question chances are they would say that they are best equipped to lead us, their fellow Americans, to a new and better place. That they would be more ethical and effective a leader than their Democratic rivals. Similarly, chances are that they would not admit to vaulting ambition. Nor would they say that leaders are stronger and superior, while followers are weaker and inferior.

Truth is though that these last two reasons are the more powerful. The reasons all six run and then continue to run, even when they’re running against all odds, is first their ambition is beyond apparent reason, and second they are persuaded that leading is somehow better, far, far better, than following.

The first reason is individual – it is psychological and personal. For a constellation of reasons, some related to nature some to nurture, some people are far more ambitious than others. The second reason is collective – it is sociological and cultural. We have grown a generation, by now two generations, in which leadership is exalted and followership is denigrated. In which standing out is more highly valued than blending in. In which individual achievement takes center stage and the common good is shunted aside. Until these values change – until we revive the conception of civics as the ultimate in high mindedness – we will be saddled with putative leaders for whom personal ambition takes precedence over the national welfare.          

On the one side is a circular firing squad – a group of people “engaged in self-destructive internal conflicts and mutual recriminations.” This circular firing squad is of course as in my previous post – the small group comprised of the six leading candidates for the Democratic nomination for president of the United States.

On the other side are not only the Republicans but the Russians who, as long predicted, are already interfering in America’s 2020 presidential election. Putting their thumb on Trump’s side of the scale.

Given this, any reasonable person would conclude that instead of aiming at each other, Democrats should be cooperating with each other. Training their fire as one on their real opposition: Republicans buttressed by Russians. However, as the term circular firing squad suggests, reason does not always prevail. The Democrats continue to cannibalize each other rather than on taking on those hellbent on doing all of them in.

What the Democrats are doing in 2020 is reminiscent of nothing so much as what the Republican did in 2016 – when the likes of Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush were so busy shooting at each other that in the end it was the putative outsider, Donald Trump, who prevailed. This time around threatens to be the same: Democratic moderates will knock each other off while the outsider, the Democratic Socialist, Bernie Sanders, will emerge the last one standing.    

This outcome would be as foolish as dangerous. It would also be altogether illogical, for as every state and national poll suggests, Democrats in the center outnumber Democrats to the left of center. But, of course, so long as Joe Biden, Michael Bloomberg, Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar and, arguably, even Elizabeth Warren continue to carve up the centrist slice of the Democratic pie, so long will Bernie Sanders hold the largest single slice of all.

What does this have to do with leadership and followership? Everything.

So, there are two ways of looking at last night’s debate among the six leading candidates for the Democratic nomination for president of the United States. The first is as a collection of six separate, disparate individuals. The second is as a group, as what social psychologists refer to as a small group.

The morning after the night before the overwhelming temptation for pundits is to look through the first lens. To see the six candidates as individuals and to rate them accordingly. This morning, then, the report cards for last night’s performances look something like this:

• Joe Biden: B
• Michael Bloomberg: D
• Pete Buttigieg: B
• Amy Klobuchar: B
• Bernie Sanders: B
• Elizabeth Warren: A

One could argue, however, that if the Democrats are to be believed, if their goal first and foremost and even only is to get Donald Trump out of the White House, the better way of looking at the Democratic field as presented on the stage in Nevada last night is as a small group. As a small group that purports to share a common enemy – the president. How then did they rate as a small group, effectively united against the man they profess most fiercely to oppose?

• Candidates as a group: D

Americans have short memories. Whatever happened in Las Vegas last night will be forgotten by the time of the next Democratic debate next week. Still, as of this morning, the happiest man in America has got to be Donald Trump. As a group the Democrats:

• Failed to address Trump as a dangerous narcissist.
• Failed to address the corruption and lawlessness of the current   administration.
• Failed to address even a single issue relating to foreign policy or national security.
• Failed to emphasize their unity against a common enemy.
• Ripped into the political personas of those inside their group instead of those outside their group.
• Ripped into the public policies of those inside their group instead of those outside their group.
• Presented themselves as an entirely dysfunctional family.
• Presented themselves as a random collection of angry, alienated individuals rather than as a small group with shared values core to America’s character and culture.

Social psychologists describe small group leaders as having two different though related responsibilities. The first is affective leadership – keeping group members reasonably cooperative and collaborative. The second is task leadership – keeping the group effectively focused on the task at hand which, in this case, is next November to defeat the incumbent president. The best way then to look at last night’s brawl, last night’s free for all, is not to see the candidates as individuals, but to see them as members of a small group that is as feckless as it is leaderless.    

• William Barr (I don’t care if he really meant it. He criticized the president.)
• John Kelley. (I don’t care if it was too little too late. He criticized the president.)
• Mitch McConnell. (I don’t care if he’s not to be trusted. He criticized the president.)
• Some Republican members of Congress. (I don’t care if they’re mostly pusillanimous. By criticizing Trump’s pick for the Federal Reserve, Judy Shelton, they criticized the president.)   
• Some Republican members of Congress. (I don’t care if they’re mostly pusillanimous. By voting to constrain the president’s military leeway on Iran, they criticized the president.)   

You get the idea! America needs more people to speak up and speak out!

Mitt Romney did it – spoke out against Trump. Where are the other Republican senators? Where for that matter are George W. Bush and Jeb Bush? John Kelly spoke out against Trump. Where is James Mattis? Where, for that matter, is H. R. McMaster, who wrote a book about speaking out? (Dereliction of Duty.)

Citizens at every level who believe that Donald Trump should not be reelected in November owe it to the state of the nation to say their piece – not later, but now, the sooner the better. After Election Day could be too late.

Anti-Trump Followers find Your Voices! Pro-Trump Followers have assuredly found theirs.

I’m in the camp of those convinced that Americans have no more sacred an obligation than to defeat Donald Trump for president in November. Defeat him so soundly and resoundingly that he will have no choice – albeit kicking and screaming – but to exit the White House in January. The incumbent president is poisonous – it’s that simple.

Because the alarm is finally being sounded, there’s tension and teeth-gnashing about the Democratic candidate for president. Who will personify the opposition to Trump? In today’s New York Times, Thomas Friedman’s column is titled, “Paging Michael Bloomberg.” He argues strongly against a leftist candidate, particularly Senator Bernie Sanders; and equally strongly for a centrist candidate, particularly former New York City mayor Mike Bloomberg.

I agree with Friedman. I too am persuaded that Bloomberg would be the best, most-likely-to-succeed candidate to take on the tyrant in the White House.

However, I refer to Bloomberg as “my hero” not because of my future preference, but because of his past performance. His past performance twice over.

First, Bloomberg demonstrated remarkable political acuity at the earliest stage of the 2020 presidential campaign. He threw his hat in the ring when he foresaw, correctly, that absent him the Democrats would be unlikely to muster a single candidate who could confidently challenge Trump. Long before Joe Biden, five minutes ago considered the Democrats’ strongest contender, dropped off the political radar, Bloomberg foretold the future.

Second, Bloomberg promised to support the Democratic nominee with the vast resources at his disposal – even if the nominee is other than he!  Nothing speaks as powerfully and persuasively to the sense of urgency he feels – as well as to his sense of duty. Bloomberg has committed himself – and a good fraction of his fortune – to removing Trump from the nation’s highest office because he has accurately assessed the dangers of a second Trump term. In consequence, Bloomberg has committed to directing his already very large campaign operation, and everyone and everything that this entails, to whoever becomes the Democratic nominee.

Let’s be clear here: the Democrats will need, badly, every bit of help they can get. Even now, Trump’s campaign machinery is in full gear, and his existing advantages, from incumbency to technology, are enormous.  This makes Bloomberg’s promise to stay the course, no matter who ultimately is the Democratic candidate, critical. For it is no exaggeration to say that without him, without Mike Bloomberg somehow in the mix, the Democrats likely are lost.