The Value of Leaders Learning from History
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Having studied business leaders over a long period of time, it was refreshing to read the perspectives and reflections on the discussion thread of “Why Don’t Leaders Learn from History?” One commenter, Murray Bristow, wrote: “I think the repetition of history by those who are repeating it is caused primarily by people viewing their own circumstances as somehow different from those circumstances faced by people in the past. Often those looking in from outside can see the parallels and may even comment on the similarities and the lessons that should be drawn from history. But when the decision makers want to go in a particular direction, they rationalize away the similarities with historical events, perhaps often attributing the differences to their own capabilities.” Murray raises an interesting dilemma for me. On the one hand, I have advised leaders to pay attention to the context to maximize the potential of making the right decisions at the right time. This ability to seize the zeitgeist of the times to create something new, optimize an opportunity, or reinvent a moribund business is the essence of contextual intelligence. On the other hand, I have also advised leaders to learn from history. But if one is too preoccupied with the present context, will they inevitably fail to recognize any parallels in history?
Murray’s post was reinforced by Kevin Chamberlain, who wrote: “Leaders often fail to consider history because they have an unhealthy sense of their own uniqueness, and they have a sense that the events around them are 'peculiar' to their time and therefore history is of little value.” Murray and Kevin raise an interesting challenge for leaders, who must both understand the peculiarities of your own time and recognize the parallels between the past and the present. In the heat of decision making, it is all too easy for leaders to both forget the past and pay little attention to the present. Great leaders must be able to hold these dual and sometimes conflicting notions in balance at the same time. In some cases, there is no disconnect. In other cases, the links to the past may not be as apparent or as relevant, but a leader’s ability to at least recognize the value of history should enable them to make more informed decisions and to potentially avoid the mistakes of others.
An appreciation for history and an appreciation for the present do not have to be mutually exclusive. Though this balancing act can be difficult, leaders who make the effort to learn from the past and understand the present context will make better decisions. The tougher part for many will be recognizing that they are not as unique as they think they might be. Murray and Kevin both correctly identified a leader’s hubris (their faith in their own abilities) as an impediment to their appreciation of history. This hubris may also block their ability to care about their context. It may be that the ability to appropriately balance the past and the present is what identifies truly great leaders.
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Tony Mayo is a Lecturer in the Organizational Behavior unit and is the Director of the Leadership Initiative at Harvard Business School. He is an author of 
Comments
One important historic lesson for leaders is that they fail if they do not have the respect and support from their people.
Too many 'leaders' overestimate their personal importance.
An interesting recent article in this context is 'The employee is always right' in Time Magazine, about bottom-up evaluation at HCL, a high-tech company in India.
- Posted by Ron
December 19, 2007 2:46 AM
Perhaps there is another challenge of time-in-a-day. I know few leaders who have enough time already, much less extra time to 'research' leaders from the near and distant past. Plus, if I as a leader have extra time, I have a strong tendency to invest it in creating a future (leading) rather than looking backward (learning critical lessons).
Also, while Tony and Murry & Kevin hit on it, it seems the dominant thread in this article is Humility (even Ron's comment hits on it). But in our "stay out of my morals" culture, the schools don't hit on this nor do the companies we work for (assuming they don't already go along with the culture). Seems like significant effort is put forward to help prevent any one person from being capable of ruining a company, division, unit, etc., so we end up ignoring the character of people in our hiring and promoting. Seems like we're stuck until we're willing to deal with morality directly.
- Posted by David Malouf
December 19, 2007 8:44 AM
Dear Sirs,
There cannot be a future without the present, there cannot be a present without the past. Any advancement be it technological or social has its roots in the past, trunk in the present and branches into the future. The mental ability to accept the transformation of past into present and present into future requires a through digestion of the subject one is into.
Rammohan Potturi
Hyderabad
INDIA
- Posted by Rammohan Potturi
December 19, 2007 12:32 PM
Thanks Tony,
Your post highlighted for me two related trends we are finding in leadership development.
The first is organisations banding together to provide leadership development programs rather than organisation-specific programs. This trend is largely fuelled by a more organisationally mobile workforce, yet it also challenges the dominant notion of every organisation being unique. Whilst written about individuals, Carl Jung's quote sums it up when he stated, 'we are all different but we differ in very similar ways'.
The second idea is that such multi-organisation programs are drawing not only on the history of modern organisations but on ancient history and leadership philosophy.
Kindest Regards
Shaun
- Posted by Shaun Killian, Director, Australian Leadership Development Centre
December 23, 2007 8:45 PM
Leadership is about liberating oneslf from the tyranny of inactiveness through self-motivation. Leadership in the 21st century is not about influencing by someone else rather by oneself. The role of top management is just to create an enabling environment where every one can develop leadership. The best leadership style is the leadership by everyone. Every organisation member should be the leader of the organisation with equal responsibility. As the hirarchies are breaking down and virtual organisations are claiming supremacy , leadership by everyone will be the best answer to fix up the leadership issues of contemporary world.
Gopi Krishna Khanal
Ministry of Local Development
Kathmandu
Nepal
- Posted by Gopi K Khanal
December 31, 2007 5:25 PM
There has been a lot of discussion in the recent past about leadership styles and especially whether down to earth CEOs make better business leaders or superstar CEOs.
Tony - I wonder if the ability and willingness to learn from the past comes easier to the "regular guy" CEOs than superstar CEOs?
Another thought - We all talk about the rapid changes that have taken place in the business environemnt in the last decades or so. In this context is it not advisable to give more weightage to the current business dynamics rather than looking to the past where the situation might really have been very different?
Uday
- Posted by Uday Gulvadi, Director Internal Audit Services -Eisner LLP
January 8, 2008 10:48 AM