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I'm Shannon burning books editor for
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knowledge of Wharton and I'm happy to be
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here today to speak to Paul Schumacher
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about his new book with Steven kup
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winning the long game how strategic
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leaders shape the
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future Paul thank you for being here
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today my pleasure Shannon thanks I'm so
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curious what challenge did you see for
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leaders that led you to WR winning the
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long game well we deal with a lot of
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leaders and they tell us especially
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managers who want to be leaders that
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they often given feedback during a
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performance review that they're doing
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very well operationally and their
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execution skills are great and then at
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the end they sort of told they should be
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a bit more strategic because they might
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have missed a new market development or
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competitor entering and they then wonder
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how do I do this and when they ask their
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bosses what do you mean can you be more
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specific they don't say much more than
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you know do like Wayne Gretsky skate to
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where the puck will be but that's often
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not enough that's right and in the book
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you provide a questionnaire for for the
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readers to assess their own strategic
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leadership yes and I think that probably
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gets to the heart of um exactly what
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you're talking about makes it more
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concrete can you tell us about those
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questions and what you what you're
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helping uh the reader to assess yeah we
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feel that it has to be more concrete
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than giving very general propositions
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such as having a vision or having
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commitment Etc so we um in a sense
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deconstructed strategic leadership into
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six elements um the these would be
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things like how to anticipate changes in
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the external environment or internally
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in the organization better it could be
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the ability to challenge yourself and
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other people's views especially in a
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changing world and our focus is a bit on
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how to be a speciic leader when things
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are changing in the external environment
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so these elements that I mentioned are
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especially important for that for
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example the ability to interpret things
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that are happening not through old
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lenses but new lenses and then in the
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world of uncertainty the ability to make
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tough decisions that takes some courage
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you can't wait for all the information
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so that's a definite leadership skill
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the ability to align people around a
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vision but how do you do alignment how
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do you bridge differences how do you
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deal with um you know conflict and
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learning is the last so we have six
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elements and each of these elements we
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in this particular survey we have about
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10 items that very behaviorally ask how
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often do you engage in the following
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kind of behaviors and that's what that
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survey does so at the end the the
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participant has a sort of a profile they
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can draw a little hexagon as to how well
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they score on these various dimensions
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and focus more on the gaps and then we
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offer specific advice on how to bridge
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the gap the biggest gaps right in
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particular one of the things that's so
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interesting is that in each of these um
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chapters you're really looking through
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the lens of discipline as a as a
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priority can you tell us more about that
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yeah we thought we thought about what
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are these skills are these abilities are
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these competencies are these
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orientations are they skills and it's a
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bit of all of that so we figure it's the
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term discipline which is a bit of an odd
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word
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in some in some quarters maybe but it
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captures three key elements namely that
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it is based on knowledge there's a
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knowledge based underlying it so if I
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say the the discipline of playing bridge
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or do sport or playing the piano that
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people associate a knowledge base that
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is one the other is literally the
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discipline or being disciplined that is
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practice a stick with a program don't be
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so easily you know distracted so that's
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important um and the third element is
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that you like any discipline you don't
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master it by reading a book you master
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it by having a framework and then
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practicing practicing practicing just
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like a musical instrument so we felt
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that discipline has all of those
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connotations but it also left uh room
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for the notion that there is an artistic
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element to it the art of a discipline
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right in the martial arts or something
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like that and I don't think we have the
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it's not a scientific um model
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necessarily it it it allows for um you
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know customization and um sort of it's
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contingent on culture and situation
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so that's all wrapped into the idea of a
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discipline that you know how to deal
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with the this enormous variety of
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situations that leaders encounter and
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can you give us a couple examples of
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leaders who've been very successful as
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strategic leaders yeah well we mentioned
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many so each chapter we start with a
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leader that everybody recognizes so the
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first chapter on anticipation we profile
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Elon Musk who most people know of course
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as having been with SpaceX a remarkable
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inventor and PayPal he became very rich
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and now he's pioneering the electric car
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with a Tesla and he does approach it as
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a discipline um when he was asked once
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on television program how can you be so
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creative he says well most people who
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want to be creative don't even try he
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says and I want my Engineers to be very
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creative we don't people to have average
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ideas and he says I work on this very
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hard till my brain hurts so there's an
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element of sort of being uh you know
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recognizing it as something you had to
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work on just like an an author would or
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an athlete
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but then other elements like challenge
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we profile actually Pope Francis who
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took over an somewhat dysfunctional
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organization some would say with a lot
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of tough issues and he may and he's
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really you know it's a tight rope how
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much does he really challenge there's
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dogmas that he can't Cannons of the
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church that he has to and he's very
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conservative in some ways and he's very
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liberal and very remarkable in other
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ways so for each of these topics we kind
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of profile leaders who we think were
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very impressive in business we uh
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describe um Mr holiday who was the CEO
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of DuPont and early on in 2007 he picked
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up weak signals that we're going to hit
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a wall with the economy but there were
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truly weak signals like the reservations
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in Hotel DuPont were down he picked that
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up on at a reception or was in Japan and
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a Japanese customer wanted more cash you
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know he he was short of cash so he
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wanted to get postponements of payments
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Etc and then the auto companies which
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are big for dupond wouldn't share their
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production plans and he gets his
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information disjointed ly and he puts
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like Sherlock Holmes kind of puts
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together the picture and and and sees
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what's happening before others do and
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survived as a consequence the deep
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depression or the recession better than
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than others the other side of things
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would be if you're not able to you know
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practice this this discipline of
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strategic leadership can you give us
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some examples of those who uh were not
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able to implement those
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[Music]
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ideas I think you can look at any of the
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failed companies right at it's Kodak or
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there's so many
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um no no Nokia would be an example but
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the ones we profile are companies like
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Lego you know Lego the Danish company
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that has all the lovely the lovely
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bricks plastic bricks they really were
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almost bankrupt after 30 or 40 Years of
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great success and it was really their
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inability to anticipate changes in their
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Market in particular the video
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Revolution the sort of the it Revolution
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that games becoming electronic and they
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were almost and in billand in in jetland
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Denmark where they employed almost
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two-thirds of the town you can imagine
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what how devastating this was because
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the company almost went under and then
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they had the opportunity to kind a deal
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with Lucas film for um you know sort of
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a really very successful uh the force
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you know they embraced the force and uh
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and that that saved them but there was
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one one leader who who who who killed
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the deal he said we're not going to work
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with Outsiders we've always done it
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ourselves was very distrustful of the
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outside world and he said Over My Dead
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Body and it was until a senior leader
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recognized that they were falling behind
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the times that the world was changing
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outside of Denmark and they needed to
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really team up with Partners who could
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do this much
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better as a final question Paul can you
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tell us uh what you hope readers will
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take away from the book yeah for one we
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hope that readers um who Aspire towards
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strategic leadership start to realize
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that you need to integrate strategy and
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leadership in a world of uncertainty
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much more than it's typical the typical
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model is you know a strategy gets
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formulated leaders are involved in that
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process but then others often execute
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and then of course in a world of
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uncertainty no business plan survives
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contact with reality so you need people
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who are very good in picking that up
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quickly and be able on the fly to make
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adjustments so the tighter integration
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that's one they will have a conceptual
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model for what is really at the core of
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doing this sort of rare skill very well
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and they have some instruments but I
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hope that they will just also learn by
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example by just you know reading the
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stories of leaders who were really quite
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remarkable uh as and we it's fairly
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International so it's not just American
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leaders as we profile them across the
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world um and and then also they may want
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to Mentor other people so leaders who
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are already strategic can use the book
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as a guide to tell people who who they
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feel should become more strategic how to
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do that thank you Paul it was great to
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speak with you it's my pleasure thanks
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Shon appreciate it
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[Music]
