CEOs Should Study President Obama

President Obama went into the proverbial "lions den", attending the gathering of the Republican Congressional Caucus in Baltimore last week.

The Democrats have a majority in the House and now 59 votes in the Senate. Obama is having problems with the Republicans, who have decided that it is good policy to simply attempt to block everything the Democrats propose--dividing the country along political and philosophical lines. Many on the left have been urging the President to forget about reaching out to the Republicans and use his mandate to push things through (remember when President Bush won his second term by a fairly slim margin and talked about all the "political capital" he had acquired and would use?). Vice President Cheney had noted that elections have consequences and that Bush had a mandate to move things forward. Funny how a larger margin of victory last year somehow did not give Obama a mandate, according to these same Republicans.

Anyway, what CEOs can learn is what Obama did by visiting the Republicans. Obama knew that he had to reset his own reputation and that of his party. He reached out to the GOP, talked to them, debated them, scolded them, and listened to them. He played the role of leader listening to his opponents. We have not seen this much previously, nor do we see it much in the corporate world. When confronted with ribald critics, companies tend to push back hard, to attempt to marginalize the opponent or vilify them.

Obama could have done the same thing, but it wasn't working, just as that tactic does not work in the corporate world. Instead, he met with his critics and showed them what dialogue looks like. By taping the proceedings, he also showed the country what leadership and true bipartisanship can look like.

There will be many who will attempt to spin this to their advantage. I'm sure that Limbaugh and Hannity will talk about the PR spin Obama is attempting or that he is trying to make us like England and its "question period" (a clear attempt to make us a European socialist society, they likely will argue). The left is likely spinning it their way demonstrating that Obama is in the right and the Republicans are always in the wrong. Some on the left will likely criticize Obama for not moving to the left rather than to the middle. However, most people know that the truth usually lies somewhere in between. The Republicans (at least the non-ideologues) have some good ideas, just as the non-ideologue Democrats do. The country is better off when we govern from the middle. At least that's my opinion.

CEOs and corporations can learn from this as well. They are not always right and their critics wrong. Meeting critics, talking with them (not at them, but with them), and listening to them can work wonders. One will learn quickly who can and cannot be talked with in a civil way and who is so ideologically driven that they have no room for compromise. But, by meeting with critics, you in effect nullify one of their primary strengths, which is their ability to characterize you.

Watch the tapes of the meeting between Obama and the Republicans. It could be used as a training manual for CEOs. The Republicans are now saying that they are sorry they allowed the meeting to be taped. They wished now they could continue to characterize the President, but now he has shown himself as a man of compromise, not the radical they have tried to show him as. He has made it more difficult for them to resist dialogue. Some on the far right and far left will not bend, but lets hope that there are enough clear-thinkers in the GOP and on the Democratic side to begin to talk. The country needs such dialog dearly, and it will show the way for others who are dealing with critics.