3 ms·

This is the wartime/peacetime leader conundrum. The tactics she used worked well because the situation was dire. They probably wouldn't have worked well in a co

by mattm 8y ago

This is the wartime/peacetime leader conundrum. The tactics she used worked well because the situation was dire. They probably wouldn't have worked well in a company with a good culture. Winston Churchill is the most famous example of this. He was a great leader during wartime but terrible during peacetime.

candiodari 8y ago
During his first war, he was absolutely terrible in wartime as well.
dmos62 8y ago
This book A First-Rate Madness by Nassir Ghaemi [0] is about that. He looks at various historical leaders and how one half of them make good wartime leaders, but bad peacetime leaders, and the other half -- the opposite. Some of his case studies are, as far as I can remember (couldn't find a summary online): generals in US civil war (Lee and the scortched-earth-guy), Chamberlaine, Churchill, Hitler, JFK, Lincoln, Napoleon, Nixon, Bush. US centric, but still pertaining to anyone. [0] https://www.amazon.com/First-Rate-Madness-Uncovering-Between-Leadership/dp/0143121332 https://www.amazon.com/First-Rate-Madness-Uncovering-Between...
- sangnoir 8y ago
  > the scortched-earth-guy William Tecumseh Sherman, of "Sherman's march to the sea"
awaaz 8y ago
Depends on who you ask. Winston Churchill was a racist bigot who starved 4 million people in India to feed his armies. http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2031992,00.html http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2031992...
- whatshisface 8y ago
  It's not that Churchill was a different person in wartime than in peacetime, it's just that most people's morals change from wartime to peacetime. So the same atrocity could be viewed as an atrocity or heroic and brave depending on what the public at large feels like their situation was like at the time. That's the point being raised about the manager: every statement the parent made was basically an accusation, but because the team was desperate the success in the end overwrote the other things in everybody's mind. If the team had failed in the end, all of the qualities that are presently being lauded would be held at fault. True morals may not be relative and situational, but the average person's mental implementation of morals sure can be.
neffy 8y ago
Churchill was a complex man, but it was his party that got defeated in the 1945 election not Churchill. (Churchill it should be said, was a Liberal, not a Conservative before the war, and joined the party to prevent conflict in the immediate aftermath of the outbreak - he would later describe it (in his diaries) as a mistake.) We don´t know if he would have been a good or bad leader during peacetime (by the time the conservatives got back into office he was no longer in his prime shall we say), but what he would most certainly have been is a leader with a lot of experience in dealing with Stalin, and a British Imperialist. Which would have been entertaining at least.

by mattm 8y ago

candiodari 8y ago

During his first war, he was absolutely terrible in wartime as well.

dmos62 8y ago

This book A First-Rate Madness by Nassir Ghaemi [0] is about that. He looks at various historical leaders and how one half of them make good wartime leaders, but bad peacetime leaders, and the other half -- the opposite. Some of his case studies are, as far as I can remember (couldn't find a summary online): generals in US civil war (Lee and the scortched-earth-guy), Chamberlaine, Churchill, Hitler, JFK, Lincoln, Napoleon, Nixon, Bush. US centric, but still pertaining to anyone. [0] https://www.amazon.com/First-Rate-Madness-Uncovering-Between-Leadership/dp/0143121332 https://www.amazon.com/First-Rate-Madness-Uncovering-Between...

sangnoir 8y ago
> the scortched-earth-guy William Tecumseh Sherman, of "Sherman's march to the sea"

awaaz 8y ago

Depends on who you ask. Winston Churchill was a racist bigot who starved 4 million people in India to feed his armies. http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2031992,00.html http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2031992...

whatshisface 8y ago
It's not that Churchill was a different person in wartime than in peacetime, it's just that most people's morals change from wartime to peacetime. So the same atrocity could be viewed as an atrocity or heroic and brave depending on what the public at large feels like their situation was like at the time. That's the point being raised about the manager: every statement the parent made was basically an accusation, but because the team was desperate the success in the end overwrote the other things in everybody's mind. If the team had failed in the end, all of the qualities that are presently being lauded would be held at fault. True morals may not be relative and situational, but the average person's mental implementation of morals sure can be.

neffy 8y ago

Churchill was a complex man, but it was his party that got defeated in the 1945 election not Churchill. (Churchill it should be said, was a Liberal, not a Conservative before the war, and joined the party to prevent conflict in the immediate aftermath of the outbreak - he would later describe it (in his diaries) as a mistake.) We don´t know if he would have been a good or bad leader during peacetime (by the time the conservatives got back into office he was no longer in his prime shall we say), but what he would most certainly have been is a leader with a lot of experience in dealing with Stalin, and a British Imperialist. Which would have been entertaining at least.