Swallow your pride You will not die, it’s not poison
Bob Dylan
Much of my perspective on the working world and on leadership has been shaped or warped by my experience as a faculty member and then a dean at a small university outside of Baltimore. It’s a good part of the reason I have such a low tolerance for incompetent leadership and have made it my goal to guide leaders to greatness. The university had once been a dynamic place, but it had long fallen into dysfunction and moral corruption by the time I left. Therefore, many of the lessons that I took away were what I call negative paradigms, an opportunity to learn from others’ mistakes.
To be sure, I have made plenty of my own instructive errors, but operating in that environment was like tap dancing in a minefield while bombs dropped from above. It was impossible to know what was a misstep and what was just bad luck.
In preparing for this essay, I went back and looked at my daily notes for just two months in spring 2014, and I find I am reliving the anxiety as I write. There was little remarkable about that stretch, yet the record is filled with unaccountable mistreatment, much of which I had forgotten. Now reading the account of these abuses piled one upon the other creates the sensation of a large mass throbbing in my chest — an alien and unwelcome presence.
My only purpose in reviewing my notes from that period in particular was because it was around the time the president of the university abruptly stopped speaking to me for no discernible reason, a silence that lasted for nearly two terrifying years. My only comfort then was that I was not the first to receive such treatment. I probably was not the last either.
Needless to say, his animus left me utterly distraught and scared for my job and career. Workplaces should not have that much power over our lives.
This essay, though, is about the aftermath, which is itself instructive and, I hope, much more amusing.
Even as I experienced such ongoing workplace trauma, I was searching for another job because, well, obviously. As I might put it in a given job interview, I was not fully aligned with my institution’s practiced values, which is a polite way of saying it was a non-stop shitshow there. Finally, around Christmas 2015, I had an offer to be a vice president under a fabulous president, a real and rare leader, at a small university in rural Iowa.
Lo and behold, right after I told my bosses I would be leaving at the end of the semester, I encountered my old president, but instead of the silent treatment he greeted me warmly. What a bizarre shock! Pretending that our relationship had been perfectly collegial all along, he immediately started quizzing me on details about my new school and its president, most of which were ludicrous because I had literally just been hired. It occurred to me that he saw my career success as some sort of feather in his cap, which was just the twisted way his mind worked. In reality, I was fleeing him and his abusive underling, my horrible boss. The president concluded our little conversation by adding, “make an appointment to see me just before you leave. I have some advice for you.”
Now two things are worth pointing out here. One was that I would be staying on until graduation which was in May, so my departure was still five months off. The other is that my contempt for this disgusting little troll was bottomless as was his for me, so I had no interest in any advice he could offer. Still, I thanked him and slipped away.
This went on for the whole semester. Time and again, he would stop me in the hallway and quiz me about my new Iowa school. He was trying to dig up dirt from what I could gather. Every now and then he would remind me to make an appointment to get his advice. I always assured him I would, and I always made an immediate intention to forget. He kept harassing me, though, so I finally gave in and scheduled a meeting with him the Monday before graduation, the last week I would be there.
The Friday before that Monday meeting I ran into the president again and he reminded me that “we have our meeting Monday.” It was difficult to understand how this meeting was such a big deal for him. He seemed to be looking forward to it. In response, I muttered something appropriately polite, and he added, “I have some advice for you.” I already knew this part, so I thanked him, looking for an escape, but he kept going. “I also have a gift to give you.”
“Oh,” I said, surprised and a little weirded out, “that is very nice.”
“It is a book.”
“Oh,” I replied with as much enthusiasm as I could fake.
“Yes. It is worth between 15 and 20 dollars.”
“Oh. Okay. Thanks.” What a wingnut!
That following Monday morning I showed up for our 9:30 meeting at 9:20, hoping to get it over with as soon as possible. As I checked in with his assistant, who looked at me with pity, he spotted me through his open door, waved me into his office, and sat me down. I had only been in that house of mirrors a handful of times over a decade-and-a-half of employment and then not for several years. We chit-chatted for a bit as he asked some of the same questions about my new school that I had already answered, and then he jumped up. “I just remembered. I have that book for you.” He sauntered over to a tall stack of paperback books and took one off the top. “I plan to give these to all the vice presidents and deans, but you won’t be here when I do.” He handed me some pop psychology book, and I thanked him. So much for the special parting gift.
He sat down again, apparently very pleased with himself. “Before you go, I want to make sure I give you that advice.” I braced myself. How could this still be a thing? What wisdom could this feckless sadist actually have to share? More importantly, how could I possibly get it together enough to feign interest?
He started by telling me how he grew up on Long Island and went to college in St. Louis in the 1960s. This was all common knowledge because he mentioned it frequently in public speeches. He then explained how when he first moved out to the Midwest, he struggled to acclimate. He could not figure out what the trouble was, but then it hit him. He smiled at the memory of his adolescent brilliance.
On Long Island, he was never far from the ocean, but in the Midwest he was nowhere near the ocean. I chuckled politely at his lame anecdote, but he was not done.
He then proffered his sage advice, the advice he had first mentioned back in January, the advice he had primed me for and pestered me about over the past five months.
This! Was! The! Big! E! Vent!
His smile widened: “So, when you move from Maryland to Iowa,” he paused to build drama, “you need to understand that there’s no ocean there.” He kept grinning, waiting for my reaction. I thought he must be kidding and smiled back at the stupid joke.
He then pretended he had something else scheduled and ended the meeting abruptly. He had not been kidding! That was it! The advice! As I said goodbye to his assistant and wandered out into the hallway, I checked the time. It was just 9:30. Ten wholes minutes had passed.
Although this man had two decades on me, he lacked fundamental wisdom, which is vital to effective leadership. His arrogance and narcissism were toxic to his capacity to learn and develop and poisoned the culture of his institution from the top down. I have no doubt that all along he thought he would conjure some brilliant counsel at the last minute, but when the time came, he choked and could only offer inanity. Instead of just swallowing his pride and letting it go, he had to say something, anything. I’ll bet he told himself afterward that he was just sticking it to me all along, putting me on, trolling me. He was like that.
Good leaders, in contrast, are constantly on guard against the encroachment of their egos. They seek always to improve and to cultivate wisdom in themselves and in others. They eschew personal animus, petty grievances, and churlish behavior. In short, they strive to act decently in all things so they don’t just go ahead—like that guy—and make an ass of themselves for all time.
How do you defend against the relentless onslaught of empty pride and ego? How do you cultivate wisdom for yourself and your organization?
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