Wrong Person for the Job
Dear Erica,
We are getting to that time of year when we being to think about the leadership of our organizations for next year. Everyone is in the nominating mode in my social service agency and I’m feeling a little stuck. The person they have nominated for vice president (who will one day be president) is, in my mind, totally the wrong person for the job. I am even thinking of leaving the board if he is picked. They are just about to ask him. What recourse do I have?
Losing Patience in Potomac
Dear Patience (or Impatience),
People get nominated for board positions for all kinds of reasons. Sometimes we nominate people because they have talent, institutional memory, commitment or guts. Sometimes we nominate people who have the financial capacity to make a difference in an organization. All of these are valid reasons. I can totally appreciate your concern, and I think it’s important to act fast if you can’t understand why this person has been chosen. I would begin with speaking in confidence (and hopefully in person) to your board president and to a professional. Don’t only talk. Listen. You may not know the person in question as well as they do. Inquire. Find out what they were thinking so you don’t have to ask, “What were they thinking?”If your issues still hold, then share them in a friendly and constructive way and talk about how these considerations can be addressed. If you really do not feel comfortable then it is your right to opt off the board. You may, however, be a nice guy and give this person a chance to shine or stumble before making up your mind. We humans can be a little too quick to form first impressions that we can’t or aren’t mentally willing to shake. But remember this important piece of advice: if you stay, your job on a board is to be supportive, not divisive. Don’t be the one to tell others that you didn’t agree to his nomination. You can share that now before an election but once a decision is formed, you need to be part of a cohesive team to the public you serve. Partisanship can profoundly hurt institutions that we care about and love.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
100 Days in Office
Dear Erica,
Today marks President Obama’s first 100 days in office. Do you think that 100 days is a measure of anything significant? Do we have any such concept within the Jewish world?
On the Hill
Dear On the Hill (at least you’re not Over the Hill),
That’s a fascinating question and one that deserves an introspective answer. This demarcation emerged during FDR’s presidency at a time when the pundits and the public first felt entitled to weigh in on whether or not the president was moving in the direction of his party and his goals. But is a 100 days enough time or the right amount of time to gauge a person’s leadership? Obama himself said in a Times interview in January that this mark of time is artificial:"The first hundred days is going to be important, but it’s probably going to be the first thousand days that makes the difference." On the one hand, it would be easy to say that’s just creating protective cover. You can tell in the first months a lot about the way that a leader communicates, his or her level of transparency and the way in which they use advisors and outside resources of wisdom and advice. But what you can’t tell is the long-term impact of new laws or how complex change is or how much history is wrapped in any decision that generates obstacles to future changes. There is no concept of a hundred days within Jewish tradition. Arguably, we take the long view on everything. After all, what’s a hundred years in the Jewish calendar? Small change. And that brings me to my last point. President Obama’s first hundred days coincides with Israel’s 61st Independence Day. We may be fewer than a hundred years old from a statehood perspective but we’re thousands of years old as a central project of the Jewish people. Now that’s a lot of time, and the country’s accomplishments required and require a lot of leadership. But that’s for another conversation.
Dear Erica,
Today marks President Obama’s first 100 days in office. Do you think that 100 days is a measure of anything significant? Do we have any such concept within the Jewish world?
On the Hill
Dear On the Hill (at least you’re not Over the Hill),
That’s a fascinating question and one that deserves an introspective answer. This demarcation emerged during FDR’s presidency at a time when the pundits and the public first felt entitled to weigh in on whether or not the president was moving in the direction of his party and his goals. But is a 100 days enough time or the right amount of time to gauge a person’s leadership? Obama himself said in a Times interview in January that this mark of time is artificial:"The first hundred days is going to be important, but it’s probably going to be the first thousand days that makes the difference." On the one hand, it would be easy to say that’s just creating protective cover. You can tell in the first months a lot about the way that a leader communicates, his or her level of transparency and the way in which they use advisors and outside resources of wisdom and advice. But what you can’t tell is the long-term impact of new laws or how complex change is or how much history is wrapped in any decision that generates obstacles to future changes. There is no concept of a hundred days within Jewish tradition. Arguably, we take the long view on everything. After all, what’s a hundred years in the Jewish calendar? Small change. And that brings me to my last point. President Obama’s first hundred days coincides with Israel’s 61st Independence Day. We may be fewer than a hundred years old from a statehood perspective but we’re thousands of years old as a central project of the Jewish people. Now that’s a lot of time, and the country’s accomplishments required and require a lot of leadership. But that’s for another conversation.
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