hardened giant, and who proclaimed to King Saul, ‘‘Let no one lose
heart on account of this Philistine; your servant will go and fight him.’’
(1 Sam. 17:32) Queen Esther risked her privileged position in the royal
palace (and her very life) to save her people from extinction. The
prophet Jeremiah was willing to risk death to warn the rulers of his
nation of their coming extinction if they did not change their idolatrous
ways; he was not put to death, but was subjected to various imprison-
ments and tortures. Daniel braved a lion’s den and the king’s wrath
rather than deny his beliefs. And Jesus and his disciples were subjected
to legal persecution, beatings, ridicule, and death. Courage, supported
by inner conviction, is what kept them going.
THE POWER OF COURAGE
Leaders who possess courage have a trait that can permeate and trans-
form everything they do. Courage is often the critical seasoning in the
‘‘leadership stew.’’ Without it, no one even wants to taste the stew;
even victory can taste bland. With it, every undertaking is an adventure,
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something to be savored by all whether it succeeds or fails (but with
courage, the likelihood of success increases greatly).
The leaders of the Bible were confronted with large but inspiring
tasks, and they realized that the need for courage was proportional to
the size and importance of these tasks. Therefore, the calls for leaders to have courage are many and frequent:
‘‘Be strong and courageous, because you will lead these people to inherit the land I swore to their forefathers.’’ (Josh. 1:6) Keep in mind that this land was swarming with enemies.
‘‘Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of
them.’’ (Moses to the people of Israel, Deut. 31:6)
‘‘Be strong and courageous, and do the work. Do not be afraid or
discouraged.’’ (King David to his successor, King Solomon, 1 Chron.
28:20)
If these messages seem repetitious, remember that the obstacles faced
by these leaders were large-scale and never-ending. They needed con-
stant reminders to be courageous. So does the modern leader. Take
away courage from a leader and you are left with a mere manager, or
worse, a functionary who uninspiringly enforces the rules of the bu-
reaucracy.
Arthur Martinez saw the need for courage in both himself and his
executives when he took over the venerable but ailing Sears retail and
catalog operation. Meeting with each applicant for a senior manage-
ment position, he did not mince words about the size of the challenge,
the courage needed to meet it, and the rewards of success. ‘‘This is one
of the greatest adventures in business history,’’ he told the applicants.
‘‘You have to be courageous, filled with self-confidence. If we do it,
we’ll be wealthier, yes. But more than that, we’ll have this incredible
psychic gratification. How can you not do it?’’1 This is exactly the cou-
rageous attitude that left the followers of Moses, Joshua, and Jesus with
little choice but to ‘‘get on board.’’
Sometimes, just to be on a particular leader’s team demands that a
follower begin with or quickly develop a strong sense of courage. In
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Paul’s letter to his young ‘‘mentee,’’ Timothy, he exhorts him to have
courage in his mission: ‘‘For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love, and of self-discipline. (2 Tim. 1:7)
Timothy was young and inexperienced, but no doubt his emerging
sense of courage was buttressed by Paul’s confident message: ‘‘If you’re
on my team, you are by definition a person of courage.’’ The people
on Lou Gerstner’s senior team at IBM are more seasoned than Timothy,
but the very fact that they’re on the team is also an affirmation of their
courageous qualities. ‘‘If you’re on Lou’s team, you’re a forceful person.
The wallflowers don’t do very well here,’’ notes a senior vice president
of IBM’s software group.2 On both Paul’s and Lou’s teams, the courage
to speak out and act is a requirement.
Another leader to whom the ‘‘spirit of timidity’’ is foreign is Herb
Kelleher of Southwest Airlines (no doubt Herb’s successor will be
equally courageous and audacious). Kelleher has stated, ‘‘You have to
be willing to take risks for your people. If you won’t fight for your
people, then you can count on your people not fighting for you.’’3
How has Kelleher ‘‘fought for his people’’? First of all, in the ‘‘up-and-
down’’ airline industry, he has never had a layoff.
And then there’s his ‘‘legal courage.’’ Southwest had lost the first
round of a court battle, spending over $500,000 only to have the courts
rule that Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio already had adequate air
service and there was no need for another carrier such as Southwest.
They lost the appeal as well. Kelleher continued to represent the com-
pany in court and paid every cent of the court costs out of his own
pocket. Says Colleen Barrett, Kelleher’s ‘‘second in command,’’ ‘‘The
warrior mentality, the very fight to survive is truly what created our
culture.’’
Paul showed great courage in the Book of Acts. He was striving to
build Christianity as a religion in a hostile and uncertain environment.
He knew he had a task to complete, and he knew his next stop was to
be Jerusalem, but that’s really all he knew for certain: ‘‘And now, com-
pelled by the holy spirit, I am going to Jerusalem, not knowing what
will happen to me there . . . I only know that in every city . . . hardships are facing me.’’ (Acts 20:22–23)
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157
A modern leader who faced a hostile environment and an uncertain
journey was Tom Tiller, who at age 29 took over the General Electric
range-building plant in Louisville, Kentucky. The range line was losing
$10 million per year, one of the six production buildings had been
closed, there had been a large downsizing, and the parent company was
not about to begin investing more dollars in a money-losing business
that seemed to have run dry of innovations.
Tiller’s first act was to lay off 400 more employees. But then he
decided to ‘‘go to Jerusalem.’’ He instinctively knew that he had to
look outward to the marketplace for solutions, not inward at an in-
grown, money-losing operation. So Tiller chartered a bus and took
forty employees on a ‘‘caravan’’ to the Kitchen and Bath Show in At-
lanta. They didn’t know exactly what they would do or learn there, but
they knew they needed to acquire a broader view of their industry and
bring back several innovative and actionable ideas.
‘‘We’ve got to do something, and we’ve got to do it fast,’’ Tiller
exhorted his troops. ‘‘We don’t have 142 years to do it.’’ Some might
have called Tiller’s bus expedition foolhardy, not courageous. He had
no idea what he might come back with, but he knew he had to go
somewhere else and do something. If it was the wrong move, he could always try something else. But his pioneering courage paid off. Within
eighteen months, GE had three new products designed, built, and de-
livered. The range division went from a $10 million loss in 1992 to a
$35 million profit in 1994.
How courageous is Tom Tiller? When GE was having problems with
stove handles that broke off, Tiller made it his priority to design an
‘‘unbreakable handle.’’ How did he prove that it was unbreakable? He
had his photo taken while he stood under a crane that was holding up
a GE range by its handle!4
Patricia Carrigan was the first female assembly plant manager in the
history of General Motors. That alone took a lot of courage. But she
was faced with a number of extraordinary problems that tested her
courage even further. First there was her background; she had more
years in education than she did in business. Also, the Lakewood plant
outside of Atlanta had been closed for a year and a half prior to her
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tenure. Once she revived the plant, grievances were near zero, absen-
teeism had declined to 9 percent from 25 percent (despite her addition
of weekend hours), and sickness and accident costs were cut by two-
thirds. Moreover, it was the first plant in GM history to hit the com-
pany’s ‘‘high-quality’’ standard in its first published audit after start-up.
Carrigan accomplished these goals by exhibiting courage and taking
risks. ‘‘If you’re going to expect an organization to take risks, you have
to show some willingness to do that too,’’ she stated. Carrigan initiated
a new working approach that literally ‘‘tore down the walls’’ between
labor and management. She instituted a training class that gave employ-
ees detailed business information and challenged them to devise jointly
developed plans for improving business performance. She also formed
over a hundred voluntary problem-solving work groups. This took
courage in an environment where relations between labor and manage-