Julia Middleton's Thoughts on Leadership

In the UK, trust in leaders has eroded. It is worth saying that maybe in some ways this is a good thing. If it means we do a double take and think for ourselves. And if it means that leaders don’t over promise.

I have been doing work recently with people who have huge IQs. I don’t say this lightly. They are faster at all discussions and this is not just about numbers – where they see a sea of numbers and go straight to the wobbly one – it’s about spotting the weakness in a strategy – the logic gap in an argument.

I do get there eventually, but I take longer – and it shows.

Then we start talking about people and those same people rate nil – in fact minus nil – on emotional intelligence. They don’t know how to deal with people unless they are the same kind of people as them, motivated by the same things, worried by the same things.

This weekend my daughter was talking about me getting older. She told me that now I need to start riding, what she calls, a push button horse. This means a horse that has no will of its own, it turns left or right or stops or starts or eats or sleeps as it is told.

It made me think that the colleagues I have been working with can only lead push button colleagues (or people who choose to be push button at work), not that they are not bright or lacking for ideas. But when you push their buttons they do what you know they will do. Without emotional intelligence you have to stick to leading push button colleagues.

When will emotional intelligence be understood? When will schools, universities and business schools start giving it equal importance. Why do I think it ranks up there? So that we have diverse, difficult, creative teams and leaders who can cope with stakeholders who operate differently from them. Please may it be soon.

Opening The Times this morning I saw an obituary for Admiral Sir Peter White. Reading it, I would love to say that I was thinking “He was a great man whom I was privileged to know” but in fact I was thinking “Another great man whom I had the privilege to know and whom I did not listen to enough”.

When I was 23 and in my first job (utterly loving it) at the Industrial Society, I was told that some old admiral was coming to join the team and his desk was going to face mine. He was wonderful. And his desk was totally beautiful – utterly and deeply tidy. The pencils were all pointed and in rows. He used to gaze across at my desk -  a tip! He has a very lovely mouth that formed into half smiles. And that was the look he used to give me about my desk.

It must have been a nightmare for him being around me. This was a man who had been there to witness the atrocities of the Japanese invasion in Shanghai, who had been at the sinking of the Bismarck and the Scharnhorst,  been at the Dunkirk evacuation, who had liberated POW’s in Japanese camps and was one of the first into Nagasaki. None of this did I know or bother to find out. And never, ever, not once in the two years that we sat opposite each other did he ever once make me feel like the silly child that I must have been. He did though repeatedly and unsuccessfully tell me to tidy my desk. He also used to say to me – when I was off to do something that he knew I was worried about – “stomach in,  chest out”. He was a deeply affectionate man and I knew he cared for me too.

May I care for young people as he did. And may I remember as I get older that young people aren’t really much interested in past glories.

I think I can adapt to most situations if I put my mind to it. Sometimes I fail.

I fly into Germany and do not take the time to sort out my head and remind myself that I am going to be speaking to a German audience, not a UK audience, so I must treat them more carefully and with more respect, and not assume so much. Or I charge from one meeting to another and don’t take the time to prepare. I don’t mean preparation like reading the papers, I do that. But this is more a case of getting my head round the different people, behaviours and agendas.

But if I put my mind to it, I do think I can adapt to a lot.

The thing that I realise, but can’t get my head around, is being in places where there is no freedom of speech. I can’t figure out how to be when I know I can’t speak freely. When I can’t build a relationship with someone by being candid. When being candid makes you someone to avoid.

Experiencing this recently has made me far better at appreciating what freedom of speech gives us. I suspect I have always taken it for granted. I also understand better that with freedom of speech comes freedom to think and freedom to make friends.

I am dyslexic. Can’t even spell dylexic (I bet someone who is not dyslexic came up with the name).

It has never got in my way since I left school. In fact it probably makes me a better speaker. But it has got the better of me now that Common Purpose is expanding in India. One million Rupees makes 10 lakhs. And 100 lakhs make a crore.

So you have to get your head around the noughts, the many noughts. In groups of three. I just can’t do it. A sea of noughts.

Guess its important to know where you’re strengths are.

(By the way, it’s Xtraordinary Week 2010, a week that raises awareness of the strengths and talents of dyslexic children and adults everywhere)

My daughter is doing her driving test in a couple of weeks. So I have been sitting by her for the last few weeks as she drives around and gets practice. She judged a messy roundabout very well yesterday and told me a secret that her driving instructor had told her. “Don’t look at the indicators, look at the wheels”, people often indicate wrongly where they intend to turn next but if you look at their wheels they will tell you where the car is going next.

The next day I chaired a complicated meeting that felt a bit like a messy roundabout with everyone going in every direction. People kept on telling us – indicating – what they were thinking but you only had to look at their bodies – even wheels – and you knew they were really headed in the opposite direction. Sure as a leader you have to listen, but watching is often just as important.

Someone complained about me last week. I made a comment in a talk to a British audience (never mind the context) and what I said was “I have never met a superior man”. To me it was unnecessary to add: “neither have I ever met a superior woman”. I would not have added it because to me it is self evident. We are equal. But I was told I had been sexist.

Simon Singh won his court battle. I am glad. It was about his right to express his views freely. He didn’t make up facts he simply stated his views.

I never got close to the intricacies of the issues but I did watch a man stand up for what he believed in and fight on against the odds when a court had found against him.

I bet lots of people told him to walk away. But he risked his savings, and risked his reputation. And allowed himself to get diverted – no doubt obsessed – in order to do what he believed was right. I admire him.

Simon Singh wins libel appeal. Photograph: Fiona Hanson/PA (guardian.co.uk)

Further reading on the Simon Singh libel suit:

• Simon Singh libel case dropped (The Guardian)
• Libel case dropped against Simon Singh (BBC News)
• Simon Singh wins libel appeal (Daily Mail)
• Simon Singh wins key battle in alernative medicine libel case (Telegraph)
• Q&A with Simon Singh: Why UK libel law must change (Wired.co.uk)

So the first of the great televised debates for the top political job in the UK takes place tonight, and I am wondering which lens we should all be watching it through…

Shall we focus on what these three men have to say on policy? Or the issues? Or will we scrutinise their competency? Or the strength of their ambition?

To me – above all – the focus should be on leadership. Who do we think will be the best leader with the best team?

The UK is in quite a mess. No secret there. We can get out of its mess, but the danger is that we will slide and all the difference will rest on the brave decisions and the national mood one of these three people will create.

We have huge assets for such a small country – in land mass and population – compared to existing and emerging world powers. But we will have to play a clever game to succeed…and to continue to prosper.

So what will I be looking for as I switch on the telly tonight? The leader with some policies I’m sure to disagree with. The one to lift a country from the recession blues and give it confidence. The leader who names the beast, who doesn’t pretend that there is no mess to speak of and confronts the hard questions. The one who can attract and keep talent around him and ensure they perform at their best. The one who speaks in a way that makes you listen.

When I was 29 and full of ideas for Common Purpose I met Anita Roddick for tea at the Meridian Hotel in Piccadilly, London. She had no idea who I was. I had begged a friend of a friend to introduce us. Over tea I told her my ideas and asked her to chair Common Purpose.

She said yes.

Only with age and experience – and regular disappointment with fellow leaders of my own age – have I really appreciated just how glorious Anita was that day.

She was at the height of her power. Her brand was vast and she just backed me on instinct. Maybe years on you might think: ‘clever her, she spotted a winner’… but it couldn’t have looked that certain to her at the time.

She could have taken the approach so many people seem to take, which is why I say I have been disappointed with other leaders. I can see the agony of the inner questioning:

• ‘Is this worth the risk?’
• ‘How might it catch me out?’
• ‘How would it look?’
• ‘I should do the due diligence.’
• ‘Why should I do this?’
• ‘Why doesn’t this person write a 16 page business plan?’
• ‘How could this inconvenience me and what would I have to do…?’

But Anita didn’t. She went with her instinct and as a result I would have done anything for her.

Sometimes I think the word ‘mentoring’ reduces what actually happens throughout this process. As a result of mentoring me, Anita became chair of my organisation and gave me an office to work from. But she also became my friend.

She asked the difficult questions, jumped in when I needed her and lightened the tone when I got grim. She mentored me, I suppose, but mostly she believed in me.

It takes courage when you start things from nothing when you are nothing. I should know. And courage was something Anita had in abundant supply, and that’s how she founded that first store in Brighton many years ago.

I know, now that I am closer to the age she must have been when we met, that it takes even more courage to risk it all again and again, backing and mentoring others to take the same route, even if it might risk your own hard won success.

Anita wasn’t timid at the start and most importantly she never became timid. The world needs more leaders like her.

27 March marks the anniversary of the first opening of The Body Shop in 1976