Authority is in crisis, in the public world as in companies, and we keep hearing about spontaneous, emergent dynamics, collective intelligence, co-construction, facilitation… How can we put an end to these ideas that muddle minds and generate chaos and dysfunction?
First of all, be the boss!
What companies, like every public project, lack is real leadership. Someone who knows where they are going, without hesitation, without doubt. Because doubt breeds anxiety and dissent. The boss is always alone. That is both his defining feature and his greatness. Not everyone is prepared for it, and not everyone is up to it. The individual selection system of France’s elite grandes écoles is, moreover, perfectly suited to this competitive world: from the earliest age, our elites are prepared to compete against one another. And it is from this competition that the best will emerge. As for the followers, they will know whom to trust, with complete confidence.
Contrary to what we are led to believe, there are not several forms of leadership. Authority is vertical; it cannot be shared. In an election, only the winner prevails, and compromises are so many compromises of principle, immoral by nature. Discussions are a waste of time, with no added value, and a source of confusion for weak minds.
Organise your projects down to the smallest detail
Out of respect for others, for deadlines and for costs, it is essential to plan every project down to the smallest detail. Anything unforeseen can only be due to poor planning, a flawed initial analysis, insufficient control of contingencies.
Good upstream organisation will make it possible to define everyone’s tasks well in advance, through explicit rules and detailed procedures that must be strictly followed.
Once the roadmap is set, the collective march only fails because some deviate from it, in the name of pretexts such as freedom, creativity or initiative – so many excuses for disobedience. Great armies only function effectively through discipline and the application of precisely established rules. In the face of the threats of our time, classic, tried-and-tested approaches guarantee the success of operations. Hunt down the weak and the guilty, replace people with machines wherever possible, to make execution reliable.
Because, as the saying goes, trust does not exclude control. Trust in structures, control of human factors, which are always the weak links.
Don’t waste time sharing your objective
Some keep going on about “meaning at work”. A company is not a democracy, and the public sphere is governed by electoral mechanisms which, between elections, leave decisions to elected representatives.
Challenging, or even simply questioning, the leader’s intent is at once a lack of respect for organisational or institutional mechanisms, a waste of time and a source of confusion. Why try to share an intention when the factors that go into a decision are both complex and many? Not everyone has the capacity for an overall view and synthesis. And what a utopia the very idea of collective intelligence is! It is nothing but a bonus for levelling down, since all opinions, even the least informed, would have to be taken into account! Why not talk about the intelligence of crowds, then, or even imagine a science that might be called “crowdology” (« foulologie »)? Everyone’s success lies in precise, rigorous execution, not in philosophy.
Because the leadership of a group can only rest on the boss who breathes his soul into it. He has no need to spell it out, still less to accept beliefs about collective facilitation that promote an equalising relativism in the name of the diversity of talents. Diversity, certainly – but within a hierarchy!
Recruit reliable supporters
While the boss is by nature alone, he must not isolate himself, or he will wear himself out. He must be able to count on reliable, loyal supporters. Surround yourself only with people who know what they owe you, and who support you because they depend on you. Push aside the lukewarm, the hesitant, the dissenters. And be merciless with critics, who are so many opponents – if not today, then tomorrow.
Every human organisation rests solely on the classic principle of the carrot and the stick. Do not hesitate, either, to divide up roles clearly, so that everyone can see who does what: to each their own clear, unequivocal remit, to avoid any unnecessary interaction. Areas of overlap should serve only one purpose: dealing with residual opposition, by dividing the forces involved. Because these spaces of confrontation can only generate conflicts, which will only be resolved by your intervention – rightly seen as providential.
Be rational, free yourself from emotions
Finally, show how modern the Cartesian tradition is – useful and certain. Those who advocate taking emotions into account are challenging pure knowledge and perfect reasoning. Why take into account the uncertainties and questions caused by emotions, when they are merely the expression of chemical surges that disturb pure reason? What distinguishes man from beast is reasoning – no question of giving it up on the pretext of so-called holistic approaches that deny the development of conceptual intelligence over the centuries.
In the face of the world’s complexity, the boss’s responsibility is to impose a framework that brings order, or restores it, and in which everyone finds their place, like an efficient ant, strong in the collective to which it belongs.
Modern science and the development of the latest technologies, like the order of nations, rest on this order – imagined, defined and rolled out, carried by rigorous and brilliant leadership, without flaw or weakness, without hesitation or doubt.
And more than human dynamics, companies and nations need clear, readable, stable organisations.
How could anyone think otherwise? Think?…
Postscript: if you took everything above at face value (which would alarm me, because it would mean that vertical authoritarianism still has some credibility), I must (briefly) set out the following convictions:
- There is no “boss”, only many forms of leadership, suited to personalities and above all to circumstances;
- In a complex, uncertain context, it is pointless and ineffective to plan every last detail. Prefer what are called “min specs”: minimum specifications. Develop your collective skills, and your ability to face uncertainty together;
- Share your objective, give meaning to your projects. And read Mehdi Moussaïd’s excellent book (he is also on YouTube, in French), which will give you fine illustrations of the power of crowds – and introduce you to “crowdology” 🙂
- Surround yourself not with henchmen but with allies: people who commit, including by criticising your project, because their criticism aims to improve it;
- And accept emotions, because they are a precious aid to sound decisions, whether individual or collective;
- Companies and nations need, above all, energy, commitment and virtuous dynamics. Not organisations that are, by nature and in the end, bureaucratic.
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