Military literature – or at least the writings of charismatic leaders – sometimes fascinates and often arouses curiosity. Whether out of interest in military matters, as a professional soldier, or as a dinosaur from the days of national service with a career in the operational reserve… Or because one is waiting (unwisely and in vain, in my view) for salvation from “providential men”, military or otherwise.
The book by Admiral Finaz – until this summer head of the École de Guerre (the French staff college) and also, it should be noted, a “naval writer” – does not set out to inspire awestruck crowds. His aim: to help build bridges between the civilian and military worlds, between companies and the great Institution, between managers and commanders…
There is, of course, plenty of material in this recent work by the man who ran the training of tomorrow’s senior military leaders (passing through the École de Guerre is the essential prerequisite for becoming a general or flag officer). And plenty of poetic pleasure too, since he belongs to the talented fraternity of the “écrivains de marine” – the French Navy’s official writers (is a pen not directly military reserved for sailors, since there is no equivalent in the other services?).
The subject that often inspires parallels between the two worlds is the distinction – or the parallels – between management and command.
All the more so because some who are nostalgic for, or idealise, an “ideal leader” – whether sociologists, managers or even heads of “management” schools – regret the absence of “leaders” and lambast the weaknesses of “management”. Disappointed with public or private “managers”, they say they are ready to turn to military leaders who have left active service, in the hope that they will put the world and companies “in order”.
The distinction between management and command drawn at the outset by Admiral Finaz, who in no way suggests such ideas, is much more subtle. And more radical at the same time. Because for him, what distinguishes “command” from “management” is the relationship to death, received or inflicted: “a serviceman obeys an order because he trusts the person who gave it to him”. And this is what he calls “the crew spirit”, since the ultimate commitment is made at least as much out of a chosen ideal as out of solidarity and esprit de corps – with one’s crewmates as with one’s leaders.
Death as the dividing line between command and management?
Indeed, while death also occurs in the civilian world, it is never at the heart of the daily mission. One may suffer it, by accident, or be close to it, in the health professions. But one does not inflict it as a vocation. And above all, managers do not send their teams, by an order, into situations where death may be received, and inflicted. This is indeed a key, factual distinction between the two worlds.
Yet, as the pages go by, this distinction between management and command fades, and the parallels between military leaders and business leaders multiply. A sign that his thinking matured through contact with the School’s civilian participants, for example? Or the prospect of passing through to the other side of the looking glass, after the last military “berthing”, and the start of a transition?
Risk: common ground between management and command?
This raises the question of risk. Are the risks taken by servicemen comparable to those taken by entrepreneurs?
Of course, entrepreneurs rarely take a risk of immediate death… And while managers take risks, they do not knowingly put their teams’ lives at stake.
But since the perception of risk is largely an individual matter, one might think that some civilian commitments weigh as heavily as taking a physical risk: for example, the family’s material future, the quality of interpersonal relationships, one’s social existence, pride lost or regained, or simply the meaning of life…
Warriors run physical risks to the highest degree. But does that mean that, for everyone, the importance of life’s other “risks” should be played down?
“How can anyone claim for a single moment that these matters of risk, meaning and mission are the preserve of military leaders alone? They are the daily lot of real business leaders”.
At the centre of everything, the meaning of life
And it is precisely there – in the meaning of action, in the meaning each person may try to give to their life – that the parallels emerge in Admiral Finaz’s book: “even though it is undoubtedly part of what makes them heroic, servicemen rarely talk about meaning. Because it is offered to them. They sometimes talk about the mission. It is given to them too, and they prepare for it constantly. Nothing is justified without the mission, and everything is a matter of meaning, too – and above all”.
So what about civilian managers?
Whether they are soldiers or entrepreneurs, whether they are engaged in a perilous, vital mission for the interests of the Nation or for their comrades in arms, or in a peaceful action with high stakes for themselves – for their professional commitment, their individual and family future, that of their employees, their reputation – all human beings need to give meaning to their action, to the time they give, as life goes by and so many choices have to be made.
Surviving, living, flourishing in ways that belong to each person alone…
And this question of meaning sometimes arises cruelly, when one thinks of the “social deaths” felt and experienced by certain professions and certain individuals. Burn-out, bore-out, disengagement… Which can lead to extremes. Like the suicides at France Télécom, when its professions were changing radically and the company was turning into Orange.
Or like those farmers who take their own lives in a last gesture of despair, when they can take no more and no longer find any meaning in their lives. And while they are often their own managers, in the legal sense, they are nonetheless “managed” by an ecosystem that ought to reflect on the consequences of its interactions.
So, between the death that comes because working life no longer had any meaning, and the death received because the meaning of one’s commitment implied, perhaps, a brutal end, is there not something the two worlds share: the need to find meaning in one’s life?
The fragile balance of meaning and commitment
The weeks spent in lockdown were an opportunity for many to ask themselves this question, or to realise its importance when they had to keep working despite their fear, or go back to work. Why do we work? Why do we live?
Some are now looking for ways to strike a new balance between personal life and professional commitment. And remote working can be, for some, a fruitful avenue – provided they organise their time and space, and their intellectual availability too.
Others were impatient to go back to work, as far as possible. To find social interactions that complement those of their private lives, and to return to the setting of their achievement, of their commitment.
Mentioning these differences does not mean downplaying the specific nature of military action, but recognising that the levers of commitment, the driving forces of life, differ from one individual to another.
And that is why, unlike the detractors of “management”, we like to value, and help, the women and men who master the art of bringing out talents, skills and individual and collective energies, and of leading sensitive projects that combine technical complexity and human diversity.
Because, to conclude with Admiral Finaz, “let us never forget that to lead is to love”. That is a wonderful “lubber line”: the line of meaning, the one that sets the course.
Loïc Finaz, « La liberté du commandement – l’esprit d’équipage » (The freedom of command – the crew spirit), Éditions des Équateurs, March 2020 (published in June)
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