leave their problems at the front door. Life is messy. Young children and aging parents need care. Marriages dissolve. People face serious medical problems. A good leader will make allowances when an employee is dealing with serious personal issues. And when that particular crisis is past, your employees will remember how you treated them. When you demonstrate empathy and compassion for the individual, you’ll cultivate a more committed and caring workplace. “Businesses are social institutions.” Growing up in an orphanage taught me some important life lessons. I learned that all people have value and need respect. And I came to understand the imperative that all segments of society recognize that they have social responsibilities; whether you are an individual, an institution, or a corporation, you are part of the social matrix. Corporations have social responsibilities to be ethical, to be terrific corporate citizens, to provide employment, and to try to avoid ever having to take people’s employment away from them. People who manage big corporations need to be cognizant of the power they have over people’s lives and not abuse that power in any way. Corporations get into trouble when they forget that they have social responsibilities, that they are not entities in and of themselves. I would also say that a strong leader will understand the macro environment in which he or she is operating. You have to understand the external environmental factors affecting your organization’s success. Only then can you adjust your expectations and interactions with people so that they will be able to operate and feel good about what they do. At both DuPont Pharmaceuticals and DuPont Merck, I was able to implement
policies that guaranteed equal pay for equal work, that would protect employees from discrimination and harassment, and that would positively impact diversity within the organization. But the fundamental thing that a leader must do is communicate in a transparent way, be honest, and be empathetic toward every one of his constituencies. And Washington College has a lot of constituencies, each with its own set of concerns and challenges. Faculty, staff, the Board of Visitors & Governors, alumni, parents, donors, friends within the Chestertown community —each has a personal relationship with this institution. A good leader will understand the needs and the psychological well-being of those constituencies. How you treat those people is situational, dependent on where they are emotionally and psychologically. And this is where I see leaders fail. They don’t take the time to assess and understand the environment they find themselves in. When I first came to Washington College, one of my main objectives was to understand what’s valued here. To do that, I talked to people—a lot of people— to gauge what they were feeling not only about the state of the institution but about the people who make up this community. What I learned is how important those interpersonal relationships are, and how committed people are to this place. In all my years, I have never been in a place where people preface any remark—even grievances—with these words: “I want you to know that I love Washington College.” Understanding your constituents and their motivation is really important. If you pay attention to those four things, the last thing you have to be aware of as a leader
is, what are you looking for as an outcome? What’s the vision? That, too, will be situational. At ETS, the goal was to link its social mission to firm financial performance. At DuPont Merck, the vision was to drive growth, with an emphasis on employee development and heightened awareness on diversity. What do I want for Washington College? I want this place to make a difference in the lives of our students, so that they can embrace their own social responsibility to make the world a better place. These remarks are excerpted from Kurt Landgraf’s keynote address given in March as part of the J.C. Jones Seminar in American Business.
SPRING 2018
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