At Large

The curiosities of human nature never seem to disappoint.  

We enjoy being celebrated for our accomplishments. We’re proud when our team wins. We feel momentarily down when we strike out in Little League, lose a game of pickleball at the senior center, or get 8 out of 10 in the Sunday New York Times Flashback History quiz.  

And we seem inherently programmed to “pass the buck.”

Some displays of ducking responsibility may be cultural, but we’re not even close to being qualified to muse about the finer points of sociology. 

Some may be familial. We seem to share the tendency to pass off the occasional missteps of children or grandchildren (especially grandchildren in our case) as momentary displays and not to be harshly judged. 

“Not to put too fine a point on it” (with due credit to Charles Dickens in Bleak House), actually accepting responsibility for something we’ve said or done seems to be a universal struggle. The accidentally fumbled jar of sweet pickle relish dropped in the aisle of the Big Y or Stop & Shop is quickly left behind since there was no one else in the aisle to bear witness. Let the staff clean it up. Someone will notice. On to frozen foods. Quickly!

The CEO gene

We’ve long mused that hidden somewhere in the human helical coil, there must be a rarely occurring phenomenon – “the CEO gene.” Over many years of working with, observing, chiding, and supporting senior executives from organizations large and small, we have found it frighteningly easy to spot those individuals who carry the gene. They’re different. Things that bother mere mortals – emotion, empathy, sensitivity – are simply not there. The CEO gene has taken over, quickly eliminating the urge to behave like empathetic fellow wanderers on the planet.

Impact on the bottom line? Close the plant. Shareholders threatening to make the annual meeting a shouting match? Reduce the workforce by 10% under the oft-raised banner of “reorganization.” Program over budget? Find someone, blame them, and fire them. Problem solved. And, perhaps the cruelest announcement of all. “I know it’s her 12th birthday, but I’ve got an important sales meeting in Sheboygan. There’ll be other birthdays … or dance recitals … or graduations.”

Anybody else hear Cat’s in the Cradle by Harry Chapin echoing in the back of your mind?

We recently experienced one of these CEO gene moments – details not important – and took a few days of reflection to sort out the impact. The ability to behave with Teflon-like insensitivity is simply not in most of our natures, so when we are on the receiving end of that kind of behavior, it takes a while to catch our metaphoric breath.

Truman and Washington

While assessing the impact and potential damage, we were suddenly drawn to two historic moments attributed to two American presidents. One may be apocryphal, the other is photographically confirmed.

Harry Truman, the plain-spoken haberdasher from Missouri who became an almost reluctant Commander in Chief at the death of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, had a plaque on his desk that said, “The buck stops here.”  It was the fully accepted end point for those who wished to play “the blame game.” No hiding. No petulantly firing someone to protect a bonus or re-election. The buck stops here.

And centuries earlier, a young George Washington figures in a parable that ended with a felled cherry tree. Asked whether he bore the responsibility, his legendary answer was “I cannot tell a lie.” My fault. I did it. I’ll take the blame.

As far as we know, there is no vaccine to ward off the impact of the CEO gene. There is, however, an exercise to defuse the potential for behaving like we ruthlessly run Gargantua, Inc. In that moment of realizing the relish jar has broken, when there is glass and sticky pickle/vinegar/sugar mess in aisle three, and there is no one else within 30 feet, take a breath, swallow hard, and park the cart to protect the spill. Then, find a jacketed store employee, and lead them to the point of impact.

We didn’t mean to chop down the cherry tree … but the buck stops