Can We Stop Taking Leadership Advice from Billionaires?

And while we’re at it, any business leader who puts profit ahead of the well-being of their employees and society.

Thanks to the #metoo and #blacklivesmatter movements, we now have daily allegations of hostile, racist, discriminatory, and toxic workplaces, including ones with abusive leaders at mission-driven, “diverse”, and non profit organizations, coming to light. Even the CEOs of Crisis Text Line and the Canadian Museum of Human Rights have had to step down due to allegations of harassment and racism.

I can’t keep track of the number of people I know who have quit high-paying, high-status jobs in tech, finance, media, law, and other industries, because their mental health was so adversely affected. And I’ve seen first hand the impact that discriminatory hiring, promotion, and compensation practices have on the culture of an organization and the mental health of its employees.

But we continue to treat executives, founders, and quite literally anyone who is wealthy, like they have the solutions to all of our problems. As if they aren’t the cause of many of our problems, as Darren Walker, President of Ford Foundation so articulately points out in his recent New York Times Op-Ed. Frankly, I’m tired of seeing headlines about how poorly employees are being treated right next to headlines celebrating the latest unicorn, decacorn, and (alleged) billionaire, even in the midst of this global pandemic.

As long as we as a society continue to see becoming rich as the goal, I don’t have much hope that diversifying a Board of Directors, though a good start, will significantly change the day to day lives of a company’s internal and external stakeholders.

A Better Framework for Managers

If we want meaningful change, leaders at all levels of an organization need a new approach - one that isn’t based on toxic for-profit systems and wealthy role-models.

I believe that if we drew inspiration from therapists for example, instead of billionaires who continue to ignore their employees’ pleas for better pay and working conditions, we’d have employees who felt supported, empowered, and valued.

I also believe that if we modeled our best practices off of teachers, instead of leaders of “impact” investment funds who bribe college admissions officers, we as leaders would be better equipped to close any perceived skill gaps — making us more confident about hiring and promoting individuals who don’t look, sound, think, or act like the rest of the team.

I even suspect that if we looked to team coaches as role models, instead of leaders of platforms that choose to spread hate speech, we’d be able to foster a more inclusive work environment and a sense of belonging that could serve to combat the loneliness epidemic in our society and even build bridges in polarized communities.

I imagine that if we adopted the values of artists and craftspeople, and not those of wildly successful entrepreneurs who, in case after case after case, chase profit to the detriment of their company, we might start to care less about profit and more about sustainability.

I’ll be exploring the lessons that we business leaders can learn from each of these professions, and a handful of others, in more depth in more posts coming soon!

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