The Spectrum Between Safety And Fear In Leading An Organization
By
Leonard Zwelling
From your earliest days on this Earth, your life was governed by a combination of safety and fear. Your parents were the oases of safety from the rest of the world, but, to some extent, they disciplined with a little bit of fear. If you lost their approval, you feared for your continued safety. At least that was my experience.
Sometimes, in our culture, the maternal figure is the figure of safety and the paternal one is the one of fear. This was not my experience at all. It was far more complex in my case in that my father was the strict disciplinarian and the source of any fear, but the loss of my mother’s approval was also something that frightened me. Both of my parents left no doubt that they loved me and would keep me safe, but that does not mean they did not instill the desire for safety or the threat of fear as tools of discipline.
But, enough about my journey on the couch on my 78th birthday, which is today as I write.
This spectrum of safety and fear also governs the way in which organizations can be led. Some leaders exude safety. They say they will take care of you. Socialist states are noted for this. They may tax you blind, but they provide for you.
Tyrants use fear. Hitler, Stalin, and Putin all scared the pants off of any opposition and with that fear controlled the country, its people, and everyone’s destiny. Donald Trump seems to do the same for the majority of the Republican Party, although I have no idea why. He’s a bully. Punch him in the nose if he threatens you. It’s working for Iran.
Today, corporations are governed along the same spectrum. Some corporate leaders epitomize safety. Pay is fair. Benefits are generous. Safety in the work place is emphasized and that credo of safety lived by one and all. Unfortunately, such work places are rare and leaders who care and govern by nurturing talent and rewarding performance on a merit basis are becoming harder and harder to find.
What seems more typical is a leader wearing a mask of safety when he truly leads with fear. The leader says all the right things to make people feel good, but in his actions creates an environment where fear rules every decision and thought of the workforce and actually inhibits optimal performance.
I am going to argue that MD Anderson has been led by fear for this entire century. Ever since Dr. Mendelsohn was caught in two business ethics scandals in 2001 and turned his fate and that of MD Anderson over to Dan Fontaine and his collective lawyers, the cancer center has been dominated by a “gotcha” mentality, entire books of rules and policies written by lawyers that are easily violated, and the arbitrary dispensing of punishment for violations, including firing, for infractions that used to be handled by a frank discussion—what I would call the measured use of fear. Anderson has devolved into a police state.
It has now gotten so bad at Anderson with the Faculty Senate eradicated and no replacement representative body for faculty input to the administration, that most faculty members keep their heads down, do their work, and go home. It will be interesting watching how the Pediatrics faculty adjusts to life at Texas Children’s as the two oncology services “merge.” (Everyone knows this is an acquisition of MD Anderson Pediatrics by TCH. The lie that this is a merger is just another tool of leadership for spreading fear.) I suspect the Pediatrics faculty is moving from a frying pan of fear into a fire of anxiety and TCH is significantly less generous in pay and benefits than MD Anderson. At least the current fear at Anderson is a known. The anxiety of an unknown future for the Pediatrics faculty of Anderson following the merger must be crushing. Of course, these Pediatrics faculty believe that they will stay MD Anderson employees right next to lesser paid TCH faculty. Wanna bet? My prediction is that the current MD Anderson Pediatrics faculty who move to TCH will be Baylor faculty very soon. If the MD Anderson Pediatrics faculty believe the lies that they are being told now, who are the real fools?
It is truly amazing to me that people who I know well as honest, bright, and capable are silent as this is occurring and gullible enough to believe that this “merger” will go well for them.
I suspect their thinking is why jeopardize that big salary, the yearly SAP, and the UT benefits to free your workplace from fear? Those MD Anderson perks may vanish very soon.
The other thing fear begets is mediocrity at the levels below the leader. That is surely the case at Anderson now with executives who do nothing, know nothing, and live only to serve Dr. Pisters and his agenda, whatever that is at the moment. I have no idea what the Pisters Plan is now except raising more money, building more buildings, and increasing his own salary.
Let me just say that Anderson leadership in the 1980s would never have gotten away with the stuff perpetrated on the faculty today and I don’t think it is because faculty then had different kinds of parents than faculty today. But the faculty when I got here in 1984 had more balls—even the women.
When I look at the institution that gave me so much and still takes good care of me, it saddens me greatly that today’s faculty has leadership that uses fear, when those who led me were so nurturing. Mickey LeMaistre, David Hohn, Margaret Kripke, and Irv Krakoff were great bosses. They encouraged me all the time and reined me in when necessary. With that leadership, I was able to optimize my productivity and have a great career thanks to MD Anderson and its leadership.
I don’t know what today’s MD Anderson faculty members think about their leaders. It may be that they don’t know any other environment than fear. And THAT, scares the hell out of me.
