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Sydney Finkelstein
Pity the tortoise in the 21st century. Stolid, careful, slowly-but-surely the
ways of the tortoise seem quaint in the face of an onslaught of hares running
amok , whether creating new businesses (Facebook, Amazon, Alibaba) or
disrupting old ones (Uber, Roku, Coursera).
But remember, in the classic Aesop's fable it is the plodding tortoise, and not
the speedy hare, that crossed the finish line first.
Is it possible that the tortoise could still win today? And what of the hare
so quick but impulsive and unschooled, calling to mind the all-nighter young
executives at the helm of companies today? How important is experience, and
even age, to successful leadership in an era where speed has become a business
goal in and of itself? The answers may surprise you.
Experience may not bring speed, but it does bring a greater ability to reflect
and put into perspective what is happening around you.
There s no denying the need for speed. Start-ups spend more time on pivots, a
fancy word for changing direction or business strategy, than ever before, while
incremental improvements are probably the best we ll ever see from more
bureaucratic companies. But the devaluation of experience and that means age,
too has gone so far that wisdom has fallen out of the very definition of
business intelligence.
The arrival of the Internet era has meant youth has never been more highly
valued by the business community. Silicon Valley companies every second one
seemingly started by a Harvard University dropout (Microsoft founder Bill
Gates; Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg) are not only reinventing how
businesses are run, they are also leveraging their success to breathe new life
into how philanthropies are run and how governments should be run.
After all, when Zuckerberg calls US President Barack Obama to lecture him on
the abuses of the US National Security Agency never mind the irony of this
coming from the creator of a company wholly-dependent on people revealing
private information about themselves to public audiences all bets are off.
The hares are surely running away with it.
The danger of generalising
Except for one little, but very important sleight of mind.
One of the most enduring human biases is that we tend to generalise from very
small sample sizes. So there s Zuckerberg, Gates, the Google guys, Jack Ma of
soon-to-IPO Alibaba, and a bunch of other successful entrepreneurs who made it
big in their twenties. But what about the tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of
thousands, of other twenty-somethings that have failed as business builders?
Don t believe me? The crowdsourcing fundraiser Kickstarter helped raise money
for more than 19,000 business ideas in 2013, the majority of which were set up
by people in their twenties and thirties. But how many actually created going
concerns, let alone became profitable? Venture capitalists have built an
industry on the premise that they only need to win big in one out of every 10
investments. Even TV shows like Dragons Den or Shark Tank demonstrate how few
young entrepreneurs can really make it.
The new business failure rate in the US is so high 50% fail within 5 years,
according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics that organisational
sociologists have been calling the phenomenon the liability of newness for
decades. Not all businesses are started by young entrepreneurs, of course, but
that s what most people believe. Even venture capitalists prefer younger
founders.
So, youth dominates in entrepreneurship as it does in the wider culture. Does
it also influence the decisions big companies make on talent? That s not a
rhetorical question.
It s not a good thing to be over 50 years old and working in a big company.
When redundancies come, you re often first in line to go because you re more
expensive. Ironically, one of the reasons there s been an upswing in start-ups
from entrepreneurs in their fifties is that they didn t have a choice. Once you
re unemployable, you have to figure it out for yourself.
Experience counts, really
I think it s time we counted up the real losses that arise from the devaluation
of experience, not just for older workers and managers caught up in the
societal meme but for the businesses that are left behind, required to fend for
themselves with one hand effectively tied behind their back.
Experience may not bring speed, but it does bring a greater ability to reflect
and put into perspective what is happening around you. And yes, it does bring
deeper compassion for the people we live among, at work and at home. Some
people call that wisdom.
Once you ve lived a little, the illusion of perfection has long gone. In fact,
you ve seen how the perfectionists you once worked with have moved on, unable
to adapt to the messiness of everyday business.
Once you ve lived a little, it becomes harder to go about your work without
paying closer attention to colleagues and empathising with those around you.
More likely, you can t help but see the nuances and subtleties of work that
less-experienced managers do not see. As a result, you re better able to
motivate others because you know what makes them tick. And you re better able
to influence others when you don t have direct authority over them. That s the
hallmark of the effective leader.
Once you ve lived a little, you ve seen bear markets and not just bull markets,
and you ve been forced to navigate around geopolitical events that periodically
disrupt business plans.
In fact, your skill set is exactly what inexperienced entrepreneurs need, yet
so often don t value.
Of course, experienced leaders don t automatically make the right calls, but
they ve got perspective and they use it. And they can be bold when
opportunities arise. Surely we would all say that about Larry Ellison, the CEO
of Oracle who has generated more than a 25% annual return on shareholder equity
over a 40-year career at the top. And is there anyone out there who doubts
83-year-old Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffet s ability to outthink the
competition as he adds year after year to his legend as one of the world s
greatest investors?
So yes, leaders can get better with age. The youthful hare may talk a good
game, but my money s on the tortoise.