General Rick Hillier’s Talk on “Managing Risk in Turbulent Times”

At a breakfast this morning sponsored by Gowling’s, General Rick Hillier, a consultant to that firm, and former Chief of Canada’s Defence Staff, spoke on “Managing Risk in Turbulent Times”. Most of the talk really related to leadership. He is a very rousing and dynamic speaker, but not as militaristic as one might assume. And I think that was part of the message. To be a leader you really need to pay attention to the human side; to relationships.

As for risk management, he talked of deciding is something is worth the risks, if you are going to do something. That’s trite, but I wonder if we do this as often as we should. Seems to me that in whatever we are deciding, we often make the decision to forge ahead based on whether we think it is a good idea. We want that desired result to increase revenue, decrease expenses, gain market share, etc. But have we really thought about the risks of doing it, and I would suggest just as importantly the risks of not doing it. Bottom line: more expansive thought should go into decision making.

But back to General Hillier’s remarks: He told of a situation in which he and his wife, and a lot of troops, were travelling in a new transport to the Canadian military. Big sucker! They were coming into Afghanistan. The aircraft, despite its size, is designed to come in quickly for a landing. Not a long, slow glide so that it will be a target for group launched rockets. So it goes from 27,000 feet to 1200 feet in about 1 minute 30 seconds. He said quite a sensation. He was a little worried because the US Major piloting the plane looked like he hadn’t started shaving yet. During the descent his wife screamed “We’re going down.”’ His response was: yes, we’re going down but it’s a controlled descent. “controlled descent”! Good analogy to our sometimes engage in dramatic changes, but hopefully being mindful that we should be in control as they proceed. Another way to manage risk.

He had a saying: no (something), no fads. Sorry, but I can’t remember what “(something)” was – it was an early morning after a wonderful evening of a dinner with Stikeman Elliott. The concept was though that one should avoid preconceptions and the “flavour du jour”. He told the story of an Inuit soldier who was 4 foot 6, but was the best in training soldiers in the Arctic. He could do amazing things. But on seeing his size you would assume that he could not do big things. One story was about how he talked a polar bear out of their camp. The same applied to the above story of the pilot. Don’t assume because of his youth that he was unable to execute the ability to control and expedite a landing which had all the potential for disastrous results. The “fads” part spoke so much to me. In management literature we see so much of this. When you really get to the bottom of it, a lot is fads, or repackaged basic principles that we’ve read about before.

But it was General Hillier’s connection with his people that spoke the most to me. He talked of his knowledge of his operational staff but also of the injured and their families. He had met them. He had taken the time to talk to them. He had done little things for them, that meant so much to them. He had grieved with the families of those who had given their lives. He helped a widow carry on the work that her husband, a medic, whose nickname was Boomer, had done with the people of Afghanistan. The work was often with children to help to prolong their lives. The rates of child mortality are high. Part of it was a very touching story of toques which were knitted for the kids to wear to prevent the loss of body heat. Apparently this is a real problem which leads to many unnecessary deaths. The widow arranged for Canadians to knits thousands of these toques, which are called “Boomers”, and the General facilitated their distribution. Not something you would think a busy General would have time to do. But it was important to him. And I think an important element of his leadership.

He has a book coming out October 24 and apparently the pre-orders are sold out, and it is like #5 on amazon.ca’s best pre-sellers list. Based on what I heard, it could very well be an interesting read. At a breakfast this morning sponsored by Gowling’s, General Rick Hillier, a consultant to that firm, and former Chief of Canada’s Defence Staff, spoke on “Managing Risk in Turbulent Times”. Most of the talk really related to leadership. He is a very rousing and dynamic speaker, but not as militaristic as one might assume. And I think that was part of the message. To be a leader you really need to pay attention to the human side; to relationships.

As for risk management, he talked of deciding if something is worth the risks, if you are going to do something. That’s trite, but I wonder if we do this as often as we should. Seems to me that in whatever we are deciding, we often make the decision to forge ahead based on whether we think it is a good idea. We want that desired result to increase revenue, decrease expenses, gain market share, etc. But have we really thought about the risks of doing it, and I would suggest just as importantly the risks of not doing it. Bottom line: more expansive thought should go into decision making.

But back to General Hillier’s remarks: He told of a situation in which he and his wife, and a lot of troops, were travelling in a new transport to the Canadian military. Big sucker of an airplane! They were coming into Afghanistan. The aircraft, despite its size, is designed to come in quickly for a landing. Not a long, slow glide so that it will be a target for ground launched rockets. So it goes from 27,000 feet to 1200 feet in about 1 minute 30 seconds. He said quite a sensation. He was a little worried because the US Major piloting the plane looked like he hadn’t started shaving yet. During the descent his wife screamed “We’re going down.”’ His response was: yes, we’re going down but it’s a controlled descent. “controlled descent”! Good analogy to our sometimes being engaged in dramatic changes, but hopefully being mindful that we should be in control as they proceed. Another way to manage risk.

He had a saying: no (something), no fads. Sorry, but I can’t remember what “(something)” was – it was an early morning after a wonderful evening of a dinner with Stikeman Elliott. The concept was though that one should avoid preconceptions and the “flavour du jour”. He told the story of an Inuit soldier who was 4 foot 6, but was the best in training soldiers in the Arctic. He could do amazing things. But on seeing his size you would assume that he could not do big things. One story was about how he talked a polar bear out of their camp. The same applied to the above story of the pilot. Don’t assume because of his youth that he was unable to execute the ability to control and expedite a landing which had all the potential for disastrous results. The “fads” part spoke so much to me. In management literature we see so much of this. When you really get to the bottom of it a lot is fads are repackaged basic principles that we’ve read about before.

But it was General Hillier’s connection with his people that spoke the most to me. He talked of his knowledge of his operational staff but also of the injured and their families. He had met them. He had taken the time to talk to them. He had done little things for them, that meant so much to them. He had grieved with the families of those who had given their lives. He helped a widow carry on the work that her husband, a medic, whose nickname was Boomer, had done with the people of Afghanistan. The work was often with children to help to prolong their lives. The rates of child mortality are high. Part of it was a very touching story of toques which were knitted for the kids to wear to prevent the loss of body heat. Apparently this is a real problem which leads to many unnecessary deaths. The widow of the Canadian soldier arranged for Canadians to knit thousands of these toques, which are called “Boomers”, and the General facilitated their distribution. Not something you would think a busy General would have time to do. But it was important to him. And I think an important element of his leadership.

He has a book coming out October 24 and apparently the pre-orders are sold out, and it is like #5 on amazon.ca’s best pre-sellers list. Based on what I heard, it could very well be an interesting read.

Luncheon Speaker - Doris Kearns Goodwin on "Team of Rivals"

Very interesting luncheon speaker at the conference today. She is Doris Kearns Goodwin, a historian and Pulitzer Prize winning author. I haven’t read any of her books, but she was speaking today on her book, Team of Rivals – the story of Abraham Lincoln.

She had spent 5 years I think it was pouring through letters and diaries to come up with a fascinating work, about an extraordinary man. She bemoaned the fact that in our age of electronic communications, such sources as she used will not be available. Is anyone keeping the electronic media of great people?

She told fascinating stories of Lincoln’s leadership, how he got the Republican (I guess that was before that party got a bad name!) nomination for president (he beat the clear favourite, who was so confident he spent the 9 months before the nomination travelling Europe, on the third ballot; how he brought his fiercest opponents into his cabinet, even listened to them, but once he decided they had to fall into line (e.g. when he decided to issue the Emancipation Proclamation there would be no more debate on whether it would be issued, but he would hear them on timing and implementation matters); how notwithstanding being treated rudely by some of these opponents he took the high road (e.g. forgiving them or not stooping to the same level of politics) [wouldn’t that be refreshing in 21st century politics!]; if someone was not doing their job how he would create an imaginary line (of time) by which if they did not do it they would be fired (he did this with a general during the Civil War); and his great ability for story telling (which I think is a great way to mentor and instil values).

But alas the book is way too long (900 pages) to keep my attention – my jaws would get way too sore from sounding out all those words! So once again I passed up buying a book at this convention (the last one was by the physicist who spoke on string theory) and having the author sign it. But come to think of that length, my current read is Crytonomicon, which is about 1000 pages – but it’s math, not history. More on that though when I finish it.