Not Everything Is A Market: The All-Around Manager Myth and School Supervision

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has proven to be a very good manager in both the private and public sectors. But even the good ones make mistakes. Education is the bane of most big city mayors because they have some leverage but not a lot of control, their constituents care passionately about it and the media are constantly issuing judgements about whether it is good or bad - usually without much evidence. The Mayor appointed as his first education czar a career lawyer who surprised everyone by being pretty effective. He got the issues, made some progress and communicated well. Instead of considering himself lucky rather than smart, the Mayor decided lightening can strike twice and appointed a magazine executive as his next education commissioner. She resigned after a few months. Margaret Heffernan explains in BNet why not every executive can manage every situation and why not everything is a market - especially when the future of voters' children is concerned:

"Cathleen Black’s appointment as New York Schools Chancellor took most people by surprise. Yesterday’s resignation, after just three months, seems to have had exactly the same effect. Nothing about this saga has played out quite the way that people expected. But it’s proved a revealing test of three presiding myths of leadership.

The All-Round Manager Myth

When Michael Bloomberg appointed Black, what stunned most people was her lack of expertise. None of the magazines for which she was famous had touched on education. Black had no kids in the public school system; she also had no prior political experience. On the face of it, she was almost the world’s most un-qualified person for the job.

Supporters argued that Black had proved such a great leader at Hearst magazines, she could be a star anywhere. In other words, you didn’t need to know about education to do one of the toughest education jobs in the world. This view of leadership sees the role as one of inspiration - making people feel committed, optimistic and empowered.

Black’s magic managerial touch, however, wasn’t enough to fix New York schools. By all accounts, Black spent most of her days just catching up on how the system worked (or didn’t work.) The mechanics mattered. It’s in the detail that solutions might be found. Cheerleading is part of leadership - but it is never the whole job. Imagining that, because you can do one thing, you can do anything is the height of hubris. Now I’ve written three books - would you like me to do your heart operation?

The Outside Advantage

At the time of Black’s appointment, I argued that being an outsider could prove an advantage. Having no political debts to pay can give you terrific objectivity short-term, but then you need to build support. You may come in as an outsider, but you’d better not stay one - and that, apparently, is what Black did. Her inability or unwillingness to build a committed team around her proved a signal disadvantage. It kept media attention relentlessly on her - which implied that she was more important than the schools, the students or the teachers. She needed rapidly to diffuse that story and focus on the real problem, which is under-achieving students. But it’s the rare media leader that can resist the allure of media attention.

Black is reported as having said, “If they knew me, they’d like me.” Really? Everyone? Have you ever met anyone that everyone likes? Doing the job well was never about being liked. It was about standing for something and being able to deliver it. That takes support, agreement, consensus. It isn’t ever just about being liked.

Politics isn’t the Same as Business

The biggest lesson to be learn from Black’s failure is that politics is not the same as business. Indeed, I’d argue that politics is a lot harder than business. Why? The goals are more diffuse: educational success for New York schools isn’t discernible in just a few numbers. The constituencies and stakeholders you have to please are more numerous - and often mutually exclusive. And in politics you have to be very successful to survive at all. The business that pleases over 50% of its entire market is rare - if it exists at all. Magazines, at which Black excelled, are classic niche products, targeting a well defined market - and ignoring the rest. You do that in democracy at your peril.

The most important lesson we should take from this saga is that not everything is a market. You can’t trade kids and schools and lives. And no product in the world matters as much to consumers as children, and their future, matter to their parents.