Doug Cartland's Four-Minute Leadership Advisory
Eyes On                     
by Doug Cartland
Doug Cartland, Inc.
03/25/2015

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Ray Baker was a writer for McClure's Magazine, a groundbreaking and influential monthly that was published around the turn of the 20th century. The magazine is credited with being the first to emphasize investigative, watchdog or reform journalism otherwise known as muckraking.

It was the 60 Minutes of its day.

(Baker is best known for a series of articles he wrote exposing the underbelly of the huge corporation, United States Steel.)

A Wisconsin boy, Baker passed the college entrance exams after just a year in high school and entered what would become Michigan State University at fifteen years old.

There he encountered a botany professor named William Beal. I'll let Doris Kearns Goodwin tell the story of Baker's experience with this unusual educator from her superb book, The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft and the Golden Age of Journalism:

"Ray's first experience in Professor Beal's laboratory made an indelible impression. Instructed to study a single plant specimen for several days under a compound microscope, he initially deemed the assignment 'a great waste of time' when he could simply research the specimen in a botany text and enumerate its characteristics.

"Baker soon came to understand that Beal wanted his students to learn by investigating for themselves, by compiling 'details and facts before principles and conclusions.'

"Beal, he would come to realize, taught 'the one thing I needed most of all to know. This was to look at life before I talked about it: not to look at it second-hand, by the way of books, but so far as possible to examine the thing itself."

The profundity of this approach is clear and has so many applications I barely know where to begin.

First, what a way to teach: Ignore the textbook. Observe it personally. Learn for yourself. Have a thought.

Second, it sure does a number on gossip doesn't it? Think about it: Don't take another's word. See it for yourself.

But let's get to the best stuff...

Smart people look and observe without blindly taking another's word for it. They realize that as others talk, the light they are providing is bending through the prism of their own perceptions with their biases attached.

Smart people don't assume to know the truth without real investigation.

Smart people see the results of another's endeavor both good and bad and seek to understand the underlying reasons. Too, they realize that the reasons may not be as simple as they'd like to make them.

Indeed, so many endeavors look great on paper only to be undone in the doing. Theory is nice, practice is everything.

How does this apply to us in business? In a million ways.

Here's one:

This story was told to me by a woman last week at a workshop I was conducting in Michigan. I don't remember the details as my focus quickly shifted, but I remember the gist.

This woman and a colleague were struggling with a rather complicated and laborious project they were given. Each day they were falling short of the objectives that were put upon them and they were getting frustrated.

Their supervisor saw the uneven results and was puzzled over the disconnect between the goals and the results.

Instead of castigating and blaming them, however, she took another tact. She wanted to understand.

Thus, one day she showed up in the office of her two subordinates, surprising them by telling them that she was going to work with them in their jobs for one full day.

She rolled up her sleeves and dug in.

And, guess what?

In the doing, in the personal observation, she found her answers and fixed the problem. In the process she won the admiration, respect and loyalty of her employees.

Doing honor to the teaching method of Beal, she compiled details and facts before establishing principles and conclusions.

For this, the old professor I'm sure would have been proud.


Oh, by the way, interesting factoid: Baker ended up marrying Beal's daughter.

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Doug

 

Doug Cartland, President
Doug Cartland, Inc.

 

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