SOURCE: Excerpt from Soundview “Executive Book Summaries,” July 2005

The Summary in Brief: Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s extraordinary life of leadership spanned more than six decades in the military, education, public administration and business sectors. The five-star general, one of only five in U.S. Army history, defined principles of leadership that were decades ahead of their time: principles reflecting shrewdness and wisdom about strategy, motivation, organization, execution and personal growth.

This summary reveals what MacArthur knew about setting the right goals; building sleek, fast-response organizations; inspiring subordinates to unprecedented performance; focusing relentlessly on results; and winning. In No Substitute for Victory, Theodore and Donna Kinni distill powerful leadership lessons from MacArthur’s life and career — lessons you can use, no matter where you lead and what you intend to accomplish.

This summary reveals what MacArthur knew about setting the right goals; building sleek, fast-response organizations; inspiring subordinates to unprecedented performance; focusing relentlessly on results; and winning. In No Substitute for Victory, Theodore and Donna Kinni distill powerful leadership lessons from MacArthur’s life and career — lessons you can use, no matter where you lead and what you intend to accomplish.

MacArthur’s Principles of Strategy

First and foremost, great leaders in every field of endeavor are visionaries and strategists. They must be able to choose the goals they and their organizations will pursue, and then design strategies capable of attaining them. MacArthur, a master strategist, was an expert at both tasks. Here are several strategic principles he used:

• Define and pursue victory. Every organization strives for victory in one way or another. Victory can mean winning a war, capturing market share or reaching a fundraising goal. Leaders are responsible for defining what victory means, focusing the intention of the organization on it and shepherding their followers in the quest to attain it.
• Manage the environment. All organizations are part of a larger environment — a market, an economy or a military theater. The organization’s capability to operate within that environment is a primary element in its success. Leaders are responsible for understanding and maximizing that capability.
• Utilize surprise. Surprise is a highly effective weapon in the strategic arsenal and can be a decisive factor in the success of organizational plans. It can confound competitors, undermine their defenses and relegate them to playing catch-up. It can also delight customers, win their loyalty and build market share. Smart strategists incorporate the element of surprise in their plans.
• Multiply your rate of movement. The need for speed in organizational movement and response has been widely acknowledged in the past decade. Lumbering corporate giants have either stagnated or disappeared from the business scene. Sleek, fast-moving companies that are able to stay ahead of changes in society and technology have dominated many markets. Leaders in successful organizations have embraced MacArthur’s dictum: Multiply your rate of movement.
• Ensure supply and support. The successful execution of strategy is critically dependent on supply and support. In war, it is fatal to launch an attack without adequate ammunition and protective support. Likewise, in business, it is futile to fight for an expanded market share for goods and services you cannot produce or deliver. Leaders in all types of organizations must consider and ensure adequate supply and support to achieve their objectives.

Inspirational Leadership

To effectively execute strategies and successfully achieve goals, leaders must motivate their followers to act. Throughout his career, MacArthur exhibited an extraordinary ability to inspire his followers. He combined command authority, charismatic image and a paternal humanity into a highly effective leadership persona. On his command, tens of thousands of soldiers risked their lives, and 80 million citizens of Japan embraced radical cultural change and a new constitution and government. Here are some of the principles of inspirational leadership MacArthur used:

• Unify command. The foundational lesson of inspirational leadership is that there must be a clear leader. Committees and management teams are rarely charismatic; they do not easily inspire the energy and loyalty of followers. Whenever possible, MacArthur insisted on a formal chain of command leading to a clearly identified and empowered leader.
• Be a role model. For better or for worse, leaders are the most influential role models within their organizations. Leaders’ actions, even more than their words, communicate their values, priorities and expectations to their followers. Great leaders live up to their words and offer an example that their followers can emulate because, as MacArthur said, “Soldiers of an army invariably reflect the attitude of their general.”
• Visibility matters. The presence of a leader enhances the morale and accountability of followers. In good times and particularly, in bad times, leaders must share in the action by taking a prominent place in the midst of their followers. Inspirational leaders are visible leaders. […] Visibility also plays a key role in reinforcing a leader’s messages. As superintendent at West Point, MacArthur broke precedent by auditing classes and evaluating them with the professors afterward. During the 1928 Olympics, MacArthur not only met regularly with the coaches and players, he took to the field to lend his support during the competition.

MacArthur’s Principles of Management

By most measures, MacArthur was a superb manager of people. He was an excellent boss who understood the fine balance between personal control and delegation. He knew how to coax the highest level of performance from his subordinates. His poor relationship with President Truman aside, MacArthur was also skilled at managing up. He had an enviable ability to persuade his superiors — from U.S. presidents to the Congress to the Joint Chiefs of Staff — to adopt policies and approve strategic and budgetary plans with which they initially disagreed.

• Weigh change carefully. Change is an organizational imperative, but the choice of when — and when not — to change is a fundamental leadership issue. As the turbulent 1960s dawned, MacArthur offered a warning about change — one that continues to be relevant today. He said: “I realize full well that the reckless spirit of the times seeks change. But change should not be made for the sake of change alone. It should be sought only to adapt time-tested principles which have been proven in the crucible of human experience to the new requirements of an expanding society.”
  Understanding that change does not take hold instantaneously, MacArthur also preached the necessity of shepherding and nurturing change programs until they are established. “A program, however, is in itself a lifeless thing, a mere skeleton,” he said, “and it has been the constant effort of my administration to put flesh and blood upon it and to imbue it with life.”
• Invest in training. Leaders are responsible for the preparedness of their followers, and training is a foundational element of preparedness. Even when training is essential to the successful execution of strategy, leaders often mistakenly treat it as an ancillary activity — one that can be reduced when budgets are tight and ignored when its need is not obvious. Ironically, those are exactly the times when training is most important.
• Develop management depth. In recent years, middle managers have often been maligned. They have been treated as organizational dead wood and their ranks have often been mercilessly downsized. Leaders of large organizations sometimes forget that managers convey and execute strategies. They represent an organization’s front-line leadership.
• Manage people positively. Great leaders tend to be motivational experts. They might choose to use positive methods or negative methods of motivation, or (most often) some combination of both. But no matter the type of organization in which they lead, they are able to create and maintain motivated and energized work forces.

A Leader’s Personal Traits

MacArthur’s achievements as a leader were supported and enabled by his personal beliefs, traits and skills. Great leaders develop and manage themselves before and after they take on the work of leading others. MacArthur embraced his future as a leader at an early age, and he managed his own life and career to maximize that future. Here are some of the leadership principles he used that were guided by his personal beliefs and traits: