via jasonpermenter
“Transparency of information breeds self-correcting behavior.”
Excerpt from an Interview with Admiral Thad. W. Allen, US Coast Guard:
Arizona Daily Star: Dovetailing on that, you were recently selected as one of top 20 leaders in America by U.S. News & World Report and the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. Would you talk about your philosophy of leadership?
Thad W. Allen: It’s a number of things. It’s probably reflective of how the Coast Guard addresses leadership. We have identified 21 core competencies of leadership that we address in all the different Coast Guard curricula.
In my personal life, it’s empowering people to do what they are capable of, making sure they’re supported and making sure that they learn how to manage risk.
The one thing that you don’t want to do in an exigent situation is “wing it.” But you are going to have to take risks, because you’re always going to have to make decisions under conditions of uncertainty.
You learn by making decisions and sometimes not having them come out all right and having people that you work for tolerate that.
One of the things I feel very strongly about in my career and have always is the concept of transparency. One of my favorite lines is “Transparency of information breeds self-correcting behavior.”
It self-synchronizes an organization. If everybody is aware of the goals and what you’re trying to do, you’re not trying to have to explain why something needs to be done. People usually are self-motivated to do the right thing.
Another thing that I have always encouraged in my subordinates is — I’ve stolen the line and it’s used in a number of places in leadership and government — “the ability to speak truth to power.”
I demand that in people who work for me. I felt that I could always walk into somebody’s office and tell them the truth when they needed to hear it.
That’s probably a subset of transparency. It’s being able to get things on the table that need to be aired.
