We revere the skills of prominent CEOs, perhaps more than we should. We romanticize Steve
Jobs types, who scream at their underlings until they squeeze sheer perfection out of them
. We lionize Jack Welch, who earned the nickname Neutron Jack for his ability to get rid o
f employees while leaving only the corporate offices standing. But theres an underapprecia
ted form of leadership that requires far more skill than being a CEO does. Its the job of
a university president. Ive worked for years alongside some tremendous university presiden
ts, like C. L. Max Nikias and Steven Sample at USC; and having seen how they can move the
needle at such vast and complex enterprises, Im quite convinced that leaders in other sect
ors have much they can learn from good higher education governance. Consider that Robert S
ternberg announced his resignation as president of the University of Wyoming yesterday, af
ter four short months in office. After quickly shaking up the campus, he was quickly shake
n out of the campus. Entrepreneurs and CEOs talk about being disruptive innovators. Sternb
erg proudly put on the mantle of disruptive innovator at Wyoming, and lost his job as a re
sult. Frankly, he sounds like he wouldve done well at many companies. But being a universi
ty president requires vision and enviable amounts of tact, shrewdness and patience. Herman
Wells, the former president of Indiana University, once observed that the ideal universit
y president would combine the physical charm of a Greek athlete, the cunning of Machiavell
i, the wisdom of Solomon, the courage of a lion, the skin of a rhino ... and the stomach o
f a goat. Corporate CEOs lead through control Being an effective corporate CEO isnt that h
ard, really: Your biggest concern is ticking off your board; otherwise, you get to order u
nderlings around and fire the ones you dont like. What you say goes. University presidents
lead through cooperation Being an effective university president involves much more diplo
macy and persuasion and vision selling. Yes, you are beholden to a board. But you have to
lead through collaboration and cajoling, not control. The most powerful group within a uni
versity is its tenured faculty. If they refuse to listen to you, you cant fire them. Thats
the whole idea behind academic freedom. But it makes moving in a new direction fraught wi
th peril. As one college president told me, You dont say, Professor Smith, I need you to m
ake this change. Instead, you say, Professor Smith, I have a great idea Id like to run pas
t you. I really need your input in order to make this work, and I wonder if you have any t
houghts about how to improve my idea and how to implement it? Can you imagine Steve Jobs s
aying that? Brilliant as he was, hed last eight nano seconds as the president of Stanford,
MIT, Berkeley, USC, UCLA, Caltech or the other 50 to 100 research giants that fuel Americ
as economic and cultural preeminence. Eisenhower was one of Americas greatest leaders. But
he had a very unremarkable ru n as president of Columbia University. Its because he didnt
know how to navigate the hyper intricate human maze that is a major university. The unive
rsity presidents job is fantastically complex. Traditional companies open and shutter, and
a founding CEO who fails can shrug it off and go on to start something new. But universit
ies are expected to maintain high quality for centuries (consider how Oxford has kept chur
ning for 8 centuries), while theyre also supposed to adapt to new developments (like onlin
e technology, globalization and so on). Give credit where credit is due: Apples a nice lit
tle enterprise, but Stanford will be thriving in 200 years, while Apple will be a historic
al footnote. Not only does the university president need to cajole a bunch of people he ca
nt fire, he needs to convince others on the outside to contribute billions of dollars to f
und his or her vision. That takes some special skill. Warren B