Steve Jobs’ – and Ted Kennedy’s – Most Extraordinary Management Lesson

High standards start with yourself.

When he was running Pixar, Steve Jobs removed two members of the Board of Directors because they never expressed views that differed from his own and always approved his proposals.

That approach could not be further from that of CEOs whose only goal is to surround themselves with a board they control, or, worse, one that simply does their bidding. Steve Jobs believed that the value of board members lay in their ability to make him better, not to flatter him.

He wanted to be challenged as much as he challenged his own teams. In doing so, he showed that his belief in high standards was genuine: He applied them to himself just as rigorously as he applied them to others. How many leaders and managers, by contrast, enjoy challenging their teams but refuse to be challenged in return? Worse still are entrepreneurs such as Sergey Brin and Larry Page, Evan Spiegel, or Mark Zuckerberg, who lock in their companies’ voting rights to make sure they cannot be seriously challenged.

The more authoritarian or charismatic a leader is, the more they should, like Steve Jobs, build counterweights around themselves. As psychology professor Irving Janis taught us through his theory of “groupthink,” cohesive groups – especially under pressure – can pursue unanimity at the expense of critical thinking. A board that blindly approves a CEO’s decisions therefore weakens the company, even as it believes it is giving that leader the means to fulfill their ambitions.

Another mistake Steve Jobs did not make was confusing professional disagreement with personal conflict. Research by management professor Karen Jehn shows that conflict can be beneficial, depending on its nature and context. Conflict over substance – over an issue – can be healthy. Conflict over style, ego, or personal dynamics is another matter entirely.

I have often written on Superception about one of the most important conditions for progress and innovation: Psychological safety. It can come from a form of goodwill in debate and toward risk-taking. Or, in Steve Jobs’ case, it can come from the certainty that high standards apply equally to everyone in an organization, regardless of their place in the hierarchy.

In the end, leadership teams that know how to challenge one another develop a fuller understanding of the choices before them, consider more options, and make better decisions. In this area, excellence does not mean the absence of disagreement. It means the ability to make disagreement productive.

Another iconic figure shared Steve Jobs’ approach. I have already quoted Ted Kennedy on Superception: “What good does it do to have a bunch of adivsers who just agree with you? I can agree with myself if that’s what I want.”

Both leaders made sure that dissent did not depend on the courage of a few individual colleagues. They institutionalized it by asking for it themselves. Their egos may have taken the occasional hit, but their stakeholders – shareholders or voters – were better served as a result.