Dwight Eisenhower: Lessons on Character and Getting Great Egos to Work Together

Selflessness. Duty. Integrity. Honesty. Gen. Dwight Eisenhower, supreme commander of the allied forces in World War II, leaned into all those character traits — and more — enroute to defeating Nazi Germany. He also listened well and cared more about his mission than his image, as we discuss this week in the third episode of our series within the show, MORE STORIES FROM THE BOOK CRUCIBLE LEADERSHIP. And he did it all while having to manage relationships with military men and political leaders who possessed big egos to match their prodigious professional skills.

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Transcript

Warwick Fairfax:
Welcome to Beyond the Crucible. I'm Warwick Fairfax, the founder of Beyond the Crucible. What's interesting about Eisenhower is selflessness and duty were hallmarks of his character as were integrity and honesty. When subordinates or superiors described Eisenhower, one word stood out, trust. Eisenhower exuded sincerity.

Gary Schneeberger:
Selflessness, duty, integrity, honesty. General Dwight Eisenhower, supreme commander of the Allied Forces in World War II, leaned into all those character traits and more en route to defeating Nazi Germany. He also listened well and cared more about his mission than his image, we discussed this week in the third episode of our series within the show, More Stories from the Book, Crucible Leadership. And he did it while having to manage relationships with military men and political leaders who possessed big egos to match their prodigious professional skills.
Welcome, friends, to this episode of Beyond the Crucible. You have tuned in to another episode in what we call our series within the show. And that series within the show is based on Warwick's book, Crucible Leadership, which came out in 2022. And the series within the show is called More Stories from the Book, Crucible Leadership. Very creative on our part, Warwick, because we did a previous series called Stories from the Book, Crucible Leadership, and this year, we're calling it More Stores from the Book, Crucible Leadership. So, that's a pretty creative way to talk about.
No, seriously, folks, there's just so many good stories in the book, that we wanted to revisit some more of them. And here's something else we're doing here that's different about this series within the show. And that is some of the stories that we talk about will be stories that you'll find in Warwick's book, Crucible Leadership. And some of the stories are those that just because of reasons that there were so many good stories in the original manuscript that some of them had to be ended up on the cutting room floor.
That happens to be the story that we're talking about this week. And that story this week is Eisenhower, that would be Dwight Eisenhower, on character and getting great egos to work together. So, this is the third episode that we've done, Warwick, of 10 of these that we're going to do this year. It's going to go the whole year, but we have a summer series that we do that will put it on hiatus for a bit. But I'm intrigued. Of all the people that you have picked, and I know the kinds of historical figures you gravitate towards, I can tell that you feel a great respect for our subject this week, Dwight Eisenhower. Talk a little bit about why Eisenhower, why he wanted him in your book. And it probably broke your heart a little bit that he didn't make it in your book, right?

Warwick Fairfax:
It's always sad when you talk with editors and you just can't have a chapter that goes, I don't know, 50 pages or whatever. You've got to cut something. So, it made sense, but yeah, this was a tough one to cut. In the original manuscript, I talk to you about Eisenhower in the chapter I had on listening. And so, I introduced that chapter by saying that to form your vision and to make it become reality, not only do you have to listen, you've got to listen well. And unfortunately, many leaders don't listen well. In fact, I'd almost say most of them don't. And typically, leaders, they want to act, they want to act now, and they don't always care about what their team thinks, because after all, they feel like they're the fount of all wisdom. What does my team know? They're lesser people. I am the sun. They are the lesser planets and moons that circle around me. And they're a necessary evil, but really, it's all about me and my brilliance.
And so, that's common, unfortunately, for leaders to think that. And so, what happens is they tend not to listen because of their egos, but also because of their lack of curiosity about the team or indeed about what's going on in the world around them. And such leaders often lacked empathy. So, if you had to summarize, why do leaders typically not listen? It's typically because they don't want to, and they don't want to because they don't really care. They really don't care about the people that work around them, and that's normal. And so, what's not normal is Dwight Eisenhower. He was not like many leaders. He genuinely cared about what his team thought. He did not have a big ego. It was all about the success of the mission. It was not about him.
Eisenhower is an example of a leader who listened well amidst very challenging circumstances. So, just a bit of the backstory about Dwight Eisenhower. He was born in 1890 and grew up in Kansas. He was a graduate of West Point and was the captain in the Army during World War I. Now, one of the pivotal moments in his career that I think changed the arc of his life was in the 1920s when he served in Panama under General Fox Conner. And General Conner became a mentor for him and a huge influence. So, one example of this is that he did okay at West Point, but he really didn't do great. He wasn't like the top student. But then, after this period in Panama with General Conner, he got orders to attend the highly-competitive command of General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth.
Now, at this point, he applied himself, and he did fantastically well. So, something about Conner, which was interesting, changed the arc of his career. And so, huge moment in his life. So, when war broke out in December 1941, Army Chief of Staff George C. Marshall, appointed then Brigadier General Eisenhower to the Army's War Plans Division in Washington. Eisenhower was promoted rapidly after that. In March 1942, he became Major General. In June 1942, he was selected over 366 senior officers to be commander of U.S. troops in Europe. By July 1942, Eisenhower was promoted to Lieutenant General in charge of the allied invasion of North Africa. And in December 1943, Eisenhower became the Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force that would conduct the Normandy invasion. So, he rose rapidly. And in the book, and what we're going to talk about in the podcast really focused on Eisenhower's war years, and in particular, the D-Day invasion. Later on, Eisenhower become President of the United States from 1953 to 1961.

Gary Schneeberger:
And it's interesting that he would become president because he was the first president, and for a very long time, the only president, to ever rise to the presidency without having held elective office. And I think as we talk through his character here, as we talk through all of the things that made him a good leader, I think you'll see why folks, why that did indeed happen, why the country trusted him to lead the nation as president back at the end of the '50s into the '60s. Another thing to mention is that you may notice, folks, I'm wearing a U.S. pin here because we are going to talk mostly about Eisenhower's military career and how that can inform your own journey beyond your crucible and into a life of significance. But this pin was my father's who served in the military during World War II, and I inherited that. And I just thought I was going to gussy up for this episode in the only military finery I have, just so it's on point with what we're talking about.
So, as we talk about his leadership qualities work, interesting for this series within the show, you came up with two that you wanted to talk about, about Eisenhower. There were two aspects of his leadership. The first one of those was his character. That's a big topic, character. How did that help him lead? Because you've got some great insights on exactly how that helped him lead.

Warwick Fairfax:
Yeah. One of the keys to Eisenhower's greatness was his character. In fact, when we talk about great leaders in history, some of my favorite leaders are leaders of character. We've talked before in the book and on this podcast about Abraham Lincoln, who was president during the U.S. Civil War in the 1860s. And it was said by historians, and there's a great book, Team of Rivals, written by Doris Kearns Goodwin, when she talks about how Lincoln was able to get on with other powerful leaders with great egos in his cabinet. Basically, they were the people who thought that the wrong man had won the Republican nomination in 1860. And he won them over by the greatness of his character. The fact that they had no respect for him as this country bumpkin from the then wilds of Illinois, which was considered the West back then, it didn't really worry him.
And so, Eisenhower, in one sense, in a similar fashion, his character was really one of the keys to his greatness. And you can see one example of this is when in 1942, Eisenhower was working for Army Chief of Staff Marshall in Washington. And Marshall told Eisenhower that despite others recommending Eisenhower for higher field commands, that Eisenhower was going to be stay put in his current staff position. Basically, many generals would have liked to be on the field, on the thick of battle and setting strategy for key theaters of the battle, whether in Europe or in the Pacific. But to say that you're going to be stuck in Washington behind a desk, most generals would be like, "Get me out of here. Get me on the field." And so, Marshall said that, "This may be difficult to hear." And his response was remarkable. It really just showed that for Eisenhower, the cause and the mission mattered above all. It wasn't about him.
So, Eisenhower impulsively and definitely passionately said this in response to his boss, Army Chief of Staff Marshall, he said to Marshall, "General, I'm interested in what you say, but I want you to know that I don't give a damn about your promotion plans as far as I'm concerned. I came to this office from the field, and I try to do my duty. I expect to do so as long as you want me here. If that locks me to a desk for the rest of the war, so be it." He was indignant. I'm here to serve my country. If that means behind a desk, that's where I'm going to be. It's all about the war effort. It's all about the cause. It has nothing to do with my ego. He was just indignant that Marshall would kind of dare to say, "This might be difficult for you to hear." It's like, "What do you mean difficult? It's about duty. It's about my country. It's not about what I want."

Gary Schneeberger:
Me. It's not about me.

Warwick Fairfax:
Exactly. And for most leaders, most generals, admirals, there's a little bit of the me in there. The fact that Eisenhower was concerned about doing his duty and not promotions must have impressed Marshall. In fact, sometimes when somebody under you says, "Look, I don't really care about promotions. I just want to do my job or my duty," it makes you think, huh, maybe I should promote a person like that who doesn't have ego.

Gary Schneeberger:
Exactly. Exactly.

Warwick Fairfax:
That's not your intention, but it could be the result, and that was the result here. So, later on, Eisenhower drafted a paper for Marshall on the requirements of a commander of U.S. forces in Europe. And so, Marshall told Eisenhower on receiving the paper that he, Eisenhower, was going to be the man to execute the plan. And that's not at all what Eisenhower was trying to do. He was just trying to draft what are the key qualities that such a commander needs. Ironically, when Eisenhower outlined the qualities for this job, it turns out Eisenhower had exactly those qualities. This paper said that the commander of U.S. forces in Europe would need to have the full confidence of Army Chief of Staff Marshall. Well, check that one. He'd worked for Marshall for a while, and Marshall had utmost confidence in Eisenhower. He must be in full agreement with Marshall's ideas. Well, Marshall probably had a pretty good idea if that was true. This commander would need to be able to play several different roles and would need to be patient in dealing with other allies.
How? How can you be patient? If you don't have an ego, and it's all about the mission. So, check, check, check, I'm sure when it came to Marshall looking at Eisenhower. And so, what's interesting about Eisenhower is selflessness and duty were hallmarks of his character as were integrity and honesty. When subordinates or superiors described Eisenhower, one word stood out, trust. Eisenhower exuded sincerity. There's an interesting quote from British Admiral Andrew Cunningham. Cunningham said of Eisenhower, "I liked him at once. He struck me as completely sincere, straightforward, and very modest." Montgomery, who we'll talk about later, British General Bernard Montgomery, he said of Eisenhower that, "His real strength lies in his human qualities. He has the power of drawing the hearts of men towards him as a magnet attracts the bits of metal. He merely has to smile at you, and you trust him at once. He is a very incarnation of sincerity." Think about this comment as we talk more about some of the key people around Eisenhower.

Gary Schneeberger:
And that, interestingly enough, is a perfect segue into what we're going to talk about next because all of the characteristics that you talked about, about Eisenhower and what other people thought about Eisenhower inform the next leadership trait that Eisenhower had that you want to talk about here. And that is this. You singled out the fact that he was skillful in managing men with large egos. Pretty much everybody we're about to talk to from this point or about to talk about from this point on had some slice, or two, or three, or four, or a battalion of large ego in them. There was a lot of that that Eisenhower had to deal with. So, how was he able to wrangle all of the very powerful men who had perhaps, not perhaps, had a different disposition than him as well?

Warwick Fairfax:
Yeah. When you think about leaders dealing with people with large egos, Dwight Eisenhower dealt with the Mount Olympus, the goat, if you would say, the greatest of all time of egos. It wasn't just he was dealing with large egos. His mission was to lead the allied invasion of Europe to free Europe from the Nazis. This wasn't a small mission. So, the mission was of utmost importance when you think of human history. This is one of the larger missions is to free Europe from tyranny, from the Nazis who killed millions of Jewish people and subjugated millions. It was a huge deal.
And so, think of Dwight Eisenhower in those days and months leading up to the allied invasion of D-Day, which was June 6th, 1944, and the kind of people Eisenhower had to deal with. So, above him, he had President Franklin Roosevelt of the United States. He had Prime Minister Winston Churchill of the Great Britain, two powerful leaders with big egos, and definitely many, many pages have been written about both men, Roosevelt and Church. They were giants in history, certainly in the 20th century. Then, he also had to deal with General Charles de Gaulle, who was the leader of the free French, and would later on become the president of France and had a massive influence in the modern French history. So, these three people in their respective countries of the United States, Britain, and France, had enormous influence in their countries, giants of their respective countries. And then, below him, it didn't get any better in that sense.

Gary Schneeberger:
No.

Warwick Fairfax:
It's like, wait, there's more. So, he had to deal with British General Bernard Montgomery and American General George Patton, two commanders with very large egos, but they were also military geniuses. I don't get into this in this part of that manuscript, but we think of General Patton in the Battle of the Bulge when the American and Allied forces were trapped in the Ardennes, which I think is maybe somewhere near Belgium. It was like in 1944, I believe. And the allies were almost surrounded in sort of a bulge. And nobody knew, well, how can we get reinforcements in time? And so, Patton said, "I got it. I can do this." And he marched his third army across large areas of land at incredible speed with a very cold weather, and it was incredible. When we think of General Montgomery, he is the hero of the battle of El Alamein in North Africa, and he was up against no lesser German general than Erwin Rommel, the Desert Fox.
So, it's almost like in Civil War terms, General Grout being the leader of the Union Army against the leader of the Confederate forces, Robert E. Lee. Robert E. Lee was a tactical genius. Or Wellington against Napoleon in the Napoleonic Wars. For Montgomery to be up against Rommel and beat him or he beat his army in El Alamein was no small feat. So, both of these generals, Montgomery and Patton may have had large egos, but they were some of the greater generals in military history. So, large egos, but they were incredibly good at what they did. So, just think about that.

Gary Schneeberger:
Sorry. It makes me think that Doris Kearns Goodwin should write a book called Team of Egos. Team of Rivals.

Warwick Fairfax:
Exactly.

Gary Schneeberger:
About what Eisenhower had to deal with because the only bullet he seemed to dodge was that he was in charge of the European theater and MacArthur, who had an enormous ego, was in charge of the Pacific Theater, and they didn't have to really work together much. That was all the presidents having to deal with it. So, it's remarkable to me just what you're going to go on and talk about what Eisenhower was able to accomplish with the kind of people he had to lead. And then, stay tuned, folks, because you'll see what these people thought of Eisenhower as their work with him and underneath him went on. So, continue.

Warwick Fairfax:
Very well said. He had team of egos. I think that would be a great, great book. Eisenhower had to conduct the Normandy invasion successfully and free Europe from Nazi control all while keeping his powerful leaders in check and pulling in the same direction. And this was a massive challenge. Some would say it was as big, if not bigger than the Normandy invasion itself. If you don't keep all these people on board, people above him and people below him, things were not going to go well. And so, this task would require a lot of patience, persuasion, and above all, listening.
So, time and again, Eisenhower's commanders would come to him with their plans and ideas, be it Montgomery, Patton or U.S. General Omar Bradley, who was over Patton. And their plans would often conflict with Montgomery combining British-led forces and Bradley's U.S.-led forces. So, they'd often want to head in different directions and he'd have to referee. And then, you'd have complications by people above him. You'd have British Chief of Staff Alan Brooke and U.S. Chief of Staff George Marshall, not to mention Churchill or I would assume Roosevelt who might want to know, hey, what's going on, Eisenhower?

Gary Schneeberger:
Yeah, just maybe a little bit.

Warwick Fairfax:
Are you sure you want to do this? For Churchill, it's like this is freeing them from the threat of the Nazis over the other side of the English Channel, and for Roosevelt, obviously, a huge deal. So, this was not easy to keep these folks in check and just referee. One of the things I think it's worth mentioning is there's some great movies that really talk about some of the characters that we're chatting about in this episode. You've got the 1970 film Patton with George C. Scott, and you have Karl Malden, the great character act who also started I think a show in the '70s, the Streets of San Francisco that I watched growing up.

Gary Schneeberger:
Good pull. That's good. Yep.

Warwick Fairfax:
Which was fun. And I think it starred a young Michael Douglas as his kind of number two.

Gary Schneeberger:
It did. Ding, ding, ding. Trivia win.

Warwick Fairfax:
Anyway, Karl Malden starred as Omar Bradley, who was Patton's boss in a pretty tough challenge. And then, for the D-Day, The Longest Day came out in 1962, and you've got people like every famous actor of the day was in this. John Wayne, Henry Fonda, Robert Mitchum. I was just looking this up before we started, and there's some obscure person called Henry Grace that was a set director, and he was tagged to be Eisenhower because he looked a lot like Eisenhower. Was he an actor? Nobody looked like him. So, hey, you over there. I know you're setting the sets, but we think you'd be a wonderful person to play Eisenhower.

Gary Schneeberger:
There's an interesting point in what you just described. Based on what we've been talking about, about Eisenhower's character and the way he conducted himself, his sincerity and his humility, right? Patton gets a movie named after him starring at the time, one of the most in-demand actors, George C. Scott, who won an Oscar for that role. You just mentioned the other movie on D-Day, which all these Hollywood stars were in, and the set designer played Eisenhower, right? Doesn't what you've just described speak to his character and his humility, that he doesn't have a movie called Ike that's out there somewhere that is bombastic and won Oscars, right?

Warwick Fairfax:
Yeah, it's so true. I'm sure you remember at the beginning of Patton, they had some scene with a giant U.S. flag and Patton is walking up these stairs and it's like all hail Caesar, right?

Gary Schneeberger:
Right. Yeah.

Warwick Fairfax:
All hail. Let's bow down and admire Patton. Patton had a massive ego, but the reason that Bradley and Eisenhower kept him on, despite his ego and he made some mistakes, was he was just a brilliant general. And if you're trying to win the war against the Nazis, you want people that can do the job that are brilliant. And so, you maybe put up with their egos, and that was the genius of Eisenhower. So, leading up to D-Day, June 6th, 1944, Eisenhower's challenges were daunting. And just to give you an idea of the logistics, and one of the things that's said of Eisenhower is he was brilliant at logistics. That was certainly something the stories look at him and military experts. And he really had to be on his game when it came to that because to launch D-Day, the D-Day invasion of Normandy, he had a force of over 170,000 troops, 20,000 vehicles, 4,124 landing ships and craft, and 1,203 warships.

And during the first few months of 1944, the South of England was transformed into a giant military base with over three million soldiers, sailors, and airmen. That's a lot of people. And so, here we are on the evening of June 4th, 1944, two days before D-Day, and Eisenhower gathered his key staff members to discuss D-Day. And that's obviously one of the scenes in the movie, The Longest Day. And so, they had to make a decision, should they proceed with D-Day on June 6. One of the challenges was there was adverse weather. And so, you've got to have at least some degree of decent weather to launch this invasion.

And so, he was going around the table asking for people's opinions. And the weather guy said, "Well, there's a narrow window on June 6, and if we don't make June 6, just because of the weather and the tides and all of that, we might have to wait for weeks after." And then, having to wait for weeks was going to be tough because you have a whole bunch of people who were waiting and ready to go. So, this was not going to be easy. So, he went around the table and asked people what do they think, go or no go? It was a simple, in that sense, binary decision, complicated decision, but it was one or the other. And so, they went round, and people like Montgomery and others all said, "Yep, let's go. Let's do it." And so, this was not easy at all. It was a tough decision, but Eisenhower realized we've got a narrow window on June 6, and if we just keep waiting, then there's going to be a chance that word might get out. There's going to be a security risk, maybe a significant security risk.
Massive amount of forces. The Germans had spies everywhere. Waiting weeks, because at the time, the Germans thought that the allies were going to attack Calais, not Normandy. So, that's where they had most of their defenses. So, this was somewhat of a master stroke in keeping this all under wraps. And in fact, one of the things they did, which was really brilliant to fool the Germans, is they had this shadow army in the South of England that supposedly were getting ready to invade Calais. And who was going to lead the shadow force, it was going to be General Patton. And so, the Germans thought, well, of course they're going to have their best general leading this, right? Naturally. They're not thinking about ego and some of the challenges that Patton presented. And so, there was Patton riding around in his Jeep with this fake army. I think they had like fake tanks, and it looked real from above, but it was probably wood, cardboard, whatever. And they're pretty good at making fakes that from the air, looked very real.
So, the allies and Eisenhower were going to great lengths to keep this all under wraps, but that can only go so long. So, with all of this in mind, Eisenhower listened, he weighed the evidence, he decided, and took responsibility. He said, "We're going to go. It's going to be June 6." Just to give you an idea of how much Eisenhower took responsibility, Eisenhower drafted two press releases. One, obviously, was the invasion was a success, but there was a second press release. And in that press release, that was to be released if the Normandy invasion failed. At the end of that press release, Eisenhower says this, "If any blame or fault attached to the attempt, it is mine and mine alone." So, Eisenhower may have listened well and taken input, but he always took responsibility. He was not going to blame anybody else.
Now, how many leaders, if things go wrong, don't say, "Well, it wasn't my fault." My gosh, I've got to deal with Patton and Montgomery, and I'm being second guessed by Churchill and Roosevelt. And even if he didn't say it then, maybe he'd write it in his war papers or in his book afterwards saying, "Hey, wasn't my fault. My hands were tied." The weather was bad, et cetera, et cetera, but not Eisenhower. If this mission failed, he would take full responsibility.

Gary Schneeberger:
And there's something in it, Warwick, there's something in it that he wrote the press release himself. As a PR guy myself, I've written a lot of stuff, good and bad for the people I work for. I get it's a different time, but that speaks to me about his integrity as well, that he sat down and put his own thoughts into that press release. He didn't farm it out to somebody else, to a flack in the army to create this. He went so far as to stand behind the words he created. That, to me, is Mount Olympus level, as you say many times, of taking responsibility for something, right?

Warwick Fairfax:
That's so well-said. And just think about that discussion. Here, you have his public relations representative, could well be somebody in the military because they had PR people in the military. And he might have said, "Well, General, I hear what you're saying and that's admirable, but are you sure you want to say that? Because it's not really just your fault." You might have pushed back a bit saying, "I admire this, but the reality, is it's the weather. You've got a lot of moving paths. You've got the British, and the French, and the Americans. Are you sure you really want to go all the way out there?" I may be wrong, but you would've thought if you were in that position, [inaudible 00:31:20] general, "I admire this, but you sure you want to say that?" Who knows? But you would've thought they might push back slightly because you're trying to protect your client in a sense.

Gary Schneeberger:
Right, for sure.

Warwick Fairfax:
And so, maybe that what happened or maybe the person knew Eisenhower so well is like, "If I do that, I'll get my head handed to me." So, maybe not. Because they'll say, "What are you talking about?" But yes, it would've been interesting to be a fly on the wall in that discussion between the-

Gary Schneeberger:
For sure.

Warwick Fairfax:
... rep and him. One of the keys to Eisenhower's success at D-Day, as well as in World War II was his capacity to manage leaders above him and below him who had large egos. So, let's take British General Montgomery. That is a real case in point because he absolutely made them feel heard. And at one point, Montgomery said to his superior, British Chief of Staff Alan Brooke, that he thought that Eisenhower had no strategic vision and was incapable of making a plan or running operations when it started. Now, this was something Brooke had said to Montgomery before, and Montgomery agreed.
And in a light of history, I think military experts and writers would say that there is some point about what Montgomery and Brooke were talking about. Eisenhower's genius was in managing large egos, and managing logistics, and getting complex operations to happen. But was he a military commander with the skill of a Montgomery or Patton? I think historians would say, "No, that wasn't his genius." As we say often at Beyond the Crucible, you want a team of fellow travelers that have skills and gifts that you don't have. Well, obviously, Montgomery and Patton were some of the greatest military tacticians and geniuses of all time. So, yes, it would be a tall order for Eisenhower to have that level of genius in that realm, but that wasn't his role. He wasn't an on-field commander. So, I think there was some truth in what Montgomery and Brooke were saying to each other.
Now, contrast this with what Montgomery said later. In 1945, he wrote a letter to Eisenhower after the Germans had surrendered. So, at this point, this is what Montgomery said to Eisenhower, really in a moment of transparency, and honesty, and self-awareness, really. He said this, "Dear Ike." As I'm sure folks know, Eisenhower's nickname was Ike. "Dear Ike, I suppose we shall soon begin to run our own affairs." Before the Allied Expeditionary Force split up, he wanted to say, "What a privilege and an honor it has been to serve under you. I owe much to your wise guidance and kindly forbearance."
Now, Montgomery said that he knew his own faults very well, and he said, "And I do not suppose I'm an easy subordinate. I like to go my own way, but you have kept me on the rails in difficult and stormy times and have taught me much." Montgomery thanked Eisenhower for all he had done for him and signed off, "Your very devoted friend, Marty." Montgomery's nickname was Marty. And that's really the understatement of the century, right? I do not suppose I'm an easy subordinate.

Gary Schneeberger:
Yes. That's the Australian way of saying it, right?

Warwick Fairfax:
Yeah. It's well worth watching those two movies. You mentioned Patton and The Longest Day. In Patton, as I recall, there's a scene when the Allied forces invade Sicily, which is a large island off of Italy, from North Africa. And Montgomery made it clear that he wanted to be the one to liberate the capital of Sicily Palermo. At least as I recall, Patton said, "Yeah, we're not doing that." And he entered Palermo first with the American forces before the British, which obviously would've ticked Montgomery off. But yeah, these are people with large egos and it's like, just because the other one wanted to go first, if I can go first and take X town or region, I will. And if Montgomery doesn't like it, oh, well, who cares? That's sort of Patton's attitude. I'm sure it would've been vice versa.

Gary Schneeberger:
For sure.

Warwick Fairfax:
I thought they didn't respect each other, but again, large egos. You don't just sit around and wait for the other person and say, "Oh, excuse me, after you." No, that wasn't the credo of Montgomery or Patton.

Gary Schneeberger:
Yeah. We're about to pivot to pulling back out of World War II and going into the World War you, the things that people are going through now, right? They're crucibles and how you apply these lessons. I'm going to give you an on-ramp to that conversation because we just talked about how Eisenhower heard people, right? He heard them. But my perspective in leadership has always been, I hear, I will hear everybody who has things to say that I can take into account before I make a decision, but there's a difference between being heard and being heeded, being followed, right? The buck has to stop somewhere. Let's go to Truman. The buck has to stop somewhere, and it surely did with Eisenhower. So, as you talk about... These two traits that we've been talking about here for Eisenhower, how do they play out for average everyday folks who are listening and watching this podcast today? How can they take some of the stuff that we've been talking about and apply it to their own lives?

Warwick Fairfax:
Yeah. What you're saying is really such a good point about being heard, not necessarily heeded. There's no question when you think of Eisenhower on June 4th, 1944, two days before D-Day, he's getting all these reports about the weather, it's looking iffy, there's a narrow window. I think many were probably thinking, let's do it. There might have been some that weren't sure, but ultimately, he was going to make the decision. And in his mind, the logical decision was to go. There's a narrow window for weather. You can't keep a secret for weeks. If you don't go on June 6 because of the tides and various other reasons, it could be weeks. So, he was hearing people, he was listening to them, but at the end of the day, he knew the right decision was go on June 6th. That was a logical, right decision.

And even if Montgomery and Patton were unsure, I don't know it would have influenced his decision. Would it have dissuaded him? He might have said, "Look, I hear what you're saying." Obviously, Montgomery and Patton, now, let's wait around and twiddle our thumbs. So, you could bank on what they were going to say. But even if they were a little wary, which they wouldn't be, he would still do the right thing. He would certainly hear them, but he would make his own decision and take responsibility.

So, when we think about just these traits we've been talking about, which is his ability to deal with large egos and his character, his ability to listen, often, our vision will come out of the ashes of our crucible. And to form this vision for it to become reality, we say all the time that we need a team of fellow travelers. Some will encourage us, but some will be our fellow team members, and we need to make sure those team of fellow travelers have skills and abilities that we don't have because nobody has all the gifts.

And so, it's absolutely critical when you gather your team is they have to be on the same page with the vision, and you've got to get them to work together and to trust and respect you. And that's not easy. They may not necessarily have full confidence in you. As you've mentioned earlier, when Abraham Lincoln became president, his cabinet, they did not feel like the right man had become president. They thought he was this uneducated person from the wild of Illinois. And so, we had to win them over. So, their confidence in him as a leader, probably not too high, might be wait and see. And how could this guy with this lack of education, he's going to lead us into the Civil War? How's that going to work out? They probably had questions.

So, for all of us, whether we're leading a nonprofit, a small company, large company, it could be a neighborhood, homeowners association, could be all sorts of things. We've got to build trust amongst the folks on our team, and we've got to build a sense of respect. Well, how do you do that? Well, you've got to listen to folks, but you've also got to have them realize that you have integrity. You will shoot straight with them. You won't sugarcoat it. That builds respect when they feel they can trust you. And when you have people on your team who have greater abilities than you do in certain areas, that's like, oh, this person wants to get the job done, wants to get the mission done. Even if maybe we know more than in this case, he does, that will breed trust because this person is about the mission, not about ego. Maybe I want to work with somebody like that.
So, you've got to be the person that people want to work with. You want to be the person the people are attracted to being around. And Eisenhower was that kind of person. Lincoln was that person. So, when you think of Eisenhower, his challenge couldn't be greater. With powerful leads above him, Roosevelt, Churchill, and de Gaulle, powerfully below him, Patton and Montgomery. We may not have to deal with leaders with these kind of egos, but we might find it's somewhere on the spectrum. So, let's say we have a vision that we're off-the-charts passionate about, and we've assembled a team who are also off the chats passionate about it because don't we want people on our team that really love the vision?

Gary Schneeberger:
Absolutely. Yeah.

Warwick Fairfax:
Why would you pick people of like, "Eh, it's a paycheck, whatever. Can I come in at 10:00 and clock out at 3:00 because it's all about the paycheck. I could care less about what I'm doing." No, you want people off the chart's passionate. Well, there's a problem with having people who are off-the-charts passionate. They might be disagreement. Maybe they agree on the vision. Maybe they want to tweak the vision a bit, but they may certainly have disagreement about how to implement the vision. And because they're so passionate about it, they might get even into heated debate.
Well, that might happen and strong egos might dig their heels in. And that's where we can learn so much from Eisenhower. He was all about the mission and not about his own ego. He had outstanding character, honesty, and integrity, and he listened well. So, think of yourself being like an Eisenhower in this sense. You're having a heated argument about your nonprofit and people are vehemently disagreeing about the approach, and you've got to show them that you listen to them, that they're heard.
At the end of the day, you got to say, "Look, I hear what you're saying, John, Mary, Frank, great points." And you might, as they say in executive coaching, which I am, you mirror back. "Well, Mary, I heard you say A, B and C. Frank, I heard you say this. John, I heard you say this." Okay. You've just proven you've heard them, right? One of the key aspects of listening is a mirroring. "I hear what you're saying, but here's the direction we're going to go." It might be in the direction of one of those three I just mentioned. It might be a combination or it might be something that neither of those three people mentioned. That's not so much the issue. As long as they felt heard and you're taking responsibility and things don't go well, you don't say, "Oh, it was your fault." Even if there's collective agreement and you don't say, "Well, it's your guy's fault. If I hadn't agreed with you, then maybe things would have gone better."
No. You say, "No. It was my decision. I might have acted on your input, but at the end of the day, the buck stops with me," as you said, to quote Truman, "And it's my fault." That's what great leaders do. And you can be a great leader of an organization of any size. It doesn't have to be the supreme Allied commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force. It could be, again, your a local nonprofit, local business you start. You've got to be able to listen well and you've got to say to yourself, "It's not about ego. It's about getting a team of incredible fellow travelers and just being honest, transparent, and listening well, and just getting the job done and taking responsibility." So, there's a lot we can learn from Eisenhower.

Gary Schneeberger:
Feels like we've gone through sort of a military campaign here just in terms of the details that we've covered. And we've reached the end of our conversation, but I want to get your thoughts on what are the big takeaways that listeners and viewers can have from the man who oversaw D-Day and how can they apply it, our listeners and viewers apply it to their VR day, which is make their vision a reality day? How can what Eisenhower teaches us help us make our vision a reality?

Warwick Fairfax:
Yeah. Dwight Eisenhower was all about the mission. It was not about ego or about promotions he might receive. You think about that conversation with Chief of Staff Marshall in Washington DC in which Marshall says, "Eisenhower, look, I need you here in Washington. I need you here on my staff. I'm not planning on giving you a field promotion. Know this is going to be tough." And Eisenhower was indignant. "Basically, What do you mean? I'm all about the mission. If I'm here throughout the war, so be it. It's all about the cause." He just was indignant that this was a conversation that Marshall would even have with him. The fact that he was so indignant just shows that... It's almost like he was wondering if his character was being questioned, which is clearly not Marshall's intent. He was trying to be empathetic with General Eisenhower, and pretty much every general wants to be in the thick of battle and not just stuck behind a desk in Washington.
But that shows you his character. He was a man of immense character, integrity, and he listened well to leaders with powerful egos. To deal with Roosevelt, de Gaulle, Churchill, Patton, Montgomery, to use that phrase I used before, that is the Mount Olympus of egos. No egos in history had greater egos in that collective bunch. And yet, he was able to work with them and have D-Day be successful and ultimately lead to the liberation of Europe from the Nazis. So, I think what we can learn from this is for us to bring our vision to reality, we need to be people of high character and integrity whose focus is purely on the vision and not how much credit we're going to get or even what our role is in the vision.
I think of Stephanie Woolard. She is an Australian who led a nonprofit in Nepal. I think it was called Seven Women and really to empower women there who often face very challenging circumstances. And there was a moment when she felt that she needed to hand off the leadership of that organization to other people. And I remember asking, "Was that hard to hand off something you founded?" "No." She's a person of great faith, but she said, "No, it was the right thing to do. It's about the mission. And I felt like it was time to step back." Now, that takes a very special leader to step back from something you founded. Well, Stephanie Woolard was showing it's all about the mission. And in that sense, she has a common character trait with Eisenhower. It's all about the mission. So, we can learn a lot from that, from his character, integrity, from wanting the best people around us.
Sometimes you want people that we get on with, not people we'll have a drink with or have a coffee with. You don't have to want to have your team over for dinner every night. You don't even have to gel with them. Maybe you have nothing in common. They're interested in the arts, you're interested in sports or vice versa or whatever. They like building things. You like reading philosophy books. I don't know. Pick the differences, but they might have nothing in common with you, but can they get the job done? They might have big egos. That's a factor, but can they get the job done? You have to decide, can I manage these egos? Okay. They're different than me. They have a big ego, but they're really, really good at what they do. This vision is so important. You make a decision. Can you manage them? And if you feel at the end of the day, yep, I can manage the egos. They've got brilliant skills and abilities I don't have. Then, you go with it.
And again, ultimately you make the decision, you make the call as a leader, and you don't pass the buck. So, we can learn so much from Eisenhower. Again, not all of us will lead the Allied Expeditionary Force to free Europe. I realize that. Not all of us will lead countries. Most of us will not be at that level, but be it a small nonprofit, a local business, homeowners association. We can learn so much from his character, his integrity, his honesty, his taking responsibility, and his willingness to have people with skills and abilities that I'm sure he realized that these people, as in Patton and Montgomery, had a level of strategic and tactical genius that he didn't have.
I'm sure if you asked him, "Do you feel you have the on-field tactical skills Montgomery and Patton had?" I'm sure Eisenhower would say, "No, probably not even close, but that's okay. That's why I have them there." So, we can learn a lot from his integrity and his willingness to have people with massive egos and skills and abilities that he didn't have and make it work to get the job done. And there are so many lessons we can learn from Dwight Eisenhower.

Gary Schneeberger:
And now is the time to start learning them, folks, because that will wrap our third series within the show episode on More Stores from the Book, Crucible Leadership. We will turn the page next month to another story to help you turn the page and move beyond your crucible to a life of significance. We will see you next week.
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