Dr. Mark on Egomaniacs

Dear _____________:

(Fill in the blank with your own name if you have been magically granted a new level of self-awareness. Or fill in your boss’s name before you secretly slip this article into his or her mailbox because you are too afraid to confront him or her face to face.)

As I’ve worked with hundreds of underperforming and failing companies over the years, a common denominator that seems to cause the greatest destruction in business is the leader with a larger-than-life ego.

I’m talking about the leaders like Montgomery Burns, Homer Simpson’s boss on The Simpsons, who once said, “I’ll keep it short and sweet: Family, religion, friendship—these are the three demons you must slay if you wish to succeed in business.” Mr. Burns is similar to stereotypical take-charge, super-competitive personalities such as Lee Iacocca, Al Dunlap, and Jack Welch.

During the past century, the success of a CEO was primarily measured by his or her ability to generate wealth for the company’s investors. Therefore, someone with a ruthless, no-holds-barred personality was required, sought after, admired, and paid handsomely.

But the world is fundamentally changing. As we learned from the pre–Sarbanes Oxley years and most recently from the collapse of many financial institutions, Wall Street firms, and automakers, we can no longer afford to measure the success of a leader by last quarter’s numbers and yesterday’s stock price. We have to redefine success by valuing leadership characteristics such as humility, communication, transparency, personal values, and servant leadership in order to create businesses that are economically and socially sustainable for the long term.

Businesses cannot afford to be led by executives who are willing to put thousands of employees and millions of dollars at stake to fulfill the demands of their egos. We can no longer afford to hang on to outdated and bad ideas for fear of offending or making the person in the corner office angry. And we can no longer afford to take good companies through bankruptcy or liquidation just because the CEO wouldn’t listen when anyone alerted him or her to oncoming trouble.

It’s time for all business leaders to take a serious look at what makes them tick. If you look in your heart’s mirror and find that any of the following descriptions fit you, then you have a problem that will more than likely place your company and its employees, vendors, creditors, investors, and leaseholders in peril.

Moreover, if any of the following describes you, then you also are likely to lose everything you worked hard to build over the years, including your money and your reputation. So as you read this, be honest with yourself, and then realize that you can change your ways—and should start doing so immediately.