Co-Leaders: The Power of Great Partnerships

by David A. Heenan, Warren Bennis

"Co-leadership...is a tough-minded strategy that will unleash the hidden talent in any enterprise. Above all, co-leadership is inclusive, not exclusive. It celebrates those who do the real work, not just a few charismatic often isolated leaders who are regally compensated for articulating the organization's vision." -David A. Heenan and Warren Bennis

Today's heads of big companies are as recognizable to us as the most popular entertainers or sports stars, but the heart and soul of every organization are those leaders below the CEO. Today's celebrity CEO has become either a figure head or an egomaniac, and often too public a personality to get the real work done. That work is done instead by teams of leaders-exceptional deputies who forge great partnerships to maximize both organizational and personal success.

Heenan and Bennis believe we must look beyond the Bill Gateses of the world to understand what makes an organization excel. Written for CEOs, managers, and anyone else interested in modern organizations, this is the first comprehensive study of co-leaders and their often quiet power. Exhaustively researched and illustrated with memorable anecdotes and lively stories, Co-Leaders examines a dozen great partners such as Steve Ballmer of Microsoft, Bob Lutz of Chrysler, Bill Guthridge, coach of the University of North Carolina basketball team, and Anne Sullivan Macy, Helen Keller's teacher.

The changing nature of corporate leadership has seen the emergence of a new Silicon Valley model of success, where boss and subordinate seem more like peers with the spotlight on great partnerships. Talent, not title, is the source of power at a growing number of hot high-tech companies. In these collegial, non-hierarchical organizations, today's deputy can become tomorrow's CEO simply by taking his or her breakthrough idea and walking out the door. Good ideas belong, initially at least, to the people who have them, not to the company and not to the boss which is why this new egalitarianism isn't just a matter of style-it's a question of survival. Co-leaders know both the executive and subordinate experience, making them better adapted to the needs of the new millennium where men and women who can command and follow will prove to be the greatest assets of any organization.

Co-Leaders is intended for everyone who aspires to make his or her organization great. By showing the enterprise through the eyes of inspired deputies, this book reveals how both organizations and individuals can benefit from a more inclusive, less celebrity-oriented definition of leadership. This groundbreaking book argues for a new gifted leaders and their talented co-leaders working together to make their organizations stronger, more nimble, more equitable...and ultimately more successful.

David A. Heenan is a trustee of the Estate of James Campbell, one of the nation's largest landowners with assets valued at over $2 billion. A former senior executive with Citicorp and Jardine Matheson, Heenan has served on the faculties of the Wharton School and the Columbia Graduate School of Business. A Wharton Ph.D., he is the author of The New Corporate Frontier and The Re-United States of America, and his articles have appeared in the Harvard Business Review, The Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times.

Warren Bennis is Distinguished Professor of Business Administration at the University of Southern California and a consultant to multinational companies and governments throughout the world. Often referred to as "the guru of modern management," he is one of the preeminent authorities on leadership. Author of over a dozen books, including the best-sellers Leaders and On Becoming a Leader, Bennis's insights have fundamentally shaped the way we think about leaders today.

Genres: Leadership, Business

312 pages, Paperback

First published February 22, 1999

Reviews

[Feng Ouyang · Rating 2 out of 5]

The premise of the book is that modern businesses require more than a star CEO or a lone leader. The concept of coleaders is gaining popularity and showing an advantage. Coleader means two or more people share the top power. Although there may still be a star, externally facing “top person,” the team share the management and vision-setting work. Often, it is the “second person” who does most of the executive tasks.
The book starts with an overview and explanation of the idea. It then spent the bulk of the book telling stories of famous coleaders in history. The profiled people are not all in business; some of them are in politics, military, sports, and social movement. The last few chapters return to the general theme, where the author makes several points, which are supported by more stories.
The book is interesting in storytelling. For example, I didn’t know Helen Keller crossed paths with other famous people such as Alexander Graham Bell and Mark Twain. However, as case studies, I do not find the stories very convincing, for two reasons.
The first is these stories may not reflect the whole picture. One of the stories is about former Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai and his relationship with the Chinese top leader Mao Zedong. I happen to know a lot about their complicated and convoluted relationship and feel that the book did not tell the whole story. Apparently, the book relied only on accounts from West journalists and ignored the many studies and records compiled by Chinese scholars, or even Western Chinese experts. As a result, Zhou was highly romanticized in the book. Such discrepancy leads me to have doubts about the other stories in the book, which I am not familiar with.
The second reason also has to do with material. In many stories, the book describes the feelings and views of the coleader based on their public interviews. We all know that business executives do not reveal their real thoughts and feelings in public interviews. Such accounts are, therefore, of limited value.
The structure of the book is unsatisfactory, as well. Although the bulk of the book is devoted to profiling stories, the general discussions do not circle back to them. Instead, the general statements are based on other, much more brief stories. Such an arrangement makes the book less coherent.
Overall, this book pointed out an important business principle and expanded it in terms of what one should do and not do to support the coleader concept. However, it seems to me that the same information could have been conveyed in an essay by someone with only casual business knowledge. The rest of the book is a collection of interesting stories, which do not add value to the central theme.

[Alberto Lopez · Rating 1 out of 5]

The argument of this, now aging, book is thin at best. That the author had to rely on people who did not lead more than each other and on fictional characters (courtesy of Arthur Conan Doyle), did not serve to impress me. I wonder if the real aim of the book should have been to call attention to the value of "co-operation" instead. I believe that the book already made at least one reference to Peter Drucker's revelations on the age of knowledge work and cooperation. So, changing the title a little would not have been too much of a stretch.

[David · Rating 1 out of 5]

Pretty lame book. Lots of stories, as is too often with Bennis involvement in a book. The book highlights a number of situations in which the Chief Executive works hand-in-hand with the #2 (typically the Chief Operations Officer).

The "insights" are worthless - they are either a poor rehash of Bennis' other books, or just so "duh" as to be not worth stating (Some "duh"'s ARE worth stating, these aren't).

Feels like this book was written during some kind of sabbatical in which Bennis was required to write a ton of books that all say about the same thing. As if he lent his same message to a number of "co-authors" who had an agenda he could tack his thoughts onto.

I cannot imagine ever needing to read this book.

[Janet · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book validated my intuition that it takes more than one person to lead an organization.

[Lori Grant · Rating 4 out of 5]

A should-read book on leadership for knowledge workers, managers, directors, C-levels, and entrepreneurs.