BOOK REVIEW:On Leadership by Allan Leighton; Random House; €11
ALLAN LEIGHTON has had a rather busy career spanning over 35 years. It has taken him from a salesman for Mars Corporation, to president and chief executive of Wal-Mart Europe in 1999. In 2002 he was appointed by Tony Blair to help restructure the Royal Mail.
So with his credentials established, the obligatory management guru book was in order and duly written; but is it any good? Not wishing to answer this in management consulting speak, but the answer is yes and no.
The book brings together an extensive array of business leaders' experiences and is divided into various sections on getting the right team, the art of communication, the customer is king, talking to the media, innovate or die and buzz terms like this. All pretty standard stuff.
Leighton sets out to cover these subjects through interviews with fellow dons of commerce, resulting in every second page being peppered with quotations from a host of business leaders, and from Leighton himself. The result of all this is rather mixed. For a casual read, it works. The random opening of a page is sure to hit on an interesting discussion; however, for a cover to cover read, the format results in frustration.
Despite this Leighton rewards the reader on a regular basis with "Leadership Lessons". Such lessons include short summaries of what to do, or in some cases, what not to do. However, the advice can be pretty basic.
What does differentiate this book from others is the wide selection of business leaders Leighton has managed to interview for the project. The Guardianrefers to him as the best connected man in the business world. He interviews the likes of Sir James Dyson (Dyson), Sir Philip Green (Arcadia), Sir Stuart Rose (Marks and Spencer), Lee Scott (Wal-Mart), Rebekah Wade (the Sun newspaper), Brent Hoberman (lastminute.com) and our own Fergal Quinn.
The interviews bring to life the world of the chief executive in an entertaining way: how they handle challenges, mistakes they made and what lesson they learnt. The interviews are very honest and revealing.
Leighton includes a lot of his own anecdotes along the way. For example, on his first day at Mars, his job was to sweep up Maltesers that had rolled off the production line. He spent the day running after the little malted balls until someone showed him that by stamping on them, the rolling stopped and the Maltesers now reduced to crumbs were simply swept up. The message? Do not struggle needlessly: ask for help. Again, like lot of his other advice, this is sensible but not rocket science.
As well as anecdotes about key turning points in businesses, there are also lots of hands-on advice which you can implement immediately, such as running meetings more effectively with a maximum length of 20 minutes (if only this was really put into practice), increasing face to face communication, hiring better people and lots more.
Leighton discusses other aspects of being in the heady heights of business leadership such as dealing with the press. He gives the example when rumours abounded about a pending merger between ASDA and Kingfisher. Geoffrey Mulcahy, the chief executive of Kingfisher, called Leighton and asked to come to see him in his home. It being a beautiful day, they sat in the garden to discuss the merger. Within 15 minutes of Mulcahy leaving, Leighton got a call from a journalist asking "Is it true that Mulcahy was drinking tea in your garden and are you doing a deal?"
Leighton makes a strong point about the lack of women in top executive positions. When he wrote the book in 2007 there was only one woman running a FTSE 100 company and only eight at the helm of a Fortune 500 company in the US. Carolyn McCall, head of the Guardian Media Group, talks about how women are seen as taking care of the organisation whereas men as seen as taking charge. Jenny Watson, the former chair of the Equal Opportunities Commission in Britain, talks about women in business; "When women go into companies, they look for the most senior figure that looks like them. If they don't see anyone, they go elsewhere."
And his definition of leadership? "In the end, it is just about being focused, listening, learning, having fun and, of course, it is about good old-fashioned common sense."
• Michael Kearney is the managing director of SAS Ireland
