Coldly Effective Leaders

Jim Judkins was one of the guys in charge of evacuating the Hampton Roads in Virginia.

Rescue workers went door to door asking people to leave.

If they refused, rescue workers gave them Magic Markers and asked them to write their Social Security numbers on their body parts so they could be identified later on.

"It's cold, but it's effective,' Mr. Judkins explained.

That simple strategy could have persuaded hundreds of people to save their own lives in New Orleans.

What the city needed most was coldly effective local leaders, not a president in Washington who could feel their pain.

John Tierney, NYT via Irish Eagle. Also available here

Comments

[laurence haughton]

My co-author (from my book "It's not the big that eat the small...It's the FAST that eat the slow") once introduced me this way:

"Laurence and I share a doctor. One day I got an urgent message from Dr. Klompus that said come to the hospital right away."

"When I arrived I saw our physician rummaging in the flowerbed. 'Why are you here and not with Laurence,' I asked."

He told me, "Your co-author needs a heart transplant and I'm here looking for a suitable stone."

That was his way of saying I could be heartless. But now I don't feel so bad. Having a heart of stone is sometimes a good thing. Thanks.