Customer Reviews

Theodore Roosevelt on Leadership: Executive Lessons from the Bully Pulpit

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Theodore Roosevelt was many different things to many different people. Most of all, he was a charismatic leader who inspired himself and others to great achievements in a time when America was starting to come of age as an emerging world power. James Strock did a tremendous job in capturing the many leadership lessons that can be learned from the life and times of this extraordinary man.

The book's thirteen chapter titles do a good job of describing Roosevelt's leadership effectiveness: "Leading-wherever you are," "Always learning," "Action, action, and still more action," "Getting the best on your team," "Putting action into words," and "Putting words into action" to name just a few. At the end of each chapter is a listing of Roosevelt's leadership take-aways that can serve as an excellent primer on leadership. For example, "A leader should aim to build a life based on service, not a career based on advancing up a series of positions," "Strive to exemplify character," "Courage (physical and moral) can be developed as an act of will," and "Use simple, down-to-earth stories to communicate complex issues."

Throughout the book, Strock made great use of many colorful Roosevelt quotes and anecdotes, what I affectionately call, "Teddyisms," to reinforce his main points and help bring those points to life. Besides extensive research into the life, writings, and others' personal recollections of Roosevelt, Strock made many effective references to respected current leadership and management experts such as Stephen Covey, Peter Drucker, John Maxwell, and Warren Bennis. Those references proved to me that Roosevelt's leadership has stood the test of time and is certainly still applicable today.

This book helped reinforce my opinion of Roosevelt as a morally and physically courageous leader who was not afraid to follow his vision and convictions despite often open and powerful public opposition. After reading this book, I can understand why many people view Roosevelt as a benchmark against which to judge public servants, especially presidents.

The fact that Teddy Roosevelt was president during America's transistion into the 20the century, and the important lessons and context his actions and personality offer for American leadership in the 21st century, is the fulcrum for this very compelling and insightful book. TR was really the first modern president, who used the bully pulpit like no president before him (and without benefit of a T.V. camera), to inspire notions of preservation and conservation, corporate and personal responsibility, technological progress and innovation, and U.S.leadership in the world domain. There are many parallels to today, but some revealing contrasts, too. For example, the same man who built a world-class Great White naval fleet over the objections of many in Congress, organized the first international environmental conference. (Nowadays, as citizens and leaders, we tend to polarize between "pro-environment" and "pro-commercial development" and/or "pro-military".) As Strock writes, TR was indeed a "preacher militant"! Strock has written a sequel, in essence, to his very well-regarded book on Reagan and leadership; ironically, the Reagan book dealt with an "old-fashioned" presidency in terms of instilling fundamental values and restoring confidence in the American story, while TR, who predates Reagan as president by 80 years, is seemingly more of a "modern" president, invoking change and sustaining bigger government for specific purposes, and challenging all around him to soar to new heights. Both have many common traits: each lived the life personally that he espoused for the general population, neither trusted (fully) large combinations of businees (or labor) interests, each implored all Americans to recognize their special place in world history, and each could be mule-like in their insistence on what he considered America's best interests. As to the particular times in which TR led, I was struck by how relatively tiny was the domain of the Federal government (the IRS did not even exist!), and was reminded of how much imbalance existed as a result of the industrial age, similar in certain respects to the modern discrepancies associated with the new technical era. While TR certainly believed that people controlled their own destinies, he obviously led the charge for government action on many issues of social concerns, and felt very strongly that business had obligations and accountability accordingly. Thus, Strock has written a "modern" book about a modern turn-of-a-century president, whose ideas never go out of style. While written with a light touch, it is inspiring and thought-provoking. I hope he continues his practical series on presidential leadership.

I just returned from watching the much ballyhooed film Pearl Harbor and meeting some of the survivors of the attack.Having just read Strock's book about Teodore Roosevelt I wondered again about the role of great men in history. This book successfully portrays TR as the epitome of the traditional American male--e.g. robust, intelligent,honest, brave, extremely individualistic, courageous,emotionally vulnerable, etcetera. Likewise,it aptly depicts TR as being more namely, one of history's great all-around leaders. I could not agree more.

The beauty of Strock's book is that it is more than a mini-biography and analytic profile, it is more than a readable and insightful business-leadership guide for success, it is more than a historical account of how great leaders are born and made. No, hidden in his inimitably sensitive and deeply perceptive prose is also a "call to arms",a cry d'couer. If you are a serious, informed, and intelligent reader you will sense this from the beginning TR quote..."the credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood..." In an age where most of our national leaders spin their way out of their self-inflicted injuries and stupidities, at a time when most of our Congressional reps do not even own a passport, in a country where recent presidents, senators, governors, and mayors have never seen active duty in the defense of our nation and only sweat while jogging, STROCK'S TR summons all of us to be stronger than we are and better than we expect. To take the road less travelled and to fear naught. The true leader LEADS by example, always adheres to the truth, and never lowers his standards of honesty. In particular, he/she must be absolutely honest with himself lest there be serious consequences.

After watching Pearl Harbor I am convinced that had TR lived long enough he would have joined Brokaw's greatest generation to beat the enemy back. I strongly recommend this tour d'force to anyone who aspires to become a leader and to all leaders who seek to be great.

Theodore Roosevelt is an excellent person to study for one simple reason: He believed that his leadership abilities were learned and developed. By reading and studying other leaders, he made a concerted effort to develop himself (much like the way he developed his weak and sickly body into the "roughrider" we now remember). Roosevelt wrote of Ulysses S. Grant, "It is part of the man's greatness that now we can use his career purely for illustration." You and I can say the same thing about TR.

Bully!

That's what I say about this book and that's what I think TR would say about it if he were alive today-and by "bully" I mean "outstanding!" and "good job!"

First of all I read this book because I wanted to find out about TR but also enlarge my knowledge about what makes certain people leaders (I am a Corporate Trainer / Documentation Manager--but history buff, too)-and I had just finished reading McCullogh's "Truman" and that was a great book but I wanted something that I could apply at the office too (yet keeping the readability of a "Truman"--) and I found it in this book. It was perfect.

"TR on Leadership" had a compelling style that didn't get bogged down in minutiae and had a thread that wove it all together-to me that thread was TR's courage and how he forced himself (even when scared to death) to always step up to the plate and face the challenges, no matter how daunting: He was the fat little rich boy New Yorker who stood up to the whiskey drinking Wild West cowboys and fought them toe to toe. He was the guy who wasn't afraid to commit himself to writing and not stopping until he had finished the book he'd set out to do. He was the asthmatic who charged up San Juan Hill. He was the idealistic ingénue politician, who took his Western-Sheriff-like ideas of right and truth and stuck them into the middle of the cess pool that was NYC Tammany Hall politics. To me, this guy defined courage because he came from so far from it.

If you ever thought you had at some time stood alone against the masses for what you believed in, whether on a document or idea at work, speaking in front of people, in a boxing ring, or anywhere, but fought on anyway (or did not fight on) you will like reading this book. It will teach you how to understand courage and how to be better at whatever you do in the future and how being courageous and believing in yourself can bring out leadership qualities.

At the end of every chapter the author also encapsulated the leadership lessons that TR has learned and that the author has culled from his research. It is really helpful and handy (I know I have posted them in documents and have presented them in seminars in sections of my leadership training-I also sent the book as a gift to a world class trainer in Munich-he loved it too-I don't think I plagiarized!)

Reading this book not only taught me about TR to the point where I feel I know the man pretty well, but it also taught me lessons that can help me be a better person. Only a few books can do that. Books like McCullogh's "Truman" did it, the Lincoln bio "With Malice Toward None" did it and I can safely say so did "TR on Leadership."

Best to all you fellow readers!

In my experience, books on Leadership are either really bad or really good. TR on Leadership is really good mainly due to the way the author organized the material. There is a clear outline for each chapter, one point leading logically to the next. There is a clever publishing technique where a small gap between paragraphs indicates that you are about to begin a new topic. After the gap, a short, punchy sentence clearly states the next principle to be discussed. The other simple, yet elegant organizational technique is how Mr. Strock ended each chapter with a bulleted list of all of the leadership principles just described. These techniques helped me to retain the material better than most books that I read.

The author chose very interesting slices from the life of TR to illustrate his principles of leadership and, unlike other biographies or leadership books I've read, the illustrations truly illustrated the principle being discussed. The writing is vigourous and clear. I ordered the author's Leadership book on Reagan in part due to the skill of the author. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

I selected the quotation for the title of my review because it expresses so well Theodore Roosevelt's core values throughout his life. He was a man of action (mentally as well as physically) who made highly effective use of the resources available, whatever the given circumstances may be. Those who have read James Strock's previous book, Lead to Serve, already know that he is a staunch advocate of values affirmed by Robert K. Greenwood in his essay "The Servant as Leader" (first published in 1970) and later developed into a book. Please keep that in mind.

Perhaps because he was a victim of bullies when he was a sickly child ("wobbly on pipe-stem legs, too weak to offer more than feeble resistance"), Roosevelt in his adult life considered it a privilege to protect as well as serve those entrusted to his care while a deputy sheriff in the Dakota Territory and then as a leader of the Rough Riders fighting in Cuba during the Spanish-American War. Later, his trust busting campaign challenged formidable power brokers on Wall Street and elsewhere whom average citizens could not. Ironically, while president, he expressed his outrage and enlisted support by taking fully advantage of what he characterized as the "bully pulpit."

However, this is not a full-scale biography of the 26th president, nor does it attempt to be. The historical material serves as a context in which to focus on Roosevelt's leadership and the lessons that can be learned from it. Consider this passage:

"Bringing the curtain down on an era when government was viewed as the handmaiden, if not the courtesan, of regnant financial and industrial combinations, Roosevelt declared that a transcendent, incontrovertible as the representative and guardian of the public interest. He was the first president to apply federal government authority on behalf of organized labor in a dispute with management. His leadership was indispensable in securing significant regulation of railroads." Roosevelt was raised in the "Silk Stocking" district of Manhattan and schooled at home by tutors for reasons of health, later graduating Phi Beta Kappa from Harvard.

Merely listing his strengths as a leader fails to reveal personality of someone who was described by those who knew him as "a steam engine in trousers," "pure act," "a child of seven," possessed of a "violent and spasmodic" mind, and widely viewed in foreign countries as "the typical American." Roosevelt also remains the only president to be awarded the Medal of Honor and the most prolific author among those who have served as president. According to Strock, "The overriding lesson of Theodore Roosevelt is that leadership is a way of life." His was a strenuous life indeed.

Those who wish to learn more about him are encouraged to check out these three volumes written by Edmund Morris:

The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Rex
Colonel Roosevelt

Those in need of a less-comprehensive biography of him are directed to Theodore Roosevelt: The American Presidents Series: The 26th President, 1901-1909 written by Louis Auchincloss.

I've always admired Theodore Roosevelt. I've devoured every single biography out there about the man so I could learn lessons on being a better man in all facets of my life. What Mr. Strock does wonderfully in his book TR on Leadership is making those lessons from TR explicit and showing how individuals today can put TR's lessons on leadership in action right away. The book is fantastically organized. Chapters are divided into sections on different areas of leadership. At the end of each chapter, Mr. Strock summarizes TR's lessons and gives nice bullet points on how to put those lessons into practice.

If you're an admirer of Roosevelt or just want to become a better leader, you should definitely read this book.

Mr. Strock, the author, again proves that he can glean the facts that create exemplary character and leadership ability. Jim Strock proves beyond a reasonable doubt that Theodore Roosevelt would have achieved great heights without the aid of the family wealth. It was Teddy's fortitude, courage and tenacity that propelled this great man. Mr. Strock has once again further established himself as a fine writer. I hope some day he turns his attention to fiction. Ted King

Astounding. One of the best books on leadership and achievement that I've ever read...and unlike many other books purporting to be "about" the leadership abilities of various U.S. presidents and generals (but which are merely a list and/or description of their victories), Strock makes a careful analysis of TR's philosophy and decisions, bolstered by TR's own extensive, introspective writings on the subject. I fully plan on picking up the other books in this series, such as those on Churchill, Grant and Lee. Highly recommended!