The analyst had only to say, "I'd like some more advice about my career. I'm doing OK financially, but I feel I'm not accomplishing as much as I could or getting treated as I should be." The oracle smiled and replied, "Ah, you need say no more. You have a high position, a good reputation and more than enough money to meet your needs, but you are frustrated by the way your clients and superiors misuse your skills and fail to appreciate your contributions. Is this not so?"

The analyst, marvelling again at the oracle's keen insight, assented.

"Well, then," the oracle pronounced, "you have learned the secret of wealth. What you seek now is the secret of power."

The analyst had not thought of it quite this way, but he readily saw the oracle's point. "Tell me, please," the analyst exclaimed.

"As you know," the oracle told him, "the secret of wealth lies in how you earn your income. The secret of power lies in what you manage." This seemed too obvious to the analyst, but he used another hard-won insight: He kept listening, in respectful silence, to learn what more there might be to this topic.

"You see," the oracle explained, "only the lowest-ranking people in any hierarchy spend most of their time controlling real things and doing the actual work!" This was not what the analyst had expected to hear next, and he kept listening raptly.

"The first line of immediate supervisors," the oracle continued, "manage tasks. Their job is to make sure the underlings who do the actual work know what they are supposed to do, and when to ask for guidance. They fit the stereotype workers have of supervisors, because that is the only level of management the workers usually see. Unfortunately, this means that workers promoted to that first supervisory level are aware of only that aspect of management. Learning what is involved in the higher levels, in many organizations, is haphazard, sometimes left entirely to those who aspire to rise higher. This one fact accounts for much of the trouble you see in organizations you have known."

Not quite sure where the oracle was going with this, the analyst simply nodded.

The oracle went on, "Higher levels of management manage relationships. Timely and frugal completion of tasks is not enough; the completion of tasks must lead to fulfillment of a larger, more complex set of objectives. Resources must be shared productively, not fought over. Competition against one's teammates must be strongly discouraged, especially the dishonest forms that such competition can take. Loyal, useful dissent must be cultivated and shaped so that it does not turn into harmful, internal competition. I trust you see that your superiors' failures to manage relationships explain the frustrations you are experiencing."

"I thought it was more malice than ineptitude," the analyst said, "but I prefer your way of looking at it. It is simpler and more consistent with the good motives these people seem to have — when they're not messing everything up! But I still think something else is missing."

"Very good!" the oracle smiled. "There is, indeed, an even higher level of management that requires yet another set of skills. The outstanding leaders in any sector, whether they are statesmen, top corporate executives, high-level consultants, leading scientists, whatever — spend most of their effort managing expectations."

The analyst was unsure about this, since it was outside his own experience. "Please tell me more," he urged.

"Executives of public corporations devote much time and energy to shaping investors' and investment analysts' expectations about the corporation's performance, then delivering slightly better results than expected," the oracle explained. "The most successful consultants pay closest attention to understanding and shaping what the clients want and leaving them feeling that they got a bit more than they bargained for. When an executive focuses on setting goals, stating values and mission, and creating incentives for people to work out, mostly on their own, how to help meet those goals and conform to those values, what is that but managing expectations, as well? And when a consultant focuses on building trust rather than just doing tasks — or, worse yet, doing what he thinks the tasks should be, without hearing what the client implied but did not say — is this not really managing expectations, too?

"And consider political leaders," the oracle continued. "Who are the most admired U.S. presidents? Kennedy failed to manage his relationships with Congress well, and therefore failed to get most of his proposed legislation passed. Johnson was phenomenally successful in getting legislation passed but is not nearly so highly regarded now. Bush (senior) managed relationships with other countries far more adroitly than Reagan, but which of them is more highly regarded by most people now? Kennedy and Reagan did best at managing the people's expectations, and that is why they are so admired."

"I see," the analyst responded with delight. "I'm going to focus much more on these seemingly tedious meetings and memos about what is to be done, but now looking at how these communications build trust and understanding and common purpose," the analyst said. "And if clients or managers simply cannot grasp the higher functions and skills of their management responsibilities, I will seek others who do! Thank you!"

And the oracle wished him well.

Note: "The Secret of Wealth" appeared in OR/MS Today in February 2003.



Doug Samuelson is president of InfoLogix, Inc., a consulting firm in Annandale, Va., specializing in analysis of complex systems. He is also a former federal policy analyst and an adjunct faculty member at The George Washington University and the University of Pennsylvania.

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