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Inspirational sayings & thoughts: About Swanson's Rules of Management

A while back, William Swanson put together a list of “management secrets” into a book he called “Swanson’s Unwritten Rules of Management”. It has been hailed as the work of a true sage. Even business superstars such as Warren Buffett and Jack Welch praised it.

The problem is that about half of “Swanson’s secrets” were actually lifted from a book published in the 1940’s, and at least a few of the others were almost literally copied from other people’s sayings.

Swanson’s Rule 19 states that: “When dealing with outsiders, remember that you represent the company. Be careful of your commitments.”

Now, this rule was written by a man who, knowing that his book was plagiarizing the work of others, let his company give away 300,000 copies of it as a public relations gesture! It is easy to get outraged, and accuse the author of hypocrisy. But there’s also another perspective.

Maybe this “rule” made such a strong impression on him because it was about something he had a lot of difficulty with. After all, we don’t tend to write rules and reminders about what comes naturally to us (“Remember to keep that heart of yours beating”).

So maybe this rule should not be read as the saying of a man who has mastered it, but as a reminder he may have written to himself: “I must remember that I represent the company. I know it is difficult for me to remember this, so I am writing this to remind myself to pay extra attention”.

I will use another example. Swanson’s Rule No. 2 was originally written by Donald Rumsfeld (it was part of a set of Rumsfeld Rules that were published by the Wall Street Journal in 2001.

This Rumsfeld rule states:
“Learn to say: I don’t know. If used when appropriate, it will be often.”

Now, if this rule was meant to be a description of Donald Rumsfeld’s actual behavior, I would find it strangely at odds with the testimony of so many people who find him extremely arrogant.

If, on the other hand, this “rule” was a reminder he wrote to himself, to keep working on his shortcoming, it would actually mean something like: “It’s really hard for me to say “I don’t know”, even though there are so many occasions when I feel like I should act as if I know. I want to remember to fight that urge, and to say “I don’t know” more often.”

Please remember that my object, here, is not to address the issue of plagiarism—or to analyze Swanson’s motivations, or Rumsfeld’s character. I am using these statements as an example of the ambiguity that is involved in so-called “rules”.

The very name of “rule” implies that the person who wrote it is an expert who has mastered that rule. This may be true, but is not always so—as in the examples above. The experts may be deceiving themselves, if not actually trying to con others.

I find it helpful to see “rules”, not as the work of a guru trying to enlighten imperfect people, but as a testament to the struggle of another fellow human being. I find a “rule” more powerful and more poignant when I think of it as something the author wrote to capture what is so hard for them to remember in their struggle to be a better person (or a better manager).

I am inviting you to think of a “rule” that is meaningful to you, and to rewrite it in such a way that it is not just a nugget of abstract wisdom, but clearly a reminder of your own struggle to achieve something that doesn’t come easily to you.

See the Rules.

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