2015：旧势力一再战胜新势力

2015年，“旧势力”人物及其战术在全球政治和商业领域大获全胜。有时，行为友善的好人做了好事后赢得了应有的赞赏，但掌声并不总是足够热烈。

2015年，许多人都谈到了透明度、合弄制、社交网络对自私或欺骗行为的约束力，等等。但实际情况是领导层和权力依然稳定，它们周边的社会格局则会让《君主论》作者马基亚维利觉得非常熟悉。

CNN提出的新势力概念是2015年的最重要观点之一。和集中、聚积并且由领导者左右的旧势力不同，“新势力开放、可供人参与而且更为透明。”这段话很好，大概可以体现出千禧一代以目的为核心的新思潮，以及社交网络的独特之处和信息的迅速传播。然而，我并没有看到多少新势力存在的证据。

在国家层面，埃及总统阿卜杜勒-法塔赫•塞西取代了阿拉伯之春，叙利亚总统巴沙尔•阿萨德则危机四伏。东欧似乎对权力主义领导者敞开了怀抱。匈牙利总理维克多•奥班显著增强了政府在社会中的权力；波兰总统安杰伊•杜达和他的政党则正在设法让自身权力摆脱司法的束缚。在土耳其，作风强硬的基要派人物雷杰普•塔伊普•埃尔多安成功连任。法国右翼党派国民阵线主席玛丽娜•勒庞及其反移民平台（在这一点上可没怎么体现出开放性）在民调和此前的投票中得到了众多民众支持。尽管能源价格下跌沉重打击了俄罗斯经济和卢布，俄罗斯总统弗拉基米尔•普京仍然让自己的影响力延伸到了乌克兰，并且强行“收回”了克里米亚，这还是在俄罗斯插手中东事务，并和欧洲针锋相对的情况下——虽然欧洲国家在是否继续对俄实施经济制裁的问题上意见不一。如果说存在旧势力战术的话，克里米亚事件当之无愧。

好吧，这就是政治，我们又能期望它怎样呢？

那么，透明度方面情况如何呢？这是新势力的另一条原则。最透明的公司是那些上市公司，因为它们必须披露大量财务和治理信息，在公布自身的社会和环境影响方面，这些公司也面临着越来越大的压力。

但密歇根大学商业管理学教授杰拉德•F•戴维斯在他即将出版的著作《正在消失的美国公司》（The Vanishing American Corporation）中指出，1997-2012年美国上市公司的数量减少了55%。2009-2014年这六年间首发上市的公司数量还没有1996年一年的多。同时，Zynga、Fackbook、Groupon和谷歌等多家公司在IPO时给了CEO过多的投票权，从而确保了他们对公司的控制。这些公司的股东并没有多少民主可言。此外，人们已经普遍注意到，一些高价值公司并未上市，比如优步、Lyft、Zenefits、饱受争议的Theranos以及Airbnb。因此，它们不必而且也没怎么披露过销售额、利润、利润率等信息。透明度方面的情况就是这样。

说到公司最高层将权力移交给一线员工，谈论合弄制的文章比真正实行此项管理原则，或者说将权力分散的公司要多。斯坦福大学商学院教授哈罗德•莱维特生前曾一针见血地指出，尽管几乎没有人称赞等级制度，而且几十年来人们一直预计它将消亡，但等级结构依然存在。实际上，在管理庞大而复杂的公司时，这种结构既为人们乐见，又是必要的手段。

因此，当读到或听到关于旧势力消亡的言论时，大家应该追问一下证据。毕竟，《时代》杂志评选的2015年年度人物就是德国总理安吉拉•默克尔，她总是具有战略眼光，经常被人低估，但又不可否认地强硬。在本次评选中名列第二的是“伊斯兰国”头目，唐纳德•特朗普位居第三。

言语和现实

2015年的情况再次表明，许多广为提倡的领导特质和行为并不总是个人职业生涯取得成功的必要条件，甚至都派不上用场。

比如说，在我们的社交网络世界里，一个人的声誉以及是否慷慨和善于合作可以说非常重要。那就跟首次担任德州参议员的泰德•克鲁兹说说这个吧，目前他是共和党三大总统候选人之一。有大量报道指出，“人们普遍认为克鲁兹先生最出众的声誉就是把自己放在第一位”。在参议员中间他也不受欢迎，这很奇怪。

互联网和现代媒体本该让虚伪之徒无所遁形。2007年，《坦帕湾时报》建立了PolitiFact网站，用以核实总统候选人所说的话。然而，目前名列前茅的总统侯选人唐纳达•特朗普的“诚信记录差的让人震惊”。最近还在民意调查中跟特朗普不相上下的本•卡尔森在这方面的表现紧随其后。在共和党候选人中，比较有信誉的是杰布•布什和克里斯•克里斯蒂，而他们两人眼下的民调排名却大幅落后。尽管选取的样本很少，但PolitiFact编辑安吉•卓布尼克•霍兰在其文章中用图表证明，诚信和政治生涯的成功之间也许存在着负相关关系，至少用民调结果来衡量时就是这样。

尽管谦虚品质广受提倡，但在总统竞选中几乎看不到谦虚的身影，而且不谦虚也基本上没有带来负面影响。特朗普把自己说的无所不能。卡丽•菲奥莉娜宣扬的则是自己担任企业高管时的成就，尽管她的成功令人怀疑。众多公司都说自己是本领域的龙头。在年报或广告中，大家有几次看到某家公司说“我们在行业中处于（或者低于）平均水平”呢？当然，就其定义而言，存在低于平均水平的公司（和龙头企业）。同时，吹嘘其智慧和惊人成就的CEO自传向来都有很大的市场。

就连例外情况都证明了这条原则

旧势力的想法很有说服力，以至于善良和慷慨有时会让人蒙羞，而不是获得赞许。以丹•普莱斯为例，他的信用卡交易处理公司Gravity决定将全体员工的年薪都提高到7万美元以上。普莱斯还同意降薪，这样公司就可以承担加薪带来的约180万美元新增支出。外界反应如何呢？福克斯新闻频道和评论人士拉什•林博把普莱斯称为社会主义者，Gravity的一些员工和客户也发出了抱怨之声。

彭博发表文章称，普莱斯此举是为了应付和他一起创立这家公司的同胞兄弟提起的诉讼，后者指责普莱斯给自己的薪酬过高。

无论出于何种原因，普莱斯的慷慨看来给Gravity带来了好处。此事公诸于众后意外地成了一次营销，从而带动销售额迅速增长。另外，员工生产率大幅上升，Gravity的成本因此未出现明显增长，这并不意外。我说“不意外”的原因是，获得诺贝尔奖的经济学家乔治•阿克尔洛夫30年前就提出了效率-工资理论。他指出，薪酬高于市场平均水平时，员工会对公司心存感激，从而更加努力工作。此外，较高的工资也会吸引更有能力的人。

今年，教皇弗朗西斯继续谈及环境退化并为贫困人口发声。甚至是在巴黎恐怖袭击事件后，教皇仍重申“难民并不仅仅是数字，他们是上帝的子民。”访问肯尼亚首都内罗毕时，他乘坐的不是奔驰或四驱车，而是一辆“灰色小本田”，用以表达自己的谦逊。教皇要传达的信息是：“别忘了穷人，尊重年轻人。”这些做法给他招来了批评，表达不满的包括天主教和新教保守派领袖、里克•桑托勒姆和克里斯•克里斯蒂等政坛人士以及家得宝创始人肯•兰昂等企业家。

看来自私自利似乎仍有很大市场，而且任何展现同情和怜悯的行为或言论都逃不过政治和否定。

变化来自于权力

有种观点认为，千禧一代的价值观以及社交媒体的透明度，将清除那些行为不端者并让慷慨的行为大行其道，但这种观点让人们对这个世界的认知出现了非常大的偏差。如果社会力量能轻而易举地选出更好的领导者并带来更善良的行为，那就什么也不用做了。进步将自动实现。

但我相信，要建立一个更好的社会，并使其充满更友善、更慷慨和更无私的领导者，最好而且可能也是唯一的途径就是认清当前的实际情况，并积攒能量来推动变革。自由民主、人权、新闻自由以及对经济和物质财富的更平均分配绝不会自行出现。在所谓的新经济、新势力乐土，为了自身利益而掌握权力或谋求权力的人并不会被清除。

我们大家都需要了解并愿意使用权力，甚至是采用原先的生硬方式。否则，就像谁人乐队所唱的那样，我们会反复“遇到新老板，和旧的那个如出一辙”。（财富中文网）

杰弗里•普费弗是斯坦福大学商学院Thomas D. Dee II组织行为学讲席教授。他的最新著作是《领导力基本策略：完善工作环境和职业生涯，行为必诚信》（Leadership BS: Fixing Workplaces and Careers One Truth at a Time）。

译者：Charlie

校对：詹妮

In 2015, “old power” people and tactics triumphed in politics and business around the world. Sometimes, good people behaving nicely did well and received deserved plaudits, but not often enough.

This year, there was lots of talk about transparency, holacracy, the power of social networks to constrain selfish or dishonest behavior, and so forth. Meanwhile, the facts of leadership and power remained anchored in a social dynamic that Machiavelli would easily recognize.

The concept of new power was named by CNN as one of the top ideas for 2015. Unlike old power, which is concentrated, hoarded, and leader-driven, “new power is open, participatory, and more transparent.” It’s a nice narrative that presumably reflects the new, purpose-centered ethos of the millennial generation, the reality of more rapid communication, and the ubiquity of social networks and the rapid transmission of information. But I don’t see much evidence of new power in the world.

At the national level, the Arab spring has been replaced by Abdel Fattah el-Sisi in Egypt, while Bashar al-Assad perilously hangs on in Syria. Eastern Europe seems to be embracing authoritarian leaders. In Hungary, there is Viktor Orban, who has significantly increased the government’s power in society, while in Poland, Andrzej Duda and his political party are trying to eliminate any judicial checks on their authority. In Turkey, fundamentalist strongman Recep Tayyip Erdogan won reelection. Marine Le Pen of France, president of the right-wing National Party, with its anti-immigrant platform (not much openness there), garners substantial support in public opinion polls and in the voting booth. And then there is Vladimir Putin of Russia, who, notwithstanding the falling energy prices that have devastated Russia’s economy and weakened its currency, nonetheless expanded his sphere of influence in Ukraine and annexed Crimea by force, an old power tactic if there ever was one, even as he exerts power in the Middle East and confronts a Europe divided on maintaining economic sanctions.

Well, this is politics, so what can we expect?

How about transparency, another new power principle? The most transparent companies are those that are publicly traded, because they face numerous mandatory disclosures of financial and governance information and growing pressure to publicly report on their social and environmental impacts.

But as Michigan business professor Gerald F. Davis points out in his forthcoming book, The Vanishing American Corporation, the number of public U.S. corporations decreased by 55% between 1997 and 2012. There were fewer initial public offerings in total over the six years between 2009 and 2014 than there were in the single year of 1996. Moreover, many companies including Zynga, Facebook, Groupon, and Google, when they did go public, provided their CEOs with disproportionate voting rights, guaranteeing their control of the companies. Not much shareholder democracy there. And as widely noted, some valuable companies such as Uber, Lyft, Zenefits, controversy-plagued Theranos, and Airbnb are not public and are therefore not required to–and do not–disclose much if anything about sales, profits, margins, or anything else. So much for transparency.

As for the devolution of power from the C-suite to front-line employees, there have been more articles written about holacracy than there are companies that actually adhere to the management principle, which promotes the decentralization of authority. The late Stanford business school professor Harold Leavitt perceptively noted that although almost no one has anything good to say about hierarchy, and its demise has been predicted for decades, hierarchical structures nonetheless survive and indeed may be both desirable and necessary for organizing large, complex organizations.

So when you read or hear about the demise of old power arrangements, you should ask to see the evidence. After all, Time‘s 2015 person of the year was the always strategic, frequently underestimated, but undeniably tough German Chancellor Angela Merkel, with its No. 2 being none other than the leader of ISIS and No. 3 Donald Trump.

Rhetoric v. Reality

2015 demonstrated yet again that many of the widely advocated leadership traits and behaviors aren’t always necessary or even useful for achieving individual career success.

For instance, in our socially networked world, an individual’s reputation and being generous and cooperative with peers presumably counts for a lot. Tell that to first-term Texas Senator Ted Cruz, who is currently in the top three among Republican presidential candidates. As voluminously reported, “Mr. Cruz stands out for his widely held reputation for putting Ted first” and is singularly unpopular among his Senate colleagues.

The Internet and modern media have supposedly made it impossible to get away with being untruthful. In 2007, the Tampa Bay Times founded PolitiFact to fact check candidates’ statements. But presidential frontrunner Donald Trump’s “record on truth is astonishingly poor,” and he is followed closely by Ben Carson, who up until recently was running neck-and-neck with Trump in the polls. Among the more truthful of the candidates in the Republican race are Jeb Bush and Chris Christie, who happen to currently be far down in public opinion polling. Although the sample is small, examining the chart in an article written by Angie Drobnic Holan, the current editor of Politifact, suggests there may be a negative relationship between truthfulness and political success, at least as measured by public opinion.

Modesty, while widely advocated, is mostly absent in the presidential race, with few negative consequences for the immodest. Trump puts his name on everything. Carly Fiorina touts her business record, despite her questionable success. The number of companies who claim they are the leaders in their particular business is enormous–how often do you read annual reports or see advertisements where the business says, “we are at (or below) the median in our industry?” Of course, by definition, there are companies (and leaders) that are below average. And the market for CEO-written books touting the executive’s wisdom and amazing achievements has never been bigger.

Even the Exceptions Proved the Rule

Old power ideas are so potent that kindness and generosity sometimes produce opprobrium rather than approbation. Take the case of Dan Price, whose credit-card transaction processing company, Gravity, decided to pay all of its employees at least $70,000 a year. Price agreed to reduce his own pay so the company could afford the approximately $1.8 million in extra expenses. The reaction? Fox News and commentator Rush Limbaugh called Price a socialist and some of Gravity’s employees and customers complained. Bloomberg published an article claiming that Price’s move came in response to a suit by his co-founder brother alleging Price had paid himself excessively.

Gravity seems to have profited from Price’s generosity, regardless of its cause, as the resulting publicity has been a marketing bonanza that helped produce rapidly expanding sales. And, not surprisingly, employee productivity has soared so that Gravity’s costs have not increased significantly. I say this isn’t a surprise because 30 years ago, Nobel prize-winning economist George Akerloff, in his description of efficiency-wage theory, noted that employers who paid above-market wages would obtain more effort from grateful employees as a result. Furthermore, higher wages also attract more talented people.

This year, Pope Francis continued to speak about environmental degradation and on behalf of the poor. Even after the Paris attacks, the Pope reiterated that “refugees are more than statistics: they are children of God.” He exhibited humility by traveling around Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, in a “little gray Honda” rather than a Mercedes or four-by-four. His message: “Remember the poor. Respect the youth.” These positions have earned Francis criticism from conservative religious leaders in both Catholic and Protestant churches, politicians such as Rick Santorum and Chris Christie, and from businesspeople such as Ken Langone, a founder of Home Depot.

It seems as if self-interest and selfishness still abound, and that no act or statement of compassion or caring is immune to politics and negativity.

Change Comes From Power

The narrative that millennial values and social media transparency will root out bad actors and promote generous behavior leads people to a very false sense of the world. If social forces will effortlessly produce better leaders and more benign behavior, people don’t have to do anything. Improvement arises automatically.

But I am convinced that the best, maybe the only, way to create a better world populated with kinder, more generous, and selfless leaders is to both recognize the current realities and accumulate the power skills to get into a position to change things. Liberal democracy, human rights, freedom of the press, and a more equal distribution of economic and physical well-being don’t just emerge. Those with power or those who seek power for their own interests are not going to be swept away in some new-economy, new power paradise.

Everyone needs to build their understanding of and willingness to use power, even in its old, “hard” forms. Otherwise, as The Who once proclaimed, we will repeatedly “meet the new boss, same as the old boss.”

Jeffrey Pfeffer is Thomas D. Dee II Professor of Organizational Behavior at the Graduate School of Business, Stanford University. His latest book is Leadership BS: Fixing Workplaces and Careers One Truth at a Time.