Power Plays – Shakespeare’s Lessons in Leadership and Management

Citation

Ingram, H. (2001), "Power Plays – Shakespeare’s Lessons in Leadership and Management", International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 13 No. 2, pp. 103-104. https://doi.org/10.1108/ijchm.2001.13.2.103.1

William Shakespeare as management consultant? The idea is an attractive one – learning lessons from history, drama and indeed any of the arts in an interdisciplinary and fully rounded way. Why should business and management be studied as a scientific and disparate subject? There is certainly a richness of experience to be found in great literature that can help us to understand people. This book follows Paul Corrigan’s Shakespeare on Management (Kogan Page, 1999) which offered a rather academic perspective, but it is Whitney and Packer who have developed this fascinating idea more fully. There is now an experiential methodology termed “mythodrama” which is used as a basis for seminars on Shakespeare held at London’s Globe Theatre for the development of leadership skills and behaviours.

Power Plays has much to recommend it in blurring the interdisciplinary boundaries and the authors’ backgrounds are an ideal blend of business academia, practical leadership experience and classical theatre scholarship. The book contends that, in Shakespeare’s 39 plays, the bard wrote more deeply about leadership, power and people than anyone before or since. Although more than 400 years have passed, the authors are confident that Shakespeare’s message is still as fresh today and that his is “a huge resource for a businessperson”. True, but to what extent does this book help pragmatic businesspeople to apply these lessons to their life?

One of the most difficult tasks in writing this book must have been the decision to arrange the lessons into the three major themes. The first theme of power in the most obvious because, in the sixteenth century as now, it is leadership and the influence of power that sit at the heart of human society. Part II considers leadership as theatre, with leaders needing to communicate with followers in order to gain support and achieve objectives. The third and final part looks at the conflicts of moral dilemmas. Polonius warned:

… to thine own self be true, … Thou canst not then be false to any man. (Hamlet, 1.3, 78‐80)

The problem is that mankind is flawed and Shakespeare demonstrates this best in the tragedies, in which great leaders convince themselves of the justice of their actions; for example Julius Caesar, Macbeth, Henry VIII and Hamlet. Interesting parallels are drawn on the falsehoods of contemporary leaders including Slobodan Milosevic, Chairman Mao and Richard Nixon. Practical lessons are also given on being an economist (“neither a borrower nor a lender be”, Hamlet, 1.3, 75‐77), deception and spin‐doctoring (“… one may smile, and smile, and be a villain”, Hamlet, 1.5, 108).

Even in the sixteenth century truth was not pure and self‐deception was regarded as the fatal flaw. Shakespeare’s self‐deceivers, King Lear, Richard III, Mark Anthony and Brutus, paid a terrible price in suffering and even death.

Yet Shakespeare’s plays, rather like real life, are not all doom and gloom. There are lighter and more humorous moments even in the most serious of situations. The bard uses the character of the fool to voice deep philosophical paradoxes and challenge comfortable views:

The fool doth think he is wise, but the wiseman knows himself to be a fool. As You Like It (5.1 30‐31)

Then, as now, it is pomposity and arrogance in leaders that need to be pricked, and maverick characters like Falstaff can help to do this.

In summary, Power Plays has played a part in the convergence of literature and business studies. It is easy to criticize such a text because interpretation is always a personal matter. For example, English ears might prick at the term “bardolatry”, and the theme of the maverick fool could have included other Shakespearean characters such as Malvolio, Bottom and Feste. Although the themes were structured logically, the epilogue could have pulled the lessons together more effectively. Nevertheless, this book does make lots of interesting and thought‐provoking connections, using examples from (mostly US) companies and leaders that break down the barrier of the intervening 400 years. I commend this book to all reflective and open‐minded practitioners.