mark o'brien

A number of years ago, a friend of mine through the Arrow Leadership Program, Jim Wallace (now with the Australian Christian Lobby, once himself Commander of the SAS Regiment, retired Brigadier), recommended a book by Sir William Slim, entitled “Defeat to Victory”, which recounted Slim’s amazing feat of leadership in turning the disastrous Burma campaign during WWII into a resounding victory for the Allies. Jim once served as some kind of military liaison for Slim, who had later become Governor General. He raved about the man and his ideas about leadership, and got me very intrigued about the book.

To cut a very long story short, the book was very hard to find, and in the end I paid a princely sum for a bookseller to locate a copy for me. It was months before I finally saw the book, and I’d pretty much forgotten that I’d ordered it by the time I got the call that it had arrived.

It arrived during a period of enormous stress and pressure in my leadership role. I found myself in a position where I desperately needed some space to think and get my head back in the game, given some of the very challenging things we were going through, and in the midst of all that I decided to start reading this book, more as a diversion than anything else.

Once I started reading, I was hooked! It was an amazing account of the emotional lows and highs of leadership, and a terrifically honest and authentic account. Slim is open about his weaknesses, his mistakes and almost blunders, and very modest about his accomplishments. It seems to me that he is perhaps the most competent leader of WWII that you have NEVER heard of because others managed to garner the limelight more effectively. But, in my book, Slim is a man every leader should study. For those who served under him, he remains legendary.

In the midst of my stress and exhaustion last year, I came across one passage in particular that just resonated with my soul and has stuck with me ever since. In fact, I made a commitment right there and then to change up the way I operate based on this piece of wisdom. In this paragraph, Slim provides a description of his daily routine during the peak of his leadership, as he prepared his army to go back into Burma to expel the Japanese.

Read it carefully:

“Life at the headquarters followed a daily routine. At six-thirty I got up; at seven, saw the important messages received during the night; at seven-thirty to eight, breakfasted with the air commanders and our principal staff officers. I attended the joint air and land intelligence conference, known as ‘morning prayers’ at eight-thirty, when the events of the past twenty-four hours were related and commented on and those for the next described to a considerable audience by British and American army and air officers. I then dealt with any urgent matters with my B.G.S. and Major-General Administration, and saw to the multifarious business that comes to an army commander for decision. We all met again at lunch and usually talked shop through the meal. I left my office at about three, read a novel for an hour, had tea, and went for a walk in the cool with one of my staff; dined at seven-thirty, talked at the bar of the mess till half-past nine, visited my operations’ room for a final look at the latest reports, and was in bed by ten. If, between then and six-thirty, when my faithful Gurkha orderly, Bajbir, roused me, anyone disturbed me for anything short of real crisis, he did so at his peril. I had seen too many of my colleagues crack under the immense strain of command in the field not to realize that, if I were to continue, I must have ample leisure in which to think, and unbroken sleep. Generals would do well to remember that, even in war, ‘the wisdom of a learned man cometh by opportunity of leisure.’ Generals who are terribly busy all day and half the night, who fuss around, posting platoons and writing marching tables, wear out not only their subordinates but themselves. Nor have they, when the real emergency comes, the reserve of vigour that will then enable them, for days if necessary, to do with little rest or sleep.“
[emphasis mine] – General William Slim, Defeat into Victory, 212-3.

These words are from a very active General, commanding a huge force during a time of deep crisis in wartime, and they are words every leader should pay attention to. This was no armchair reservist or casual Charlie. This was a wartime leader in the very fight of his life, in what seemed an impossible situation with minimal resources and a fearsome enemy, having already barely escaped complete decimation. Too many leaders (including myself) operate for too long with very little margin and think-space in their lives, and this kind of pace is both unsustainable and less effective than the leader who has space to think, to reflect, assess and make good decisions that aren’t emanating from a fuzzy and tired mind. William Slim’s advice is invaluable for every leader.