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Leading in Office, in Crisis, and in Exile
Michelle Bachelet, former President of Chile, executive director of UN Women.
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Featured Guest: Michelle Bachelet, former President of Chile, executive director of UN Women.
KATHERINE BELL: Welcome to the HBR IdeaCast from Harvard Business Review. I’m Katherine Bell.
After first career as a physician, Michelle Bachelet went into politics and before long was elected the first female president of Chile. She now works for the United Nations. I had the pleasure of interviewing her for our September issue, and today you’ll hear part of our conversation.
Michelle, you studied medicine, and then quite a bit later, military strategy. That’s an unusual combination. What about that preparation turned out to be useful to you later, when you became a political leader?
MICHELLE BACHELET: Well, I would say I studied medicine because I wanted something that could combine science with social action. And I will tell you what gave me that. In terms of my kind of leadership, I would say it reinforced my way of behaving, in terms of every time I have to deal with something, I really wanted to know not only on the surface, but as deep as possible, to really try to understand the roots, and then to propose solutions, or if I may say, if you make the power with the medicine, medicines that will really solve the problem, and not only sort of make up that it looks like you solved the problem, but you didn’t have a real result. Or sometimes you don’t have the possibility of a medicine who will solve the problem, but at least you could identify which were the essential issues that it was understandable to work on, so you can really progress.
So I would tell you that’s my scientific background. It’s like this serious, professional approach to issues. And not only in social issue, but also economical issues, and also on political issues. I always try to find which were the different options and which were most cost effective, which was the political economy on this, so when I had to make decisions, I will make the best of them. But also from the military, if I may say. And that’s also not only from my study, but from my home, I would say certain discipline, the capacity of working on teamwork, but on the other hand, to be in command. So to learn when you need to delegate, but when you need to make decisions that nobody else can make.
KATHERINE BELL: Of course, you had a different kind of education, too– a quite horrific one– when you were tortured and exiled by the Pinochet government. How did that early experience affect your development as a leader?
MICHELLE BACHELET: Well, I will believe my family, my father, my mother, and my own experience. What it produced in me is reinforcing, probably, ideas and that it will be afterwards reflected on the kind of leadership that I developed, is that there is something we need to fight against always, is against fundamentalism. You can have clear options. You don’t need to be always compromising everything and not making decisions. You need to make decisions, but you need to make it considering a whole amount of factors.
In my kind of leadership, it’s a leadership that makes it official that tries to make win/win proposals. So pride is not always possible. Try to produce agreement, consensus, on wider portions of the actors, political actors, social actors. Because I truly learned from my bad experience that there is no good and bad, there is, I couldn’t say, monopoly of one side or another side. Smaller or bigger as a national project, you need people to feel ownership of that. And the only way to do it is that you have a non-confrontational way. You can be very firm, very direct, but not confrontational. And try to [? assume ?] more and more people, forces, into this project. Sort of a more inclusive approach, if I may say.
KATHERINE BELL: So related to that, how did organizing activists in exile prepare you to leave the government when you got back to Chile?
MICHELLE BACHELET: Well, I mean, I started being active in politics when I was at the university, but I have to tell you, since I was born, I was organizing things. Whatever. If it was needed to go to a camping, or picnic or a basketball game, I was always organizing. I had musical groups and we were organizing festivals, music festivals. So this sort of organizational issue did not start in exile. It started from the beginning. So I was always proposing ideas, and of course when you propose ideas, you’re doing it, implementing it.
So of course, in exile, it was only the continuation of that, because we did what we needed to do. What it was supposed to do, and we thought it should be done. So of course, that experience led me– I would say, the exile experience, even though as a child, I’ve been in the US, so it’s not like I live in an island always and not knowing about the world. But I would say the importance of exile in my life is that it permitted me to get in touch with another part of the world, Europe in this case, and Australia in the other. So it will open my mind to many different things, to different cultures. And that, I would say, enriched me as a person in my capacity of understanding and putting me in place of others, trying to see with the eyes of others when I analyze issues.
And I think when you are a leader, it’s very important not only what you think is the correct thing, the right thing to do, but also try to understand why other people do not think the same, so that will help you. Or have a better understanding and maybe changing what you thought was the right thing. Or elaborating the best argument that will convince the rest that what you are proposing is the right thing to do.
And I feel this relation with other cultures, with other countries, gives you also this openness, you know? To listen to others, to try to understand others, but also how to deal with difference and diversity.
KATHERINE BELL: You tackled major reforms in every ministry or agency you’ve led, and you’re doing it again, bringing several agencies together at the UN. What do you think makes organizations willing and able to change?
MICHELLE BACHELET: First of all, I have to say that I know that there’s always resistance to change in organizations that have been working for a long time. And sometimes for people, it’s very difficult to think out of the box, because they are used to working in a certain way. Certain ways of behaving are rewarded and others are punished, sometimes. So I believe the more important thing is, first, as a leader to be able to establish with clarity the vision, and the goals, and the objectives of the new organization. Because when you need an organization to change, first of all, you ask yourself what is it that I have to do? And then, you ask yourself if this structure is fitted to achieve that goal?
And when you define clearly the goals, and then you decided that this architectural structure is not the one, you identify which are the obstacles, and you define which is the new kind of structure. Then what you need to do is to work with the people in terms of massifying or socializing this new point of view, and training or incenting them. Give the instruction, on one hand, a clear instruction how the organization is going to work. But I think in that sense, it’s not a waste of time to have all the necessary meetings, all the necessary communication with people in terms of, I would say, achieving the change.
But having said that, this is not an easy matter, and you need time, and you need persistence, perseverance, patience in some minute, but push hard all the way around.
KATHERINE BELL: Speaking of change, you were the first woman defense minister and president in a quite conservative country. What do you think made you successful in those roles?
MICHELLE BACHELET: I believe the most important thing is what I mentioned already. People knew that I was there not because of a personal ambition, not because I was trying to work for myself, but I was trying to work for the country. And that I [UNINTELLIGIBLE] that even though I was part of a coalition, I was the president of all the Chileans, and I worked for all the Chileans to be included and improving the conditions of life.
Second, I believe that it was important this non-confrontational way of working, by on the contrary, to try to build bridges, to try to produce agreements, but substantive agreements. And always, always– and I think this probably is the more important issue– in every policy that we define, putting the people in the center. Understanding that the system has to adjust to the people and not on the contrary. Not the people to adjust to sort of neutral systems. So I think this approach probably was the more important for the people.
And the other thing that comes with this is always speak with the truth, understanding the responsibility and being faithful to this responsibility. When I was a candidate, I did not promise things I couldn’t implement. Of course, sometimes things don’t work, but then I spoke with the truth to the people and say this didn’t work, and I’m sorry, and we’ll fix it.
And all of these issues, I think what produces for the people were certainties that we were working very seriously for them, but also it created a lot of credibility. And I think this was also part of my leadership that helped a lot on being able to implement a lot of different reforms and a lot of different policies.
KATHERINE BELL: What about when change– even catastrophic change– just happens? I’m thinking of the massive earthquake Chile suffered during your last weeks in office. How did you handle the transition out of power in the midst of such a serious crisis?
MICHELLE BACHELET: Well, this was like the 16 last days. With the transition to the new government, we have started it from the beginning, when the new government was elected. I mean, this was like on the 16th or 17th of January. So we had pretty much like a month, and a little bit more than a month, to make all the transition, to work with them, to give all the information. Particularly because the new government hasn’t been in government for many, many years, so it was many things very new into them. So we organized things so that it will be a very smooth and useful transition.
But of course, the last 16 days of my presidency, I was completely dedicated to the earthquake and all its consequences. And I just stopped hours before I gave the power to the new president of the republic. And I worked until the last day. So it was much different what everybody was telling me, that when you finish government, what you need to do is to avoid the tendency of getting creative and inventing many other new things. Because what you understand is your time’s ended, and now is the time for the new people. But we had to be involved in the urgency during all the 16 days, so we worked so hard until the last minute, if I may say.
And I would say the last minute, because during the opening of the new president, we have two earthquakes. So it was a very, I would say, intense schedule and agenda.
KATHERINE BELL: That must have been really intense emotionally for you, as well.
MICHELLE BACHELET: The emotion, you feel it afterwards, because you are sort of with the adrenaline at higher levels, and you’re working, working, working, working. Almost no sleeping and no eating. But of course, to be with the people, because the people needed me to be near them, close to them. It was very heavy and very strong. But for me, I was doing not only my job, my duty. What I wanted to do is to be with them, to the people that needed me. Needed me and needed to in some way have hope that even though things were terrible, things will get better. And that the government were there to ensure that things will go better.
KATHERINE BELL: Right. Well, thank you so, so much for being here, Michelle.
MICHELLE BACHELET: Thank you very much.
KATHERINE BELL: That was Michelle Bachelet, former president of Chile and currently head of the UN Women program. Selections of this interview appear in the September issue, and as always, on hbr.org.