Leadership in the Headlines

Chapter 9

Leading in the 21st century

When I used to write about financial markets, I would occasionally round up the year by reporting on the work of an imaginary stockbroker, Back, Track & Hindsight (and its 110-year-old head of equity analysis Nick Nostradamus), which, ‘by issuing reports only after the market has moved, managed to maintain a 100 per cent record of accuracy’.

Hindsight is far easier than foresight, which is why business journalists, in particular, tend to steer clear of predictions. Innate scepticism about successes means we write a lot about failures and disasters, and somewhat less – for fear of being accused of boosterism – about successes. Perhaps affected by having covered the collapse of Enron at the turn of the ...