The Intangibles of Leadership: The 10 Qualities of Superior Executive Performance

Chapter 10. Fallibility

This is the very perfection of a man, to find out his own imperfections.

—St. Augustine

The Perils of Perfection: Part One

At this juncture, every word he spoke seemed to carry extravagant weight. The race was that close. He'd been in the small towns and the big cities. He'd addressed the wage earners and the well-heeled, and those whose lives had been turned upside down by a turbulent economy. He'd run a respectful campaign anchored by soft-spoken intelligence and well-articulated arguments, more or less a direct contrast to his opponent's soldier mentality and more blustery discourse. He'd opted from the very beginning not to go in for smear tactics or play the obvious card, the one everybody had been talking about for months ...