Management guru betrayed by Clinton
Franklin-Covey teacher says president
didn¡t learn lessons well
By David M. Bresnahan
Copyright 1998, WorldNetDaily.com
President Clinton was not the good student
his executive management instructor thought
he was.
The firm that teaches thousands of executives
once taught Clinton and is disappointed in
their disgraced student, who they say must
resign.
Clinton is arrogant, addicted to power, rules
by fear and intimidation, cannot be trusted,
and is no longer capable of commanding the
respect necessary to conduct the business of
the nation, according to Dr. Blaine Lee, vice
president of Franklin-Covey Company. Lee
and Dr. Steven R. Covey have spent many
years teaching executives and leaders the
principles of management that have enabled
their company to grow from 10 employees to
over 5,000.
Covey personally trained Clinton during his
first term in more than one all-day session on
separate visits to the White House. Covey
would not grant an interview at the time of
those sessions, but a source close to him
admitted that he was extremely impressed by
Clinton.
Covey reportedly believed Clinton to be an
ideal, attentive and responsive student. He
had great hopes and expectations that Clinton
would apply the principles he teaches in his
best selling books and tapes, "Seven Habits of
Highly Effective People," and "The Power
Principle: Influence with Honor," which he
coauthored with Lee. Now his partner says
Clinton has failed miserably.
Although Covey is traveling and unavailable
for comment on the latest events in the life of
his most notable student, Lee was only too
happy to express concern and dismay.
"If people are in enough pain, they'll do or say
almost anything," said Lee. He compared
Clinton's recent progressively apologetic
comments about his indiscretions with
Monica Lewinsky to the way the Korean
Army tortured prisoners and got them to say
what they wanted.
"You can get anyone to say almost anything if
you hurt badly enough. That hurting can be
self-inflicted. It can be internal hurting as well
as the external squeamish kind, but when an
apology is extracted under those
circumstances it's highly suspect," said Lee.
If a person says they have repented they must
demonstrate that by refraining from the
behavior involved for a sufficiently long
period of time to prove that they have really
changed. Lee says that just because Clinton
claims to have repented does not mean he
really has. He also says that Clinton cannot be
trusted because of the way he was forced to
tell the truth about his affair with Lewinsky.
"If he'll only tell us the truth under extreme
duress, what's going to happen next time?
What happens if he's got to send our boys to
war? And so the power to lead is also the
power to mislead. He's violated the
expectation," said Lee.
Lee says that when Clinton admitted to the
country that he had an affair with Lewinsky in
his televised address on Aug. 17, he did so
only because he was forced by the
circumstances. In subsequent responses to
reporters, and in a recent prayer breakfast
presentation, Lee says that Clinton became
more and more apologetic out of necessity --
not out of sincerity. After expressing his most
sincere apology for his actions to date, Clinton
also told the room full of clergy that he had
instructed his attorneys to fight hard for him.
If he could speak to Clinton today Lee would
say: "I expected you to say with this big
announcement, 'The country is going to be
better off without my leadership. I will step
down. I care that much.' That wasn't said. That
was left hanging like the Lewinsky apology
was left hanging on August 17."
If Clinton is really sorry for his actions and
wants to repent, then he should not also fight
the charges tooth and nail, according to Lee.
The inconsistency disappointed him, and he
said he believes most Americans are also
disappointed in the double standard.
"Which one is our president? The contrite
one? The one who's sincerely apologetic ? Or
the one who's going to use whatever political
processes are at his disposal to make sure he
maintains his position? Are you doing this
because of force of circumstance, or are you
apologizing because of force of conscience,"
asked Lee rhetorically.
Clinton shows all the signs of someone who's
addicted to power. Lee also says that power
for people like Clinton becomes an
aphrodisiac. His hunger for power and his
fear that he may lose it have become the
dominating force in his life.
Clinton is not using the principles of power
taught by Lee and Covey in their training
program. Clinton exerts power and controls
people through fear, intimidation,
manipulation, and lies. He also humiliates
and demeans people to maintain superiority
over them, thereby giving himself a kind of
high.
The courses presented by Franklin-Covey
Company to Clinton and thousands of
government employees as well as executives
in the commercial marketplace are based on
what they call "principle centered power."
Something Lee says Clinton does not follow.
"There's a completely different path to
power," explained Lee. "It's like, I don't have
to control you. It's, I have something to offer
you. Hey, do my windows and I'll pay you
$20. We dicker, we bargain, we make some
kind of compromise and you and I end up
with a deal.
"Principle-centered power is when we respect
and honor someone so much that they
understand us well enough. They deal
honorably with us and we want what they
want. They don't have to stand over us, and
they don't have to threaten us. They don't
have to offer us anything because they are
overlapping the legitimate needs of the
organization, or the country, or our family
with our legitimate needs. A win for them is a
win for us."
Lee is also concerned that Clinton has lost
respect among political leaders and leaders of
other countries. He says it will be difficult or
even impossible for Clinton to be an effective
leader because of his loss of trust where it is
needed most.
"He won't have the moral authority in the
marketplace that he's supposed to have as the
President of the United States," said Lee.
"If it's really true that he was in the office with
her (Lewinsky) while some dignitary was
waiting down the hall, I mean that's like the
height of arrogance. That 'I can do this. I'm the
master of the universe.' It's a very heady thing,
and that is a core symptom of almost all of the
addictions and compulsive behavior patterns.
That there's a belief in the moment that, 'I can
do this and I can get away with this because
I'm president of the United States. I'm
accountable to no one, and if I can do it, it's
okay. If I can get away with it, it's OK. If I get
caught I have to misrepresent, because the
worst thing is not telling Monica or the people
that I've done something wrong, it's all of a
sudden having that power to do what I want
diminished in any way.' I think that he's
fought tooth and nail to keep that. It's been an
eight-month battle to keep that power. He's
using everything in his existence to say, 'See, I
got away with it.'"
The only thing Clinton can do to begin to
restore his credibility is to resign from office
rather than continue the attitude that no one is
as good as he is at running the country. Lee
says Clinton must be willing to "fall on the
sword."
Whatever happens, it is unlikely that Lee or
Covey will accept an invitation to teach
Clinton their management methods again any
time soon. Lee is doing the only thing he says
he can now do that may help Clinton
"Personally, I'm praying for the man. I think
he needs a lot," he said. |
