9/19/2015

Notations For the Week-End: On the United States




The US elections season is in full force and all have been quite busy.    Our team had decided to withhold daily commentary on it and to provide a monthly "Notation" on it especially as we are witnessing a very busy October with a new Republican Debate before is and the First Democratic Debate as well.    It will be interesting who will be left standing as the Republicans continue their debate.

Our team saw this interesting  asssessment done by the Fortune's Geoff Colvin as he reflected upon the "day after" of the GOP Debate--with a focus on "Performance": 

Fortune Power Sheet By Geoff Colvin.
Daily insights on leaders and leadership
By Geoff Colvin










September 17, 2015
If you had just landed from Mars last night at 8 pm EDT, having never heard of the Republican candidates or seen a polling number – if all you had to go on was what you saw in the debate on TV – whom would you have picked as the leaders?
You probably would have picked Donald Trump simply because of the attention all the others paid to him, plus the amount of talking he did, which was more than anyone else. And then you likely would have picked Carly Fiorina for her polished, presidential demeanor and command of policy issues, and Jeb Bush, who also talked a lot, spoke well about policy, and pushed back effectively against Trump’s bluster.
But I suspect you never would have guessed Ben Carson, who was hesitant, uncertain, and practically invisible in the early going. He got warmed up and asserted himself better as the interminable evening wore on, but he alone refused to attack Trump even when presented with obvious opportunities. And yet in all the polls – in Iowa, New Hampshire, and nationwide – Carson is the only candidate ranking anywhere near Trump in popularity.
A conundrum of this race, and a lesson for leaders everywhere, is that the two most successful candidates so far are the loudest one and the quietest one. That fact tells us a few things:
-There is no superior leadership style or any definable leadership personality. Style and personality are not what make a leader.
-Authenticity always comes through. As different as Trump and Carson are, they’re both real, and voters can sense it. They can also tell instantly, and generally dismiss, who’s delivering rehearsed, focus-group-tested talking points.
-Differentiation is key. Marketers will tell you that the most important factors in brand power are differentiation and relevance. Trump and Carson are in many ways at opposite ends of a spectrum, and much of their strength comes from being at the ends, not in the middle.
Other observations: Most of the commentary this morning focuses on Fiorina, and rightly so – she performed excellently and will certainly rise in the polls. It remains to be seen whether her record as CEO of Hewlett-Packard will become an issue. She and Trump sniped at each other over this until Chris Christie shut them down by calling their spat “childish” and irrelevant to the voters. He did Fiorina a favor by changing the subject because she was indeed a disastrous CEO. As she now gets more attention, we’ll see if anyone really cares.
Christie was hugely improved over the previous debate. But he still isn’t sufficiently differentiated.
Bush’s performance was once again a snooze until he went after Trump for bringing Bush’s wife into the debate. Then he became authentic and energized. A continuing problem is that he keeps talking about the importance of optimism, and it falls flat. He might heed some advice often given to writers: Don’t tell me, show me. That is, don’t talk about optimism. Be optimistic.


  
In the meantime, though, the business of governing continues.    The United States Justice Department just settled with GM over the ignition switch debacle.    It also went after VW forcing VW to recall 500,000 cars.    This is just some of the key headlines as the daily affairs of the people continue onward which we look forward to noting and reflecting upon.   This is as  we went to press for this edition of "notations", we were seeing reports of Iran having released some key Al Qaeda figures in exchange for a kidnaped diplomat.     It was also of note how The US-Russia dialogue seems to be gathering pace anew as Russia has made a major commitment to support Bashar Al Assad.    

There is also another very interesting event before us:  The arrival of Pope Francis.   It has meant the launch of the biggest domestic security operation in the US.   He is arriving on September 22 and it will be quite an event to be witness to.   It will include declaring the founder of the California Missions, Junipero Serra, A Saint.

We wanted to end this edition of "notations" with this from the Clinton Campaign.   It was just funny--we hope all agree: 

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