This week, I happend to see the wonderful PBS three-part documentary about the career of Secretary of State, George Schultz. Besides serving as a professor at MIT, dean of the University of Chicago Business School, and Secretary of Labor, Treasury and State, historians are likely to report that Mr. Schultz was the most effective statesman of our time.
When asked about lessons learned, George Schultz flatly stated: “It all begins with ideas. Without them you get lost.”
True, he was a Republican because he believed in limited government and free markets. But he also believed that once in government the aim is not partisian success, but rather to simply find the best ideas that will help solve complicated problems.
As I struggled to understand how to transform institutions, I found myself pleading with my colleagues to back away from immediately jumping into tactics and try to see what we do first as “a way of thinking.” Over time I came to see my work as an “adventure in ideas,” and a personal search for the best ones.
It’s the best ideas that shape the big picture and inform the selection of the most effective tactics. In fact, for me that is what justifies the description “professional.”
It’s not difficult to think up new “stuff” to do. Anyone can do that. How many times has someone come to you with a tactic they want you to implement, but that you know will just not work? What makes us professionals is the experience and analytical tools that we bring to the selection of the best set of tactics for each situation and market segment.
Indeed, it all begins with ideas. Without them, you get lost!
Larry D. Lauer 
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