The Seven Liberal Arts Habits of Highly Effective Leaders

Lawrence Today magazine, Fall 2002

As befits a mathematics major, Harry Jansen Kraemer, '77, chairman and CEO of Baxter International, has a highly organized and conveniently numerical way of thinking about how the liberal arts values he perceives in Lawrence and similar institutions translate directly into leadership in the business world.

These form a thoughtful, and rather catchy, summary of the basic argument for the liberal arts in business. As such, they should be carefully studied and committed to memory by all Lawrentians, whether they are defending the honor of their degree in a job interview or a barroom debate.

"A lot of what I've been able to accomplish goes directly back to what I was exposed to at Lawrence," says Kraemer. "The values and the philosophy around the liberal arts have played a very significant part in my life. It was apparent to me early on in my career that what I think of as the key attributes, the key skill sets in business, are basic to a liberal arts education, and all of them were implicit in the Lawrence environment."

Here are Kraemer's seven habits, in his words:

Living and working by values: Establishing a strong set of values may be the most important thing Lawrence stresses and accomplishes, and it's probably the most important asset to bring to your career.
Getting the right people in the right jobs: Building, retaining, and growing a team is absolutely critical to success. I think you develop a lot of that ability through the liberal arts, in the form of an ability to work with people, share opinions, openly debate, construct your views, and learn respect for the other person.
Setting a clear direction: This is about thinking clearly, finding the essence of what you're trying to accomplish, and communicating it clearly. At Baxter we try to keep it simple so we don't get too complicated and confuse people. We're not speaking MBA-speak, just letting our 48,000 team members know as clearly as possible what we're trying to accomplish together.
Communicating effectively: I probably spend 40 percent of my time in talent management and people issues and 40 percent on communication. And this is pure liberal arts preparation. I remember 20 years ago, being in a cube and hearing announcements and thinking, 'I'm not sure what this person is trying to say, but if [Professor Mark] Dintenfass or some of those guys got hold of this thing, this poor guy would be locked up.' You have to be able to express yourself in order to lead.
Motivating people: This derives from #3 and #4: letting people know what the goal is, communicating it effectively, helping them understand their role, and bringing it together in a way that makes people care about it. That comes back to the way the liberal arts help you to see the big picture and synthesize its different parts.
Executing the Plan: This has to do with understanding how to get things done and, most importantly, actually doing them, and doing them well. It's great to think big thoughts, but they're nothing till you make them actually happen. The high standards of a place like Lawrence, which makes you do a lot of work and pushes you to do it well, prepare you for this. It's about the idea and making it real.
Measure, Assess, and Reassess: You plan, you implement, you learn something. What did you learn? Maybe that we were going in the wrong direction, we were doing the wrong thing. That's fine. But then we're going to change. We're going to loop back. We're going to make sure that the values are in synch, that we've got the right people in the right places, that our vision is clear and that it's been communicated clearly, that we motivate people to do the right thing, and that we execute. Then we assess and reassess, and do it all over again.

"Notice," says Kraemer, "that I haven't talked about any detailed business stuff. The reality is, this is all liberal arts stuff. Eventually you're going to need specific, focused technical skills, but you need to lay that on a base of good general learning and strong humanistic values. And the best way to build that base, I think, is at a place like Lawrence."

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