New Leadership at Microsoft

With the selection of Satya Nadella as its CEO in February 2014, Microsoft signaled a departure from the loudness of Steve Ballmer and a return to someone more like Bill Gates in his skill set and approach to management. Nadella is very competent technically and managerially and has demonstrated this over the years at Microsoft as he has successfully led change initiatives, most recently at the Cloud and Enterprise group. People report that he has done so by asking questions, listening, and engaging and energizing participants in ways that allow them to get out of their comfort zone and succeed. Those who have worked with him say he is honest, inclusive, authentic, and caring—generating success by thoughtfully nurturing the involvement and commitment of those around him.28

Whenever we, the authors, work with groups of university students, or managers and executives who are attempting organizational change, we caution them not to assume that their perspectives are held by all. They often fail to understand the impact of their own biases, perspectives, and needs and how they differ from those of others involved in a change initiative. They believe that they understand the situation and know what must change; this attitude can create significant barriers to accomplishing the change objectives. The strength of their concerns combined with their lack of self- awareness creates blind spots and causes them to block out dissenting perspectives. When change leaders talk to stakeholders, they may receive polite responses and assume that this implies a commitment to action. Statements such as “That’s an interesting assessment” are taken as support rather than as neutral comments. Change leaders’ inability to read subtle cues or misinterpret legitimate concerns as resistance, rather than thoughtful feedback, leads them astray.

In an extreme attempt to protect himself and his followers from his personal shortcomings and cult- like reputation, Nehru, one of the founding fathers of modern, independent India, used an alias when he wrote the following about himself in a prominent publication in 1937. The backdrop was the struggle for independence from Britain, which was achieved 11 years later.

What lies behind that mask of his, what desires, what will to power, what insatiate longings? Men like (Nehru) with all their capacity for great work, are unsafe in democracy . . . every psychologist knows that the mind is ultimately a slave to the heart and logic can always be made to fit in with the desires and irrepressible urges of a person. . . . (Nehru’s) conceit is already formidable. It must be checked. We want no Caesars.