Remembering Ben Bradlee’s leadership

(9/11/95) Ben Bradlee, in his office, on the eve of the release of his book of memoirs. Photo by Bill O'Leary/TWP.

I remember it as if it were yesterday, being ushered into the great Ben Bradlee’s glass-walled office in The Washington Post’s giant newsroom. It was the fall of 1987 and I was an editor at Inc. magazine and a long shot candidate to be the deputy business editor of the Post. Most of the other senior editors had pretty much decided I wasn’t ready for prime time (not enough newspaper experience).

In those days, business news was something of an after-thought at The Post, where many editors — including Ben — viewed it as arcane and peripheral. So when I made my pitch that the way to make business interesting and exciting was to cover it the way we do sports, most of them looked at me like I was nuts.

Ben, however, got it right away. And what he really liked was my willingness to stick with the idea despite the wall of skepticism I had encountered. He had also checked me out with his old pal, Tom Winship, the editor of the Boston Globe. We told each other a few Winship stories, reminisced about the North Shore of Massachusetts where he was born and I was then living. And that was it. With the managing editor looking on skeptically, Ben asked me when I could start. As he might have put it, he just liked the cut of my jib.

By today’s standards, Ben was a lousy manager but a great leader. He trusted his gut on the big things, didn’t bother with the little ones and wouldn’t spend a lot of time second-guessing himself on either. Strategic planning was anathema to him, as were rules and budget meetings and personnel evaluations. For him it was all about hard work, ambition, passion and what he would have called, in his roguishly sexist way, balls.

As someone who exuded it, Ben also gave extra points for style. He was fiercely loyal to those he considered part of his team, and he expected loyalty in return. Faced with a choice or a problem, the first thing he wanted to know was what you thought ought to be done.

Back in the early days of the Post’s Web site, editor Jim Brady asked me if I’d be willing to organize a new feature — what today we call a "vertical" — on the topic of leadership. Ben’s wife, Sally Quinn, had started one focused on faith and religion. And so began On Leadership. Who better, I thought, to put on the masthead with me than the best leader I knew, Ben Bradlee. By then, Ben had kicked himself upstairs and spent much of the day gossiping with old friends and doing crossword puzzles, but he eagerly lent his reputation to the effort. He also appreciated the irony of his online role, since he had never really mastered the computer.

In at least one respect he was useless — I was never able to tease out of him any philosophy or theory of leadership. Still, whenever I was stumped coming up with someone to comment about the latest Washington crisis or controversy, Ben was ready to brainstorm or pick up the phone (with help from his irreplaceable secretary, Carol Leggett) to enlist a new contributor. Unlike the rest of us mortals, he never had trouble getting through.

The fact is that very few people could say no to Ben. The real secret to his leadership style, the way he was able to get you to do what he wanted you to do, was that he was a master of flattery. When you were talking to Ben, he made you feel as if you were the most important person in the room or in the conversation. Even though you knew otherwise.

(Steven Pearlstein and Ben Bradlee | Photo by The Washington Post)

Steven Pearlstein is a business and economics columnist for The Washington Post and founding editor of the On Leadership section. He is also a professor of public and international affairs at George Mason University.

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