Changes

by Eduardo del buey

Changes

“Change your opinions, keep to your principles; change your leaves, keep intact your roots”.

Victor Hugo

A fundamental quality of an effective leader is the ability to learn. One of the results of learning is to gain new information and insight and, when it makes sense, change one’s perspective.

Changing one’s point of view doesn’t mean abandoning one’s values.

If one’s values include using the best available information at the time of acting, one is respecting their fundamental values. If new information comes in, changing one’s opinion is congruent with one’s fundamental values.

In her recent pre-recorded interview on CNN, Vice-President Kamala Harris addressed her shifting positions since her 2019 run for president, telling interviewer Dana Bash that “my values have not changed” even as the policy specifics had.

Pressed on her prior calls for a fracking ban, she promised that she would now not block the practice. She told Bash that she had been convinced by the new scientific information that she had absorbed after almost four years in the White House.

This was a good answer to a “gotcha” question, and it demonstrated Harris’ commitment to learn and apply new knowledge to critical decisions. This even if it means making a 180º turn from her previous position.

Four years in the White House taught her many things and made her views evolve with the facts that she learned.

This is something a good leader must do to ensure that decisions are based on the best available information and make sense to the voters.

In 1984, Brian Mulroney was elected Prime Minister of Canada on a platform that he would never pursue free trade with the United States. Yet, a report by the previous Finance Minister was issued that demonstrated the advantages of such an agreement between both countries.

Based on this and other studies, he changed course and began negotiations with the Reagan administrations that led to the bilateral free trade agreement in 1988.

He fought an election in 1988 on this issue and was rewarded with a second majority government.

In 1992, Mulroney, President Bush and Mexican President Salinas de Gortari negotiated the North American Free Trade Agreement. It was to come into force on January 1, 1994.

In the U.S. presidential election campaign that year Democratic candidate Bill Clinton campaigned against it. In the Canadian federal election of 1993, Jean Chretien also ran against it.

Yet, when elected, and both leaders saw the evidence, they too accepted NAFTA, albeit with two small addenda on labor relations and environmental issues to address voters’ concerns.

Time does not stand still.

What may be true at one moment can change as time moves on and new facts appear.

Change can sometimes appear frightening and can lead many to resist.

New strategies must be adopted to meet new challenges.

Vice President Harris’ response demonstrated true maturity and intelligence. It underscored her commitment to constant learning and the courage to admit that previous positions were no longer valid in the face of new information.

Albert Einstein once observed that the measure of intelligence is the ability to change.

Sometimes ideas must fall apart so they can come back together in a better way.

Progress is impossible without change, and the wise leader is someone who embraces this idea.

Republicans are criticizing the Vice President for changing her position.

But changing a transitory idea is not discarding your values.

If your fundamental value is to grow through knowledge, then you remain true to your values if you accept new possibilities that arise from new information.

The first step towards change is awareness.

The second step is acceptance.

And the third is action – movement away from the old shibboleth and towards the new reality.

And this is an essential component of leadership.