The Brilliance of Subtle Strong Leadership

Cynthia Artin
Aug 28, 2017 · 1 min read

Over the last twenty years, I’ve worked for the Leonard Berstein of corporate leadership. His vision — extradorinary. His work ethic — unmatched. His inspiration — endless.

Not everyone is as fortunate as me. Not everyone gets to “ride the pipe” and surf the surging oceans of disruption with so agile a surfer.

We were born to surf, born to lead, born to follow. I was born to share the vision, through words, of this surfer who just so happens to see the rising and falling crests of future seas.

When my husband, Tom, a world-traveling jazz musician, writer, photographer and sheerly genius observer of the human condition shared this experience of Leonard Bernstien conducting Haydn’s Symphony 88, 4th movement, a lightbulb lit up over my head.

Some are born hearing and seeing music.

Some, the genius, need not wave their arms and conduct ferociously, try to control the musicians, the orchestra, rather…

Rehearse the players, guide them, help them also hear and see a common song, and then…

And then, glance, smile, appreciate, and lift up the sheer talent around them — signaling “yes that is what I heard too.”

Or “yes that is even more beautiful than what I heard.”

There’s a symphony in our future, and it may just be that the corporate leaders who make decisions, their investors who support those decisions, are best served by those who see and hear the best in all of us, abandoning the broken mechanisms of politics and profits, and lead with subtle strength.

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