On Monday, September 28, I had the opportunity to hear George W. Bush speak as part of the John Maxwell Masterclass. I’ve been part of this group all year and I’ve made a habit of sharing what I learn with all of you, but this session left me with something I didn’t expect, which was a complete shift in how I saw a man I thought I already understood.
I was 21 years old during the 2000 election and I remember how divided everything felt between Bush and Al Gore (looking back, it seems almost tame compared to what we see today). I was a hard-core Democrat and I genuinely worried about what a Republican administration would mean for our country. I’ve since learned that this country is much bigger than the parties we attach ourselves to, but the image I had of him stayed with me for years. The media portrayed him as someone who wasn’t very bright, poked fun at his made-up words and rarely let up.
And yet he was the person who carried our country through one of its darkest moments. I was in New York City on 9/11 and I watched the cloud of ash move toward us, so I know in my bones what New Yorkers felt that day. I knew he had surrounded himself with smart people like Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice, but somewhere along the way I had decided that he wasn’t the smart one in the room. What I didn’t appreciate back then is that a great leader is smart enough to surround himself with people who are smarter than he is and humble enough to let them lead alongside him.
John opened the interview by asking him whether leadership is lonely and Bush answered no without any hesitation, because he had surrounded himself with wonderful people who made him better. It reminded me of something my Sunster always says, that you have to find your “who’s,” the people who help you get where you’re going and hold you up along the way.
His humility came through from that very first answer and it quickly became clear that no one was going to control this interview. He was a firecracker (John had his questions ready, but Bush had other plans) and the only thing to do was embrace the aura that was George W. Bush and ride the wave with him. He was funny, he laughed at himself easily and he had a warmth that filled the room. He told us that humility is the most important quality a president, or any leader, can have and the way he explained it made so much sense to me. The higher you rise, the more intentional you have to be about listening to people and showing them you value them, because if the people around you can’t tell you what you need to hear, they can never help you.
When John asked him what he was most proud of when he left the White House, he gave two answers. The first was that he never lied, cheated, or stole and the second was that his family came out stronger than when they went in. I sat there thinking about how rarely I hear a leader measure success by integrity and family and how much those two answers told me about the kind of man he is.
He also talked about the culture inside the White House and they joked about having the lowest turnover of any recent administration, but the detail that stayed with me was about punctuality. He was the president of the United States and if he showed up ten minutes late, who was going to say anything? He never did, because being on time was how he showed people he respected them. Culture that outlasts you gets built in exactly those small moments and the same goes for purpose. He spoke about giving his team something bigger than any one person to work toward, like the decision to support the fight against AIDS in Africa and how that shared purpose gave people a reason to pull together.
Then he spoke candidly about his approval ratings and how the right decision often wasn’t the popular one. After 9/11, the country needed to see strength and steadiness from him and he understood that when people are afraid, they look to their leader to stay calm. Approval rises and falls with the headlines, so the only decision worth making is the one you can still stand behind once the applause is gone.
We weren’t allowed to take pictures or notes, so everything I’ve shared comes from memory and I wish I could fully capture the feeling of seeing such a public figure as simply a man who loves his family and loves his country. That hour gave me insight into who he is and a newfound respect for him, because it humanized someone I had only ever known through the headlines. It also reminded me of what makes a good leader, which is being smart enough to fill your room with the right people, even when that means you’re no longer the smartest one sitting in it.
