The 23rd Infantry Division (Americal), where I served in Vietnam for a short time as operations officer, was commanded by a wonderful soldier, Major General Charles M. Gettys. I learned a great deal from General Gettys. He was a calm, confident commander, not given to outbursts or showing off his rank. He placed great confidence in his staff, but there was no question who was in charge.
He and I were casually chatting one day when the name of another general came up. He was a highly regarded officer, but Gettys had reservations about him. “Colin, he’s a good guy,” he told me, “but he is one of those ‘busy bastards.’ He always has to be doing things and coming up with new ideas and working absurd hours.”
Gettys’s wisdom has stayed with me, and I have tried to learn from it. He pointed out back then (maybe intentionally) a road I was inclined to travel. I’ve always done my best to come up with new ideas, and I certainly worked hard in all my jobs. But I have tried not to be a busy bastard. As President Reagan used to frequently observe, “They say hard work never killed anyone, but why take a chance?”
I’ve seen many busy bastards over the years . . . I shouldn’t call them bastards, but Gettys’s words have burned into my brain. Most of them are good people, not bastards. They just can’t ever let it go.
A busy bastard never leaves the office until late at night. He has to go in on weekends. He shows up in the morning at hours suitable only for TV traffic announcers, failing to recognize that a couple dozen staff people have to show up at the same time to make sure he gets the support he can’t do without and to prove they’re as committed to the job as he is.
In every senior job I’ve had I’ve tried to create an environment of professionalism and the very highest standards. When it was necessary to get a job done, I expected my subordinates to work around the clock. When that was not necessary, I wanted them to work normal hours, go home at a decent time, play with the kids, enjoy family and friends, read a novel, clear their heads, daydream, and refresh themselves. I wanted them to have a life outside the office. I am paying them for the quality of their work, not for the hours they work. That kind of environment has always produced the best results for me.
I tried to practice what I preached. I enjoy fixing things, especially old cars, and especially old Volvos. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff lives across the river from Washington in a mansion in Fort Myer on a hill overlooking the city. A hundred feet behind the mansion were three garages. When I was Chairman, the garages were always filled with dead circa-1960 Volvos waiting to be fixed or stripped for parts. People who really needed to see me on weekends knew where to find me . . . under a Volvo. If they wanted to visit or chat, I didn’t mind, as long as I could continue working. I enjoyed analyzing a dead engine to discover why it wouldn’t start, reducing the possibilities for the failure down to one, fixing it, and then rejoicing when the engine fired up. My office problems seldom lent themselves to such straightforward, linear analysis. Once a car was running, I had no further interest in it. I would buy a ninety-nine-dollar Earl Scheib paint job and sell it as fast as possible. I was under a Volvo one Sunday in 1989 during our invasion of Panama when the Operations Center called to tell me we had picked up the dictator Manuel Noriega.
While I was making the transition to Secretary of State, I interviewed a number of candidates for senior positions. Toward the end of one of these interviews, an extremely able and gifted Foreign Service officer asked if I would mind if he went out to jog in the afternoons.
“You can go home and jog as far as I’m concerned,” I told him. “I trust you to know how to get your work done without me maintaining a sign-out sheet on you.”
The very fact that a senior officer would ask such a question pointed out how necessary it was to demonstrate to my staff that I wasn’t a busy bastard.
My mentor in this style of operating was Frank Carlucci. When the Reagan administration took office in 1981, Frank was appointed Deputy Secretary of Defense; and I became his military assistant. Because Frank always tried to leave the office at a reasonable hour and avoided the place like a plague on weekends, I worked reasonable hours and so did everyone else on his staff. We ran a very efficient office.
In the spring of 1981, I persuaded Frank to release me for a field assignment. The officer who replaced me, a compulsive worker, stayed late every night. Even though Frank only rarely came in on weekends, and never for more than a couple of hours, his new military assistant felt he had to be there. Sure enough, all those extra hours generated more work for the entire staff. The workload expanded to fill the time. Most of it was make-work, anything but necessary or important. Frank found himself with additional paper he didn’t ask for, need, or expect. He had to start working longer hours!
In late 1986, in the aftermath of the Iran-Contra scandal, Frank became President Reagan’s National Security Advisor and I became Frank’s deputy. Our task was to reorganize the national security system and fix the deficiencies that had caused the scandal. Even during this stressful, demanding time, with a presidency at risk, Frank maintained his long-standing work habits. One of my responsibilities as his deputy was to keep an eye on him to make sure he didn’t have to work late. I didn’t have to worry. Left to his own devices, with no crisis pending, he would leave at 3 p.m., play tennis, and go home. He worked hard, was incredibly well organized, and got the work done. The staff followed Frank’s lead.
By the time I had reached my most senior positions, I never went to the office on weekends unless a war had just started or some other crisis demanded my presence. On Fridays, I left the office with tons of work; I was far more efficient in the quiet privacy of my home. I expected my staff to do likewise. If you have a reason to go in, then go in, but never think that going in just for the sake of going in impresses me.
President Reagan was a joy in this regard. He didn’t need encouragement to keep reasonable work hours. When Frank Carlucci became Secretary of Defense, I took over as National Security Advisor. As I’d done earlier with Frank, one of my jobs was to watch the President’s schedule to make sure we didn’t keep him late. Toward the end of the day, we gave him a homework package. He was normally upstairs in the residence with Mrs. Reagan by six o’clock. Friday afternoons were even better. Right after lunch, he usually got an end-of-the-week briefing from Secretary of State George Shultz. Reagan would listen patiently but with limited attention. Around 2:15, when he heard the drone of Marine One descending onto the South Lawn, he’d perk up. It was time to leave for Camp David! He’d arrive there by 3 p.m., and short of an emergency, stay until Sunday evening. Seldom were guests invited to Camp David. The President relaxed, read staff papers and books, and spent time with Mrs. Reagan. This was their time. And, hallelujah, it was our time to get caught up, spend time with our families, and rest up and get ready for the demanding week ahead. The nation was safe without the President whizzing all over the place on weekends. Our only concern was the books he was reading. Despite our best efforts, old friends would now and again slip seriously odd books into his briefcase, generating often unanswerable questions Monday morning. One Monday, the President came in brimming over with curiosity about how trees create pollution.
Reagan loved relaxing at his ranch in the Santa Ynez Mountains just outside Santa Barbara, California. We loved it even more. We were condemned to camp out in fancy cabana suites on the beach at the beautiful Santa Barbara Biltmore hotel. Twice a day the senior staff assembled to see what we needed to tell him. We’d telephone up to the ranch and brief him, and we’d send up intelligence, situation reports, and papers for him to work on. If no crises were looming, we could quietly take care of business and prepare for the challenges ahead or split for the pool or the beach, making sure we could monitor everything in case of an emergency. It was rare for anyone to have to brief him at the ranch. I went up just once, to brief him on a treaty we had just concluded with the Russians to reduce our nuclear weapons inventories.
I worked hard all my life and always expected those who worked for me to do likewise. But I tried not to generate make-work. I learned early that a complete life includes more than work. We need family, rest, outside interests, and time to pursue them. I always keep in mind a lesson taught to all young infantry lieutenants: “Don’t run if you can walk; don’t stand up if you can sit down; don’t sit down if you can lie down; and don’t stay awake if you can go to sleep.”