Hillary's Success As SoS Depends On The Appointment Of A Good Manager As Deputy

[Median Democrat]

Hillary brings a lot of prestige and intellect to the position of Secretary of State. However, as this article notes, Hillary's management skills are not reassuring. The most prominent issue, as noted in the Atlantic article regarding the inside operations of her campaign, is that she did not keep her surrogates and staff on the same page with Patti Solis Doyle, Mark Penn and Harold Ickles all going to war with each other in a tri-partite conflict in which Hillary expressed frustration with the conflict, but did not actively resolve it (the Atlantic article notes during one contentious phone call, Hillary just hung up the phone).

I think Hillary can be effective IF she has a Deputy who will focus on the day to day management that Hillary and Obama can trust. Hillary is at her best when she is focusing on big themes and the big picture, but I don't see her as a person who can actively mediate warring factions with her staff. Indeed, I think Hillary likes high achievers with huge egos (Ickles and Penn), which tends to increase the level of conflict in her staff.

So, Hillary and Obama need to resist the urge to appoint another foreign policy big name who would be somewhat redundant of Hillary, and choose a relative ego-free bureacrat who is willing to quietly focus on the management of the State Department while Hillary focuses on the Big Picture, and dealing with major foreign policy issues.

Just because Hillary is brilliant, and I do think she is brilliant, does not make her a good manager, and I frankly think she is drawn to the high achieving big ego types, which is what doomed her campaign. Hillary needs a no-non-sense bureacrat to run the State Department. Richard Holbrooke is not that person. Let Holbrooke be an adviser, but don't give him the day to day management.

This Newsweek article and the Atlantic article on Hillary's campaign illustrate Hillary's strengths and weaknesses. Hopefully, Hillary has learned and goes for boring, but effective as a Deputy.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/171569