Joseph

Joseph's Guide to Managerial Success

Recently a number of books have been published about techniques for success in the business world, using historical characters as role models-for example, Queen Elizabeth I, Niccolo Machiavelli, Attila the Hun, and Gen. George Patton. I believe that Joseph, as described in the latter parts of Genesis, can fruitfully be regarded as a role model of this kind, and we can learn to be effective managers by following his example.

The first business lesson we learn from Joseph is When you're applying for a job, the most important thing to show is your proven ability to do the job. This may consist of either a good track record or a demonstration of high-quality work. This is much more important than your educational credentials or your collection of recommendation letters. Observe how Joseph gets his job as Pharaoh's right-hand man. He gets it partly because of his proven track record of having correctly interpreted the dreams of the chief butler and chief baker. But, most important, he gets the job because of a live demonstration of his ability to interpret Pharaoh's dream.

Note that the recommendation of the chief butler is not as important as the demonstration of ability. As Rashi (12th century French Rabbi Shlomo Yitzhaqi)) notes, the butler's recommendation is what we might call a mixed message, because he uses derogatory language in his first reference to Joseph (41:12). He calls Joseph, in effect, "this Hebrew slave kid."

It is also worth noting-and young people should especially pay attention to this--that for a job interview it is important to be dressed and groomed appropriately. It is written of Joseph (41:14) that even though they bring him "hastily out of the dungeon," he shaves and puts on nice clothing before he goes to see Pharaoh.

Now let's look at Joseph's demonstration of his skill--I'm referring to his interpretation of Pharaoh's dream. The main lesson for management that we learn from this is that what you hear is just as important as what you say. In other words, good listening skills are crucial to success in the business world. There is a midrash about the failed dream interpretations of Pharaoh's magicians that says that they interpret one dream as meaning that Pharaoh will have seven daughters born and will have seven daughters die, and the other dream as meaning that Pharaoh will conquer seven provinces and will lose seven provinces. Joseph's breakthrough, which he notes twice for emphasis, is that the two dreams are one and the same (41:25-26). What Joseph has that the magicians lack is good listening skills, because if you look carefully at what Pharaoh tells Joseph, you'll see that he says, "I have had a dream [singular], but nobody can interpret it."

Another lesson we learn from this scene is that the best way to get hired is to create the need for a job that matches your skills. Before Pharaoh's interview with Joseph, Pharaoh doesn't know he needs a viceroy to manage Egypt for him. But as part of his interpretation of the dream, Joseph says (41:33), "And now let Pharaoh look for a discerning and wise man, and set him over the land of Egypt." Thus he creates a job for himself.

One of the important managerial qualities that Joseph demonstrates in this scene is the ability to combine foresight with a plan for action. He not only predicts the seven fat years and seven lean years, but he proposes a plan for storing grain during the time of plenty so that Egypt will not starve during the time of famine. Joseph himself identifies the qualities a manager must have to be capable of both prediction and planning: he says the man appointed by Pharaoh should be both discerning (navon) and wise (chacham) (41:33). Immediately afterward Pharaoh recognizes Joseph's mastery of these skills and says (41:39), "There is none so discerning and wise as you."

This dichotomy between discernment and wisdom is an interesting way of classifying important cognitive skills that have been identified by job analysts in our own times. The group of skills called discernment consists of abilities to gather, synthesize, and reorganize information, reason inductively and deductively, perceive patterns, identify and understand complex problems, and recognize cause and effect relationships. The group of skills called wisdom consists of abilities to visualize, generate and evaluate ideas, appraise solutions, plan implementation, identify downstream consequences, analyze and monitor operations, and manage time and resources. Or, to put it in simple terms, having discernment and wisdom means having both theoretical and practical skills; the combination of both of these is essential for successful management.

In books about management, much has been written about the relative merits of the big-picture manager who delegates authority (as an example I might cite George W. Bush), versus the micromanager who monitors all of the important tasks (as an example I might cite Al Gore). From the example of Joseph, we see that a good manager needs to combine some aspects of both of these archetypes.

Note that Joseph suggests creating a structure in which authority can be delegated. After proposing that Pharaoh install a viceroy, he adds (41:34), "Let Pharaoh...appoint overseers over the land" to manage the actual task of gathering. It is interesting that he asks Pharaoh to appoint these overseers rather than taking on this task himself. Rabbi Obadiah ben Jacob Sforno (Italian, d. 1550) observes that this strategy ensures that the overseers for each city will recognize Joseph's authority and thus will work under him as a unified team. As a newcomer to high office Joseph realizes he does not have any authority in the eyes of the people. No doubt he also realizes that he does not know the movers and shakers in the various cities of Egypt and thus is not able to choose appropriate overseers wisely.

He suggests that the grain be gathered "under the hand of Pharaoh" (41:35), which Rashi notes means that it will be put into government-administered storehouses, but it does not mean that Pharaoh or even Joseph himself will participate directly in managing matters of grain acquisition, transportation, storage, freshness monitoring, or rodent control.

However, Joseph does choose to micromanage one aspect of the program: when it is time to sell grain, he handles money matters directly. Nachmanides (13th century Catalan Rabbi Moshe ben Nahman Gerondi) explains that this is why Joseph, rather than an underling, comes face to face with his brothers when they come to buy grain. Apparently the reason Joseph personally manages this function is that he does not trust his staff to handle large sums of money. Note that later (47:14) it is written, "And Joseph brought the money into Pharaoh's house." Knowing the general level of Egyptian morality, I would judge this a wise course of action.

The dual nature of Joseph's managerial strategy is summarized when Joseph's brothers come to buy grain, and it is written (42:6), "And Joseph, he was the governor (hashalit) over the land; he was the seller (hamashbir) to all the people of the land." No doubt in other managerial situations certain functions besides money will need to be micromanaged, but the important lesson to take away is that good managers don't deal exclusively with the big picture or exclusively with the details; they make a point of knowing which details need personal attention and which can be delegated.

The last half of this parsha presents difficulties for those who would extract lessons about management because it involves an elaborate deception. It is important to remember that the deception does not stem from Joseph's managerial role, but rather from his relationship with his brothers. Therefore we should not conclude that deception is a good managerial strategy.

On the other hand, the deception can be useful for understanding Joseph's managerial role, because as long as Joseph conceals his identity from his brothers, he has to deal with them partly as family members and partly as business clients. The contrast between the businesslike and the personal styles of behavior provides some significant lessons in good management.

An obvious example is Joseph's concealment of his weeping when he overhears Reuben reminding the brothers of their guilt (42:24), and later when Joseph sees his brother Benjamin (43:30). The reason is that he does not want to reveal his knowledge of and affection for his brothers. But the behavior also reminds us that it is not businesslike to reveal powerful displays of emotion. Emotion is useful in the workplace, and nobody can be expected to behave like a robot, but shouting or tears usually are not effective for motivating other workers. Note that when Joseph repeatedly accuses the brothers of being spies (42:9-16), he is not described as shouting at them but instead chooses to inspire fear by his actions-jailing them for three days.

Another example of the contrast occurs after Joseph arranges for it to appear that one of the brothers has stolen a silver goblet. When the brothers are brought before Joseph to be judged, Judah says (44:16) that because of their long-time guilt (he is referring to their sale of Joseph into slavery), he expects they all will be enslaved as punishment. Joseph separates their private feelings from the businesslike situation of administering justice for this particular theft, and he pretends to focus only on the latter. It is interesting to note that, according to Joseph's steward (44:10), the appropriate punishment under Egyptian law would have been the death of the thief and the enslavement of all the brothers. However, Joseph says (44:17) he will enslave only the thief and set the others free. The lesson for management is that when meting out punishment one should temper justice with mercy. This is a fundamental Biblical injunction for civil justice, but it applies equally well to the workplace.

Let's be careful to regard some of Joseph's behavior as purely fraternal and having nothing to do with his managerial function. For example, when he invites the brothers to dine with him in his house and gives Benjamin five times as much food as the rest (43:34), this is only to test whether they will resent this favoritism as they did Joseph's coat of many colors. If anything, it highlights the fact that favoritism is not good managerial practice.

Of course I don't seriously regard Joseph purely as a role model for the business world. Although he is acting in the political and economic world of Egypt, he also has a spiritual mission-the interaction with his family that I have been trying so hard to separate from his business dealings. The duality of his skills-discernment and wisdom-which I referred to earlier as two kinds of business ability, may also be regarded as applying to the spiritual and worldly realms.

One of the important lessons of this parsha and of the whole Joseph story is that the two realms are inextricably entwined. Our mastery of the business world has meaning only if our lives serve some spiritual purpose; we cannot serve a spiritual role without interacting effectively in the material world. If we look a little earlier in Joseph's story-to where he refuses to sleep with Potiphar's wife and thus loses his job as household manager and is thrown into prison-we see that moral behavior can sometimes lead to business failure.

I wish that all the people who read the hot-selling books about business management would also take time to read Torah and, like Joseph, would keep their priorities straight.

Dr. Shatkin can be reached at laurence@myself.com