EXECUTIVE CONFIDENCE

executives in business and government can fail in three ways and thus bring about a chaos in their department. They can:(1) seem to give endless freedom;(2) seem to give endless barriers;(3) make neither freedom nor barriers certain. Executive confidence, therefore, consists of imposing and enforcing an adequate balance between their people's freedom and the unit's barriers and in being precise and consistent about those freedoms and barriers. Such an executive adding only in himself initiative and purpose can have a department with initiative and purpose. (PAB 84)