Leadership the Eleanor Roosevelt Way: Timeless Strategies From the First Lady of Courage

• Author: Major Alison Martin
• Pages: 06

2003] BOOK REVIEWS 155

LEADERSHIP THE ELEANOR ROOSEVELT WAY: TIMELESS STRATEGIES FROM THE FIRST LADY OF COURAGE1

REVIEWED BY MAJOR ALISON MARTIN2

Women who are willing to be leaders must stand out and be shot at. More and more they are going to do it, and more and more they should do it.3

1. Introduction

   In recent years, authors have studied the words and the lives of former presidents, political appointees, and even the occasional sports icon in an effort to find leadership principles that can be translated for use in everyday life.4 In her book, Leadership the Eleanor Roosevelt Way, Robin Gerber attempts to show how women leaders can also provide leadership wisdom.5 The author derives leadership principles from Eleanor Roosevelt's remarkable life and tries to demonstrate how these principles can be "a model for personal achievement."6 Gerber uses the biographical format because she is specifically targeting women readers and believes that "women respond to the narrative of whole lives."7

   As a senior scholar at the Academy of Leadership at the University of Maryland, the author has been training women in leadership for more than twenty years and has a unique perspective on the subject.8 Her experience in the area of women's leadership allowed her to use this book to start a dialogue on the role of women, not just as leaders, but in all walks

   1. ROBIN GERBER, LEADERSHIP THE ELEANOR ROOSEVELT WAY: TIMELESS STRATEGIES

      FROM THE FIRST LADY OF COURAGE (2002).

   2. U.S. Army. Written while assigned as a student, 52d Judge Advocate Officer Graduate Course, The Judge Advocate General's Legal Center and School, U.S. Army, Charlottesville, Virginia.

   3. 2 BLANCHE WIESEN COOK, ELEANOR ROOSEVELT, 1933-1938, at 372 (1992), noted

      in RUBY BLACK, ELEANOR ROOSEVELT: A BIOGRAPHY 138 (1940).

   4. See, e.g., BOBBY BOWDEN & STEVE BOWDEN, THE BOWDEN WAY: 50 YEARS OF LEADERSHIP WISDOM (2001); JEFFREY A. KRAMES, THE RUMSFELD WAY: LEADERSHIP WISDOM OF A

      BATTLE-HARDENED MAVERICK (2002); DONALD T. PHILLIPS, LINCOLN ON LEADERSHIP: EXECUTIVE STRATEGIES FOR TOUGH TIMES (1992).

   5. GERBER, supra note 1, at ix.

   6. Id. at inside cover.

   7. Id. at x.

      of life.9 Although the title of the book would indicate that it is simply another in the leadership genre, Gerber's underlying goal appears to be one of a continued fight for women's equality.10

2. Analysis

   Gerber developed a list of twelve leadership principles that she gleaned from the life of Eleanor Roosevelt. These principles include: "Learn from Your Past"; "Find Mentors and Advisors"; "Mothering: Training for Leadership"; "Learning the Hard Way"; "Find Your Leadership Passion"; "Your Leadership Your Way"; "Give Voice to Your Leadership"; "Face Criticism With Courage"; "Keep Your Focus"; "Contacts, Networks, and Connections"; "Embrace Risk"; and "Never Stop Learning."11 Some of the principles Gerber advocates are the same ones included in most leadership books. Others are new and different, but Gerber appears to struggle to find stories from Roosevelt's life that match the principle. Still other principles are interesting, well developed, and worth reading.

   Have I Not Seen These Before?

   Principles like "Learn from Your Past"12 and "Find Mentors and Advisors"13 were not particularly new or noteworthy. The author fails to distinguish these principles from other leadership books stating the same ideas. There are no startling revelations from Roosevelt's life that help to solidify these concepts or really bring them to life. Instead, Gerber uses the same themes that any student of leadership would already know.

   Not only does Gerber fail to show why some principles are new or particularly important to Roosevelt's life, she also uses some principles

   8. See id. at inside cover; see also James MacGregor Burns Academy of Leadership, Staff Biographies, available at http://www.academy.umd.edu/aboutus/staff/rgerber.htm (last visited Sept. 13, 2003).

   9. See, e.g., Robin Gerber, Don't Send Women to the Back of the Troop Train, USA TODAY, Sept. 23, 2003, at 13A; Robin Gerber, Golf's Grass Ceiling, CHRISTIAN SCI. MONITOR, Aug. 2, 2002, at 11.

   10. See GERBER, supra note 1, at xi.

   11. Id. at xvii.

   12. Id. at 1.

   13. Id. at 21.

       that are very similar to each other. Thus, "Learning the Hard Way"14 reads

       a lot like "Learn from Your Past,"15 while the chapter on...