Pope Francis Why He Leads the Way He Leads

“Wow. Where did that guy learn to lead like that?” A friend asked me that question a few weeks after Jorge Bergoglio had been elected as Pope Francis. My friend was startled-pleasantly so-by the new Pope’s powerful gestures during those early days: asking the crowd’s blessing before offering his own on his election night; taking the bus with fellow cardinals instead of the Papal limo; choosing to celebrate Holy Thursday by washing the feet of residents in a juvenile delinquent home, including the feet a Muslim woman.

Where did Jorge Bergoglio learn to lead like that? In fact, I’m pretty sure I know at least part of the answer. He learned to lead the same way that readers of this journal learned to lead: from those who parented and mentored us, through our sometimes difficult life experiences, and by absorbing practices and insights of the Jesuit way of living and approaching the world.

I had explored some of these Jesuit principles some years ago in the book Heroic Leadership: Best Practices from a 450-Year-Old Company that Changed the World. That book highlighted some stories from early Jesuit history and explored leadership values that are deeply rooted in the culture and spirituality of the Jesuits, like self-awareness, ingenuity, heroism, and love.

When Cardinal Bergoglio was elected Pope, the publisher asked if I might be willing to write a follow-up of sorts, and I was delighted at the chance to treat Cardinal Bergoglio as a “leadership case study.” I was also lucky: I had been giving leadership talks and conferences in Argentina only a couple of years earlier. I had made my own network of Jesuit friends there, and WUJA colleagues like Carlos Gianicolo helped introduce me to ex-alumni who had studied under Fr. Bergoglio in school; and I also had the chance to interact with a number of Jesuit priests who were then seminarians in the Colegio Maximo, where Bergoglio was rector.
Those contacts gave me the opportunity to focus on something that none of the other treatments of the Pope had explored: his Jesuit background and the themes he stressed as a Jesuit. I had been astounded that none of the Pope’s biographers had really focused on this aspect of his formation. Imagine, for example, if someone wrote a biography of President Eisenhower of the USA without even mentioning Eisenhower’s life formation as a military man. Analogously, how can one understand Pope Francis without understanding his Jesuit formation: after all, the Pope himself has said, “I still think like a Jesuit.”

This essay is too short to elaborate fully on that statement, but my book (Pope Francis: Why He Leads the Way He Leads) explores themes like  the importance of self-discovery in leadership formation, the need to plunge fully into the world yet step back from the world daily, and the need to know one’s non-negotiable values while remaining open to change. The book is readily available on Amazon, or at the website of the publisher, Loyola Press. A Spanish edition, by Granica, will be published by the Fall of 2014.
I hope that WUJA colleagues might be interested in exploring, through the book, the Jesuit roots of the Pope’s leadership style and vision. After all, this is the very same vision that many of us received in our education. Thus, I hope that reading the book will enable readers to reflect deeply on their own convictions and formation, and to appreciate their own leadership opportunities in life.

I know, however, that the question most WUJA colleagues want answered is the same one that many others in the world are asking: what will Pope Francis do next? Will he make major changes in the Church?
I have no greater perspective on that topic than anyone else. I would make only this observation: none of us imagined or expected any of those striking gestures that came during the Pope’s first few weeks. What exactly the Holy Father will do or change I cannot predict, but I suspect that we will continue to be surprised by this man who has been formed in our Jesuit tradition and who is serving as such a powerful example of our tradition at its best.