Robert Hargrove

Several months have gone by since I have written here and I'd like to tell you about what I've been up to. In the late summer, I began working with someone who I believe has the potential to be an extraordinary leader. I am speaking of  Reilly Finn, the VP of Corporate Communications for a Tier 1 Defense Company. I started executive coaching with her on her first 100 days in her new job with a mandate from her boss to make “Comms” a more strategic organization.

I asked Reilly what her Impossible Future was. Her response: A world without war! Given she was employed by a defense firm, I was really wowed. (She related it back to her five-year-old son, whom she wanted to keep out of harm’s way.)

"Imagine a world without war," she said, later adding that we would not only have to address the defense and security issues related to failed states like Iraq and Afghanistan, but also the billion or so people in the world who have been left out of the global economy and who live on less than $2 per day… I knew this was going to be a fascinating and intriguing assignment.

Though part of me thought Reilly’s Impossible Future was pie in the sky, I was determined to help her to fine a path forward to realize it. It would be one thing if she were the CEO of the company who had contacts with the White House, the Secretary of Defense, and Joint Chiefs, but how could she do it as the head of Comms, which is not usually thought of as a power house function in a big corporation?

The stuff that most Comms chiefs work on are press releases, promotion announcements, and brand compliance (getting the logo right) and so on. Mainly transactional stuff which could be classified under Reilly’s day job. However, I could see early on that Reilly, a natural leader with the desire to make a difference, was destined to turn this job into a transformational assignment for herself and the company. In short order, we were both involved in a project that at least had the potential to impact her company in the USA and world wide.