Who would have thought that a person called Barack Obama, who was searching to rent a place in Washington in early 2005 after getting elected as a senator (from Illinois), would go on to occupy the White House on January 20, 2009? A person with an unusual childhood, no political background, without money or power and who started his career as a community organiser would rise to become the most powerful man in the world!
For all those who believe in miracles and have faith in the fact that human beings are capable of achieving anything, his story will be the finest example. Many say he was lucky and got there at the right time; I would say, his destiny matched with his innate desire to make this world a better place to live in.
In 64 BC, when Marcus Cicero ran for the consul (the highest-elected political office of the Roman Republic), his brother Quintus wrote a letter to him and gave some advice on running an election campaign. The letter is a timeless classic and interpreted by many laureates, besides being translated into many languages. The suggestions are mainly :- “Make sure you have the backing of your family and friends”, “Surround yourself with right people”, “Build a wide base of support”, “Promise everything to everybody”, “Communication skills”, “Know your opponent well” and “Give people hope”. On the point of “Promising everything to everybody”, he writes, “voters will be much angrier if you refuse to promise them their heart’s desire than if you back out later and if not done you can always say I wanted to do all the things promised but circumstances didn’t let me do.” Practically, this is happening all around the world.
This post is for all those who believe that leaders are not always born but they can be developed into one. Here are the nine lessons from Obama’s historic election victory.
Build A Grassroots Campaign
It was the first time when a grassroot campaign was built at such a huge scale in such a short period. In any campaign, a dedicated group of volunteers with a clear understanding of the candidate’s vision, interacting directly with people, work better than a digital army.
David Plouffe, Obama’s campaign manager and the man behind his successful campaign in 2008, writes in his book, “The Audacity to Win”, “As a former community organiser, Obama felt in his gut that if properly motivated, a committed grassroots army could be a powerful force. The grassroots could play three pivotal roles for our campaign. One, volunteers could help fund our campaign with small contributions to a greater degree than any previous presidential candidate had succeeded in doing. Two, we wanted them to organise their local communities for the campaign — the best way to get new people to caucuses and polls was to have a family member, friend, neighbour ask them to go. Three, we needed to help deliver our message person to person which was critical — trust in and attention paid to traditional media sources seemed to be dwindling rapidly.”
Use Of Technology
Technology didn’t replace the ‘people-to-people’ connect, but it helped to scale, get the message delivered instantly and also in the fundraising for Obama’s campaign.
Their campaign office, headquartered in Chicago, conducted training programmes for a grassroot army and used technology remarkably to communicate with them. They sent regular emails and videos to volunteers and supporters. They had also designed a performance management system for staff including volunteers and relieved many who were not able to achieve targets.
“Obama’s outsider bid for the Oval Office was built on a promise that the voices of average Americans would overcome the well-funded “special interests” in Washington. That message — and the Internet — helped the Obama campaign raise 24 percent of a record-breaking total of $746 million from individual donations of $200 or less,” writes Alexis Simendinger on The Center For Public Integrity
Data-Driven Campaign
Obama’s Campaign team relied more on data than believing on what political pundits have to say on news channels and newspapers. Sasha Issenberg clearly outlines the extent of data usage in Obama’s campaign:
“In the 2008 presidential election, Obama’s targeters had assigned every voter in the country a pair of scores based on the probability that the individual would perform two distinct actions that mattered to the campaign: casting a ballot and supporting Obama. These scores were derived from an unprecedented volume of ongoing survey work. For each battleground state every week, the campaign’s call centres conducted 5,000 to 10,000 so-called short-form interviews that quickly gauged a voter’s preferences, and 1,000 interviews in a long-form version that was more like a traditional poll. To derive individual-level predictions, algorithms trawled for patterns between these opinions and the data points the campaign had assembled for every voter — as many as one thousand variables each, drawn from voter registration records, consumer data warehouses, and past campaign contacts.”
Communication Strategy — Storytelling, Uniformity
Obama is a great storyteller and those who follow him regularly know it. He communicated about his family background in the form of a story and successfully linked it with the African-American movement. His “Joe the Plumber” story to explain tax policy dominated the third debate with John McCain and ultimately helped him to swing undecided voters.
Apart from Obama being an incredible story teller, the campaign team also ensured uniformity in the delivery of his message. If Obama was talking about energy in a rally or in a TV interview, all the TV and newspaper ads would be on energy and all the volunteers would be discussing about energy. The entire communication channels were in sync with each other which helped to deliver the message clearly.
Build A Great Team With A Clear Chain Of command
“It involves having a vision where a country needs to go, it involves to bring together best people and being able to spark the debate how we are going to solve healthcare, energy and going to deliver good jobs. And, then going to mobilise American people to get behind that agenda for change. That’s the kind of leadership that I want to show as president of the United States.” – President Obama answering a question on ‘How he views presidency’ in early 2008.
President Obama clearly stated the role of a leader – he showed intent to bring specialists from different fields together and enable an environment where they can argue with each other, disagree with each other, but remain together as a flock. In the end, it was he who called the shots. President Obama’s clarity and emphasis on building a great team helped in his campaign enormously.
Keep Your Inner Circle Small But Diverse
This is very important when one wants to avoid leaks of electoral strategy and tactics. In the days of the presidential primary, only four people were in the inner circle – David Plouffe (campaign manager), David Axelrod, Robert Gibbs and Obama himself. David Plouffe writes in his book that they learnt this from George W Bush’s campaign where they kept their inner circle small and never expanded it, which meant that if they had to add someone, somebody had to go.
Interestingly, all three have worked for three different candidates in previous elections and brought their diverse experiences to the campaigns. Obama should also be given credit for sustaining a relationship with all those who were with him since his struggling days. After all, loyalty is such a rare trait these days.
Have A Clear Strategy, Stick To It
At several occasions during the campaign, his strategy seemed trivial to many and pundits questioned if there was a strategy in the first place. But, the focus on Iowa primary election and understanding what winning Iowa would mean in the fight against Hilary Clinton, were valued much later. For the Super Tuesday too (February 5, 2008) Obama’s campaign focussed on smaller states contrary to Hilary Clinton’s which focussed on the big states. Super Tuesday was a day when the primary elections for 22 states were held and were considered to be a decider. His strategy for that day was ridiculed in the press, but ultimately, he won more delegates than Hilary did.
If You Have A Strong Opponent, Reset The Race To Change Momentum
It was same like the famous Test match played between Australia and India in Kolkata in 2001. The Australian team of that time was invincible, having won 16 test matches in a row prior to the match. India won that match even after being compelled to follow-on. It changed the momentum and made people believe that the Australians could be defeated. The same thing happened when Obama won the Iowa primary – his team believed that Hilary Clinton could be defeated.
The Magic Of 3Hs — Humility, Honour, Honesty
Recently, George W Bush was asked which quality was most important to be a President. He replied: “Humility. I think it’s really important to know what you don’t know and listen to people what you don’t know”. Throughout his campaign and also during his presidency, Obama possessed these qualities.
He never attacked his opponents personally and refrained from highlighting past controversies. David Plouffe writes in his book that Obama became furious when they circulated the D-Punjab memo in the press. ” ‘This is the first time I was embarrassed by my campaign,’ he said.” Plouffe notes in his book, reflecting on Obama’s reaction to the entire issue. The next day, he apologised to Hillary Clinton, taking full responsibility for it. This is so rare in public service nowadays.
These qualities helped him to be the best version of himself.
Having said that, all these might not have worked if Obama hadn’t been a great candidate. He deserves full credit for his judgment, temperament and calmness during the campaign. In 2002, he was the first leader to speak against the Iraq War which helped him to be picked by John Kerry to give a keynote speech in 2004 Democratic Convention. That speech gave him national recognition overnight and laid the foundation for him to become President of the United States of America after four years.
In his eight years of presidency, Barack Obama went on to become one of the most beloved leaders across the world.