ITAY TALGAM is a renowned orchestral conductor from Israel who believes that the orchestra is a metaphor for the workplace. The conductor has the opportunity and possibility to create an organised collective sound from the untidy noise of a diverse ensemble of individual musical instruments with the nuance of a single gesture, writes ELAINE BYRNE
Talgam demonstrates the unique styles of six great 20th-century conductors, illustrating fundamental lessons for all leaders (www.ted.com). In doing so, he explains how an orchestra’s conductor faces the ultimate leadership challenge: creating perfect harmony without saying a word. The conductor does this through intuitive listening and knowing how and when to give direction.
America’s conductor in chief, President Barack Obama, celebrates tomorrow the first anniversary of his election. But celebrate might be the wrong word. US unemployment is at almost 10 per cent despite a $787 billion (€533 billion) economic stimulus package. Its recession is deeper and longer than anyone anticipated, with a budget deficit that will reach an incredible $1.5 trillion next year. The US continues to fight a war on two fronts, in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Obama has his shortcomings. On my trip to his inauguration last year I met Noam Chomsky, who was circumspect about the possibilities for real democratic change and sounded a note of caution about the blind positivity towards Obama.
And yet, despite these potentially suffocating difficulties, America is undergoing a subtle programme of nation-building.
On Friday, the Democratic speaker of the House of Congress, Nancy Pelosi, unveiled draft healthcare reform legislation. If passed, this 10-year $900 billion plan will revolutionise access to the broken and unequal public-private US health system.
Obama’s very first speech to the joint Houses of Congress prioritised support for the Serve America Act, Ted Kennedy’s last legislative initiative before he died. The Edward M Kennedy Serve America Act 2009 is the greatest investment in public service since the New Deal of the Great Depression and creates infrastructure to empower people to put their energy into addressing critical social needs.
And that’s the difference between America and Ireland.
Despite intractable economic reasons to the contrary, there is robust confidence in the capability of American political leadership. There is a sense of hope and self-belief. In the face of economic adversity, the opportunity for nation-building has been embraced.
In Ireland, we are absorbed in an intellectual famine. Over the last six months it was standing room only when public intellectuals such as Amartya Sen, Joseph Stiglitz and Chomsky came to Ireland. All three featured heavily on our radios and televisions, with Chomsky holding court last night on RTÉ One television’s The Frontline.
In the absence of any positive vision being articulated, we have increasingly looked outside Ireland for conductors to direct us. To Obama, to the Irish diaspora at Farmleigh. And so, instead we have an Ireland lost in a yawning sea of economic language that will define the future for those not yet born. Special purpose vehicles and subordinated debt and long-term economic values translate as hollow uncertainty for most people waiting anxiously for next month’s budget.
Our Ireland is one where the Shane Fitzgeralds, our young graduates, are being encouraged to leave this country by fellow Irish citizens because, in the headline words of yesterday’s piece on this page, “Ireland is a disaster . . . leave now and enjoy your life”.
This is an Ireland that gathers in her thousands to the shrine church in Knock on the say-so of a clairvoyant, in the desperate hope of a miracle, of anything. An Ireland that worships tree-stumps in Rathkeale. An Ireland that has had a 43 per cent increase in the numbers taking their own lives during the first three months of this year. An Ireland that is preparing to strike and polarise itself even further. An Ireland that seeks to abolish democratic institutions.
“That it should come to this!” said Hamlet. The Shakespearean tragedy, which examines themes of real and feigned madness, is on this year’s Junior Cert syllabus – something else whose abolition is being considered, according to some reports.
Negativity will not save us. “The character of the country cannot be lost,” said Henry Grattan, that great Irish parliamentarian of the 18th and 19th century.
Our foreign policy is one not centred on war but development assistance and aid. Successive UN secretaries general have praised our long-standing tradition of UN peacekeeping. We may have a shot at the European Council presidency with the candidature of John Bruton.
According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, Ireland has one of the youngest civil services within the OECD, which suggests a public sector potentially more amenable to change and reform. We also boast a remarkably youthful demographic, with two-thirds of our population younger than 44 years of age.
And then there's that legendary sense of humour the Irish are famous for, which might even win us that most British of institutions, the X-Factor.
Talgam’s orchestra metaphor teaches us that as powerful as the conductor is, he is only one person and is entirely dependent on the orchestra to create the sound that he will then manage. Nation-building and second republics require musicians as well as conductors.
I love my country. She’s the only one I have.