Thursday, April 19, 2007  Using Caesar to Teach About Leadership
I believe that biography can be a useful tool for understanding
complex organizations from a variety of perspectives. In many
cases, certain people have been able to achieve considerable
success despite complicated organizations and multiple internal
and external challenges. By examining the lives of these people,
it is often possible to take what these people have done and
apply it to organizations today. This can become a powerful
teaching tool.  I believe Julius Caesar is such an example. He
lived a remarkable life and is probably the person most
responsible for the destruction of the Roman Republic and the
birth of the Roman Empire even though the death of the Republic
would have probably happened at the hands of someone else had
Caesar not been around. Although he was never technically
emperor, his was the first of what would be a long line of
military rulers who brought Rome to greatness and then centuries
later to an eventual decline and