BECOMING CEO of the GIRL SCOUTS by Jim Collins

“When Frances Hesselbein became Chief Executive of the Girl Scouts, it was at the most perilous time in the organization’s history. Declining market share, dissatisfied customers, economic weakness and even hostile take over threats. John Byrne wrote in Business Week, ‘Lurking in the background like a corporate raider was the Boy Scouts of America that had launched a feasibility study of extending membership to girls.’ I just really wonder what would have happened had there been a hostile takeover of the Girl Scouts. She walked into a situation of eight straight years of declining membership—it had gone from great to good. And she came in as a consummate Level 5: bleeding green, ambitious for the cause of the Girl Scouts. ‘We are here to make girls strong. We are here to develop young girls into competent women, that is what we are here to do.’ But she had a key insight. ‘The way we’ve done it is outdated. We used to define making girls ready for the future as defining as making them ready for marriage. We will give them the merit badges in sewing and cleaning and whatever, but what about the merit badge about how to deal with testosterone driven boys? How about the math merit badge, how about the accounting merit badge, how about the skills that would allow you to be a competent, independent strong women in today’s world? And what about all the girls who aren’t white?’ The Girl Scouts at that time served mainly white girls, and Frances said, ‘No, we must have every part of society, all girls must be strong. We must become inclusive.’ And so, what she did was she said, ‘We are going to relive those values, but we are going to change the whole practices of the Girl Scouts and make it relevant to today’s world, while never losing our principles.’”