[House Hearing, 117 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
PATHWAYS TO SUCCESS: HOW PRACTICING CIVIL-
ITY, COLLABORATION, AND LEADERSHIP CAN
EMPOWER MEMBERS
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
SELECT COMMITTEE ON THE
MODERNIZATION OF CONGRESS
OF THE
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
SEPTEMBER 23, 2021
__________
Serial No. 117-10
__________
Printed for the use of the Select Committee on the Modernization of
Congress
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via http://govinfo.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
48-601 WASHINGTON : 2022
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SELECT COMMITTEE ON THE MODERNIZATION OF CONGRESS
DEREK KILMER, Washington, Chair
ZOE LOFGREN, California WILLIAM TIMMONS, South Carolina,
EMANUEL CLEAVER, Missouri Vice Chair
ED PERLMUTTER, Colorado BOB LATTA, Ohio
DEAN PHILLIPS, Minnesota RODNEY DAVIS, Illinois
NIKEMA WILLIAMS, Georgia DAVE JOYCE, Ohio
GUY RESCHENTHALER, Pennsylvania
BETH VAN DUYNE, Texas
COMMITTEE STAFF
Yuri Beckelman, Staff Director
Derek Harley, Republican Staff Director
C O N T E N T S
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OPENING STATEMENTS
Page
Chairman Derek Kilmer
Oral Statement............................................. 1
Vice Chairman William Timmons
Oral Statement............................................. 3
WITNESSES
Dr. Alison Craig, Assistant Professor, University of Texas at
Austin
Oral Statement............................................. 4
Written Statement.......................................... 8
Mr. Shola Richards, CEO and Founder, Go Together Global
Oral Statement............................................. 11
Written Statement.......................................... 13
Ms. Liz Wiseman, Founder, Wiseman Group
Oral Statement............................................. 15
Written Statement.......................................... 19
Discussion....................................................... 25
PATHWAYS TO SUCCESS: HOW PRACTICING CIVILITY, COLLABORATION, AND
LEADERSHIP CAN EMPOWER MEMBERS
----------
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 2021
House of Representatives,
Select Committee on the
Modernization of Congress,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to call, at 9:00 a.m., in Room
2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Derek Kilmer
[chairman of the committee] presiding.
Present: Representatives Kilmer, Cleaver, Perlmutter,
Phillips, Williams, Timmons, Latta, Van Duyne, and Joyce.
The Chairman. There we go. Okay.
The committee will come to order.
Without objection, the chair is authorized to declare a
recess of the committee at any time.
I now recognize myself for 5 minutes for an opening
statement. I won't use all five.
Earlier this year, this committee made a conscious decision
to explore some topics that aren't always easy to discuss. It
is one thing to acknowledge conflict in the workplace. It is
unpleasant, but it is quite another to really dig into that
unpleasantness to ask why it exists and what we can do to
address it. These conversations are hard because they force us
to consider our own actions and to think about the roles we
play in an institution that has become increasingly polarized.
None of us want to shoulder the blame for Congress' low
approval ratings, but every Member bears responsibility. As one
of our witnesses, Shola Richards, has said, there has never
been a drop of rain that believed it was responsible for the
flood. I thought of that on my walk to the Capitol this morning
as I got drenched. So, while these conversations are tough, we
need to keep having them. We need to address the institution's
problems instead of acting like they will somehow resolve
themselves because they won't.
The bottom line is that, if we want things to work
differently, we need to do things differently. The good news is
that this committee gives us an opportunity to do just that. We
are providing a forum for discussing some of the thorniest
issues Members confront on a day-to-day basis. Our mission is
to make Congress work better for the American people. And, in
order for that to happen, Members of Congress also need to work
better.
Institutions are a reflection of the people who work for
them, and nearly every Member I know is here because they want
to solve problems and make things better for the folks they
represent. But the desire to do good isn't reflected in the
dysfunction that is more often on display.
Our committee held a planning retreat earlier this year,
and we kicked things off by talking about why we ran for
Congress in the first place and whether Congress has met our
expectations. And there was a lot of hopefulness expressed. One
member said she was here to open doors for more people to have
a voice in politics. Another spoke about her strong desire to
be part of the solution. And one member summed up the
congressional experience best when he said, ``I have never been
more disappointed or more inspired.''
There is so much desire to get things done and so much
frustration with the process. The system often feels top-down,
which makes it hard for rank-and-file Members to feel
empowered. What is more, as we have discussed in this committee
before, the incentive structure can sometimes feel out of
whack. Members are recognized more for racking up social media
hits than they are for hard work.
The frustration is definitely there, but today we are going
to focus on harnessing that desire to get things done. Every
Member wants to be effective and productive on behalf of the
people they serve. The trick is finding out how to turn that
desire into tangible action.
The experts joining us today know a lot about the tools and
approaches that lead to success in the workplace. They have
researched and advised top business leaders all over the world
and understand how to build and maintain successful teams. They
understand what factors motivate people to produce at high
levels, as well as the connection between job satisfaction and
success.
The research shows that leaders who practice civility and
who take a collaborative approach to their work are able to
produce and achieve at higher levels. So I am looking forward
to talking about how Members can apply these principles to
their own work in Congress and figure out creative ways to move
their policy and political goals forward.
As with our past few hearings, the committee will once
again make use of the committee rules we adopted earlier this
year that give us the flexibility to experiment with how we
structure our hearings. Our goal is to encourage thoughtful
discussion and the civil exchange of ideas and opinions.
This is the wonky part.
So, in accordance with clause 2(j) of House rule XI, we
will allow up to 30 minutes of extended questioning per
witness. And, without objection, time will not be strictly
segregated between the witnesses, which will allow for extended
back-and-forth exchanges between members and the witnesses.
Okay.
Vice Chair Timmons and I will manage the time to ensure
that every member has equal opportunity to participate. Any
member who wishes to speak should signal their request to me or
Vice Chair Timmons, and I know we have got some participating
virtually. So just give us the, you know, tug of the ear, as
you wish, Mr. Latta.
Additionally, members who wish to claim their individual 5
minutes to question each witness pursuant to clause 2(j)(2) of
rule XI will be permitted to do so following the period of
extended questioning.
Okay. With that, I would like to now invite Vice Chair
Timmons to share some opening remarks.
Mr. Timmons. Good morning.
Thank you all for traveling a great distance to be with us
today. This is our third hearing on civility and how we can get
Congress to actually do the job the American people want to us
do, which is working together to solve the biggest challenges
we face.
It has been years that we have been talking about
immigration and healthcare and debt and spending, and we really
haven't gotten very far on many of these issues. And it is
definitely not the right path forward. It has been a
destructive experience. We can see the challenges we are facing
now. We have to find a way to work together. And I think that
this issue, civility, and how we have really fact-based
collaborative policymaking, we have to figure this out. We
really have to figure this out, and I think that this committee
has the potential to make recommendations that will make
Congress work better for the American people.
So this subject, in my mind, has been divided into three
categories. The first is time. The second is incentive
structures. And the third is relationship-building.
Time is one that we have talked about for the last 2-1/2
years. In 2019, we had 65 full working days, so 65 full working
days. We had 66 travel days, fly-in/fly-out days. The 6:30 vote
we took on Monday, we call it--I call it a bed-check vote,
making sure you are here. That is not a working day. We didn't
do any work on Monday. So, you know, this week we have Tuesday,
Wednesday, Thursday, full working days, and then we fly out on
Friday.
So we can't have 65 working days every year and think that
we are going solve problems. We just have to have a way to be
here more, and we talked about that. And, you know, it is not
just physical presence. It is what we do when we are here. I
call it pinballing. You know, you have got committees, one,
two, sometimes three or four. You have subcommittees, two,
three, four, seven. And then you have votes. And then have you
fundraising. And then you have constituent meetings. There is
just so much that you can do. And, generally speaking, people
that run for Congress try do everything. And when you try to do
everything, sometimes you either let things slip through the
cracks or you don't do some of the things very well.
So time is one really important one. We have to free up
time for Members to do their job and to engage in this fact-
based policymaking.
Incentive structures is the second. We have a lot of
conflict entrepreneurs. The loudest voices are heard and
rewarded often. And the people that are working to solve the
problems are--it is just a tough road. And it is not nearly as
rewarding as yelling from the top of the mountain. So we have
got to find a way to incentivize collaborative fact-based
policymaking. We have to find a way to facilitate an exchange
of ideas from a position of mutual respect and not use the
often-provided political talking points and have--you have no
idea what is in the weeds. But, if somebody gave me a piece of
paper, I can talk about it in a mildly angry way. So we got to
get away from that. And we got to find a way to actually dig--
dig deep on these issue because the answer to these problems is
not going to be on one page of paper with bold font. `
Last is relationship-building. This kind of ties into the
first two, and it is embodied in the term ``civility norms.''
We don't have opportunities for relationship-building across
the aisle, largely because of our schedule. That is the time,
and the incentive structure doesn't reward it.
We have to create physical space in the Capitol. We had a
dinner a couple of weeks ago, months ago. And it was wildly
challenging to get 12 Members to have a dinner on this complex.
It was wildly challenging. And when we thought we figured it
out, they wanted $7,000. And that is just not going to work.
So, you know, there is physical space all over the Capitol. You
should be able to walk off the floor and have a cup of coffee
with a Member and have a conversation about these things, not
go home turf, home turf. ``Come to my office.'' ``I don't want
to go to your office.'' ``Come to''--you know, it is--the
physical space cannot be overlooked in this conversation. And,
again, you got to have more time. You got to have incentive
structure.
So that is where I have been thinking about these things. I
would love to have--can't wait to hear your thoughts on these
issues and how we can really fix this problem. It is, I
believe, the most important thing that this committee will do.
And I just really appreciate you-all taking the time to travel
this far distance and look forward to hearing from you.
And, with that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back. Thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you.
So we are joined today by three experts who are here to
discuss how Members who pursue a civil, collaborative, and
leadership-oriented approach to their work in Congress are
better able to achieve success.
Witnesses are reminded that your written statements will be
made part of the record. Our first witness is Dr. Allison
Craig. Dr. Craig is an assistant professor in the Department of
Government at the University of Texas at Austin. Her current
book project, ``The Collaborative Congress,'' examines how
rank-and-file Members of Congress work together to craft
substantive and successful policy proposals in a polarized
Congress.
Dr. Craig worked for several Members of Congress, both on
the Hill and in district offices, from 2001 to 2012.
Dr. Craig, you are now recognized for 5 minutes.
STATEMENTS OF ALISON CRAIG, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, UNIVERSITY OF
TEXAS AT AUSTIN; SHOLA RICHARDS, CEO AND FOUNDER, GO TOGETHER
GLOBAL; AND LIZ WISEMAN, FOUNDER, WISEMAN GROUP.
STATEMENT OF ALISON CRAIG
Ms. Craig. Thank you, Chair Kilmer, Vice Chair Timmons, and
committee members for inviting me here to speak with you today
on an issue I care a great deal about.
So, when I tell people that I study collaboration in
Congress, it usually prompts a joke along the lines of ``how
can you study something that doesn't exist?'' So I always like
to start by just saying that, you know, despite what people
think, you know, there is actually a lot of evidence of Members
do--looking for opportunities to work together both within
their own party and across the aisle.
You know, nearly every Member of Congress engages in at
least some degree of collaboration. And the average Member has
about 15 people that they work with in a given Congress. And
that is going to include both policy, working on legislation--
includes everything from writing legislation to chairing a
caucus.
But, obviously, there is a lot of room to grow. About 7 to
8 percent of bills introduced are the result of bipartisan
collaboration. Given the substantial benefits of collaboration,
of working together on legislation, that number should be
significantly higher. Bills that are presented as the work of a
pair of Members are significantly more likely to pass and
significantly more likely to be enacted. So, if you just
exclude post offices and all commemorative legislation, the
average House bill has about a 10-percent chance of passing the
House over, you know, a lengthy period of time. And it goes up
to about 15 percent if it is a partisan collaboration, so if it
is two Members of the majority party working together, and 20
percent if it is a bipartisan collaboration.
So, yeah, so Members and staff know that bipartisanship is
how you get things done in Congress. You hear Members say that
all the time, that, you know, this is how you get things done
around here is to be bipartisan. And so then the question is,
why don't we see more of it?
You know, I have had a lot of conversations with Members
and staff on how they decide to reach out to other offices to
work together on a bill or a letter. Over and over again what I
hear is that Members wants to collaborate more. They want to
work across the aisle, but they don't think they can find
someone in the other party to work with. They assume it is not
going to be worth the hassle. And, at the end of the day, it is
easier to just write the bill that you want to write and
introduce it yourself.
So then thinking about how to get a more collaborative
Congress, you know, Members work together when you expect that
the payoff is going to be worth the effort. Right? It is cost
and benefit. So you need to both increase the incentives, as
Vice Chair Timmons said, and also remove obstacles of working
together.
In term of incentives, obviously ``your bill is more likely
to pass''' is going to be a bill one. But whether it passes or
not, you know, the sponsor is going to get most of the
recognition there. It is their bill. So someone who is the,
like, lead cosponsor may not get credit for passing or even
introducing the bill unless they promote it themselves.
So one of the things that I would suggest to kind of
improve the incentive structure is allow two Members to be
listed as the sponsors of the bill. It is going to
significantly increase the benefits of being the number two and
let them get more substantive recognition for their work. You
could even limit it to bipartisan pairs and say this is the
sponsoring Democrat and this is the sponsoring Republican. Or
you could say any two Members to--in the first case to
highlight that it is a bipartisan bill.
Other incentive-based strategies could include committee
chairs prioritizing bipartisan legislation, promoting the
benefits of collaboration to new Members, and increasing
transparency around the suspension calendar.
On the other side of the equation is making it easier for
Members to work together, and this is where I think that there
is a lot of work that can be done. You know, Members need to be
able to find someone to work with and ideally before there is
even a bill, because collaboration is a lot easier behind
closed doors. But this requires connections, which is one of
the reasons that collaboration actually significantly increases
once Members are in their third term because now they have the
personal connections and the relationships that they can tap
into more easily.
When you start thinking about how who you could team up
with from the other party, you naturally go first to your
friends. You go to the people that you have worked with before.
And so what do you do when your connections are limited? Maybe
you are in your first term. Maybe your go-to guy on energy just
retired. You know, there are a lot of situations in which, you
know, Members need some help facilitating those connections.
So my other set of suggestions revolve around providing
tools to make it easier for Members and staff to find someone
to work with. You know, committees could create, like, a
nonpartisan Member liaison position who Members and staff could
reach out to if they are looking for someone else on the
committee to work with, like, who would be good on this issue?
The committee staff would be kind of a matchmaker. And since I
am on a ``collaboration is like dating'' kick, you could also
set up an anonymous but moderated sort of messaging board where
staff could go out and post things like ``in search of Democrat
on E&C interested in cybersecurity for possible letter'' and
try to facilitate that sort of, like, very early collaboration
in that regard because staff also really do play a big role
here.
Vice Chair Timmons mentioned the issue of time. Well, the
staff are here a lot more than the Members are. And a lot of
the times, if a Member doesn't have a connection, you naturally
then go to your staff and say, ``Okay, well, who do you know
that we could work with?'' And so anything that can facilitate
additional connections among staff would also, I think,
translate to the Member level. And so, you know, creating a
sort of, like, coworking space, places for staff, improving the
ability of staff to get together would also I think be helpful.
The Members in all these cases still have to decide to work
together. They still have to agree on what a bill or a letter
would look like. But this is going to get over that first
hurdle of scrolling through 435 Members and cold calling
someone that you think might be interested.
And that brings me just to my final point, which is that
collaboration breeds collaboration. You know, one of the things
I find pretty consistently is that once--you know, the Members
who start to collaborate then collaborate more because mutual
friends facilitate connections. If you have a lot of
relationships, you will make more. Members who work together
successfully on one project are more likely to work together on
another, and Members who have more extensive personal networks
or staff that have more extensive personal networks are more
likely to know, you know, the right person to go on an issue.
And that is going to, again, really increase the collaboration.
So the easiest thing--it is not actually that easy--but for
individual Members to do is to start by reaching out to someone
that they want to work with.
So, thank you.
[The statement of Ms. Craig follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
The Chairman. Thanks very much.
Our next witness is Shola Richards. Mr. Richards is an
award-winning director of training and organizational
development, as well as a sought-after keynote speaker for
commencements, conferences, and government events. He is the
author of two books--this is part of this committee's
Amazon.com sales effort--``Making Work Work'' and ``Go
Together,'' which introduce strategies for replacing
divisiveness and incivility to create positive living, working,
and leading communities. Prior to starting his own consulting
businesses, he served as the director of training and
organizational development for UCLA Health.
Mr. Richards, you are now recognized for 5 minutes.
STATEMENT OF SHOLA RICHARDS
Mr. Richards. Thank you, Chairman Kilmer, Vice Chair
Timmons, members of the select committee, and staff and
personnel who helped to make this very important hearing a
possibility.
As a keynote speaker and consultant, I am often asked why I
choose to engage in the difficult work of civility. There will
always be mean and rude people. A drama-free and respectful
committee meeting won't travel as far on social media as a 15-
second sound bite would. And, you know, as they say, nice guys
finish last. Right?
That is why when it comes to civility specifically in
Congress, when I told my friends that I was coming here, they
said to me, what is the point? What is the point?
To me, that is like asking, what is the point in showering?
You are only going to get dirty again. True, right? Well,
similar to showering, civility also is best used when it is
done consistently.
So what is civility? Civility in its simplest form is a
sincere and consistent demonstration of respect. Without a
baseline of respect, there can be no trust. And, without trust,
communication among team members will deteriorate rapidly. And,
without trust, respect, and effective communication, committee
meetings will devolve into dysfunction; highly-skilled staff
members will quit; and, most importantly, the American people
who rely on this institution to improve their lives will become
disillusioned, and they will lose faith in their elected
officials.
On the other hand, people who consistently demonstrate and
practice civility are not only viewed more positively by others
based on the research and are more productive, they are also
more effective leaders as well. More on that to come.
So, in this hearing, I would like to share a recommendation
on how Congress can use civility to create a more positive and
productive institution that truly serves the American people.
It is my hope that every committee will consider beginning each
new session of Congress with what I call civility norms. To be
clear, this is not a code of conduct. Code of conducts
traditionally are created by the leaders of an organization
with the expectations that those within the organization will
follow said codes.
Civility norms, on the other hand, are very different. They
would be created by the members of each committee for the
members of each committee. This would ensure that each
committee's norms would be specific to that committee's needs.
So, for example, it is likely that the civility norms for--that
are created in the Ways and Means Committee could be very
different than the civility norms created in the Armed Services
Committee.
And that is exactly the point. Generic civility rules for
large organizations such as the House of Representatives, for
instance, rarely work in the long term due to their lack of
specificity. In my experience in the work that I have done, I
have seen much greater commitment to actively practicing these
norms when a smaller group of people, for example, a committee
or a subcommittee within the House, play an active role in
creating those norms. Additionally, there is greater
willingness to hold their peers accountable to those norms
because they are the once who agreed to these norms in the
first place.
To create these norms is simple, and the process is simple.
Ideally in a committee's first organizational or planning
meeting of the new Congress--and, of course, to be very clear,
this meeting would be bipartisan--the members should answer two
very simple civility questions. The first one: What are the
behaviors that demonstrate respect and should be reinforced
during each of our committee hearings? Some examples of
responses that I've seen in my work here, for example, can be
actively listening and showing respect while others are
talking. It could be something as simple as disagreeing with an
idea without attacking the idea who presented the idea.
The second question, equally important, is: What are the
behaviors that do not demonstrate respect and should not be
tolerated during any of our committee meetings? Some examples
could be making derogatory remarks about other Congress people
during a meeting or on social media, disrespectful body
language, like eye rolling while another member is speaking, or
intentionally ignoring another committee member.
The answers to these questions should be agreed upon by the
committee members, recorded, and used as the committee's
civility norms going forward. Additionally, each committee
should also determine how they will incentivize behavior that
promotes civility in the committee meetings. An example, for
example, would be posting a civility score on the committee's
website or on their social media for committee members who
consistently adhere to the committee's norms.
Let's be real. Committing to this process may seem time-
consuming. I get that. But couldn't the same be said about
sitting in committee meetings where toxic conflict, incivility,
grandstanding, and dysfunction is the norm? Civility is too
important to be left to chance. That is why it needs a real
process.
I am deeply grateful to the select subcommittee for
ensuring that civility is finally given the attention and
respect that it deserves.
And, with that, I yield back.
[The statement of Mr. Richards follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
The Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Richards.
Our final witness is Liz Wiseman. Ms. Wiseman is a
researcher and executive advisor who teaches leadership to
executives around the world. She is the author of,
``Multipliers: How the Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter,''
and, ``Rookie Smarts: Why Learning Beats Knowing in the New
Game of Work.'' Her forthcoming book, ``Impact Players,'' will
be available this October. Ms. Wiseman is the CEO of The
Wiseman Group, a leadership, research, and development firm
headquartered in Silicon Valley, California. She has been
listed on the Thinkers50 ranking and in 2019 was recognized as
the top leadership thinker in the world.
We are grateful that you are with us. Ms. Wiseman, you are
now recognized for 5 minutes.
STATEMENT OF LIZ WISEMAN
Ms. Wiseman. Chairman Kilmer and Vice Chair Timmons and
members of the committee, thank you for this opportunity to
share a few ideas.
I have been asked to share a few of the best practices of
what leaders and the business world and the nonprofit world do
to build an environment where work is productive, where people
are empowered, where people are deeply engaged, and where
people find work fulfilling. And I want to start by sharing a
few principles that I think underlie some of those practices.
And these are truths that I have learned studying some of the
best leaders in the organizations in the world, as well as
studying some of the worst.
And what we find is that, even in organizations that are
deeply hierarchical, where there are very clear reporting lines
and rules, the best leaders don't lead with formal authority.
They don't lead with threat of repercussions. And they lead
through influence. And they lead in a way where people
volunteer their best thinking and where people hold themselves
to the highest standard. The best leaders clearly lead through
influence.
The second is that people in all types of jobs at all
levels and all types of organizations come to work wanting to
contribute everything that they have. They want to do work that
is meaningful, and they want to do work that has an impact. It
is like deeply embedded in us to have this kind of impact, and
the best leaders in some ways simply allow that to happen. They
remove the barriers for people to make a contribution.
And the third principle that we find is that people tend to
do their best work in a climate that is both comfortable and
intense. And so what the leader's job is to create an
environment where there is an equilibrium between safety, where
people feel they can speak out and contribute, where they feel
accepted, but also where they feel compelled, where they are
stretched, where they need to do their very finest work.
Let me share a few of the practices we see from the very
best leaders on this.
The first is that, instead of just giving people work, the
best pleaders delegate leadership and ownership and
accountability. Most leaders want to involve people, give them
sort of a say and participation. But when ownership is unclear,
people tend to default to the leader; they tend to stall and
tend to get disengaged. What we find that the best leaders do
is they give members very clear portions of work, so even small
portions of the larger committee's work, and they give them
full ownership of this.
One of my favorite practices on this comes from John
Chambers, the former CEO of Cisco. When he was a fairly new CEO
to Cisco, he was making his first executive--he was hiring a
vice president of customer support. And he says to him: Doug,
when it comes this part of the business, you get 51 percent of
the vote, and you get 100 percent of the accountability.
And I just don't know a clearer or a simpler way to tell
someone else that you own this, that you are in charge. Just
give someone 51 percent of the vote.
The second is that the best leaders tend to encourage their
members to set and achieve stretch goals. You know, it is very
easy for a manager to assign work based on people's current
ability and to give people goals or objectives. But we find
that, in that case, when you give people goals and it is in
their wheelhouse, people tend to do the usual. And we know what
the usual looks like in this setting. But people are most
deeply engaged when they are given a challenge, something that
is a question, not a directive, and something that is beyond
their current capabilities. It is something that feels a little
bit like a mission impossible.
One of my favorite examples of this is the former CEO of
Gymboree, the children's clothing company. When he took over
the helm, he could see that there was room for improvement on
earnings per share. And, rather than give targets out to his
management team to cascade through the organization, he set a
mission impossible. And he said: What would we need to do
across the organization to improve our earnings per share by a
dollar this year?
And people got thinking. And soon everyone had a mission-
impossible goal, something that could contribute to this larger
goal. That year they massively overachieved. They set a new
mission impossible, which the next year they massively
overachieved. And, within 4 years, they had five times
increased their earnings per share.
So, you know, a good practice for doing this is to not give
people goals or objectives but to give people puzzles to solve.
And maybe the most visual example I can give is to ask you to
remember the scene from the ``Apollo 13'' movie where they are
trying to return the astronauts back. It is the iconic scene
from this movie, not ``Houston, we have a problem,'' a
different one. It is the one where the engineering manager
pulls together his team. He dumps out on the table all of the
parts that are available in the lunar module that is now
filling up with toxic gas. And he says to his engineering team:
We have got to find a way to make this fit into the hole for
that with nothing but these resources.
And it is actually the architecture of a great way to issue
a challenge, is to give people a puzzle. How do we do X by Y
with nothing but Z resources? And what happens is people tend
to respond because they don't know how to do that, actually.
And so people start to find answers. And it puts the ownership
on the team, rather than it sitting with the leaders. So the
best leaders ask the questions rather than give directives, and
they create puzzles for their team to solve.
A third leadership practice would be to create tough and
fierce but really healthy and civil debate. Leaders typically
in business and in other settings tend to rush to debate where
they have fire for the deed, when opinions are high. They tend
to debate opinions or issues and topics, but the very best
leaders treat debate a little bit like surgery. They do it very
selectively and very carefully, and everyone prepares. And they
debate well-framed questions with clearly defined options.
One of my favorite examples of this comes out of Microsoft,
an executive named Lutz Ziob. In running his business, when
there becomes a vital issue--not every issue. Delegates a lot
of those. But, when there is a vital issue, he pulls the team
together. He says: This is an issue we need to debate. Here is
why it is important. He frames it. He poses the question. And
then he says: I want you to come back in 2 weeks, ready to
debate this. And everyone is asked to come with two things:
one, evidence; and, two, a point of view.
When he starts the debate, he lays the ground rules. I want
this to be fierce. I want people to push hard on these issues.
But I want it to be civil. He defines that, and then people
start to go. He asks people to come with a position already
established. They argue for their point of view. And then, when
thing are starting to settle into kind of a pattern, a decision
is becoming clear, he mixes it up. And he says: I want you to
switch points of view. You know, Marcus, you have been arguing
for this. You know, Amanda, you have been arguing against it.
Amanda, you are arguing for it. Marcus, you are arguing against
it. Go. Or, Marcus, you have been looking at this from
marketing point of view. And, Sunir, you have been looking at
this from a sales point of view. Sunir, you are about
marketing. You know, Marcus, you are all about sales.
And it is very unsettling, but the team gets very used to
it. And, in the end, the team comes to a decision that the team
agrees to. And it is unclear who was the winner of that debate
because he has mixed it up.
My very favorite debate practice is the simplest one. It
comes from third graders arguing, debating the merits of great
literature in the Junior Great Books program. It is three
questions. I will add a fourth question. It is that the leader
of the debate should ask the question and not give an answer.
Two, they should ask for evidence. No one gets an opinion
without bringing evidence for it. Three, they should ask every
person to weigh in on it. And, fourth, the one I would add to
this is to ask people to switch. The switch creates amazing
things.
Lutz also opened up his debates. He has the members of the
debate around the team, but he opens up the debate to other
people in the organization so that they can observe the debate.
The best leaders don't tend to assign work based on
people's skill sets or job responsibilities. The best leaders
tend to look for what each member of the team is naturally and
natively good at. I call it someone's native genius. It is just
like what our minds are built to do. It is what we can't help
but do. And they find a way to tap into that.
I see so many leaders who do this as an entire team at the
onset of a project, which is, like, let's first see what kind
of capability we are working with. And everyone understands
people's genius. At first I thought this was sort of a little
bit of a hippy practice. I come from California. We are prone
to hippy thinking. I thought this was a bit strange. Every
group, every single group I have seen do this, where they
identify the native genius of each member of a team or a
committee, has said, ``It is the best thing we have ever
done.''
The last one that I would like to just sort of end on is
this idea of creating transparency. I think and what I have
seen is the best way to create civil debate and collaborative
practices is to create transparency and put good leadership on
display. When Alan Mulally had taken over Ford and they were
hemorrhaging losses in the billions, he would tell you that the
secret to that success was he stopped one-on-one meetings with
his executive team members. He established a joint meeting
where they dealt with issues as a team. They had a simple color
coding system to deal with the severity. And then he opened up
those meetings to members of Ford. Everyone was to bring a
guest. And it was remarkable how the behavior of the executives
changed instantly.
I think there is a number of ways that congressional
committees can take--can put their leadership behavior on
display because people tend to lead at their very best when
they know that people are watching, particularly young people.
There are several other practices in the testimony I am
happy to answer questions about. Thank you.
[The statement of Ms. Wiseman follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
The Chairman. Thanks very much.
I now recognize myself and Vice Chair Timmons to begin a
period of extended questioning of the witnesses.
Any member who wishes to speak should just signal their
request to either me or Vice Chair Timmons. Or for those who
are joining virtually, if you want to use ``raise hand'' or
just tug the ear, or as you wish. Exactly, there you go.
One, I really appreciate the testimony from each of you. It
seems like we sort of covered three different themes all around
how to make the place function a little bit better: civility,
collaboration, and leadership. And I thought maybe the
committee could start by just pulling on the threads related to
civility.
I presume that Vice Chair Timmons will ask a little bit
about incentives since in his opening remarks he spoke about
that. I think one of the things that this institution struggles
with is this notion of sort of what we owe each other in terms
of standards of conduct. As part of this effort, I reached out
to a sports coach who had taken over a team that had a pretty
dysfunctional culture. And he said the rules are what governs
us when we are at our worst, and the norms and culture are what
keeps us at our best.
And so, Mr. Richards, your suggestion of establishing some
sort of standards I think is really important.
Now here is what is tricky in this place. One person's
violation of standard and norm is another person's only avenue
for exercising the rights of the minority. You know, and we
have seen that in this place. We have seen it recently with,
you know, every suspension bill now there is a roll call vote
on. And, you know, and we saw that when the Democrats were in
the minority and literally took to the floor and did a sit-in
on the issue of gun rights or gun safety.
So you see at times things that, probably, if there were
those sort of codes of conduct, you know, this is--I think it
is worth recognizing this is different than rules. Right? You
are talking about how do we engage one another in a way that
might lend itself to a more collaborative approach.
So I am just looking for any guidance you have to the
committee as we think about this and as we think about making
recommendations, how to thread that needle, recognizing that
it--that, as an institution, we want to be respectful of the
rights of the minority and we also want to make sure that the
place isn't just dealing with persistent obstruction.
Mr. Richards. Thank you for that question, Chairman Kilmer.
You know, since you brought out sports first--and I am
hoping I will be the first of many sports metaphors throughout
the day hopefully. When I look at a sports team, I think of a
football team. And if I remember correctly, Mr. Cleaver also
formerly played football. So I--when I think of football or any
sport, really, what happens are rules that govern the sport.
But there is also unwritten rules around respect, not just for
the teammates but respect for the game. So, when you see
someone who violates an unspoken norm or a team norm, so to
speak, not only are the people on the other team upset at that
person, but people within the team are upset with that
particular player. You notice that people can fight hard and
play hard. At the end, they are trading jerseys because they
can still respect the game.
So, when we come to the House of Representatives and we
think about the work that is being done here, the reason why
norms are important is that it is conflict with guardrails. So,
when you see people who are engaging in disruptive behavior,
things that make this institution dysfunctional in some way,
there should be some sort of guardrail in terms of, ``Hey, this
is how we are going to be working here,'' and more than just a
Code of Conduct but really specific to each committee and
subcommittee to see whether or not this is something that would
actually work.
So, in my experience, I have found, like I said in my
opening testimony, people are more willing to adhere to norms
when they play a role in creating them, regardless if you are
in the majority or in the minority. This is part of--because,
as we all know, this is cyclical. Sometimes you will be in the
majority; sometimes you will be in the minority. But the idea
is these norms should be constant. They make a difference when
people actually adhere to them. And, most importantly, more
people are willing to hold others accountable to these norms
because they played a role in creating them.
So, while it is hard to do this--and I know we can't
legislate people being nice and kind to each other. I just want
to be very clear. That is not what I am saying, unfortunately.
But what would be nice is that if people could at the very
least have some sort of norms, some process that they can
remind themselves of when they show up.
I think Phoenix Suns Coach Monty Williams said, and I want
to make sure I get this quote right: Everything that we want is
the on the other side of hard.
And this is hard. This is not easy. If it was easy, this
would already be done. So it is going to require some sort of
process and, quite frankly, some new suggestions that I am so
happy to get into during our question and answer. But I want to
cede my time and share with the two fabulous ladies on either
side of me.
The Chairman. I don't know if anybody else wants to speak
to that question. Otherwise, I will invite Vice Chair Timmons.
Go ahead. And then others who want to pull on any of these
threads related to civility, and then we will shift gears and
talk about collaboration.
Mr. Timmons. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Dr. Craig, I want to talk about incentive structures,
particularly at the committee level. We have talked a lot about
Congress as a whole. Just--there is a lot there: 435 Members is
very challenging. But, when you kind of go down to the
committee level and say, what can we do to really change the
incentive structures within committees, which is where most
Members of Congress do the most of their work, it becomes maybe
a little bit more manageable.
We had Congressman Upton come and talk about how, when he
was the chairman of E&C, they had--you know, they gave priority
to bipartisan amendments. That seems like a pretty easy thing
for us to recommend. Sitting interspersed throughout the dais,
I really think that that is something that is a no-brainer,
just creating, forcing people to sit amongst their colleagues
on the other side of the aisle. I really think that has
potential. Modifying the questions--the questioning structure
is something that we talked about, actually exchanging ideas as
opposed to just using talking points and not really defending
your ideas. Honestly, that is one of the biggest things that I
think is missing in really our country today. You don't defend
your ideas. You can say things that may be incredibly
intelligent or may not make much sense, and nobody actually
says: Let's really get into the weeds on that. What is the
effect of that policy you are proposing? And what about this?
Nobody does that. You go on Fox News or CNN, and you get
praised. There is no--there is no back and forth.
One of the things that we talked about, discharge petition.
I mean, you know, 218 is what you got to get. But what if there
was another one? What if it was like a bipartisan discharge
petition with a lower threshold? You get 100 Rs and 100 Ds, you
are guaranteed a vote. And, you know, taking that same thought
process to committees, you are guaranteed a hearing if you get
X percent of committee equal Rs and Ds.
So that causes me to say: All right. I have this thing I am
passionate about. I got to go and sell it to people on both
sides of the aisle because that is the only way that I can
guarantee my outcome, things like that. I mean, throw out some
new ideas, talk about those. I am open to really anything.
Ms. Craig. No, I appreciate that. Thank you, Vice Chair
Timmons.
You know, I think that you are right that committees are I
think an excellent avenue for a lot of collaboration to occur
because it is, first and foremost, a smaller group and it is
easier to get a smaller group of people working together. You
know, I think that having, you know, actually tying into the
idea of kind of setting committee norms, having one of the
norms and--would work better again in some committees
understand others--be, like, some level of prioritization of
bipartisan legislation, you know, the committee chair agrees
that they are going to--you know, if you get X level of
support, yes, they are going to put it on the agenda or at
least have a hearing. Similarly with amendments, it could
happen that way.
You know, I think that, in terms of kind of tying, I guess,
the committees into, like, the relationship building, like, one
of the things I like--well, we will see how it goes. But I
think I like how you are doing because it is the questioning
here in terms of it keeps people in the room more. And that
then also, I think, facilitates relationships and more of a
conversations and builds connections between members if you
have that sort of structure within the committee hearings.
In terms of kind of then when you move on to the floor side
of things, you know, I think--toying around with the idea but
the idea of, like, the suspension calendar, obviously, is where
a lot of bipartisan--the main benefit of, I think, of a lot of
bipartisanship is that it becomes much easier to get through on
suspension. But a lot of Members don't really know how that
works, especially, like, in the first couple of years. And it
is not really clear.
And so, even if you weren't to say--so all--I mean, you
could go all the way to saying, like, yes, there is a
guarantee. Like you can show me that you are going to get two-
thirds, that this bill will get two-thirds support, we will put
it on the agenda. But at the very least allow Members to, like,
submit their legislation and say: Hey, I have enough--maybe I
don't have two-thirds cosponsors, but I have enough bipartisan
support here that I am confident we will get past that two-
thirds vote. And allow them to kind of raise the legislation to
the attention of the leadership to hopefully get it on the
schedule would be another one of my suggestions.
Mr. Timmons. Thank you.
Anybody else have any thoughts on incentive structures?
Mr. Richards. I will jump in.
You know, I have two young daughters. And I have learned
that the best way to get any type of behavior to change is to
focus on the behavior that you want versus the behavior that
you don't want.
And there has been some talk and some ideas around in terms
of collaboration. But also, too, with civility is having, like,
a civility score or something that you can actually see in real
time who is playing an active role in getting Congress to work
again? And this hopefully would disincentivize the folks who
want to be difficult and be obstructionists and make things
difficult for the institution. But, more importantly, it shows
what this institution actually values, which is collaboration,
which is civility, people working together, and, most
importantly, doing this in a way that is public so that people
can actually see what is going on, on social media or on the
website.
It helps to get people to think: Okay, this is important.
Clearly this is something that is being measured. I don't want
to be a person who is staying out of this. I want to be a part
of this. And hopefully really engage people's better angels in
doing the right thing.
Ms. Wiseman. There is something I would like to add to
that. When I look at what is done in the business world to
incent collaborative behavior, civil behavior, you know,
collaborating in the business world, you know, in many cases,
is as hard as in really complex organizations where people have
interests and very different interests. And what the
organizations tend to do is, first, they create case studies,
like: Here is what it looks like when it is done well.
And they create heroes out of these people, and there are
probably video-based case studies.
I think there could be a lot of power in saying: Where has
it been done well? Where are the positive examples? And let's
put that on display and maybe continue to build this library of
case studies of successful, bipartisan, collaborative, good
leadership, and civil discourse. That is one thing that
businesses tend to do. I think it could work here.
Another is not just the kind of formal incentives but spot
incentives. A lot of organizations use these peer-based spot
incentives where anyone without prior approval can see good
leadership, collaborative behavior, bipartisan legislation,
civil behavior, and give somebody a spot award. Maybe it is a
lapel pin. Maybe it is a sign on their door that says this is
what--this is what the desired behavior looked like. And it is
not only fun to receive one of these, people love giving these
kinds of awards. It is incredibly gratifying. I think there is
power in doing something that simple.
Mr. Timmons. Thank you.
I yield back.
The Chairman. Okay. We have a flurry of hands that just
went up. So I have got Mr. Latta, then Perlmutter, then Joyce,
then Phillips, then Cleaver.
So, Mr. Latta.
Mr. Latta. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thanks for
today's hearing. I think it is very instructive.
You know, I think that you have heard me say that, in my 25
years of almost in the legislature, either in Congress or back
in the General Assembly, I have always pushed for what I always
call the five Cs. The top of it was civility. And you got
cooperation and then collaboration and then camaraderie but,
you know, working together.
But, you know, it is a tough world out there. And I think
that is what you had mentioned in your opening statement. Or
maybe it was Mr. Timmons that, you know, time is one of our
biggest enemies out there. It is getting to know one anymore is
very, very difficult.
And, for our panelists, maybe I could hear from each of you
because just to get your thoughts on how--where we are today
because, again, you know, we live in an instant world. You
know, people are reading the scroll on the bottom of their TV
or something like that or something off their handheld device,
and get their information in less than 30 seconds and not
delving into it.
But when--you know, when you take away the thoughts of
where we are with the internet, with Instagram, with Twitter,
with Facebook, you know, how do we get out there to make sure
that, you know, we are working with each other? Because, again,
it is difficult, you know. And I objected when, you know, the
cameras were right outside the House floor. You know, it seems
like Members would run right out and--from the floor after they
said something and get right in front of the TV cameras.
And, you know, it is the way we address each other on the
floor. I am a big stickler for that. One of the things in Ohio
that we had as a rule is that you never addressed anybody by
their name. It was always by where they were from and, you
know, to keep things on a nonpersonal basis just on that.
But I am just kind of curious. You know, in this instant
world that we are in today, how do you all see that we can get
this civility? Because, again, with time being a problem,
getting to know people, having that ability, how do we address
that in today's world? Thank you.
Mr. Richards. I will take that.
Ms. Wiseman. I will follow.
Mr. Richards. Perfect. It is so interesting when we talk
about time. And, you know, I think we have to get creative when
we think about time, how we use it, how we use it within this
institution and maybe, quite frankly, maybe outside of it.
So, creatively speaking, what would be cool--and I am using
that word intentionally because I don't think this is happening
now--is an idea where folks from either side of the aisle could
invite a person from the opposite side of the aisle out to
dinner. Now, I want to be very specific about this, because
this is not just some idea of, like: Hey, let's go have dinner
with someone from a different party. This is very intentional,
and I want to be clear when I say this.
So the idea behind this to make this work because then it
is hard to find time when you have multiple committee meetings
and different competing priorities, I get that. But what would
be great is you could have a dinner once a month that is
actually expensed by this institution. Now, not the $7,000
dinner that Vice Chair Timmons was talking about in his opening
remarks, but it could be something like $50 or $100, whatever
makes the most sense.
But what is important about this particular dinner is you
are off-site. You have an opportunity to connect with someone
that is not really based on, ``Hey, will you sign off on this
bill,'' and things of that nature, but leaving work aside and
having an opportunity to get to know someone based on the
relationship-building that Vice Chair Timmons was mentioning in
his open.
It should be branded, though. And this is really important.
It is not like: Hey, we are going have dinner. You could call
it something like, just naming a President, a Jefferson Dinner.
Hey, I am going take someone out on a Jefferson Dinner. Now the
idea behind this is that, when you brand something, you give it
a name, there is an expectation behind it. So it is, like, when
we have this dinner, the expectation is I am going to take
someone out from a different party, and we are going have
dinner expensed on this institution where we can get to know
each other and finally build that trust away from the cameras
that you see after a hearing where people run out to their
favorite cable news station and get in front of a camera and
say: Look how I did. Look how I did.
This is more around getting people to understand each
other, to start humanizing people, and taking the time to get
to know people and build those relationships.
Maybe most importantly though, once you find that friend
from the other side of the aisle, it is easy to say: I will
just keep taking this person out to dinner every single time.
It should switch. So it should be a new person every month
in order to be able to get this expensed.
This is a very simple, powerful way to do this. Businesses
all over the world use this as an opportunity to get people to
know each other. I am surprised that this is not built into
this institution, knowing that it works. So once you get the
opportunity to build this, it can create bonds that go far
deeper. And it hopefully will alleviate the challenges of time
that Mr. Latta was speaking about earlier.
I have more, but I just want to stop there for that.
The Chairman. Anyone else want to swing at that?
Ms. Wiseman. I would like to add something to this. You
know, it is no secret that we are--there is a lot of
performance going on, performing for cameras, performing for
social media, performing for constituents. You know, it is
happening with our young people performing for social media. I
think we know how damaging this is.
I think there is some interesting thinking that can be done
about, how do you allow people to perform for a different
audience, and I know there is a practice of allowing school
children field trips to come in and watch. And I just wondered
what would happen if committee meetings were open not just to
whatever classes happen to be by but there was active just
reach to bring in middle school field trips and not just have
them come and go but to look for teachable moments. And perhaps
these norms of behavior, as they are codified or we say, ``Here
is what good leadership, civil, collaborative, productive
leadership looks like,'' I would think, like, put that on a
piece of paper and give that to each kid who sits down. And
maybe make a bingo card out of that. Maybe you make a checklist
and give them a pencil and say: Just circle every time you
notice that behavior.
And then maybe the teacher has a conversation about that
with the students. Behavior would change.
Maybe you structure in more teachable moments where there
is a chance to talk to the school classes that come down about
what it means to be a steward and not just a representative of
geography or a constituency but what it means to be a steward
of a democratic process and the obligations and the higher
obligations that come with being a public servant.
And I think if you create an audience that people value,
people will perform at their best. I think you could also bring
peer observation in, or there is a slew of external executive
coaches who I am sure would be happy to come in on a pro bono
basis and observe and coach and help people lead at the very
best. But I like bingo cards for school kids myself.
The Chairman. That is fun.
Ms. Craig. Well, I would like to add to that, just because
I am really sad I did not give my students bingo cards for this
hearing because I am making them watch.
But just to briefly chime in on the role of time, you know,
I think that is one of the reasons. You know, there is a lot of
conversations. You hear a lot of people talking about how, you
know, part of the problem with Congress is that no one lives
here anymore; no one plays--you know, the kids aren't playing
on the same baseball time. Like this is a very common refrain.
We don't actually have a lot of evidence to say that that
is what kind of caused the decline of civility. So I want to
caution with that. But I feel like sometimes we get so hung up
on these conversations of, like, well, no one living here, so
we don't hang out, we are not friends, that no one thinks
about, so how do we adapt to the new world in terms of finding
new ways to make connections and finding, you know, new ways to
have these conversations. I think, you know, going out to
dinner, the dinner idea is fantastic. This is one of the
reasons that I also emphasize staff because, again, the staff
are here all the time. And so, if you can facilitate
connections between your staff, the staff can then be a bridge
to make connections between Members. And, yeah, I mean, I think
just generally.
The other thing I would say is that, in terms of kind of
the instant response, it is also why I think part of it is
getting--part of what would increase civility is to have a lot
of these conversations happen behind closed doors and then come
out as a joint, united front and make that the announcement,
rather than having, you know, ``Oh, here is an idea,'' and
then, you know, go through some back and forth and place
different, competing proposals on the table. Instead, just come
out as a united front of, like, ``Here is our idea,'' and
really take joint ownership of it.
The Chairman. Mr. Perlmutter and then Mr. Joyce.
Mr. Perlmutter. Is that on? Yeah.
I guess just in trying to put these in silos, I am not
sure. You know, civility, collaboration, leadership, they are
all part of the same thing.
So, going back to the sports analogy, you know, the
Broncos, two of our fiercest competitors were the leaders of
the team, Peyton Manning and John Elway. Okay? And I mean they
wanted to win. Period. And made it a better team. What we have
under this--in this room under the dome is we have two teams
competing. It is different than Microsoft and everybody getting
in the room and debating, you know, towards a thing. They are
part of the same team.
So what has been difficult for all of us is the team
element has become more and more pronounced over time.
So I just open it to the three of you because I think you
are all talking, you know, from the leadership, you know, the
more competitive the leader, you know, all of a sudden, you are
going down one path. And I can pick a couple of my committees
where I have just the fiercest competitive leader in one
committee versus a more collaborative leader in another
committee. And you get different results. There is no question
about it.
So, in the setting that we have, which is difference than a
corporate setting, you know, it is--we are sort of in the game
the whole time. How do you manage that? How do you bring out
civility? How do you bring out the collaboration? I guess that
is my question.
Ms. Craig. Sure. So I can jump in on this.
You know, I think--I do think there is a perception issue
more so than--I mean, yes, there absolutely are competing
teams. Don't get me wrong. I am not going to come in here and
be, like, no, no, everyone really gets along. But the--I
actually do have a fair amount of research showing that the
majority of Members are mostly just focused on, you know,
creating policy solutions and/or district advocacy, you know,
like the majority--a bare majority--but the majority are
focused on that end.
And so that is where I see the role of collaboration I
think being really impactful is actually getting those, like,
rank-and-file Members who are less concerned about the partisan
fighting that is going on over here and more concerned about
working together and making these connections and because, like
I said, you know, kind of collaboration facilitates more
collaboration.
So, if you have these two Members that are really concerned
about policy working together and then, oh, they are
successful, like, other people will hopefully try to imitate
that behavior and expand the, you know, value, the norm of
collaboration within the Congress by just demonstrating good
behavior or collaborative behavior anyway.
Mr. Richards. Can I jump in, too?
Thank you for that Dr. Craig. I am--I just love sports
metaphors because, I mean, using Peyton Manning and John Elway
is a great example for this. And I know your district is
obviously in Colorado. And the idea--right? The idea is when
you talk about John Elway and Peyton Manning, the two things
about them, besides being Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks for
the Denver Broncos, they also are not just fierce competitors,
but they did something that could also be duplicated within
this institution.
You mentioned before that there is fierce teams that are
separated, and they are fighting for their cause. So the one
thing that could help interrupt that is intraparty policing
where there is someone within the party who is willing to say:
Hey, listen, you can fight for your cause and fight hard, but
still let's remain within these guardrails.
It is more--far more powerful hearing it from someone
within your own party who is willing to say: Hey, this is not
okay. Like I understand that you are fierce. But to get on
social media, to run to said news network, and just start to
disrespect or humiliate someone is not advancing this cause.
And this is going to take courage. Quite frankly, and I
know courage is a relative term, but the idea is this is going
to require people to put their necks out a little bit. I think
if you are in a, politically speaking, a safe district where
you are most likely to be reelected over and over and over
again and because, for whatever reason, there is more people in
your party there, it is either deep blue or deep red, there is
less of a willingness to engage for sure, if we are going to be
honest. But the idea is, if someone from the party within the
party chooses to hold someone accountable, this is beginning
the process of turning the ship around that has been so off
track for so long.
And that is what Peyton Manning did. That is what John
Elway did. They went to the situation. And even Tom Brady who--
sorry--but he went to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers after they were
a horrible team and in one year turned them around. And I think
it is because the inside of the team, there is a spirit of
accountability, which I think is sometimes absent in this
partisan bickering that we see so often.
The Chairman. It is interesting. I mentioned I have talked
to a sports coach, and he talked about they have a players
council, where it is that type of holding each other
accountable. It is not getting sent to the coach's office
because you violated a rule. It is, you know, it is a peer
basically pulling you aside and saying: Hey, you know, we don't
really do that here.
You know, I keep wondering if there is a way to structure
something like that in Congress. I don't know that there is.
But I can tell you, like, if Emanuel Cleaver came up to me and
say, ``Hey, you know, that is--you were outside of the lines
here,'' like, that would probably change my behavior. Right? I
mean, he would be the chair of the players council.
Mr. Joyce.
Mr. Joyce. Unmute. They we go.
The Chairman. There we go. I knew you could do it.
Mr. Joyce. You would think, after 16 months, I would know
how to work this thing.
When I--you know, you touched on a good point, as always,
Derek. But I thought that maybe I would have those
conversations with some knuckleheads, who aren't here, when
they said stupid things that reflected poorly on all of us.
And, on top of them, you know, giving me grief, then they
turned around and said crazier things.
So you would like to think that, you know, peer-to-peer
discussions would work. Maybe with some they do. But certainly,
in this instance, I see it as more--and I think--I am sorry.
But the last speaker touched on it, the idea that the, you
know, that Tom Brady or the coaches, in other words, the
leadership has to bring and be incentivized to bring that to
the team. And I was wondering if any of the panel had an idea
on how that might be accomplished or how the team could search
for the leadership to actually make that happen.
Ms. Wiseman. I will comment on that.
I don't--I think I first want to acknowledge that I
understand that the business world has a different model. I
don't think the leadership dynamics are any different, that
people are people. However, the organization's structure
creates a very different dynamic because, in the business
world, as well as the nonprofit world or our school systems,
there tends to be a unifying leader.
And, in this setting, there is an absence of a single
unifying leader. There is competing teams and which means that
the unifying force has to come from within the organization for
there to be a functional process.
And I want to share just an observation and then maybe a
resource. The observation would be, you know, so much of my
work is studying power inside of organizations. And I have been
thinking a lot about this question over the last months, and
the conclusion I come to is probably a conclusion that everyone
in this room has already come to. But I want to share it
anyway, which is, in absence of a unifying force and if the
peer-based leadership dissolves, people need clear leadership.
And I think what is happening is we will, as a country, trend
toward authoritarian leadership. Like we will see that this
vacuum is filled. If it is not filled in Congress, it is going
to be filled more and more with leaders who take very
authoritative position. And I think more and more, as our
citizens, the electorate, people like me see a lack of peer-
based unifying leadership in these buildings, the voters are
going to want leaders who are authoritative and dictator-like,
and I think this is a disturbing trend. I don't think we want
to see that on any party. And so we have to find a structure
where this comes from the middle of the organization or from
the top of the House, so to speak.
That is probably an obvious conclusion. But I feel like
shared--like that is the only conclusion I can come to is we
will move more and more to an authoritative society. And that
troubles all of us, I believe.
The resource I would point you to is there an organization,
I think you are familiar with, the Partnership for Public
Service. And I am a member of their advisory board. I have been
serving with them for the last, I don't know, 2 or 3 years.
And, as part of that work, they have and we have built a
leadership model that takes some of the best thinking out of
the business world, that looks at what are some of the
peculiarities and challenges of being a leader in the public
service space. And it is centered in the idea of stewardship
and public service, and I think it is a tremendous resource to
say this is what good leadership looks like in this context.
And I think you will be talking to some members of that
group next week, but I would encourage you to look at that
leadership model in particular.
The Chairman. Dr. Craig.
Ms. Craig. I just wanted to jump on here real quickly
because the answer is that that is a really hard thing to do,
frankly. I mean, you elect party leaders whose job is to keep
your party or get your party into the majority. I mean, that
really--that is who you elect to be your party leaders are the
ones that you think are going to be, you know, keeping your
party in the majority. And that requires distinguishing
yourself from the other party, and it rewards conflict, and so
on and so forth.
So I am, with respect to Liz, I am not sure it is the right
idea to try to change kind of how the leaders are. But maybe--I
am really into this, like, council of--now I don't want to call
it council of elders, but that is because I am--like, you know,
kind of another sort of--create a new leadership position that
is a little bit more bipartisan, that is elected--I really--in
a majoritarian institution, this is so hard to do. But find a
way to create it so that it was absolutely a bipartisan
position and have them be someone who is, like, providing,
setting this norm of collaboration and voice that isn't
necessarily the partisan--the party leaders. Or hire a staff
member or hire, like, a parliament--the parliamentarian version
of the civility director.
Mr. Richards. May I add one small thing to that too and
just to add on to kind of what Dr. Craig was saying? I also
think there has to be a reimagining of our leaders around, who
is their audience? You know, we have to think about this more
deeply. We have an idea that your base are the people who are
on Twitter, who make up, what, like 20--I think only 20 percent
of Americans, according to Pew Research, are actually on
Twitter. So that is not your audience. That is maybe the most
vocal minority who is speaking up, and there is a need to
placate those people, and there is way that that kind of moves
the conversation towards the fringes to satiate that base.
But what would make more sense is to reimagine the audience
of the remaining 80-plus percent of people who may consider
voting for you, may consider working with you, maybe consider
pushing your agenda if you were to behave in way that was maybe
more civil, more thoughtful, and can engage more people. It
just may be time to reinvent that and think about it
differently.
The Chairman. Mr. Phillips.
Mr. Phillips. Mr. Perlmutter and I were just reflecting on
the proposition to have children, you know, attend everything
and how beautiful that would be even in our caucus meetings
because it would change. Then, again, we have plenty of
children already, I would argue.
There is so much to unpack. This is my favorite
conversation in Congress because I was reading Chairman
Kilmer's tweet this morning. And he wrote, quote: Research
shows that leaders who practice civility and who take a
collaborative approach to their work are able to produce and
achieve at higher levels.
And having come from the private sector myself, that is
exactly how things worked until I got Congress.
And I thought a lot about this. You know, there are 435 of
us. You know, if we were in a private enterprise or a business,
surely each one of us would have been fired already for
insubordination at one time or another. But only--and a
handful, clearly, if there was accountability, would probably
be terminated for poor behavior. Growing up in a household, you
know, we had a parent who provided accountability. In schools,
we had a teacher or principal. In business, we have a boss.
And, here, as I reflect on rewards systems and the incentive
structure to all of your respective points, it is actually
antithetical. It is the opposite rewards, which is so terribly
confounding to me.
You know, so a couple of questions. You know, voters are
electing dividers to Congress. And then those elected to
Congress are electing dividers to leadership positions. That is
just pretty clear. It is true on both sides of the aisle. A
couple of questions and one reflection.
You know, I think we have this vice happening in America.
We have got angertainment on one end of the vice that is
thriving, using us as pawns to divide. And then we have
gerrymandered districts, as you, I think, reflected on, Mr.
Richards, that reward deeply blue or deeply red behavior. And
then all the rest of the country is in the middle of this vice.
I want to better understand the psychology behind why both
Americans might be electing dividers, why we in Congress seem
to be elevating the wrong people. And then, secondly, what if
hypothetically there was a third caucus? How would that change
the behavior, do you think, in the institution, a more
moderate, a combination of thoughtful Democrats and Republicans
perhaps that would be a triangulation, if you will, of power?
Would that change anything in the U.S. Congress?
So, two questions: the psychology behind why and how some
internal dynamics might change with a third entity instead of
just two teams.
Ms. Wiseman. I can speak to a little bit on the psychology
of why. One of the things that I study is, I mean, leaders I
call multipliers who bring out the best in others versus
leaders who are very smart and capable but have a diminishing
effect on others.
Mr. Phillips. Uh-huh.
Ms. Wiseman. They tend to be very divisive leaders. And
often they have staying power in organizations, and they have
success. And I have spent a lot of time trying to understand
why people keep working for them and why people follow them,
and I think it addresses a couple of your concerns. And what
happens is, when people feel voiceless and they feel like their
voice is not being heard: Nobody is listening to me; I am going
to get behind someone who people are listening to. And, even if
I in some ways abhor this person, this is my only avenue for
voice.
And it is what happens in the business world is people tend
to follow them.
The other dynamic that we see out in the private sector is
that these leaders tend to have a diminishing effect on others,
and others get intellectually weakened around them. We become
lazy. We will--I will just defer thinking to them. I will let
them do the hard stuff. I will just sort of be hands and legs.
And people actually become less capable around these leaders.
So they are less capable of standing on their own. So they
become places where people degrade around, and then they become
dependent on them for any kind of influence.
And so I think it is a very--it is a very disturbing cycle
of degeneration. And I think it is--I see it happening all the
time in the workplace. And I think it is also happening in our
political system.
Mr. Phillips. And just--and to my second question about
just this notion of these two teams, you know, what happens if
there is a third team in a construct like this? What do you
think?
Ms. Wiseman. Probably changes everything.
Mr. Phillips. How so?
Ms. Wiseman. Well, it gives more options. And, you know,
you don't have a mortal enemy. And you have to form--I don't
know. I don't want to purport that I understand anything about
the political process, but I think it creates more options and
more like a market system perhaps. But I don't know. This is
not my expertise.
Mr. Phillips. I appreciate it.
Ms. Wiseman. So we are over the edge of my expertise.
Mr. Phillips. I appreciate it.
Ms. Craig. I think I am, like, obligated to jump in here as
the political scientist at the table.
So I am sitting here, trying to imagine a third party. And
I just can't get to the point where it exists. Just in terms of
thinking about the House, the way, because of the Members that
are elected right now, you have--you know, if you imagine
everyone on kind of on a left-right continuum, obviously, there
are issues that go on other dimensions. But right now there is
actually such a gap between the two that filling in the middle,
like, Members who are even at the more, you know--like
conservative Democrats and moderate Republicans are probably
better off with still, like, their own party preferences than
going all the way to the other party. The further apart the
parties move, the less incentive there is----
Mr. Phillips. Of course.
Ms. Craig [continuing]. To cross the aisle, obviously.
So, yeah, so I get really stuck on the where does the third
party come from because ideally you would have, like, a middle
component. And we don't really anymore. I mean, that is really
true that the--for a number of different reasons actually, you
know. A lot of moderate Members are losing their seats. And
then that also, I think, leads to a more polarized Congress.
In theory, though, you know, and it is a theoretical
version of having three parties, I mean, it definitely changes
thing because all you have to do is, you know, look at
parliaments where you have to start, look ahead to these
coalitions. So, okay, we are going to try to forge weird groups
to try to get a governing majority. And, I mean, you know, I
like a good parliamentarian, just a parliamentary system. But
that is kind of the dynamic that you would get where you would
have--force--it would force people to kind of break outside of
their group in order to get a majority.
And the only other thing I would add on that is that, while
we do not have a third group, you know, it is important to
remember that, right now, for the time being, you do have--I
mean, I know it is bad to talk about them on the--or Hill, but
you have the Senate on the other side, which actually does
serve as, to some degree, as--it does force a degree of
bipartisanship. If you want to get something actually through
the Senate, there are ways around it, obviously. But you need
to get past that 60-vote threshold. And that is going to
require, you know, Members of both parties.
And so that is, you know, I think, certainly an element
that can also kind of help people break out of their coalitions
if you emphasize that a little bit more and focus on that a
little bit more.
Mr. Phillips. And before we move on, any thoughts on if
rank choice voting, as an example, might change the rewards
system for candidates to broaden their base of support perhaps
or to not just pander to the base?
Ms. Craig. So that is really outside my area of expertise
in fairness.
Mr. Phillips. All right.
Ms. Craig. So I am really kind of hesitant to jump in on
what--because it really varies. You know, I think it depends a
lot on the State. It depends a lot on the districts that they
are running in.
I will say on the subject of thinking about the incentives
in districts that, you know, there definitely is a line between
the really what we call safe districts but really the strong
partisan districts where there is, if not a disincentive,
certainly no real incentive to be bipartisan there.
But one of the things that I find in my research is that
for Members who represent districts where it is not even just
the marginal ones, they went up to about 60 percent of the
vote, kind of that 50 to 60 percent, 48 to 60 percent range,
the Members who collaborate more, who have larger and more
robust networks, actually do a little bit better in their
elections.
So, if you have those sorts of districts that are a little
bit more swingy, a little bit more moderate, then that
actually--the voters end up incentivizing collaboration. But,
when your district is 80 percent Democratic or 80 percent
Republican, they want--they are with their team, and they want
their team's positions, and nothing else will do.
Mr. Phillips. Yeah, I do see a correlation between good
behavior in more competitive districts----
Ms. Craig. Uh-huh.
Mr. Phillips [continuing]. You know, no question, yeah.
Mr. Richards. Can I take a quick stab at those two
questions, Mr. Phillips, really quickly?
I--kind of on--adding onto Liz's point earlier around
leadership, why people follow leaders who may be divisive in
some sense, I think the easiest way to look at this is, when
you see bad behavior, bad behavior is an unskilled expression
of an unmet need. I will say it again: All bad behavior is, is
an unskilled expression of an unmet need. So there are needs
that are not being met, and the skill to meet those are not
developed.
So, oftentimes, you will find a figure who is able to
engage the lesser angels of a person, so to speak, and, without
the skills to manage those needs that are not being met, it is
easy to follow someone like that.
Secondly--and this is outside of my expertise, but I will
take a stab at it anyway--is the idea of adding a third
potential party to the table, so to speak. My initial response
was I don't see how that would truly fix anything. It is like
having a dysfunctional couple, and they are married. And it is
like: Hey, we should add a child; that is going to fix
everything. And I don't know if that would.
I mean, like, the reason why I think about that is I think
about how adding something to a situation that is already
dysfunctional without really finding some tools that are going
to repair the current dysfunction will be aided by adding
something additional to it, if that makes any sense.
Mr. Phillips. Yeah, and the reason I asked that, of course,
is in, you know, when there is triangulation of leadership, it
forces you, to get anything done, you need two of the three.
Mr. Richards. True.
Mr. Phillips. And that is--anyway, thank you all very much.
I appreciate it.
The Chairman. Mr. Cleaver and then Ms. Van Duyne.
Mr. Cleaver. And thank you. This has been very, very
interesting. I almost ran over to make sure I was here in
person. We have so many problems. And you have been very
articulate in giving us some reason to, you know, contemplate
ways in which things can function better.
We have multiple influences, and one of them is the media.
And I understand the media. I mean, but if you want to get
attention and want to become a national personality, I mean, if
I, you know, took off my pants and ran around, you know, this
building, I mean, I would get significant coverage tonight.
Ms. Craig. Or lack thereof coverage.
Mr. Cleaver. Yes. But if I did it, you know, to demonstrate
that we have naked policies, you know, then I am heralded. And
so that is a part of it that we--nobody wants to talk about
because nobody wants the media to get mad at them.
However, the good news is that, 2 weeks ago, a major news
outlet--I am not going to mention them because I don't--we have
this lengthy meeting. And I don't want--they may not be ready
to talk about it. But they are interested in something that you
have talked about and I have talked about here in our
committee. And that is they want to figure out a way that their
particular news outlet can measure civility among Members and
recognize Members, you know, like, we are measured, as I have
said to the committee, by every group in the world. I mean,
the, you know, laborer, and the Chamber, I mean, everybody, you
know. You get a 98 or whatever.
And they are interested in doing it. We ran into a problem,
and we talked about this. It was a lengthy meeting, and I was
thrilled to see that that media outlet was actually wanting to
do something to turn down the volume and or maybe more
particularly to celebrate individuals who were not turning up
the volume.
And the problem that we ran into is--was--and it is going
to be difficult to solve--and that is, you know, by
personality, by their nature, there are a lot of Members whose
voices are never heard because they just kind of, you know, do
their work, get on the plane, and go home. Do their work at
home. Come back. They are not going to be recognized by the
media. And so, if you, you know, if you say, well, they are the
ones who have the greatest level of civility, it is probably
not a good way to, you know, to measure others.
And I said to them, using a sports analogy, I said: Yeah,
we have got to create a way to do it because you can hit 450 in
baseball, but if you did not come to bat a certain number of
times, you can't win the championship. You know, you have to
have--a certain number of at bats that you have to have in
order to be a part of the statistics. And so we couldn't--we
were not able to get past that in the conversation. And so I am
just wanting to throw that out to you.
And then, to this, finally, said there are a lot of Members
who on both sides of the aisle really want things to do better.
I have been beaten up by a Republican friend who said: You
know, you quit writing the letters.
And for the newer Members, for about 5 years, I wrote a
letter each week to all of the Members, 435 Members.
And then I was in New York over the weekend, and another
Member came up to me and said: You are the problem.
I said: What?
They said: Where are the letters?
So I thought I would start it again. I think the chairman
was probably here when I was doing the letters every week to
everybody. So I am going to--I did one yesterday--2 days ago
that is going out.
So I know that there are a lot of people who want things to
be better. And they don't celebrate, you know, people who are
doing a nasty--making a nasty remark. But, on the other side,
if you have any ideas on this system of measurement, I think
this particular news outlet is really interested in doing this
because they spent a lot of time with me twice and probably
watching our meeting because that is where they first got the
idea.
Ms. Craig. So I can jump in on this.
And I don't have an answer for you quite yet on how to
measure civility. But I did make a little note for, like: Next
project, consider finding a good measure of civility. So maybe,
you know, a little bit, a couple of years.
You know, I think--but you have raised several, I think,
really excellent points that, you know, first and foremost, the
media is driven by conflict. It is not actually their fault.
That is what--the views. You know, it is, you know, conflict
draws attention.
But I will say that bipartisanship actually also gets
coverage, like when--I mean, it is covered in a certain way
where it is covered, it is, like, a rare show of bipartisanship
on Capitol Hill. The number of headlines I have tracked of,
like, The Washington Post, The New York Times that highlight
the rare show of bipartisanship makes it kind of clear it is
not actually all that rare. But if that is--if it gets them
writing about it, cool. That is great.
So, when bipartisanship is successful, you know, I think it
does get attention. And I think the--the idea I was proposing
about having Members have or having legislation that has, like,
two sponsors, a Democrat and a Republican sponsor, I think
would actually help in that it would make that bipartisanship
much more visible. It would also make--we could get all sorts
of scores to calculate for you if you do that on the political
science side of things.
But the other thing I would just say is that, you know, so
there is a couple of political scientists at the University of
Illinois who have done work kind of classifying Members,
classifying all of you by your behavior in terms of not
civility but in terms of, like, your actions, in terms of,
like, how much do you fund raise, how much due vote with your
party, so on and so forth. And the vast majority of Members
fall into categories that, as Mr. Cleaver was pointing out,
don't get any attention. It is 16 percent of the Members end up
falling into, like, the two high-profile categories of, like,
the party--you know, party leaders and not just leadership but,
you know, carrying party warriors, I think is what we are going
to call them, and what we call the ambitious entrepreneurs,
although I really like conflict entrepreneurs, too, for that.
But that is, you know, a small segment of Congress. The
vast majority of them are policy--policy wonks, district
advocates, you know, people who are focused on their policy.
And so, you know, also doing internal work to promote more of
that behavior, like, promote that activity more publicly could
be part of it. Certainly passing their legislation obviously
ends up getting more attention by making it more public that
way, but it is a big challenge.
Ms. Wiseman. I want to add one thought to that. I agree
with you. You know, there is a reason why the media covers
conflict. We are interested in conflict. It is part of our
human nature. We are drawn to the salacious. It is interesting.
It is compelling. And rather than trying to change that, maybe
to play with it, double down on it, which is, you know, a great
movie, something that we are fixated on is all about conflict.
No one wants to watch a movie or read a story that lacks
conflict, but what we love even more than conflict is conflict
resolution.
And I wonder if there is a chance to tell stories about
conflict and then say: Here is the conflict. Here is how we
were warring, at odds. Here was the no-win situation. And here
is how people came together to resolve that.
These are stories people want to read. These are case
studies that would get media attention. So I would play up the
conflict and add the resolution piece to it, and I think we
could get a lot of attention for it.
Mr. Richards. I want to echo what you just said, Liz. That
is--I am so grateful that you said that because--and I know
that the media is set up in a way to kind of, you know, attract
people to drama. I understand that. But I will be just be from
my own personal experience, and I feel like I am pretty dialed
into the civility stuff. I had never heard of this select
committee prior to, like, a month ago. And the work that you
all do is so meaningful and so powerful. And, quite frankly,
when I tell people, when I told my friends, like, yeah, I am
going to be testifying on Capitol Hill about civility, it is,
like, there is an amazing Select Committee on the Modernization
of Congress that is doing really powerful work to make Congress
work better. There is?
So there is a responsibility. And I don't know on your
websites if you have this front and center, if this is
something that people can actually see, so people are aware of
the work that you are doing. It could make a huge difference to
know that there is hope on the horizon. There are people who
understand this problem because I will tell you, on the ground,
people are just, like: Yeah, this is the way Congress is
broken. That is the way it is. It doesn't seem like anyone is
taking the effort to fix it.
So this hearing, hearings like this and the work that you
all are doing needs to be publicized even more than it
currently is.
Mr. Cleaver. The problem--I am sorry. I am from Kansas
City. It is the home of Hallmark cards. And the Hall family--I
am not doing a commercial, although they--the family, they are
good friends of ours. But, Don Hall, Sr., reads every script
for the Hallmark movies. The number one watched net--yeah,
network during--from Thanksgiving to New Year's is the Hallmark
Channel.
And one of the thing that--my son is an actor. So I have
started paying attention to this stuff. But one of the things
you have to, if you know Hallmark--I don't know if any of you
know the culture. I don't--every movie ends beautifully. I
mean, I mean, whatever it was that happened, it is--it ends
beautifully. They have to end that way. And the millions of
people who are watching, they know how that is going to end.
And yet the overwhelming majority of Americans watch it from
Thanksgiving to New Year's, and they already know how it is
going to end.
And so people are--they are hungry for things to work out
well. And, you know, and they enjoy it and celebrate it. And I
think we are fighting against it here. I have a--I don't want
to get him in trouble. I have a friend who is a Republican. We
have traveled all over the world together. I have wiser--
friends. And I said it to him the other day. We were someplace.
And I said: You know, I am scared to say anything about this
because I don't want you to end up getting death threats.
I mean, I--you know, death--I have two people in prison
now. I don't have them. The FBI put them in two prisons. And,
you know, we talked about it yesterday in Homeland Security.
And so I am almost--I don't want one of my friends to end up
getting, you know, threats. And that is where we are right now
in the country. You know: You have violated the rules of the
tribe, and, therefore, we are going to attack you and call you
and tell you what we are going to do to your children and so
forth.
So the--I think there is a hunger for it. But if we allow
this thing to continue to get out of--to get further and
further and further out of control, I am--I--you know, I have a
little 6-year-old grandson who I love more than I love myself
most of the time. He can do some other things. We won't talk
about it here. But I actually fear right now for what my little
6-year-old is going to experience, I mean, in our country.
And so I--I think this committee is doing valuable
business. I appreciate you being here. I think that we got to
get out of this thing where we can't even acknowledge
relationships because we are afraid to do it.
Thank you. I am sorry, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. No.
Ms. Craig. Can I--I just want to jump in really quickly,
because an idea came to my mind while you were talking. It does
not solve the problem of death threats, unfortunately. But in
terms of we were talking about the Hallmark movies. And I think
one of the reasons that, you know, the Hallmark movies are so
popular is because everyone knows, for that one month, you can
turn on that one channel, and you will get a feel-good movie.
But you could actually imitate that behavior in Congress
where you have a sort of, like, this is the bipartisanship
month or the week, you know, whatever it ends up being where
you have, if you had a week that was focused on, you know,
bipartisanship and collaboration and you kind of centralize all
of your activities around that theme like as a House, then that
is going to be an easier way for you to get attention from the
media probably also in terms of these, like, small little bills
that wouldn't get attention of themselves. But if you do an
entire week of it, like, right now I think that would be so
shocking that people would be, like: Well, we are definitely
going to cover this. But, you know, you can kind of capitalize
on that by consolidating things.
Ms. Wiseman. Yeah, and you can play it right after Shark
Week.
The Chairman. I feel like this is the time where I should
thank C-SPAN for being here, but I also----
Mr. Phillips. We need Hallmark to cover Congress.
The Chairman. They did a week, covering the week of this
committee. They replayed all of our hearings. As you can
imagine, it was ratings gold.
Ms. Van Duyne.
Ms. Van Dyne. I had--hit the button. It is not----
The Chairman. There it is.
Ms. Van Duyne. Is it on? All right.
I appreciate the work of this committee. But I think it is
also incumbent on each of us as leaders to take those
responsibilities of reaching out and being everything that we
talk about in being a leader, of being accountable, of being
collaborative.
As a freshman, this has been an interesting time. I think,
as anybody in this room will acknowledge, we are probably at
our most divisive that we have been in decades. You know, my
third day here, we had January 6th. The week after that we were
talking about impeachment.
We have a lot of different characters on both sides of our
aisle, but I don't want to give anybody death threats. But I am
just looking across the table. And, yesterday, Representative
Cleaver and I signed a deal inking a caucus that we are
creating as former mayors, trying to work together. And, you
know, when we were mayor, I didn't have a letter next to my
name. People knew where I went to, you know, where my kids went
to school, where we went to church, where I shopped. You know,
we were very accessible. And so, as mayors, I think we look at
it differently. We want to be productive.
I don't know anybody here who is just wanting to be on C-
SPAN. I think a lot of us come here with ideas of what we want
to do, and we are desperate to be productive, which means
working and collaborating. And I am looking at, you know, Ed
Perlmutter, at the bottom of the--you convinced me to join the
Congressional Softball Game, the softball team. Thank you very
much for the 7 a.m. practices.
But, I mean, those opportunities, we are creating. It is
not, you know, having a month where we are doing it, and it is
just kind of hokey, but we are creating those opportunities.
Last week, I was in Minnesota with, you know, with fellow
colleague Dean Phillips. We were going around and talking to
businesses that were in his district to find out the
commonalities. What are businesses across the country facing?
And I am in Texas. He is in Minnesota. I will tell you: They
are facing the same things.
And I look forward to having you in Texas to do those, to
do the same type of meetings.
I think it is incumbent on all of us to create
opportunities to do that. Now, look, we may not be in agreement
on a lot of our votes. But I am trying to find ways that we can
work together. Now, as a freshman, I may be naive to be doing
these things. I mean, time will tell if they actually are
effective. But I think it is important that we all recognize
that we are here to do a job, and we can't do a job if the only
thing we are doing is just throwing axes. And I don't know if
those are interesting ways that have been tried before and have
failed. But what are your thoughts on some of those ideas?
Ms. Wiseman. I think that is the essence of leadership.
That is my thought.
Mr. Richards. I have to jump in, too, because it is
interesting, Ms. Van Duyne. I was in your district, Tarrant
County, and had an opportunity to speak at the Fort Worth
Convention Center. And there was a moment where I saw almost
the epitome of civility in terms of what I would see from--
there was a moment where something went wrong from an AV
perspective. And the amount of people who came in and didn't
place blame and didn't point fingers and just collaborated to
get everything working again, it was hard to explain because
there was no Republican, Democratic, Black, White, gay
straight, born-again, atheist. It was just: Hey, let's work
together to make sure this event goes off without a hitch.
And in my travels around the country, I have always found
that the leadership that Liz was speaking of, you know, often
comes up in moments of crisis. But I also want to see how this
can continue in moments that are just a regular Thursday or,
you know, just a normal way of operating. I think we can get
there.
I did want to mention, too, to Mr. Cleaver--and I am really
sorry about the fear that you shared about your grandson, about
potential--I mean, it hasn't happened hopefully, but death
threats that could be something that is a problem for even
admitting that you are hanging out with someone who is across
the aisle. Ms. Van Duyne was talking about going to Mr.
Phillips' district in Minnesota outside of Saint Paul to have
an opportunity to connect, and now it is on C-SPAN.
But the idea is we have to normalize this. And as hard as
it is to feel like, well, you know, I would rather keep it
private for fear of these things, if we normalize that there is
nothing to be afraid of, of having people across the aisle have
meaningful relationships, I think we can begin the process of
making meaningful change.
Ms. Craig. And I would just jump in and say, I mean, I
think that trips like the two of you are talking about are
really fantastic for a few different reasons. But one of them
is because a part of working together to solve problems starts
with agreeing on what the problem is, and I think sometimes
that is missing. You know, sometimes these conflicts can't be
solved because you are not actually agreeing on what the
problem is. And then, obviously, the solutions are going to
vary. So, if you start by doing this sort of, you know, fact-
finding and work together to actually come around on the
problem, then I think that facilitates also collaborating on
solutions.
And then the other thing I would say is, again, I think it
is a lot of work could be done in terms of just making it
easier for Members to find people to work with, especially
Members in their first term who maybe don't have the robust
connections that more senior Members have. And that is, you
know, I think utilizing the infrastructure that currently
exists in the House, like utilizing committee staff is
obviously one place to facilitate that. But, even if it were
just--I mean, Zoom makes things very challenging right now.
But, you know, having these sorts of Jefferson Dinners, which I
also am a big fan of, to get people to meet each other, like,
you know, once you get more--once you get more, like, personal
connections, they kind of have more--you know, they build upon
themselves. And I think that helps a lot.
Mr. Richards. One last thing, back to Ms. Van Duyne's
point, orientation, and I know it was probably very odd for you
being oriented during a pandemic and everything like that. But
if we can also use orientation as an opportunity to set some
norms around civility, knowing that being new to Congress, that
could also be a great opportunity as well.
The Chairman. Indeed, one of the recommendations out of
this committee was to do that.
Mr. Richards. Oh, awesome.
The Chairman. So we are thinking alike.
I think we have covered a lot of good terrain. I want to
give folks an opportunity to ask some kind of cleanup
questions. I just want to quickly, and then I will ask--I know
Vice Chair Timmons has a question to follow up on, too.
Dr. Craig, I think one of the--it is not just around
incentives in terms of the challenge of collaboration. It is
actually sometimes just hard to find, you know, who do I want
to work with on this? I keep thinking that there are lessons to
be learned from private industry. I worked for a management
consulting firm that had thousands of people all around the
world. And I could say who has got expert--you know, I could
literally go onto an intranet and say, who has expertise on
this subject?
Similarly, I don't think anything like this exists in
Congress where I could come in and say: Hey, I am a new Member.
I want to work on veterans' housing issues. Are there other
Members who have self-identified as wanting to work on that--or
rural broadband or reducing debt or whatever? It does seem like
something like that might be useful and being able to identify
the staff person on your team who would be the point of contact
for something like that. Is that kind of along the lines of
what you were thinking about when you said, you know, like a
craigslist or something like that, you know?
Ms. Craig. No, that is. That is really what I was thinking
about. But another idea, similarly, along similar lines is,
like, again, within kind of the House intranet if all of the
Members set up profiles that were, like, here are my top three
priorities, the things that I am really interested in working
on, and here are my staff contacts for those, it is a different
presentation than like what you put out on your public-facing
web pages because this would only be for internal use.
But, you know, we do this in academia where it is, like:
Okay, I am looking for someone to collaborate on a paper that
studies X. And it turns out I can pull up their websites. And I
can find, okay, you know, they--this is their priorities, the
priorities in their research. And so I think that would also
translate really well if you don't necessarily want to set up a
dating site for legislating in Congress.
The Chairman. Vice Chair Timmons.
Mr. Timmons. Chair, thank you.
When I got sworn in, I guess this was 2019. One of the
coolest experiences I had was a dinner in Statuary Hall, and it
was all the Republican freshmen. And the Marine Corps Band was
there, and it was very formal. It was just a very cool
experience. And I know the freshmen Republicans my year,
freshmen Republicans, they are some of my closest friends in
Congress, and I have a relationship with all of them.
I don't have that on my Committee on Financial Services.
And I don't have it to the same degree even close with the
freshmen Democrats from my--from my year.
So we are talking a lot about just opportunities. And we
had previously discussed the idea of having committee dinners,
annual committee dinners. And the Library of Congress has a lot
of space. I don't think it is reasonable to open up Statuary
Hall for that many dinners. But there is multiple spaces within
the Library of Congress. And you could host a dinner, for
example, Financial Services. You invite Republicans, the entire
committee. And you have 10 seats per table. You do four Rs,
four Ds. And you bring in people that you anticipate will be
speaking in front of the committee and for hearings. You know,
we can anticipate this pretty well with Financial Services. I
imagine it is the same for most other committees. And you just
have a get to know each other. There is no--there is no agenda.
It is just, what are you working on?
So I think that is something that is an easy, low-hanging
fruit that we can do. But there is also this opportunity of
issues. I mean, there is 10, 20, 30 issues that are very
important to everybody. Why not have a dinner just to get to
know people? Hey, if you care about immigration, we are going
to have this opportunity where it is going to be an incredible
experience to go and have dinner in the Library of Congress--it
is beautiful--and share a meal together. And, you know, make
sure each table is divided, R and D.
And these are just layouts. I mean, I think everybody can
agree that this is something that should be going on that is
not. So I think that we will spend some time looking into that
more.
And the other thing with civility, a civility officer, I
don't know where they would go. But this is not going to be
easy. What I am talking about is not something that you just
say: All right, you do this.
Somebody is going to have to be in charge of making sure
that all the committees are scheduled right. We don't even
populate some of the committees until a certain time. So there
is all this scheduling. And then you have to make sure that--
you know, I know that Zoe Lofgren and Rodney Davis serve on
four committees or five--I don't even know--five committees. It
is crazy. So you got to make sure there is no conflict, but it
is doable. It is very doable.
So I think that that is a really good direction that came
out of everything that we just talked about. So, I mean, any
thoughts on that idea? I mean, it seems like we are taking
everything that we just talked about and putting it into an
action item.
Mr. Richards. Yeah, I would happily jump in on that.
I love the idea of the dinners and having an opportunity
from people from different parties to have an opportunity to
connect. There is something humanizing about breaking bread.
There is something--this has been, gosh, since the--the
beginning of time where people connect more deeply when they
have an opportunity share a meal together.
I will also on that vein share something that could be a
potential recommendation, as well, that could be useful from
the business world is--and Liz kind of talked about this, but
this is a little bit different--is Bring Your Child to Work
Day.
Now let me explain. Not necessarily bringing your child
into committee hearings but having an event once a year where--
because I know the challenges--and Dr. Craig had talked about
this before--where people don't live in the District anymore.
They live away from D.C. So the idea of bringing your family
here for a period of time where they could have an event, where
it is bipartisan, and there is speakers, and there is teaching
events. But, most importantly, lawmakers and their children get
to interact with other lawmakers and their children. And the
children are in age-appropriate events that are things that
they can enjoy and have an opportunity connect.
It builds the trust that I think is so desperately lacking
in this institution where people can feel like: Hey, my kids
get along with their kids, and there is an opportunity to do
this. One, it will also help to make people understand what
their kids--what their parents do for a living, which is
certainly nice. But maybe, more importantly, it will remind
lawmakers to set positive examples to their children and have
an opportunity connect to people who may ideologically think a
little bit differently from them. And I think it is a powerful
way to begin this process and gives people something to look
forward to on a bipartisan basis.
Ms. Craig. And I would just say I think also the thing of
the committee dinners idea is a great idea. I would suggest,
instead of trying to make it so the entire committee gets
together, because that is going to be really hard with some of
your bigger committees and scheduling is a nightmare,
obviously, but if you made it so that it was just like a small
dinner, like eight members of Financial Services and the
members had to sign up, it also creates some scarcity, like I
think that could also get people a little more excited if it is
hard to get into the dinner. And so, you know, it becomes
something that, you know, they want to do--they haven't had the
chance to do it--and facilitate participation with the
schedules.
The Chairman. Mr. Phillips.
Mr. Phillips. Just one more quick question, and we have
spoken about this pretty regularly. Just the physical construct
of this hearing is remarkably unique in Congress. We are facing
each other instead of backs towards one another. And maybe even
more important, we are all on the same level, you know, you
testifying with all of us, Democrats and Republicans. Do you
think the physical construct perhaps of how we do our hearings
and conduct our meetings might even change? In my experience,
it is a little harder to be rude to someone who is just a few
feet from you, not to mention physically on the same level. So
any thoughts on that?
Mr. Richards. I mean, 100 percent, 100 percent. I think,
Mr. Phillips, just this idea of sitting--and I am a little bit
of a political nerd. So I do--watched a few hearings in my day.
But, to your point, it is having layers of higher ranking
people with more tenure sitting higher than ones who are lower
ranking, so to speak, and talking to the backs of people's
heads is not--not only does it not increase collaboration, but
it is just not really a civil way of doing it.
This is an opportunity for hopefully whoever has C-SPAN as
part of their cable package to see how this actually works----
Mr. Phillips. Yeah.
Mr. Richards [continuing]. When people do look at each
other in the eye and have an opportunity to communicate. It is
not just the subject matter that is creating this civil
conversation that we are engaging in, but I do believe, to your
point, it is the format.
Mr. Phillips. Yeah.
Mr. Richards. I think it makes a huge difference, and I
don't want to overstate that. I think it does make a difference
to be able to see people and look at them when they are
speaking.
Ms. Craig. And I want to--oh, sorry. Go ahead.
Ms. Wiseman. I just wanted to add to that. I do think it is
hard to be divisive and dislike people when you are close to
them. And it makes me think--I want to share just a small story
because it is about sports, and I haven't been able to add to
the sports metaphor. And it is something--a story I heard Steve
Young tell, you know, former 49er quarterback.
Mr. Richards. Yeah.
Ms. Wiseman. And he talked about one of his opponents,
Reggie White, who was this, like----
Mr. Richards. Uh-huh.
Ms. Wiseman [continuing] Fierce----
Mr. Richards. Sure.
Ms. Wiseman[continuing] Lineman and he talked about what it
was like being the quarterback in the pocket, like, knowing
that Reggie White, who was, I don't know, like, 6 foot 5, like,
I don't know, 300 pounds of, like, massive offensive line
coming at him. And he said: I could hear Reggie coming. He was
loud, like, I knew he was coming to get me. And I lived in
terror of this man.
He said: But when Reggie would come and tackle me--you
know, I think he led the NFL in quarterback sacks. He would
take Young, and he would grab him. And he would tackle him to
take him down, and then he would use all of his own weight to
flip Steve over and so that Steve landed on top of him so that
he would take him down but not hurt him.
And then Steve said: And then, as soon as he tackled me, he
would be like, ``Hey, Steve how you doing?''
And Steve would be: Not so great right now, actually, but
glad you asked.
He would be like: Hey, Steve, how is your dad?
And, you know, Steve is trying to shake it off. And I think
it is this wonderful metaphor, which is you can be fiercely
competitive.
Mr. Richards. Yes.
Ms. Wiseman. You can be on opposing sides. You know, Reggie
came at him with everything he had and was ready to take him
down, but he did it with civility.
Mr. Richards. Yeah.
Ms. Wiseman. And he didn't hurt Steve.
And I think that is a metaphor for how people can work.
Yeah, you can be competitive. You can try to be vying for a
point of view, but you can do it with dignity and civility and
with good leadership. It is just like we need a few more Reggie
Whites in Congress. So that is what I would offer around
proximity, like they are close.
Mr. Phillips. I love that.
Ms. Craig. And the only thing I would add is that I think
that, you know, one of the strengths of this structure of a
committee hearing is that it does turn into much more of a
conversation. I mean, your average committee hearing, you know,
you come in. You give your 5-minutes talk. And then you leave.
You have no idea what anybody else said in that committee
hear--not everyone but frequently you have no idea what anyone
else said in that.
Ms. Wiseman. No, always.
Ms. Craig. Yeah. So, you know, this encourages people to
stay and have this conversation. But it also encourages more of
an exchange of ideas. And, you know, I think that talking
about--I don't have a good sports metaphor here, unfortunately.
I am really sad about that. But, if you think about--thinking
about, like, navigating the fact that there is this really
intense conflict that isn't going to go away anytime soon,
there are still a lot of areas where there is a lot of room for
common ground. You know, if you think about going back to
your--you are, like, people who go back to their districts,
even if it is a really, you know, deep red, deep blue, they are
afraid. They are, like, oh, well, I compromised, and so,
therefore, it is bad. The district isn't going to care if it is
something like ``and we worked together to bring you all of
these money'' or ``we worked together to bring you all of these
roads.''
You know, that is sort of like distributive politics, in
particular, is, you know, everyone is very collaborative. But
having the conversations I think reminds people of the areas
where you can find common ground, and then that also then
facilitates collaboration.
Mr. Phillips. Terrific. Thank you.
The Chairman. Okay.
With that, I would like to thank our witnesses for their
testimony today.
And, Dr. Craig, I would like to thank your students for
watching and boosting our C-SPAN ratings.
I would like to thank the committee members for their
participation. You are right. The structure we are using is not
cosmetic. I mean, it is with an eye towards trying to foster
similar collaboration that we are talking about today.
As always, I want to thank the staff of the committee for
pulling together such a great hearing with three such terrific
experts.
And, again, thanks to our friends from C-SPAN for showing
up.
Mr. Perlmutter. Can I just make one point?
The Chairman. Yeah, go on, Ed, Mr. Perlmutter.
Mr. Perlmutter. I am surprised that Mr. Cleaver didn't talk
about Patrick Mahomes.
The Chairman. I would like to thank the National Football
League for the substance for the day.
So, with that, without objection, all members will have 5
legislative days within which to submit additional written
questions for the witnesses to the chair, which will be
forwarded to the witnesses for their response.
I ask our witnesses to please respond as promptly as you
are able.
Without objection, all members will have 5 legislative days
within which to submit extraneous material to the chair for
inclusion in the record.
And, with that, this hearing is adjourned.
Thanks, everybody.
[Whereupon, at 10:59 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]
[all]