Dear Mr. Grant,
My purpose in writing is to ask you to think about two important things you said two years apart, as you mull your next step here in ºüÀêÊÓƵ. In the next couple of months or so, your name will be on the front pages of newspapers all over the world as the company you lead, Monsanto, with Germany-based Bayer.
The $66 billion deal will be quite profitable for you, but that’s not what concerns me. Your place in ºüÀêÊÓƵ does.
About two years ago, when we met for the first time, you came to the Post-Dispatch with other members of , the organization of big-company CEOs that has for decades been a moving force behind most big decisions made in ºüÀêÊÓƵ. We were talking about how the community needed to respond to Ferguson, and your voice was the loudest and most eloquent in the room.
People are also reading…
“Ferguson,†you said, “is the fracture point that fundamentally changes ºüÀêÊÓƵ, or else everything crystallizes and nothing changes. In our lifetime, you might not ever have another chance to swing at the fences.â€
At the time, I was surprised by your candid assessment.
Here’s why: What I had discovered in my short time in ºüÀêÊÓƵ is that Civic Progress liked to do most of its work in the shadows. Lately, I’ve been hearing that from some local business leaders as one reason why ºüÀêÊÓƵ isn’t reaching its potential.
What they’re telling me is that compared with similar organizations in big cities where these business leaders also work, Civic Progress is too quiet. Its CEOs stay behind the scenes. They don’t work hard enough, or publicly enough, to provide the leadership that the city, the region, needs.
Part of the problem is that much like our city and our county, the one with 90 separate municipalities, even our civic leadership is divided. When business leaders bring important people to ºüÀêÊÓƵ, they sometimes aren’t sure whom to set up the big meetings with: Is it Civic Progress? Or the Regional Business Council, or the Chamber of Commerce? Maybe the ºüÀêÊÓƵ Economic Development Partnership? Do they meet with the mayor or the county executive? Which one first?
The people telling me these things are serious business people who care about ºüÀêÊÓƵ.
Like you, they see that this city is at an important turning point.
The “fracture point†of Ferguson, as you put it, wasn’t a day or a week or a month. It’s a moment in time in a city’s evolution. In some ways, that moment in time has not yet been seized by city and county leaders. But there is progress.
One key area of progress is that there has been a tremendous amount of talk over the past two years about fixing the broken government structures in the region. From to , from the editorial board to the Legislature, there is a growing consensus that there has to be a way for our community to speak with a unified voice.
You know this. Even during the process of your sale to Bayer, you had to run the gantlet of government leaders and civic organizations to tell your story about why you think Monsanto’s sale won’t be a bad thing for ºüÀêÊÓƵ.
That brings me to the second thing you said, just a few days ago.
“It doesn’t sound like it, but I’m a ºüÀêÊÓƵan,†you told one of my Post-Dispatch colleagues. Your Scottish brogue gives away your roots across the pond. But, as you said, “I’ve lived here for the last 20 years and raised my family†here.
Last spring, when the Missouri Legislature was near passage of SJR 39, which would have made it easier to discriminate against gays and lesbians, Monsanto was among to make sure that Missouri didn’t go the way of North Carolina, which has since lost the NBA All-Star game and numerous NCAA events as a result of its passage of a similar law.
Traditionally, ºüÀêÊÓƵ business leaders are slow to get out in front of such issues. But when they unite, whether it’s defeating a bad piece of legislation in Jefferson City or backing a tax hike to improve mass transit in the city, good things happen.
Sometime soon, ºüÀêÊÓƵ is going to face a serious decision about its future governance. There is a lot of talk about a city-county merger, about a movement to combine police and fire forces, about making big changes that will improve the region’s ability to grow and to speak with one voice.
That movement can’t succeed without the leadership of its biggest CEOs — not behind the scenes writing checks, but putting their voices on the line, leading the charge. Smart business leaders who care about this city tell me that they believe it’s time for Civic Progress to come into the 21st century and truly lead.
I don’t know what you intend to do when the Monsanto sale is complete, but here’s what I hope you do: Use your voice as chairman of Civic Progress to swing for the fences. Bring your thoughtfulness and eloquence to the front of the debate in ºüÀêÊÓƵ over the future of our governance, and challenge other business leaders to do the same.
Thanks for your time,
Tony