Lincoln and Leadership The article Lincoln and Leadership can be found in The Economist. Right now, there is a big wave of love for the 16th President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln. This can be attributed to Steven Spielberg’s new film Lincoln and the novel Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns. The article looks at why Mr. Lincoln was a successful president. The article is quick to point out that Lincoln was an outside choice for president. There were two other candidates that had much more experience in line for the job. Instead, the GOP went for a man that lost his bid for Senate and had only served one term as a Representative. The idea is that because Mr. Lincoln did not have the experience needed and was not the cookie cutter mold of a politician, he was able to bring in new ideas and successfully be remembered as one of the greatest leaders of the USA. There are many companies that are looking towards outsiders to see if they can bring about many profits and ideas to companies. Chief executive posts in companies have been given to outsiders have risen from 14% in 2007 to 22% in 2011. In Europe, it rose from 14% to 31%. Eight bosses were examined by William Thorndike that outperformed the S&P average by more than 20 times, and it turned out, that they were all outsiders. They were not experienced workers in their field. Some were widows, unemployed or an astronaut. The article also criticizes some outsiders. It was found that between 2009-11,