Its funny and entertaining, but I still feel more confused than informed.

keep in mind, being cool doesn't always make you a good leader, but being a good leader is always cool.

  being a good leader is always cool

like when you need to make tough decisions and fire people?

The two should go together, IMHO. I would much rather be fired by the cool boss that I could relate to and shoot the shit with than a cold, by the book boss. The problem with that is a lot of bosses find it hard to fire their "friends" and maintain their appeal.

My last boss was like that, which is why he delegated the hiring and firing to a "hired gun". He was a good guy for the most part, but that was the most difficult thing to watch as I got up into management and saw what was going on. He would make the calls to have someone canned, delegate down to the "gun" and then put on a face of disbelief and contempt in front of everyone as though it wasn't his choice to fire the person.

You may question, as did I, how people could buy this circus act, but it worked quite well. When anyway would question the CEO as to why he doesn't fire the "gun" if he doesn't agree with what he's doing, he would always comment that when you put someone in a position like that you can't undermine what they do. For better or for worse, you have to back them and their decisions. Which is true, but was also just a smoke screen for what was really going on to those none the wiser.

I'm sure the remaining employees appreciate your keeping the company afloat.

i may have taken the original comment out of context. i've seen a couple CEOs being cool (hip, funny, etc.) when they needed a leader. i think that's dangerous, and that's the point i meant to make.

specifically to yours, no, its not cool to fire people, but i would rather hear well rationalized case for deciding to let me go (assuming it wasn't performance related) instead of a cleverly written kthxbai. still, that even that wouldn't be cool.

Exactly that. Anyone can keep cool and be the fun boss when everything's aces, but the real test of a leader is how adversity is handled.

I agree that the ideal leader is cool all the time, but not every human being worthy of a leader can manage to stay everyone's favorite dude while terminating careers out of necessity. In those cases, I'd rather the leader be a hard-ass than have him be Michael Scott.

epic acquisition email. The density of so many cultural references and sarcastic reflections made by the leader of an organization sent me into a fan-boyish world wind.

I could only reply, "where do I sign up?"