A few Sundays ago I stumbled upon one of the morning interview programs which happened to feature the Mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg, and the Mayor of Newark (NJ), Cory Booker.
Politically speaking, Booker is a young guy, born in 1969, and a former community activist and Councilman. Bloomberg was born in 1942, a generation ahead of Booker, and is well known as the founder of Bloomberg, LP., a financial software and services giant.
At one point, as the two mayors were being interviewed, Bloomberg began answering a question (about crime or drugs or handguns) by saying, “Of course, Mayor Booker has a harder job than I have.”
That might or might not be true--I don’t know enough to say. But the fact that Mayor Bloomberg recognized his younger peer in that very gracious way says more about Bloomberg than it does about the difficulties of their respective jobs.
Undoubtedly Michael Bloomberg wants to be a wildly successful mayor of New York. He’s driven, and I’m sure has a healthy ego and many of the trappings that go with it. But if he makes a mess of it all, he’s still worth $16 billion dollars, the eighth richest American on earth, and the founder of a hugely successful financial services empire.
You can’t take that away from him, and he knows it.
(The one time Bloomberg was fired, incidentally, he was paid a reported $10 million severance. So, he even knows how to get fired well.)
In other words, Bloomberg comes to the job as Mayor with all of his (fancy term warning) psychic income needs met. He’s already successful. He’s already made it. He appears comfortable with himself and his accomplishments.
He could have been the Big Dog in that television interview and he chose not to be; instead, he made the gracious gesture of promoting the young guy next to him.
I’ve seen that before in other settings. 
Many years ago, when I had to go before Cook County Aldermen and lobby for cable TV rate increases, I could always tell the ones who had successful careers outside of politics from those who were trying to make a successful career as Alderman. The former were kinder and more understanding. Not weak, and you’d be crazy to assume that. But there was no drama, no spectacle in their questions. No grandstanding. They were trying to do the right thing for their communities, and trying not to kill a young general manager in the process.
I could write a book about the other kind of Aldermen, the kind out to prove something, earning their psychic income on the job.
The other place you see this phenomenon is on Boards of Directors, both for-profit and not-for-profit. A wise CEO doesn’t need to pick the richest or smartest Directors, but would do well to find Directors who have met all of their own psychic income needs prior to joining the board.
Because that turns out to be the kind of Director who asks hard questions at Board meetings that he knows the CEO can handle (and look good in the process), and saves the hard questions that might not be so flattering for a one-on-one coffee after the meeting.
Those kinds of Directors have met their psychic income needs elsewhere. Most of them have also met their real income needs, and happen to be the smartest people in the room as well. Which is, of course, more than a coincidence.
Many years ago, when I had to go before Cook County Aldermen and lobby for cable TV rate increases, I could always tell the ones who had successful careers outside of politics from those who were trying to make a successful career as Alderman. The former were kinder and more understanding. Not weak, and you’d be crazy to assume that. But there was no drama, no spectacle in their questions. No grandstanding. They were trying to do the right thing for their communities, and trying not to kill a young general manager in the process.
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