Page 201 - Leadership Lessons of the White House Fellows

THE LESSONS

party to holding meetings with Jewish leaders. When we got there, the Jew-
ish leaders were somewhat somber, but the vice president explained the
genesis of President Carter’s decision to them and asked how we could
be more responsive to their concerns. He never gave a hint that he had
had no idea the deal was going to happen. He made something positive
come out of it. I witnessed his loyalty to the president and his ability to
compromise. Having been an activist on the streets, I hadn’t learned much
about that, but on that trip I learned that sometimes half a loaf is better
than no loaf at all.”
Diaz would convert that concept into action years later when he was
tapped to be general counsel to the Department of Housing and Urban
Development by former White House Fellow and HUD Secretary Henry
Cisneros (WHF 71–72). Diaz and Cisneros met through the White House
Fellows program in the 1970s. Years after finishing his Fellowship, Diaz
was working as a judge to reform Philadelphia’s court system by ridding it
of a seven-year backlog and making changes that resulted in savings of
$100 million. When Cisneros, who had been mayor of San Antonio, Texas,
was appointed HUD secretary by President Clinton, Cisneros called on his
old friend Diaz to serve as general counsel. “I didn’t want the job. I didn’t
want to go work for a friend, and I turned him down three times,” Diaz
admitted. “But because I trusted Henry and he trusted me and we were
both White House Fellows, I ultimately decided to go ahead and take the
job. It turned out to be a very successful period.”
As General Counsel to HUD, Diaz used litigation settlements to incor-
porate and implement Cisneros’s policies. Diaz arrived at HUD during the
most litigious period in the department’s history. He resolved twelve major
cases that had been pending for a decade and hired as his deputy the lawyer
who had brought more suits against HUD than anyone else. “I wanted to
demonstrate my willingness to be a listener and to develop a strong trust
relationship so we could resolve all those cases,” Diaz said. “And I was
very aware that I had to use the art of compromise to resolve these very
contentious cases. During my time at HUD I also applied what I learned
from Vice President Mondale about the need to be loyal to your principal.
Compromise and loyalty do go hand in hand. I learned that you must do
everything you can to directly and openly engage the individuals with
whom you disagree. However, once a decision is made by the leader or a
consensus is reached by the management team, whatever the case may be,

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