RAILROADER: The Unfiltered Genius and Controversy of Four-Time CEO Hunter Harrison

No detail was too small for Harrison. Even the company ball cap got a makeover. Instead of black with white letters, it shifted to company colors, blue and gold.

“He can be, sometimes I think, probably too tough on people.” His point was that while it was one thing to maximize returns for shareholders, there was an array of stakeholders that had to be considered. Among others, employees fell into that category.

Managers, he frequently repeated, do things right—while leaders do the right thing. “My mandate in these jobs has never been to be Mr. Popularity.”

Nobody can bullshit him,” said Hargrove in 2017. “Not the management, not the union, not the workers.” Harrison knew their jobs. That gave him credibility in the field, but it also created angst among employees.

It was also the opposite of what he thought a revamped railroad needed—in-your-face contact with railcars. Harrison would soon announce that he was relocating head office to a rail yard. CP’s headquarters would be where the action was—next to the tracks.

Soon, non-operating people like computer programmers would be trained as conductors. Managers would learn how to drive trains. This would not only give the company flexibility, but office workers would learn what it was like on the front lines of actually operating a railroad.

He didn’t necessarily want the smartest people in the world, he wanted the hardest working people in the world. “Y’all take the technology and give me the good worker and I’ll beat you to death,” he told them.

“He’s going to die with his spurs on,” Gray said presciently in a 2017 interview. “He has no choice. He’s addicted.”

“Just care,” he pleaded.