KING: It's an honor to welcome Marilyn Carlson Nelson to LARRY KING LIVE. She's an extraordinary woman, chairman, former CEO of the Carlson Companies. She received global recognition for the Carlson brand of hotels and restaurants, travel and marketing services, named one of the America's best leaders by "U.S. News & World Report." And her new book is "How We Lead Matters: Reflections on a Life of Leadership."
You're the first CEO, first female CEO of a major company?
MARILYN CARLSON NELSON, CHAIRMAN & FMR. CEO CARLSON COMPANIES: Oh, I think there might have been a couple before me, maybe Jill Barad (ph) at -- at...
KING: The toy company.
NELSON: ... the toy company, et cetera. But one of the early ones. I hate to admit it but it's true. It was very exciting.
KING: What do the Carlson Companies -- what do they do?
NELSON: Carlson is a travel and hospitality company. We have a thousand hotels.
KING: Oh!
NELSON: Radisson, Country Inns and Suites, Park Plaza, Park Inns. We have TGI Fridays all over the world, 160 countries of hotels and restaurants.
KING: I thought we were going to help you make it.
(LAUGHTER)
NELSON: Oh, well, you are! You are.
KING: So what are you, retired or you're...
NELSON: I'm the chairman.
KING: You remain chairman?
NELSON: Right.
KING: Now, tell me about the book, "How We Lead Matters: Reflections on a Life of Leadership." (INAUDIBLE) and the foreword is by our own David Gergen. What prompted you to write it?
NELSON: Well, I didn't expect to write a book. One day, my grandson, Jamie (ph), who was 12 at the time, said -- they call me Mame -- said, Mame, were you alive during segregation? And at first I wondered if he thought the Civil War, and then I realized he was probably studying Civil Rights and the '60s. And that was when I came out of school.
And I also started thinking there's a real chance that my grandchildren won't ever really know what I fought for, what I stood for. You know, they'll see me as the person who was on the sidelines for soccer games and hockey games, et cetera. So I started writing little stories. And I put a piece of poetry with them because I love poetry and I thought sometimes it makes the point.
And they were very accessible stories, everything from meeting -- from serving brats and beer to the KGB to going to China and working with Madam Chan, one of the wealthiest women in China and how we became so close and never spoke a word in the same language, to the gerbils and how I had a test of my integrity when one of my younger daughters brought the gerbils home -- but all little stories that were insights into moments in my life where I kind of had an "A-ha." I saw something about leadership or I saw something about accountability.
Larry, if I could give them only one gift, I'd ask them not to point fingers and always say, Why doesn't someone else fix it, but to take hands and fix it.
KING: Could you teach leadership?
NELSON: I am teaching.
KING: You can?
NELSON: I am teaching.
KING: You mentioned you don't believe in born leaders?
NELSON: Yes. I think there is -- I think there is -- well, Aristotle said look for the children with gold in them. I think there are some human beings who have a natural caring for others and natural energy and a desire to make a difference. I know Hubert Humphrey said once that you could tell a leader because they felt like everything was their responsibility.
They wanted to fix their friend's children's diseases or they wanted to pick up something off the floor if there was something left on the floor, and -- but I've been teaching corporate responsibility and I do think you can -- you can learn to be an integrative thinker. You can begin to understand that there are relationships beyond the obvious and that sometimes -- actually, I happen to think women are particularly good at it. That -- because I think you need to connect the dots.
It's something you do. I mean, you're a genius at that. You can see relationships. Some people are very linear, and they just don't recognize that there are externalities to every decision and that these decisions are complex. And tomorrow's leaders, I think, are going to need to partner. I think government won't be able to do it alone. NGOs won't be able to do it alone, and business as multi- nationals it is can actually partner and we can solve some of these big problems together. KING: The book is "How We Lead Matters." The guest is the extraordinary Marilyn Carlson Nelson. Subtitle, reflections on a life of leadership. What a life. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KING: We're back with Marilyn Carlson Nelson. Extraordinary woman. Her book is "How We Lead Matters. " This book was published by accident?
NELSON: It was published by accident, yes, because --
KING: Meaning?
NELSON: After Jamie asked me about my reflections, and I started reflecting and putting it on paper, some of the executives started asking me if they could have copies, and then I got worried. I wanted it to be so honest. It talks about everything from how I felt becoming CEO to having hysterectomy to how I felt when I lost a daughter in an automobile accident, and it's all very, very personal.
And I sent it to a friend who actually, without asking, sent it to McGraw Hill. So unlike most people who shop their books and I got a call that McGraw Hill wanted to publish this. I should send some more stories. And they laugh because they say I'm the only one that ever sat there and said, you don't really think someone would want to read it, do you? And they said, are you talking as out of publishing your book? But I felt like someone was going to have the keys to my diary a little bit.
KING: Do you know David Gergen?
NELSON: I know David Gergen.
KING: Extraordinary guy.
NELSON: He's wonderful. I'm blessed to be on the dean's council at the Kennedy Center and to work from time to time with David Gergen. And he is nurturing public sector leaders. I think he's one of the best examples of true leadership.
KING: He's special. How old was your daughter when she died?
NELSON: Nineteen.
KING: How did you deal with that?
NELSON: How do you deal with it? I think, first of all, you -- you go through all the steps. Everybody sends you books telling you that you're going to go through the steps and you think, oh good, I'm a smart person. I can skip a few but you don't. You go through depression and anger, and they tell you that you're probably going to get a divorce because there's a high probability, but my husband and I almost 50 years now together. We just clung to each other, and slowly but surely, we tried to make sense of it.
KING: Have other children?
NELSON: We have three other children.
KING: Did that help?
NELSON: I'd say at the time I thought when people say you have other children, it was like, they're not -- no one's replaceable. I mean, they're not interchangeable, but I'm sure when I have friends who've lost an only child and how lonely it is, I'm blessed and we are blessed. But the interesting thing, Larry, is that as we started to try to come to grips with it, what we were more aware of than anything was that she didn't have any more time. And we had time.
And the fact that her life was cut off made us realize that ours could be cut off. Any minute. And we wanted to use our days. So, my husband became vice chairman of the Medtronic, and he was a surgeon before that. He went to Medtronic because he felt like maybe he could use his scientific understanding to help more people. And I became just convinced that I wanted every day to matter. So, at night when I go to bed and I pull back the covers, I ask myself, if I were an artist and today was a painting, would I step back and say, I'll sign my name to that.
And some days I can sign my name to -- I've kind of lived up to what I'd like to be. I've been loving. I've been forgiving. I've perhaps struck a blow for things that I believe in and haven't walked away. Some days I don't. But just going through the exercise kind of commits me to trying to use those days to cherish the people I love, to try to make the world a more inclusive place and to use her needless death as long as I have breath to make a difference.
KING: The book "How We Lead Matters: Reflections on a Life of Leadership." The guest is Marilyn Carlson Nelson. Some more moments after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KING: Marilyn Carlson Nelson is the guest. The book is "How We Lead Matters." David Gergen wrote the foreword which is pretty good for anybody to get a foreword written by someone as no other than knowledgeable and wonderful as Mr. Gergen. It's published by McGraw Hill. There's still a shortage of female CEOs, right?
NELSON: There is.
KING: Why?
NELSON: I don't think there's going to be, actually, Larry. I think, right now, we have 44 percent of the people getting MBAs are women that used to be less than 30 percent. So, I think that's one ticket that a lot of people need to check off. I don't think it's essential that you have an MBA, but I think the culture kind of looks to that as one of the steps. We have 60 percent of the undergraduate degrees now are going to women, 60 percent.
There are two for every two men graduating from undergraduate, three women are graduating, over half of the lawyers, law school, and medical school. So, it's important the pool is there. And I think the demographics are in our favor that if you can say in our favor. The fact is that we're going to be, you know, in our country, we're barely replacing ourselves with two children. Western Europe is less than replacing themselves.
And today, it's not really in the post industrial world, it's not how strong you are or how tall and muscular you are. It's really how you can vision and lead and collaborate, and I think that women are going to partner with men, and I actually think there's going to be that kind of wonderful energy. We got great energy with some of the immigrants who came to our country. My grandfather who came from Sweden, I mean, so full of energy and excited.
KING: Think we'll see a woman president?
NELSON: We almost did.
KING: Almost did.
NELSON: We almost did and a very strong and capable woman. I think we will, of course, one day. I think we'll see a woman president. And --
KING: A great women leaders in other countries.
NELSON: Fantastic. I - I think so often -- I've met with several of them, and even some leader in the more traditional leadership roles. Queen Silvia of Sweden has become a very dear friend. We'd been working -- she created something called the World Childhood Foundation, and she invited our family, my sister Barbara heads our family foundation, and she came and invited us to participate with her in creating the World Childhood Foundation which was to deal with street children.
And then, of course, we backed into a subject that you've been looking at recently because these street children, especially runaway girls, but even little boys, are so vulnerable to being trafficked. It is 21st century slavery. And I guess, if I had to describe myself, I think one of the descriptors I would use would be I like to think of myself as a 21st century abolitionist because we're in the travel business. We discovered that a lot of this plays out through travel and tourism.
That there are over 2.5 million children being trafficked for sexual purposes around the world. And when I heard that 45 percent of the travelers to go see angervot (ph) are really going there to use those children or to buy those children, I thought, we have to do something. And so, Carlson was the first, and I have to say so far, the only significant travel or hotel company in the United States to sign on to end child trafficking with the (INAUDIBLE) which is subsidiary of the United Nations.
KING: Yes.
NELSON: And it was Queen Silvia, really, who said, you have a platform, use it.
KING: And we've not seen the last of you and me.
NELSON: That's good.
KING: I have some ideas about you are an extraordinary lady.
NELSON: I'm so glad to see you.
KING: The book "How We Lead Matters: Reflections on a Life of Leadership." The Extraordinary Marilyn Carlson Nelson.