Word: queens
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Press aides labor to plan backdrops so the cameras will take away an image that reinforces the message their boss is trying to highlight that day. A press office whose chief used to be known on Fleet Street as "the abominable no man" now promptly returns phone calls. The Queen's Christmas broadcast no longer has her staring straight into the camera, but uses video clips to illustrate her points. Her Majesty even carries a cell phone inside that handbag. All in all, Prince Andrew says, "I think this organization is very good at change management. We live...
...That "imperceptible change" is exactly the sweet spot the Queen is trying to hit, says a senior adviser. Moving glacially, of course, can accentuate the sense that she is out of date. But by background as well as policy, that's the way she wants it. Her "Uncle David," King Edward VIII, loved making waves before he abdicated in 1936, and spooked his successors about playing the reformer too overtly. "No gimmicks!" the Queen has told aides. "I am not an actress!" She wants the monarchy to be a focus for continuity and enduring patriotic values, which make instinctive sense...
...Queen has also subtly refurbished the most public aspect of her work - her interaction with ordinary people. She has never been naturally extroverted, perhaps a reaction to growing up so famous that as a child she had a territory named after her in Antarctica and was immortalized in Madame Tussaud's astride a pony. Her early friend and bridesmaid Pamela Hicks noted the unrelenting press of "intimate strangers" always peering in alongside motorcades. But over the years the Queen has learned to make encounters more enjoyable - and memorable. When she grants honors, she studies biographies of each recipient and writes...
...What does the Queen herself have to do with these changes? Does she benignly preside while staffers take the initiative, or is she a hands-on manager? Her staff say that she is almost spookily well-informed and observant. "Her memory of detail, her instinct for what is right, is absolutely superb," says Ross. Hunka, the personnel chief, says "she's obviously not immersed in the details of employment legislation, but whenever an issue gets to her, her feedback is never against what I would say as an experienced human resources person. She's always on the beam...
...letting her down." Hunka says the palace "is almost without politics. I never have to write a memo to cover myself. There's no top job to compete for, and no revolving door of CEOs you have to please." Reid, who climbed to the top of KPMG, calls the Queen "the best person I've ever worked for. She lets you get on with the job, but she and her husband see things with great clarity. Sometimes we look at every conceivable angle; she'll just cut through...