Review: Leadership. Lessons from a Life in Diplomacy, by Simon McDonald

After a successful Foreign Office career lasting more than forty years, the final five of them as head of the diplomatic service as Permanent Under-Secretary (PUS), Simon (now Lord) McDonald has produced a mixture of memoir and reflections on leadership. He is, happily for his readers, less than diplomatic in his assessments of some of the politicians, ambassadors and other senior officials with whom his path crossed. For good measure, he devotes a lengthy final chapter to the constitutional reforms he would like to see in Britain.