What Defines Your Leadership?

In the April 9, 2012 issue of Fortune magazine, an article on The 12 Greatest Entrepreneurs of Our Time – and What You Can Learn From Them by John A. Byrne provides a brief but insightful look at what makes these successful men tick (three women received honorable mention but didn’t make it to the top 12).  I’d like to provoke your thoughts by sharing the critical success factors about the top four.

Steve Jobs – Apple – Didn’t rely on consumer research, but instead “connected the dots” about relationships between technology and life experiences.  He believed that it wasn’t consumers’ responsibility to know what they wanted, especially if they haven’t seen anything like it before.  In essence consumers are often limited by their own experiences and imagination.  

Bill Gates – Microsoft – Picked smart people and put them to work on important things. Both his business partner (Paul Allen) and his successor as CEO (Steve Ballmer) fall into that category.  These are people who he bounced ideas off, and who in turn would come up with even better ideas.  Gates believes that brilliant people should work on the best and most important projects.

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Fred Smith – Fedex – Learned about logistics from his experience serving in Vietnam where he saw the importance of integrating ground and air operations to move material and equipment, and to support the troops.  He also learned the importance of investing in the right first line managers to make good decisions, and to praise them publicly for their work.

Jeff Bezos – Amazon – Takes a mini-retreat every quarter.  This is time for him to reflect on the past, and plan for the future.  His time alone with no phones is spent web-surfing for new trends and ideas that he then writes in a memo to himself and other members of his executive team for follow-up and action. These ideas typically take on a life of their own as others add to them until something develops.

So by now you get the picture.  Each of these individuals changed the way we communicate or connect by introducing a new operating concept. They also spend a lot of time on continuous improvement of current ideas, and innovating with new ideas, even before customers can imagine what they want.  They had to first envision a future very different from the present; a breakthrough idea.  Then they had to believe that it was possible for such an idea to come to fruition. This required several leadership characteristics, which are critical for all of us.

Perseverance – Most people fail many times on the way to success.  Success is often about finding out what doesn’t work until you narrow it down to what does work. Many scientists like Alexander Graham Bell, George Washington Carver, and Thomas Edison discovered and invented many things because they were always trying new ideas, and thus discovering other things in the process. This means a “never quit” attitude, turning each failure into a stepping stone to the next opportunity.

Focus – There will be plenty of people along the way who will offer their ideas on what you’re doing, whether it will be successful or not, and what you should be doing instead. If you really believe in what you’re doing, you must tune out any words that take you away from your goal. Often, those people have a limited perspective either based on lack of knowledge or lack of commitment. Instead find those who are supportive and encouraging, and allow their energy to spur you on.

Passion – The question here is how much you believe in what you’re doing. If the object of your passion is merely to make money, then you’ll probably cast around from one idea to the next in search of what’s working, and very few will succeed this way. (With Bill Gates and Warren Buffett are giving most of their money away, they must have discovered that there’s more to life than just money.)  Instead, your passion must be about your mission or purpose in life. For Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook that’s helping people to connect and share information across the world. For Herb Kelleher of Southwest Airlines that’s providing low cost airfares with great customer service.

Capability – All of the above means nothing if you don’t have the intelligence to bring your ideas to market. This is the difference between a great idea left on paper, and a good idea brought to market. Maybe someone else had a Facebook or Apple - like idea, but if you can’t experiment with it, develop it, fund it, market it, and sell it, then it’s of no value.  Clearly understand your capabilities, find others who possess the skills you need but don’t have, research and understand your market, gain insight into the areas that are saturated vs. where the opportunities lie, build a solid business plan, find funding sources.  Remember, if it’s easy, anyone can do it and it’s no longer a game changing idea.

Wild Card – This final characteristic is what makes you who you are.  It’s the strongest characteristic about each man listed above that made them successful.  It’s different for each person, based on their personality, their business strategy, and their product or service.  What works for one may not work for another.  It’s like the secret ingredient to a recipe that everyone loves but can’t quite figure out how to imitate. It’s like a chemical reaction that occurs when your passion mixes with your capability.

So my question to you is, what’s your defining leadership characteristic? What attribute or insight do you possess that is the primary key to your success? What will others remember you for? Think about how and where you’re most creative.  What do you do that most often yields results or engages others? This is your God-given gift. Simply embrace it and leverage it to your success.

Click here to read the Fortune article.

Who's Your Tiger?

I caught a few minutes of an interview recently between Charlie Rose, the acclaimed PBS interviewer and recent CBS morning news host, and Jim Nantz, CBS Sportscaster for The Masters’ Golf tournament.  The key topic of course was Tiger Woods and his chances of again winning this major tournament.  According to Nantz, Tiger’s left knee has been operated on four times, literally rebuilt, but that process has spawned a number of other injuries related to the knee, including Achilles tendon issues.  If he is to succeed in his quest to beat Jack Nicklaus’ record of major championship wins, Tiger needs to win five more majors. Assuming his body holds up another 10 years, with four majors a year, 40 in total, he should be able to easily best Nicklaus. 

Interestingly though, they commented that the field of golfers has changed significantly since Tiger’s last major win four years ago.  Instead of just the golfers in their 30s and 40s, most of whom have been mentally and physically intimidated by Tiger’s skill, there is a new crop of younger golfers in their 20s emerging who are poised and ready to establish and define their own era of golf.  They’re not intimidated by Tiger, or used to him beating them by double digit strokes. They’re confident and fearless. 

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I’m not a huge golfing fan so I sought out my local golf pro (my husband) to gain insight on whether Tiger really upped the level of the game, or were the new younger golfers just better.  His opinion was that Tiger’s focus and commitment to the game taught other would-be players about the importance of body strength, practice and pure skill. This interview was really thought provoking,  so I have two questions for you.  Who’s your Tiger? And how do you respond to him?

A Spirit Of Defeat

During the 15+ years since Tiger turned pro, golfers his age and older have become acquainted with his talent, and learned the difficulty of facing off with him in a tournament. His very presence draws a crowd both in person and on TV, and competitors know that he will up the ante of the game. It’s not just a physical game, it’s a mental one as well. Like David facing Goliath, his very presence can be taunting and overwhelming to some. Second place could almost be as good as winning if you lose to Tiger. This is a spirit of defeat, accepting loss even before you play the game or go through the process.

So what “Tigers” are in your life? Are they looming challenges that you can’t imagine overcoming? Maybe it’s a career goal, educational aspiration, organizational challenge, family issue, or your own mental picture of your capability and worth. You’ve failed so frequently in this area, been beaten, and had no though that you might come out on top. You’ve given up even before you entered the race.

Fearlessness

Then there’s another younger group of golfers who haven’t experienced years of defeat at the hand of the champion. They’ve had time to study him, learn from his moves, and perfect their own style. Maybe they’re cocky, maybe they’re naïve, or maybe they’re just really good. Time will tell, but they’re starting out with a fresh mental attitude about their capabilities and future on the tour.  They may respect Tiger, but they won’t yield to him. Give them the opportunity and they’ll march into battle and boldly snatch the victory. 

So what about you?

Is it possible for you to recreate your mindset from a spirit of defeat to one of fearlessness?  When you’re facing your giants, do you think of how you’re equipped to overcome them, or do you think about all the reasons why it will be difficult? In fact, do you even consider them as giants, or just a stepping stone to victory?

The Bible has numerous examples of situations where God’s people faced enemies stronger and greater in number than them. Yet because He was on their side, they emerged victorious. In one situation, Gideon led a band of 300 brave men to take on an army as numerous as the sand. But before they went out against that army, he and his servant snuck into the enemy camp at night and overheard one soldier sharing a dream with his companion. In his dream, a loaf of barley bread tumbled into their camp and struck a tent, overturning it so that it collapsed. The companion interpreted the dream (correctly) to mean that their entire army would be delivered into Gideon’s hand. After returning to camp, Gideon mustered his small army and led his men to victory. They simply surrounded the enemy, blew their trumpets and shouted God’s victory, then watched the enemy slaughter one another.

So who or what is your Tiger, and how will you face him? If you replay old mental models of defeat you’re on the wrong track.  Visualize yourself winning. Define yourself as a champion. Set a new standard. Be fearless.

The Facebook Way

Much is being written about Facebook these days, as the company moves toward it’s long awaited IPO.  Earlier this year, co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg held a global all-employee meeting.  Everyone thought he was going to announce the IPO, but instead (according to an article in the March 19^th issue of Fortune) he used that time to talk about the company’s mission and priorities.  He recognized that the eight year old startup company with phenomenal growth and value was about to undergo a transformation that could potentially ruin the culture that had made it so successful. He admonished employees to maintain their focus on the characteristics that fostered the “hacker way”, building through continuous improvement; the mottos on the wall like “Done is better than perfect”; the orientation to constantly improving customer interface that brought over 800 million people in the world to open up a Facebook account. He recognized that the IPO would subject the company to more outside scrutiny and investor demands; and that more importantly, many of the employees themselves as newly minted millionaires might lose their edge. They might lose the driving desire to create something new and innovative.  They might decide to pass on the quarterly all night hacking sessions where employees work on something other than their day-to-day job; trying out ideas and thinking up new products. 

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Mission or Money

While those of us on the outside may think of Facebook as existing to make a profit, Zuckerberg has a broader more impactful vision.  In his words, they don’t build services to make money, they make money to build better services.  That ethos will be tested now among  their 3,000+ employees. His goal has been to open up more connections across the globe. He uses the internet and technology to help people establish relationships, share information, and make their voices heard more quickly and personally than ever before possible.  

That drives an entirely different set of decisions than might be the case if he simply wanted to make money. And I would venture to say that if his primary goal were to make money, that the company wouldn’t have been as successful as it is today. Because while money is a huge motivator, and can be very powerful, there’s very little passion attached to it. It’s always a tool, a means to an end in terms of accumulating enough to exchange it for something of value (a purchase or trade), or such that the amount itself provides leverage or power to influence others. 

People will work to get paid, but after a certain point will want to use that money to spend their time doing something that is meaningful to them. But employees motivated by the mission of their company, in this case Facebook, will see the meaning in their every day work, and as long as their value is recognized, monetarily and non-monetarily, they will extend themselves for that mission.  Employees there get real time feedback from the over 100 billion connections between users of site users, and instantly see their handiwork on display. They see the global connectedness and cultural transformation that has occurred as a result of their work. 

Managing Growth

So with Facebook growing at breakneck speed, the impending IPO threatens to change the very culture that made it successful.  Zuckerberg is attempting to avoid that or at least carefully shape their future culture.  They’ve developed training programs for new hires to teach the Facebook Way.  They’re resisting the typical corporate hierarchical structure and processes in favor of encouraging  healthy dissent, experimentation and mockups instead of formal presentations, and people with passion to prove the boss wrong.  Zuckerberg’s included a letter on Why Facebook Exists with his IPO filing to reinforce their five core values; focus on impact, move fast, be bold, be open, and build social value.  He will continue to reinforce that as after the IPO he will maintain 22% ownership and 57% of its voting shares…enough to give him a strong voice in every decision.   

The founder or visionary CEOs of companies like Apple and Starbucks left their companies after a point of significant growth, only to return to re-focus them on the mission that made them great in the first place. Zuckerberg admits that he’s fulfilling a commitment to early investors and employees to allow them to make money on the company. It is transforming to fit a new set of demands and he and his leadership team have to work harder to steer the machine, course correcting to maintain the focus that got them there in the first place. Hopefully the Facebook Way will survive the transition, and their mission will hold fast.  Meanwhile, I’m about to post this on my Facebook page.

Click here to read Zuckerberg's IPO letter to investors

Click here to read the Fortune article

Copyright 2012 Priscilla Archangel