Book Notes
Strategic = long term plan, overall objective
Tactical = short term plan, immediate
Quotes from the book:
“What makes leadership so hard is dealing with people, and people are crazy.”
“And the craziest person a leader has to deal with is themselves”
“By trying to do everything, he was accomplishing nothing”
“If there aren’t relationships between people, there is no team, just a group of random people”
Getting People on Board
- Without everyone buying in the plan, it will most likely fail
- “My plan” is not “our plan”
Being a Leader
- You have to be the ideal.
- Your team will, consciously or unconsciously, mimic your emotions
- It’s all on you but not about you.
- Take out the trash – it shows your team that you don’t think you’re above menial tasks. It’ll encourage your team to follow your lead. Your team will begin to help you out of respect “[They] won’t want to let [you] down”.
- Humility is the biggest factor of being a leader.
- Never look down on them.
- “The more you talk, the less people listen”
- Be articulate
- The more confidence and charisma the better
- “Being a leader who is not required to be able to perform tasks assigned to the front lines is not an excuse for being ignorant or unprepared”. You might not know the fine details of how equipment works, but you should understand the gist of it
- Keep learning and getting better
- Make sure to spend enough time on the front lines with your team
- The leader can’t control the weather, but the leader can have contingency plans
- “Picking up the brass” – mundane tasks that have to be done and should be done by the entire team, including the leader. It’ll show your support for them and will show who on the team may be slacking.
- “When people have no input, they have no ownership, when they have no ownership, they have no personal stake in driving the mission success. As soon as they hit resistance, they will stop forward progress”.
- Training balance: Don’t give exercises so hard they’ll break the team, but don’t give exercises so easy that they’ll get lazy and assume “they know it already”
- Imposter syndrome: thinking you’re not ready to be a leader. This is good, it means you’re humble and will be thoughtful about your words, actions and decisions. All positives
- Avoid overconfidence
- Ask smart questions – if it’s a silly question, you haven’t done your homework – manuals, SOPs, background material
- Total ownership:
- Someone is late? The leader didn’t explain the importance of being on time
- Someone gets drunk on a work night out? The leader didn’t explain the importance of parameters around drinking
- Someone failed on a project? The leader didn’t give enough supprt
- Most leadership should be subtle. In emergencies, step up and take action, but otherwise, be subtle. Everything is good, but not too good:
- We were denied the funding? This might take more time but we can learn to be more efficient
- The mission was cancelled? Not ideal but we have more time to prepare
- Instead of:
- “I’ll tell you how to execute”, try, “How do you think we shoudl execute?”
- “Let me coach you…”, try, “Can you explain why you do it that way?”
- “I will mentor you…”, try, “I would love to compare how you do things to how I do them”
- The ability to:
- Read people
- Break down complex problems into simple, easy-to-understand concepts
- Find other people to bring onto the team to compensate for your shortfalls – do this to overcome leadership deficits
- “Because I said is” is one of the worst things you could ever say, ever. Period. In any situation. Explain the WHY.
- Reflect and diminish. Repeat emotion back to people but lesser, defuse it slowly. Match them but down a few notches. Respond appropiately
- Annoyed employee over a delayed delivery, express your frustration but defuse and offer support
- Inappropriate comment, laugh with them but explain why you should BOTH take things a bit more seriously
How to succeed as a New Leader
- Be humble
- You don’t know everything. Ask smart questions
- Listen
- Treat people with respect
- Take ownership of mistakes and failures
- Pass credit up and down the chain
- Work hard. No job is beneath you
- Have intengrity – Do what you say, say what you do. Don’t lie
- Be balanced. Avoid extreme actions and extreme opinions
- Be decisive
- Build relationships
- Get the job done. Performance counts
Being a part of the team
- It’s your job to support the mission, which means supporting the boss and the team mates.
- Jockeying for position and maneuvering against one another means you aren’t focusing fully on the mission.
- To be a good leader, be a good follower.
- For every solution, you are the solution – regardless of how small or annoying the problem is.
- When there’s a problem, pause before jumping in. If someone gives a solution, that’s fine. When you see the void, pause, wait, look around, assess if anyone else is going to jump in. The problem will grow and everyone notices. Then, make the call. People will be waiting for the solution. They will listen when you speak.
- Total ownership on mistakes and how you will improve in the future, what you will do next time
- Give the leader room to lead.
- Don’t take things personally.
- The most important thing in the team is the team. The team exists to accomplish the mission.
- Hurt the team, hurt the mission.
- Be yourself, but don’t let your personality interfere with the relationships in the team.
- Avoid disrespecting the boss when they’re not there – it compromises your character.
- Instead of agreeing when people are complaining “The mission is dumb”, try “it’s hard to understand the mission from our perspective. Why do you think the boss has us working on it?”
- “The boss might not be perfect, but he’s driving us towards the same goal we want to accomplish”
- “Complaining about the boss won’t get us anywhere, what we can do is try and form a good relationship with her so we can influence her in the right direction”
- “The boss has quirks, but he’s straight forward, so let’s work with him as best we can, which means dealing with those quirks as best we can”
How to work with your boss
- Ignore your ego – “Your” way may not actually be better, get over yourself
- Don’t create drama over your ego
- If your plan is 10% better, don’t correct your boss. Leave it. It’s not worth it
- If your plan is 50% better, highlight it subtly.
- Ask yourself, “Will this aid my relationship with my boss?”
- “I am the person who can make things happen”
- “Am I doing this to get a promotion?” – “No, I am not trying to build the relationship for my own personal gain; I am trying to build a relationship with my boss so we can better accomplish the mission”
- ‘Playing the game’ isn’t kissing up to your boss, you’re trying to optimise things so you and your team can best accomplish the mission.
- Didn’t get tat promotion? Avoid ultimatums like “I’ll leave the company”, they’ll show your hand, show your loyalty, and break relationships and trust. Be gentle about things, use extreme caution.
How to plan
- Cover and move
- Simple
- Prioritise and Execute
- Decentralised Command
- Keep things simple
- By doing everything, you achieve nothing
- Prioritise the biggest problem, solve it/fix it, move to the next one
Purchase on: Amazon