General Colin Powell: 18 Lessons from a very successful leader
Mariam
Career and Personal Development
http://www.littleafrica.com/career/powell.html
General Colin Powell: 18 Lessons from a very successful leader
Lesson 1: (Good leaders sometimes make people unhappy). Good leadership
involves responsibility to the welfare of the group, which means that
some people will get angry at your actions and decisions. It's
inevitable-if you're honorable. Trying to get everyone to like you is
a sign of mediocrity: You'll avoid the tough decisions, you'll
avoid confronting the people who need to be confronted, and you'll
avoid offering differential rewards based on differential performance
because some people might get upset. Ironically, procrastinating on the
difficult choices, by trying not to get anyone mad, and by treating
everyone equally "nicely" regardless of their contributions, you'll
simply ensure that the only people you'll wind up angering are the
most creative and productive people in the organization.
Lesson 2: "The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day
you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that
you can help them or concluded that you do not care. Either case is a
failure of a relationship". If this were a litmus test, the majority of
CEOs would fail. One, they build so many barriers to upward
communication that the very idea of someone lower in the hierarchy
looking up to the leader for help is ludicrous. Two, the corporate
culture they foster often defines asking for help as weakness or
failure, so people cover up their gaps, and the organization suffers
accordingly. Real leaders make themselves accessible and available.
They show concern for the efforts and challenges faced by underlings
- even as they demand high standards. Accordingly, they are more
likely to create an environment where problem analysis replaces blame.
Lesson 3: "Don't be buffaloed by experts and elites. Experts often
possess more data than judgment. Elites can become so inbred that they
produce hemophiliacs who bleed to death as soon as they are nicked by
the real world." Small companies and startups don't have time for
analytically detached experts. They don't have the money to subsidize
lofty elites, either. The president answers the phone and drives the
truck when necessary; everyone on the payroll visibly produces and
contributes to the bottom-line results or they're history. But as
companies get bigger, they often forget who "brung them to the dance":
things like all-hands involvement, egalitarianism, informality, market
intimacy, daring, risk, speed, agility. Policies that emanate from
ivory towers often have an adverse impact on the people out in the
field who are fighting the wars or bringing in the revenues. Real
leaders are vigilant-and combative-in the face of these trends.
Lesson 4: " Don't be afraid to challenge the pros, even in their own
backyard." Learn from the pros, observe them, seek them out as mentors
and partners. But remember that even the pros may have leveled out in
terms of their learning and skills. Sometimes even the pros can become
complacent and lazy. Leadership does not emerge from blind obedience to
anyone. Xerox's Barry Rand was right on target when he warned his
people that if you have a yes-man working for you, one of you is
redundant. Good leadership encourages everyone's evolution.
Lesson 5: "Never neglect details. When everyone's mind is dulled or
distracted, the leader must be doubly vigilant." Strategy equals
execution. All great ideas and visions in the world are worthless if
they can't be implemented rapidly and efficiently. Good leaders
delegate and empower others liberally, but they pay attention to
details every day. (Think about supreme athletic coaches like Jimmy
Johnson, Pat Riley and Tony La Russa). Bad ones - even those who
fancy themselves as progressive "visionaries" - think they're
somehow "above" operational details. "Paradoxically, good leaders
understand something else: An obsessive routine in carrying out the
details begets conformity and complacency, which in turn dulls
everyone's mind. That is why even as they pay attention to details,
they continually encourage people to challenge the process. They
implicitly understand the sentiment of CEO-leaders like Quad
Graphic's Harry Quadracchi, Oticon's Lars Kolind and the late Bill
McGowan of MCI, who all independently asserted the Job of a leader is
not to be the chief organizer, but the chief disorganizer.
Lesson 6: "You don't know what you can get away with until you try."
You know the expression "it's easier to get forgiveness than
permission?" Well it's true. Good leaders don't wait for official
blessing to try things out. They're prudent, not reckless. But they
also realize a fact of life in most organizations: If you ask enough
people for permission, you'll inevitably come up against someone who
believes his job is to say "no". So the moral is, don't ask. I'm
serious. In my own research with colleague Linda Mukai, we found that
less effective middle managers endorsed the sentiment, "If I haven't
been told 'yes', I can't do it," whereas the good ones believed
"If I haven't been explicitly told 'no' I can." There's a world
of difference between these two points of view.
Lesson 7: "Keep looking below surface appearances. Don't shrink from
doing so (just) because you might not like what you find." "If it
ain't broke, don't fix it" is the slogan of the complacent, the
arrogant or the scared. It's an excuse for inaction, a call to
non-arms. It's a mind-set that assumes (or hopes) that today's
realities will continue tomorrow in a tidy, linear and predictable
fashion. Pure fantasy. In this sort of culture, you won't find people
who proactively take steps to solve problems as they emerge. Here's a
little tip: Don't invest in these companies.
Lesson 8: " Organization doesn't really accomplish anything. Plans
don't accomplish anything, either. Theories of management don't
much matter. Endeavors succeed or fail because of the people involved.
Only by attracting the best people will you accomplish great deeds." In
a brain-based economy, your best assets are people. We've heard this
expression so often that it's become trite. But how many leaders
really "walk the talk" with this stuff? Too often, people are assumed
to be empty chess pieces to be moved around by grand viziers, which may
explain why so many top managers immerse their calendar time in deal
making, restructuring and the latest management fad. How many immerse
themselves in the goal of creating an environment where the best, the
brightest, the most creative are attracted, retained and - most
importantly-unleashed.
Lesson 9: "Organization charts and fancy titles count for next to
nothing". Organization charts are frozen, anachronistic photos in a
workplace that ought to be as dynamic as the external environment
around you. If people really followed organization charts, companies
would collapse. In well-run organizations, titles are also pretty
meaningless. At best, they advertise some authority-an official status
concerning the ability to give orders or induce obedience. But titles
mean little in terms of real power, which is the capacity to influence
and inspire. Have you ever noticed that people will personally commit
to certain individuals who on paper (or on the org. chart) possess
little authority-but instead possess pizzazz, drive, expertise and
genuine caring for teammates and products? On the flip side,
non-leaders in management may be formally anointed with all the perks
and frills associated with high positions, but they have little
influence on others, apart from their ability to extract minimal
compliance to minimal standards.
Lesson 10: "Never let your ego get so close to your position that when
your position goes, your ego goes with it." Too often, change is
stifled by people who cling to familiar turfs and job descriptions. One
reason that even large organizations wither is that managers won't
challenge old, comfortable ways of doing things. But real leaders
understand that, nowadays, every one of our jobs is becoming obsolete.
The proper response is to obsolete our activities before someone else
does. Effective leaders create a climate where people's worth is
determined by their willingness to learn new skills and grab new
responsibilities, thus not perpetually reinventing their jobs. The most
important question in performance evaluation becomes not, "How well did
you perform your job since the last time we met?" but, "How much did
you change it?"
Lesson 11: "Fit no stereotypes. Don't chase the latest management
fads. The situation dictates which approach best accomplishes the
team's mission." Fitting from fad to fad creates team confusion,
reduces the leader's credibility and drains organizational coffers.
Blindly following a particular fad generates rigidity in thought and
action. Sometimes speed to market is more important than total quality.
Sometimes an unapologetic directive is more appropriate than
participatory discussion. To quote Powell, some situations require
long, loose leashes. Leaders honor their core values, but they are
flexible in how they execute them. They understand that management
techniques are not magic mantras but simply tools to be reached for at
the right times.
Lesson 12: "Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier." The ripple
effect of a leader's enthusiasm and optimism is awesome. So is the
impact of cynicism and pessimism. Leaders who whine and blame
engendered those same behaviors among their colleagues. I am not
talking about stoically accepting organizational stupidity and
performance incompetence with a "what, me worry?" smile. I am talking
about a gung ho attitude that says "we can change things here, we can
achieve awesome goals, we can be the best." Spare me the grim litany of
the "realist", give me the unrealistic aspirations of the optimist any
day.
Lesson 13: "Powell's Rules for Picking People" - Look for
intelligence and judgment and, most critically, a capacity to
anticipate, to see around corners. Also look for loyalty, integrity, a
high energy drive, a balanced ego and the drive to get things done."
How often do our recruitment and hiring processes tap into these
attributes? More often than not, we ignore them in favor of length of
resume, degrees and prior titles. A string of job descriptions a
recruit held yesterday seem to be more important than who one is today,
what she can contribute tomorrow or how well her values mesh with those
of the organization. You can train a bright, willing novice in the
fundamentals of your business fairly readily, but it's a lot harder
to train someone to have integrity, judgment, energy, balance and the
drive to get things done. Good leaders stack the deck in their favor
right in the recruitment phase.
Lesson 14: (Borrowed by Powell from Michael Korda): "Great leaders are
almost always great simplifiers, who can cut through argument, debate
and doubt to offer a solution everybody can understand." Effective
leaders understand the KISS principle, Keep It Simple, Stupid. They
articulate vivid overarching goals and values, which they use to drive
daily behaviors and choices among competing alternatives. Their visions
and priorities are lean and compelling, not cluttered and
buzzword-laden. Their decisions are crisp and clear, not tentative and
ambiguous. They convey an unwavering firmness and consistency in their
actions, aligned with the picture of the future they paint. The result?
Clarity of purpose, credibility of leadership, and integrity in
organizations.
Lesson 15:
Part I: "Use the formula P=40 to 70, in which P stands for the
probability of success and the numbers indicate the percentage of
information acquired."
Part II: "Once the information is in the 40 to 70 range, go with your
gut." Powell's advice is don't take action if you have only enough
information to give you less than a 40 percent chance of being right,
but don't wait until you have enough facts to be 100 percent sure,
because by then it is almost always too late. His instinct is right:
"Today, excessive delays in the name of information-gathering breeds
"analysis paralysis". Procrastination in the name of reducing risk
actually increases risk.
Lesson 16: "The commander in the field is always right and the rear
echelon is wrong, unless proven otherwise." Too often the reverse
defines corporate culture. This is one of the main reasons why leaders
like Ken Iverson of Nucor Steel, Percy Barnevik of Asea Brown Boveri,
and Richard Branson of Virgin have kept their corporate staffs to
bare-bones minimum. (And I do mean minimum-how about fewer than 100
central corporate staffers for global $30 billion plus ABB? Or around
25 and 3 for multi-billion Nucor and Virgin respectively?) Shift the
power and the financial accountability to the folks who are bringing in
the beans, not the ones who are counting or analyzing them.
Lesson 17: "Have fun in your command. Don't always run at a breakneck
pace. Take leave when you've earned it: Spend time with your
families.
Corollary: "Surround yourself with people who take their work
seriously, but not themselves, those who work hard and play hard." Herb
Kelleher of Southwest Air and Anita Roddick of the The Body Shop would
agree: Seek people who have some balance in their lives, who are fun to
hang out with, who like to laugh (at themselves, too) and who have some
non-job priorities which they approach with the same passion that they
do their work. Spare me the grim workaholic or the pompous pretentious
"professional"; I'll help them find jobs with my competitor.
Lesson 18: "Command is lonely." Harry Truman was right. Whether
you're a CEO or the temporary head of a project team, the buck stops
here. You can encourage participative management and bottom-up employee
involvement but ultimately, the essence of leadership is the
willingness to make the tough, unambiguous choices that will have an
impact on the fate of the organization. I've seen too many
non-leaders flinch from this responsibility. Even as you create an
informal, open, collaborative corporate culture, prepare to be lonely.
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