Leading In Totally Screwed Up Times: 35 in 35 Tom Peters/07 November 2001

All Slides Available at … tompeters.com Note: Lavender text in this file is a link.

“There will be more confusion in the business world in the next decade than in any decade in history. And the current pace of change will only accelerate.” Steve Case

Uncertainty: We don’t know when things will get back to normal. Ambiguity: We no longer know what “normal” means.

The Leadership 35

1. Leaders Cede Control.

“I don’t know.”

2. Leadership Is a … Mutual Discovery Process.

Leaders Do Not “Transform People”! Instead leaders-mentors-teachers (1) provide a context which is marked by (2) access to a luxuriant portfolio of meaningful opportunities (projects) which (3) allow people to fully express their innate curiosity and (4) engage in a vigorous discovery voyage by which those people (5) go to-create places they (and their mentors-teachers-leaders) had never dreamed existed. And then the leaders-mentors-teachers (6) applaud like hell, stage “photo-ops,” and ring the church bells 100 times to commemorate the bravery of their “followers’ ” explorations!

2. Great Leaders on Snorting Steeds Are Important – but Great Talent Developers (Type I Leadership) are the Bedrock of Organizations that Perform Over the Long Haul.

P.S.: Jack didn’t have a vision!

Model 25/8/53 : Sports Franchise GM

4. When It Comes to TALENT … Leaders Always Swing for the Fences!

Message: Some people are better than other people. Some people are a helluva lot better than other people.

“We believe companies can increase their market cap 50 percent in 3 years. Steve Macadam at Georgia-Pacific changed 20 of his 40 box plant managers to put more talented, higher paid managers in charge. He increased profitability from $25 million to $80 million in 2 years.” Ed Michaels, War for Talent ( ) Ed Michaels

5. Leaders “Manage” The Internal Brand Promise.

MantraM3 Talent = Brand

6. But … There Are Times When This “Cult of Personality” (Type II Leadership) Stuff Actually Works!

“A leader is a dealer in hope.” Napoleon

7. Find the “Businesspeople”! (Type III Leadership)

I.P.M. (Inspired Profit Mechanic)

8. Leadership Mantra #1: IT ALL DEPENDS!

Renaissance Men are … a snare, a myth, a delusion!

9. The Leader Is Rarely/Never the Best Performer.

33 Division Titles. 26 League Pennants. 14 World Series: Earl Weaver—0. Tom Kelly—0. Jim Leyland—0. Walter Alston—1AB. Tony LaRussa—132 games, 6 seasons. Tommy Lasorda—P, 26 games. Sparky Anderson—1 season.

10. Leaders DO!

The Kotler Doctrine: : R.A.F. (Ready.Aim.Fire.) : R.F.A. (Ready.Fire!Aim.) 1995-????: F.F.F. (Fire!Fire!Fire!)

11. BUT … Leaders Know When to Wait.

Tex Schramm: The “too hard” box!

12. Leaders FOCUS!

“To Don’t ” List

13. Leaders Understand the Ultimate Power of RELATIONSHIPS.

13A. Leaders Are Natural EMPOWERMENT FREAKS!

13B. Leaders Know … Women Roar/ Women Rule.

Women’s Strengths Match New Economy Imperatives: Link [rather than rank] workers; favor interactive-collaborative leadership style; sustain fruitful collaborations; comfortable with sharing information; see redistribution of power as victory, not surrender; favor multi-dimensional feedback; value technical & interpersonal skills, individual & group contributions equally; readily accept ambiguity; honor intuition as well as pure “rationality”; inherently flexible; appreciate cultural diversity. Source: Judy B. Rosener, America’s Competitive SecretJudy B. Rosener

14. Leaders LOVE RAINBOWS – for Pragmatic Reasons.

“Diversity defines the health and wealth of nations in a new century. Mighty is the mongrel. … The hybrid is hip. The impure, the mélange, the adulterated, the blemished, the rough, the black-and-blue, the mix-and-match – these people are inheriting the earth. Mixing is the new norm. Mixing trumps isolation. It spawns creativity, nourishes the human spirit, spurs economic growth and empowers nations.” G. Pascal Zachary, The Global Me: New Cosmopolitans and the Competitive Edge

15. Leaders FORGET!/ Leaders DESTROY!

Forbes100 from 1917 to 1987: 39 members of the Class of ’17 were alive in ’87; 18 are in ’87 F100; the 18 F100 “survivors” underperformed the market by 20%; just 2 (2%), GE & Kodak, outperformed the market from 1917 to Source: Dick Foster & Sarah Kaplan, Creative Destruction: Why Companies That Are Built to Last Underperform the Market

“Good management was the most powerful reason [leading firms] failed to stay atop their industries. Precisely because these firms listened to their customers, invested aggressively in technologies that would provide their customers more and better products of the sort they wanted, and because they carefully studied market trends and systematically allocated investment capital to innovations that promised the best returns, they lost their positions of leadership.” Clayton Christensen, The Innovator’s Dilemma

16. BUT … Leaders Have to Deliver, So They Worry About “Throwing the Baby Out with the Bathwater.”

“Damned If You Do, Damned If You Don’t, Just Plain Damned” Subtitle in the chapter, “Own Up to the Great Paradox: Success Is the Product of Deep Grooves/ Deep Grooves Destroy Adaptivity,” Liberation Management (1992)

17. Leaders HANG OUT WITH FREAKS!

“Are there enough weird people in the lab these days?” V. Chmn., pharmaceutical house, to a lab director (06.01)

18. Leaders Make [Lotsa] Mistakes – and MAKE NO BONES ABOUT IT!

Sam’s Secret #1!

19. Leaders Make BIG MISTAKES!

“Reward excellent failures. Punish mediocre successes.” Phil Daniels, Sydney exec (and, de facto, Jack)

20. Leaders Pursue DRAMATIC DIFFERENCE!

1 st Law Mktg Physics: OVERT BENEFIT (Focus: 1 or 2 > 3 or 4/“One Great Thing.” Source #1: Personal Passion) 2 ND Law: REAL REASON TO BELIEVE (Stand & Deliver!) 3 RD Law: DRAMATIC DIFFERENCE (Execs Don’t Get It: “intent to purchase” – 100%; “unique” – 0% to 5%) Source: Jump Start Your Business Brain, Doug HallDoug Hall

21. Leaders Make Their Mark / Leaders Do Stuff That Matters

The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it. Michelangelo

22. Great Leaders Have … Great Ideas.

?????/!!!!! Ideas > “Leadership”

“In an era when terrorists use satellite phones and encrypted , US gatekeepers stand armed against them with pencils and paperwork, and archaic computer systems that don’t talk to each other.” Boston Globe ( )

“Our military structure today is essentially one developed and designed by Napoleon.” Admiral Bill Owens, former Vice Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff

WANTED: GREAT IDEAS! NO: “Good gov’t” YES: EFFECTIVE/ RESPONSIVE Gov’t (in altered/ambiguous times)

23. Leaders LOVE the New Technology!

100 square feet

I’net … … allows you to dream dreams you could never have dreamed before!

24. Needed? Type IV Leadership: Technology Dreamer-True Believer

The Golden Leadership Quadrangle: (1) Creator- Visionary … (2) Talent Fanatic … (3) Inspired Profit Mechanic. (4) Technology Dreamer- True Believer.

25. Leaders Out Their PASSION!

!

“Soft” Is “Hard”

Message: Leadership is all about love: Passion, Enthusiasms, Appetite for Life, Engagement, Commitment, Great Causes & Determination to Make a Damn Difference, Shared Adventures, Bizarre Failures, Growth, Insatiable Appetite for Change. [Otherwise, why bother? Just read Dilbert. TP’s final words: CYNICISM SUCKS.]

26. Leaders Know: ENTHUSIASM BEGETS ENTHUSIASM!

BZBZ: “I am a … DISPENSER OF ENTHUSIASM!”

27. Leaders Know It’s ALL SALES ALL THE TIME.

TP: If you don’t LOVE SALES … find another life. (Don’t pretend you’re a “leader.”)

28. Leaders LOVE “POLITICS.”

TP: If you don’t LOVE POLITICS … find another life. (Don’t pretend you’re a “leader.”)

29. But … Leaders Also Break a Lot of China

If you’re not pissing people off, you’re not making a difference!

Characteristics of the “Also rans”* “Minimize risk” “Respect the chain of command” “Support the boss” “Make budget” *Fortune, article on “Most Admired Global Corporations”

30. Leaders Give … RESPECT!

“It was much later that I realized Dad’s secret. He gained respect by giving it. He talked and listened to the fourth-grade kids in Spring Valley who shined shoes the same way he talked and listened to a bishop or a college president. He was seriously interested in who you were and what you had to say.” Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, Respect

31. Leaders … SHOW UP!

Rudy!

32. Leadership Is a Performance.

“It is necessary for the President to be the nation’s No. 1 actor.” FDR

33. Leaders Have a GREAT STORY!

“A key – perhaps the key – to leadership is the effective communication of a story.” Howard Gardner Leading Minds: An Anatomy of Leadership

MB S A!* *Managing By Storying Around/David Armstrong

34. Leaders ??? :

“LEADERS NEED TO BE THE ROCK OF GIBRALTAR ON ROLLER BLADES”

“Hire smart – go bonkers – have grace – make mistakes – love technology – start all over again.”

35. Leaders Know WHEN TO LEAVE!