Aug
19
Tom Peters on Leadership
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In the article “Rule #3: Leadership Is Confusing As Hell” in Fast Company by Tom Peters discusses “why leadership will be more important than ever” and some of what his leadership insights…..
- Leaders on snorting steeds (the visionary greats!) are important. “But great managers are the bedrock of great organizations…. Stop being conned by the old mantra that says, “Leaders are cool, managers are dweebs.” Instead, follow the Peters Principle: Leaders are cool. Managers are cool too!”
- Leadership is confusing as hell. “If we’re going to make any headway in figuring out the new rules of leadership, we might as well say it up front: There is no one-size-fits-all approach to leadership. Leadership mantra #1: It all depends….. We need to think about situational leadership — the right person, the right style, for the right situation…. Motto: The situation rules. Leader for all seasons? In your dreams!”
- Leaders love the mess. “There’s no mess — and no creativity, no energy, no inspired leadership.”
- The leader is rarely — possibly never? — the best performer. “…there is no more important decision that a company makes than the selection of its first-line managers. The best leader is rarely the best pitcher or catcher. The best leader is just what’s advertised: the best leader. Leaders get their kicks from orchestrating the work of others — not from doing it themselves.”
- Leaders deliver. “If you’re aiming to be a real leader during the next five years, then you need to mimic the pizza man: You’d better deliver! For the past five years, ideas and cool have counted (which was important). What counts now? Performance. Results.”
- Leaders understand the ultimate power of relationships. ”….what really matters are the relationships that leaders have created with their people.”
- Leadership is an improvisational art. “The game — hey, the basic rule book — keeps changing. Competition keeps changing. So leaders need to change, to keep reinventing themselves. Leaders have to be ready to adapt, to move, to forget yesterday, to forgive, and to structure new roles and new relationships for themselves, their teams, and their ever-shifting portfolio of partners.”
- Leaders trust their guts. “‘Intuition’ is one of those good words that has gotten a bad rap. For some reason, intuition has become a “soft” notion. Garbage! Intuition is the new physics. It’s an Einsteinian, seven-sense, practical way to make tough decisions. Bottom line, circa 2001 to 2010: The crazier the times are, the more important it is for leaders to develop and to trust their intuition.”
- Leaders trust trust. “…In a world gone nuts, we cry out for something or someone to rely on. To trust. The fearless leader may (make that, had better) change his or her mind with the times. But as a subordinate, I trust a leader who shows up, makes the tough calls, takes the heat, sleeps well amidst the furor, and then aggressively chomps into the next task in the morning with visible vitality.”
- Leaders are natural empowerment freaks. “There are two ways to look at Jack Welch’s legacy as a leader. The first is to say that he has created more value for his shareholders than any other comparable modern-day business leader. Which he has. He has also created more leaders than any comparable modern-day business leader….. When we think of Welch, we do not ordinarily think vision. (What is GE’s vision? I haven’t a clue! “We bring good things to life” ain’t it.) We do think rigorous performance standards, empowerment (”WorkOut” in GE-speak), leadership, and talent development. Jack Welch, it turns out, is a great manager.”
- Leaders are good at forgetting. “Peter Senge’s brilliant insight 10 years ago was that companies need to be learning organizations. My campaign 2001: Companies need to be forgetting organizations….. Got an idea? Don’t dally. Go for it while it’s an original! Doesn’t work? Try something else. If that doesn’t work, fuhgeddaboutit!”
- Leaders bring in different dudes. “….Winning leaders know that their organizations need to refresh the gene pool. That happens when leaders forget old practices and open up their minds to new ones. That also happens — and more effectively — when leaders bring in new people and new partners with new ideas. As a leader, do with your people what Cisco has done so effectively with technology: Acquire a new line of thinking by acquiring a new group of thinkers.”
- Leaders make mistakes — and make no bones about it. Nobody — repeat, nobody — gets it right the first time. Most of us don’t get it right the second, third, or fourth time either. Winston Churchill said it best: “Success is the ability to go from failure to failure without losing your enthusiasm.” Churchill blew one assignment after another — until he came up against the big one and saved the world…. When you make mistakes, you need to recognize them quickly, deal with them quickly, move on quickly — and make cooler mistakes tomorrow.
- Leaders love to work with other leaders. ”….Leaders are known by the company they keep. If you work with people who are cool, pioneering leaders who have customers who are cool, pioneering leaders who source from suppliers who are cool, pioneering leaders — then you’ll stay on the leading edge for the next five years. Laggards work with laggards. Leaders work with leaders. It really is that simple.”
- Leaders don’t create followers, they create more leaders. “Too many old-fashioned leaders measure their influence by the number of followers that they can claim. But the greatest leaders are those who don’t look for followers.”
- Leaders love rainbows — for totally pragmatic reasons. “Another good word gone bad: “diversity.” The case for diversity during the past 20 years has been that it was the “right thing to do.” Well, in no-bull times, diversity isn’t a good thing, it’s an essential thing. It’s a survival thing. The case for diversity is the case against homogeneity: When the world is undergoing sudden, unpredictable, dire change, you need to have a diverse gene pool. You need to have multiple points of view. In a heterogeneous time, homogeneity sucks!”
- Leaders don’t fall prey to their own success. “There are a lot of people who have made it really, really big over the past five years. Some of them actually think that they’re responsible for their success, if you can imagine that. But in crazy times, leaders don’t believe in their own press clippings. And they never, ever let their organizations get complacent!”
- Leaders wear their passion on their sleeve. “There’s absolutely no question in my mind: Leaders dream in Technicolor. They see the world in brighter colors, sharper images, and higher resolution. Leadership, in the end, is all about having energy, creating energy, showing energy, and spreading energy. Leaders emote, they erupt, they flame, and they have boundless (nutty) enthusiasm. And why shouldn’t they? The cold logic of it is unassailable: If you do not love what you’re doing, if you do not go totally bonkers for your project, your team, your customers, and your company, then why in the world are you doing what you’re doing? And why in the world would you expect anybody to follow you?”
- Leaders know: Energy begets energy. “Every successful company, every successful team, and every successful project runs on one thing: energy. It’s the leader’s job to be the energy source that others feed from. But sometimes the leader has no energy. Sometimes the situation is bleak, and the outcome is in doubt. And I say: Fake it! For it is at that critical juncture that having energy is the most essential. So if you gotta fake it, then fake it! Once you kick-start the energy cycle, nature takes over. The energy will start to flow. Benjamin Zander said it best: The job of the leader is to be a ‘dispenser of enthusiasm.’”
- Leaders give respect. “…Care. Respect. Leaders care about connecting — because it moves mountains.”
- Leadership is a performance. “According to HP big cheese Carly Fiorina, ‘Leadership is a performance. You have to be conscious about your behavior, because everyone else is.’ Leaders spend time leading — which means that they spend time and exert ceaseless effort making sure that they come across with the right message in the way that they walk, talk, dress, and stand. Leadership is not only about action. It’s also about acting.”
- Leaders have great stories. “A performance needs to have a script. Howard Gardner wrote about that in his book, Leading Minds: An Anatomy of Leadership (BasicBooks, 1995). Effective communication of a story is a key — perhaps the key — to leadership… Why? Because stories are the real thing. They are how we remember, how we learn, and how we visualize what can be. If you want to involve your colleagues in the future performance of your business, then don’t just present them with the numbers. Tell them a story. Numbers are numbing. Stories are personal, passionate, and purposeful.“
Technorati Tags: Leadership, Management, Passion, Energy, Tom Peters, Change, Performance, Business, Tips, Insight, Lessons
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6 Responses to “Tom Peters on Leadership”
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I love to read Tom’s insights. In this one I like, “The leader is rarely — possibly never? — the best performer.”
Yes. I find that is true. Which is a problem for some organizations because they always think that only the best will do. They promote the “best” and expect that they will be good leaders. Then they find it isn’t true. So when it isn’t working they naturally send them to more training. That still often does not work. Then organizations become frustrated. So they install structured leadership programs with certifications. When that doesn’t work?!?!? Ultimate frustration.
Second idea I agree with is that leaders fail. That also creates problems with organizations. They don’t like and won’t hire failures. Every great leader had major failures. In our world of accountability, high performers, legal actions, and aversion to failures…is it any wonder organizations have difficulty developing and recognizing leaders?
As Tom says, leaders are leaders. Don’t try to force them into omnipotent roles.
I told someone to read your Made to Stick review and came back to look at some of the fresh material you have composed. I find it cogent, helpful, and insightful. Thanks for all the resources.
Tom Peter’s leadership insights are indeed wonderful. It’s important to have positive thoughts because people always have different perspectives. It would be great if we understand both sides.
These are great insights. I especially like “the leader is rarely the best performer” because it speak the truth about real leaders who are more concerned with the team’s work than their own.
Wow - what a great, insightful and useful blog.
Keep up the good work.
Niranjan
Great points are included by Tom Peter. Realy I believe leader should be a team member. Then only it is possible to lead the team. This is well said in Leaders give respect. All points are self explainatory. I liked Leadership is a performance.