________________________
After spending a "life time" in the field and leading in many
situations, Shwarzkopf learn key lessons of his life in one day. He
moved to the Pentagon for less than a month when the chief told him to
take his place while he spends about one month visiting troops around
the world. Schwarzkopf was astonished by the task that he now needs to
handle without him being ready for it. He followed the chief to the
corridor: "What am I going to do about such and such plan, should I make
the decision or wait until you come back..." The reply came: "Apply Rule
13." "Yes, Sir, Salute. Rule 13! eh, What's that?" The chief gave him
one of the lessons he will never forget:
"When Placed in command, take charge." As he was going back to his
office and thinking about the great leasson he just learned, he felt
that his worries started to ease.
He remembered more things he needed to worry about and went back running
in the corridor. "Should I decide on this issue this way or that way?
And on this other issue, do we need to decide now or could we wait?" The
reply came: "Norman, Apply Rule 14." "Yes, Sir, Salute. Rule 14! eh,
What's that?" He now got his 2nd lesson:
"Do What's Right."
Other key lessons from the conference are as follows:
- A main reason for the success of Desert Storm was that the 800,000
people involved knew the one goal they were all there: "Kick Iraq out
of Kuwait."
- In a fully loaded oil tanker, if it is moving forward and you
immediately shift it to full reverse. 30 minutes later the ship stops,
before it really starts reversing direction. Keep that in mind when
managing organizations. Don't keep changing your direction. You're
organization will not be able to cope with it.
- Failure is contagious but success is infectious. Say: "I'm proud of
you." "You're a bunch of winners." Reinforce success. You must reward
success. Expect some failures. Remember you're dealing with human
beings. Give the people the latitude to learn.
- Great leaders tell people what to do not how to do their jobs. They
allocate resources, and give them authority.
- You don't have to win all fights. Consider: Is the issue really
significant? Should you fight that battle?
- Challenge of leadership is to get people to willingly do that which
they ordinarily would not do. Like risk their survival.
- People look up to a leader and they expect leaders to have higher
values than they themselves.
- The best football coaches: when teams win they contribute it to the
team, when they lose they contribute it to themselves.
- Your organization will never get better unless you admit there's
something wrong with it.
Here are the rest of my notes.
Before the session there were interviews with 3 key leadership
professors - authors.
Dr. Thurow - MIT
- Team building and leadership go together - You need a technical leader
not a sales leader.
- Different people have different leadership skills. Schwartzkopf had
challenge of different nationalities, people he never met, brought
together in minimal time with great numbers (800,000) under his command.
How do you turn this into an effective team is the real challenge.
Dr. John Kotter - Harvard
- Knocking down one hurdle after another - lots of people say enough -
get tired - great leaders, though, never stop.
- If you don't give them room, and micro-manage them you will not grow
leadership.
- Show leaders role models and logic about why is it important to lead.
- The challenge for troops is that during Peace - things go one day at a
time. In a war, things have to happen immediately. Shifting is difficult
with unpredictable situations.
Warren Bennis - USC
- Celebrities have admirers (from a distance); leaders have followers
(much closer).
- Fads and fashions - TQM - CQI - turbulent times. Here is a paradox for
you: If you're not confused, you don't know what's going on.
- Empowerment - list desired expected behaviors: Are these rewarded,
Punished, or Ignored? No improvement in behavior will happen or be
effective without these.
Here is the summary of Schwarzkopf presentation:
- There is no born leader.
- Leaders are ordinary people faced with certain circumstances.
- Leadership: is fundamental; for any type of organization whether the
followers are 15, 100, 1500, or 80,000.
- As you think as a leader, you are a leader.
- Leadership, not management is key to progress. Managers manage things
- systems management, financial management - without concentration on
people.
- Leaders focus (lead) on people with ambitions and feelings, just like
the leaders themselves.
- People make all machinery and systems working. The best machinery we
have in the field will not function without people.
- Challenge of leadership is to get people to willingly do that what
they ordinarily would not do. Like risk their survival.
- The leader is not always the boss. In orgnaizations at time of crises,
people will turn to the true leader.
- Most important in leadership is character - concept of duty -
endurance.
- 99% of all presidents that failed, had failures on character.
- In surveys, followers said they're lying to bosses because they know
leaders do the same so it is OK.
- People look up to a leader and they expect leaders to have higher
values than they themselves.
- Leaders are respected because they accept responsibility of them and
people they lead. You can't delegate it.
- Best football coaches: when teams win they contribute it to the team,
when they lose they contribute it to themselves.
- When leaders are down, and one says " you're really doing a good job",
they're recharged.
- If you're only looking for next promotion or award then you would be
disappointed. The joy should come from leadership itself.
- Your organization will never get better unless you admit there's
something wrong with it.
- Zero defects will never happen in the people business; although it is
perfect in the operating room.
- Vietnam showed that the the Department of Defense had a lot of things
wrong although their numbers always showed they were 98.5% good. That
made the difference between quality of soldiers in Vietnam and Desert
Storm.
- Don't shoot messerngers. Environment has to be ready to accept
suggestins and improvements.
- Establish goals. Only meaningful if people understand the goals,
understand their contribution.
- Desert Storm: 800K people. One goal: Kick Iraq out of Kuwait.
- You don't need to solve the problems now. During Desert Storm, a
leader came to Norman and said that we have a different culture than the
Arab culture and we have to let them understand how we think.
Schwarzkopf clarified his answer after Saeed Khabbaz from Aramco asked
if the culture issue should be ignored. He said I told him what makes
you think that a culture that is only 170 years old is right and a
culture that is 5,000 years old is wrong. He linked that back to the
main objective, whether we go with this culture or that, does that have
a direct impact on what we are to achieve here, he said.
- Standards: Let people know what is expected of them. What is the
measure of success. "What does it take to pass this course?" then go and
do better.
- People don't work to their potential -- the standards should be set
high to get best out of the organization.
- Failure is contagious but success is infectious. "I'm proud of you."
"You're a bunch of winners." Reinforce success. You must reward success.
Expect some failures, dealing with human beings, the latitude to learn.
- Show me a good loser and I'll show you a loser.
- Great leaders tell people what to do not how to do their jobs. They
allocate resources, authority.
- Leaders recognize their people are better than them. The whole is
better than the sum of its parts.
- Do what's right even when there is nobody there to judge you or see if
you make the right decision.
- Revisit your tough decision. If you know in your heart what you've
done is right, don't listen to naysayers. He mentioned his experience
when he wanted the Iraqis to believe he is sending in the marines from
the Gulf, and in reality he had 300,000 people lined up on the Western
side of Kuwait. Initially his commanders told him he is crazy to do this
and his plan is most likely to fail and lots of people will die. He
stayed for a long time debating the best way to do this. He listened to
all his people, then he made the decision.
- It is important to have principles like: Duty, honor, country.
- Have your subordinates participate in the decision making process;
more options; it becomes their decision; The ultimate decision is the
leader's.
- He always tells his people to go out and come back with at least three
courses of action.
- Recognition: tangible promotion, pay; intangible- just as important
-- "Thanks" Put your hands around them; hug.
- How to challenge leadership that is resistant to change?
- Biggest responsibility is to develop suborindates to take your place.
- Your power is to make the tough decisions.
- Are you right? Is it significant?
- You can learn more from a bad leader than a good leader.
- Your job is to insulate subordinates from the bad leadership above.
- What are boundaries of taking charge if leaders don't lead?
- You have to assume role, somestimes. As long as it is positive,
dynamic, rather than bad mouthing - there is no leadership vacuum.
- Try not to second guess leaders facing tough decision and committing
others' lives. The ones in the field usually know better than the ones
far removed.
- Is there a solution there. Is it significant? Should you fight that
battle?
- People make a country what it is.
- A major reason for difference between Vietnam and Desert Storm is
leadership fit their jobs exactly without interfering or making
decisions of others. Like the Secretary of Defense in Vietnam making a
decision on which targets to hit. He said although the four main people,
Bush, Cheney, Powell, and him were quite knowledgeable in their area,
everyone knew where he starts and where he stops. He said when the
president told him not to go into Baghdad, although he knew he could
finish the job in no time, he stopped. Everyone knew such a decision was
a persident's decision and it was Schwarzkopf duty to obey it.
- In a full oil tanker, if it is moving forward then shift in full
reverse.; 30 minutes later the ship stops.
- In downsizing, remember leaders lead people. Set up programs for
retraining, placement services.
- In football and in organizations, it takes the whole team to succeed
not just one best player.
- Accentuate the positive, reduce the negative, sometimes you need to be
a cheerleader. Sometimes it looks superficial, but it always has an
impact.
- He wanted to make a difference, wanted people to say, he really did
something good where others benefited. "Selflessness" is key for a
leader to be remembered.
TKS...Jamal Al-Dabal
Saudi Aramco
--dabaljk@aramco.com.sa (Jamal K. Dabal )
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>