I’d like to introduce a new book by Robin Sharma – The Leader Who Had No Title: A Modern Fable on Real Success in Business and in Life. If Sharma sounds familiar its because he is also the author of the bestseller – The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari: A Fable About Fulfilling Your Dreams & Reaching Your Destiny.
In The Leader Who Had No Title, Sharma writes a parable where we discover that to increase your happiness, advance in your career, and fully become who you are meant to be we must all become leaders; leadership isn’t something reserved only for the executives at the top.
From Robin Sharma:
I’ve distilled everything I’ve learned into a step-by-step formula that I’ve shared in my new book “The Leader Who Had No Title: A Modern Fable on Real Success in Business and in Life” (Free Press). Here are 9 smart moves you can make today to start changing the game and creating exceptional results:
1. Remember that you need no title to be a leader. Leadership has less to do with the size of your title than the depth of your commitment. I’ve seen front-line employees, taxi drivers and carpet installers doing their work like Picasso painted. Leadership isn’t really about authority. It’s about a choice you can make to do your best work each and every day, regardless of where you are planted.
2. Shift from Victimhood to Leadership. No great career, business or life was ever created on a platform of excuses. Too many people play victim at work. They blame the boss or the economy or the competition or the weather for their less than mediocre results. Leaders Without a Title are different. They get that they have power. It may not be the power granted through a title like CEO or SVP. But they have power. And that’s the power to see opportunity amid crises. That’s the power to drive positive change. That’s the power to encourage everyone on your team. And it’s the power to step into the person you’ve always longed to be.
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3. Innovate or Stagnate. To Lead Without a Title is to leave everything you touch better than you found it. Mediocity happens when people refuse to change and improve all that they do. Look what happened to some of the big car companies because the slowed down their devotion to innovation. The competition ate them for breakfast. And put some out of business. The best leaders and the best enterprises have a hunger to improve. It’s such a deep part of their culture they know of no other way to be. And that’s the edge that makes them great.
4. Become a Value Creator versus a Clock Watcher. Success comes from the value you add rather than from the busyiness you show. What’s the point of being really busy around the wrong things? Leadership is a game of focus. Focusing on fewer but smarter activities, the ones that create real value for your teammates, customers and the world at large.
5. Put People First. “The business of business is people” said Southwest Airlines founder Herb Kelleher. We have a ton of technology yet less and less humanity. Yet let’s remember that people do business with people they like, trust and respect. One of the clients we’ve done leadership development work with is RIM. Yes, they are a fast and innovative technology company. But they also get that excellent results come from people playing at excellence. So build your team. Meet your customers. Deepen human connections. Treat others with respect. And put people first.
6. Remember that Tough Times Build Strong Leaders. Look at any exceptional leader and you’ll find that they stepped into their leadership best during a period of crises versus calmness. To Lead Without a Title is to hunt for opportunity amid every adversity. Every setback has the seeds of an opportunity. Companies like Apple, Google and Amazon were built because their people leveraged disruptive times into brilliant wins. And because their people refused to give up when faced with difficulty.
7. Go to Your Limits. The more you play out on the edges of your limits and take intelligent risks, the wider your limits will expand. The more you leave your comfort zone, the bigger your comfort zone will grow. Each day at work, do the things you know you must do but are scared to do. That’s how you grow, build your leadership capability and access more of the leader within you. There’s zero safety in staying within what I call “The Safe Harbor of The Known”. That’s just an illusion that bankrupts too many businesses and breaks too many human beings.
8. Lead Yourself First. “The Leader Who Had No Title” isn’t just a book showing you how to create exceptional business success and win at work, it’s also a handbook for personal leadership. Because how can you lead other people if you haven’t first done what it takes to lead yourself? Get to know your values. Think through what you want your life to stand for. Become physically/mentally and emotionally strong. And have a remarkably good relationship with your family. What’s the point of becoming super-successful yet being alone?
9. Give Back a Legacy. Success is good. Significance is even better. Sure profit and peer recognition and doing great work is mission-critical. But even more important than that is what you give-and all you leave behind. As I write in the book, “even the longest life is pretty short. And all that matters when you get to your last day is the difference you’ve made and the people you’ve helped.” So as you Lead Without a Title and step into your leadership best, stay focused on adding value. And making an extraordinary contribution.
This reminds me of some examples in my life about leadership. One day, when I was a teen, I ran into a friend’s dad. He asked me if I had a part-time job. Somewhat embarrassed, I told him I was a cashier at a local supermarket. He saw I wasn’t exactly proud of my job. But he told me something valuable that I remember to this day – “It doesn’t matter what you do so long as you do it well and to the best of your ability.” That really stuck with me and I used that to work my way up in the supermarket company to where I was working in the front office with the owners by the time I left.
Another thought about leadership that comes to mind reading these nine steps is that leaders are made before they have their title. You don’t become a leader once you get a title. You already show leadership which leads to the title. I used to run a Boy Scout troop. In a troop the boys pick their own leaders. On average, its the boy who has already shown he can lead a patrol or the troop that gets voted in as a leader. Its the people who are already leading their peers that get recognized. People know who the real leaders are regardless of their position or title.
I think about work too as an example. There are those who get lucky or know the right people when they get promoted but most of the people who rise up through the ranks are those who are already doing their jobs like they are the next level up (or more). Its the ones who are leading that get the titles later on. In other words, you have to lead to be a leader, not the other way around!
I can’t wait to read The Leader Who Had No Title. Is this a personal finance book in particular? No. But it sounds like it discusses those aspects we need to grasp in order to make the best of ourselves and when we can do that we can prosper in our lives, which includes our personal finances.
I’d like a few of you to read this book for free! The publisher is kind enough to agree to send out a copy of the book to three lucky readers of Free From Broke. In order to enter, leave a comment telling me an aspect about leadership from your own personal experience.
The window for comments for the giveaway will be open until Tuesday, March 9th at 11:59 pm EST. Make sure you leave a valid email so I can contact you for your mailing info to give the publisher. One entry per email address. Only valid comments will be entered (I reserve the right to eliminate comments I feel are spam). If I don’t hear back from the winner after 48 hours I may pick another winner. Winners will be chosen randomly using Random.org.
(Note: The giveaway for the book has ended.)
{ 15 comments… read them below or add one }
Not to get too ‘Boy Scouty’ here, but when I was elected as the top leadership position in my Troop, things were different. I took office immediately after one of my best friends who I looked up to as a leader. I thought I could never be a leader like him, and I was right.
The best leader I could be was one like me. I stayed humble and coached people to do their best and look after each other instead of dictating what they should do. I sat at the front, but my heart was in the middle, always doing and encouraging instead of giving orders to others.
To this day, I still lead that way. If you surround yourself with people who can do things you can’t, leading them to do their best and work together is better than pretending you know how to and are able to do their job.
My friend died when we were 17. I still look up to him.
My Insight says that Every Person has the potential to be an Excellent Leader and Every Person at the Same time is looking forward to a good example of a Leader.
People treat strangers who understand what they are doing with the Interest as somebody to look upon too. Of course not everybody consistently keeps meeting their expectations, but this lifelong habit of looking upon to somebody never dies.
I have always been better than average in everything I have attempted and have been looking upon by many of my peers, seniors and subordinates as a reliable person whom they admire.
.-= Raghuraman´s last blog ..What is Wrong With GLOBAL WARMING ? =-.
Thanks for the title, definitely want to check this out (eventually).
And of course – these tie in quite nicely to personal finance! We’ll let people draw their own conclusions instead of spelling it out, but should be pretty evident.
PS – So are you an Eagle yourself then?
.-= FinEngr´s last blog ..Maximizing Value, The Opposite of Earn More Spend Less =-.
I spent 18 years in the Air Force, 3 on active duty as an enlisted airman and 15 years with the Air National Guard. I started out as a Senior Airman and worked my way up to Major. While I was with the ANG I went on a lot of deployments and had the opportunity to work with some really excellent military leaders and some not so excellent leaders. I always strove to be the kind of leader my guys followed because they wanted to and not because of my position or rank because those were the kinds of officers I respected the most. If you can pull that off then I think you’re definitely doing something right.
.-= David @ MBA briefs´s last blog ..Do mass firings improve performance? =-.
David,
Have you ever read the book, “It’s Your Ship” by Captain D Abrashoff?
.-= FinEngr´s last blog ..Maximizing Value, The Opposite of Earn More Spend Less =-.
I once saw Abrashoff speak… very inspirational about how he empowered his people but set high expectations.
.-= LeanLifeCoach´s last blog ..5 Ways People Waste Money =-.
I’ll give a quick example of how one person with leadership skills and a vision can make a huge difference, while someone else with an ego problem and lack of leadership skills can destroy everything in his path.
Up until recently I was working a second job for a large retail chain. The extra money was nice and it was a relatively stress free atmosphere so I stayed there for a few years. In that time I had the opportunity to see 5 different store managers come and go.
The guy who hired me was a real leader. He treated the store like it was his baby and busted his butt to make sure it looked good and ran smoothly. He showed concern for his employee’s personal lives and understood that we all had other priorities that needed our attention. And he actually pitched in and worked himself when needed. After a short time he was promoted to manager of a larger store and then he moved on to the corporate office. He clearly understood leadership.
The last manager I worked for there could not have been more different. He acted as if he was a superstar with special privileges and he spent most of his time sitting in the office instead of out on the floor working. When he did come out all he did was bark orders that usually made no sense or contradicted something else he had said earlier. He was mean-spirited and nasty and I heard him call more than one person stupid. He would also threathen to fire people for minor reasons. Not surprisingly people hated him and morale went down the toilet. The store started to look like crap and a many of his best workers quit. The last I heard corporate was unhappy with him and had warned him to shape up or be shipped out.
He was a horrible excuse for a leader and he pretty much ruined the store from top to bottom.
.-= Mike @ Saving Money Today´s last blog ..How to Make Money Picking Up Poop =-.
One of the first lessons I learned as a leader was to never ask (and you should always ask, never tell) someone to do something that you are not willing to do. Lead by example has always worked well for me.
.-= LeanLifeCoach´s last blog ..Ban Antibiotics and Save Money =-.
Thanks for giving us a chance to win a book FMB.
Leadership is one of those things every business school tries to teach and instill. I believe it can be learned, but I’m not so sure if it can be delivered.
A long time ago, I remember taking a leadership role at my high school job in McDonald’s. The manager went for a loooong lunch break to Wendy’s, and the cash registers all went down. My colleagues panicked, and the lines grew.
I walked out to the other side of the counter and just made an announcement that our cash registers were down. Stay patient, bear with us and we will manually calculate all your meals after tax. The crowd calmed down b/c they understood the situation, heard a solution, and all went well!
Manager came back from Wendy’s, and started yelling us again. All good!
Best, Sam
.-= Financial Samurai´s last blog ..Treat Your Job As If You Won The Lottery =-.
I attended an on-campus talk a few years ago that was given by one of Intel’s top female engineers, a virtual pioneer in her field. When I asked her if she experienced any difficulties amongst her peers being one of very few women, she replied that her secret was to do her job and do it well because “you can’t argue with excellence.”
Setting a positive example as one who works hard and delivers results is one of the best ways to rally people behind the work that you find important.
I absolutely love the concept of leadership as a silent revolution taking place – a force driven by good will and instinct and positive power that takes charge from a natural place not needing a pleasing title…
I had a boss when I was in the military that taught me so much about great leadership. He was the type of person who was always on the move, making sure that he was visiting all his troops while never micro-managing. He even took the time to hear what people needed and wanted in their work, and made significant efforts to obtain them.
Since he was one of my first bosses, I took it for granted. But after experiencing the leadership of other supervisors who would lead through email and without taking the time to understand their people’s concerns, I really began to appreciate my old boss.
In my opinion Leadership begins in the mind. Its about conditioning your mind.
This is synonymous to the famous saying : Great leaders are not born, they are made.
after being like 3 rd banana for 20 years in my trade as a paperhanger(wallcovering installer in a union) taking orders from a foreman and getting the shitty areas to do he sorta croaked. well a boss came up to me on a job and loved my work and gave me the chance to run the shop. well life is sweeter now. i take all the nice areas now so my paychecks are more now. We work piece work getting paid by the square yard.
I belive leadership is governed by a persons core values as the determine the way one interacts with others. The people that one is in the company of, will see how that person treats them in different situations and from that give that person the respect or role of being their leader.