The Passion Imperative: The

Leadership50Tom Peters/Bangkok/01August2006

The Basic Premise.

1. Leadership Is a …

Mutual Discovery Process.

“Ninety percent of what we call

‘management’ consists of making it difficult for people to get things done.” – Peter

Drucker

“I don’t know.”

Organizing Genius / Warren Bennis and Patricia Ward Biederman

“Groups become great only when everyone in them,

leaders and members alike, is free to do his or her

absolute best.”“The best thing a leader can

do for a Great Group is to allow its members to

discover their greatness.”

Leadership’s Mt Everest

“free to do his or her absolute best” …

“allow its members to discover their

greatness.”

Quests!

The Leadership

Types.

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.

Whoops: Jack didn’t have a

vision!

3. But Then Again, There Are Times When This “Visionary” (Type II Leadership) Stuff Actually Works!

“A leader is a dealer in

hope.”Napoleon

4. Find the “Businesspeople”!

(Type III Leadership)

I.P.M. (Inspired

Profit Mechanic)

5. All Organizations

Need the Golden Leadership

Triangle.

The Golden Leadership Triangle: (1) Talent

Fanatic … (2) Creator-Visionary …

(3) Inspired Profit Mechanic.

6. Leadership

Mantra #1: IT ALL DEPENDS!

“Renaissance Men” are … a

snare, a myth, a delusion!

7. The Leader Is Rarely/Never

the Best Performer.

The Leadership

Dance.

8. Leaders …

SHOW UP!

“A body can pretend to

care, but they can’t pretend

to be there.” — Texas

Bix Bender

9. Leaders … LOVE the

MESS!

“If things seem under control, you’re just not

going fast enough.” —Mario Andretti

10. Leaders

DO!

“We have a ‘strategic’ plan. It’s

called doing things.” — Herb Kelleher

11. Leaders

Re-do.

“If Microsoft is good at anything, it’s avoiding the trap of worrying about criticism. Microsoft fails constantly.

They’re eviscerated in public for lousy

products. Yet they persist, through version after version, until they get

something good enough. Then they leverage the power they’ve gained in

other markets to enforce their standard.”Seth Godin, Zooming

12. BUT … Leaders

Know When to Wait.

Tex Schramm: The

“too hard” box!

13. Leaders Are …

Optimists.

Hackneyed but none the

less true: LEADERS SEE CUPS AS “HALF FULL.”

Half-full Cups: “[Ronald Reagan]

radiated an almost

transcendent happiness.”

Lou Cannon

14. Leaders …

DELIVER!

“It is no use saying ‘We are doing our best.’

You have got to succeed in doing what is

necessary.” —WSC

15. BUT … Leaders Are Realists/ Leaders Win

Through LOGISTICS!

16. Leaders

FOCUS!

“To Don’t ” List

17. Leaders … Set CLEAR DESIGN

SPECS.

Danger: S.I.O.

(Strategic Initiative Overload)

JackWorld/1@T: (1) Neutron Jack. (Banish bureaucracy.) (2) “1, 2 or

out” Jack. (Lead or leave.) (3)

“Workout” Jack. (Empowerment, GE

style.) (4) 6-Sigma Jack. (5)

Internet Jack. (Throughout)

TALENT JACK!

18. Leaders …

Send V-E-R-Y Clear Signals About

Design Specs!

Ridin’ with Roger: “What have you done to DRAMATICALLY

IMPROVE quality in the last 90

days?”

If It Ain’t Broke … Break It.

19. Leaders …FORGET!/

Leaders … DESTROY!

Forget>“Learn”

“The problem is never how to get new,

innovative thoughts into your mind, but how to

get the old ones out.”

Dee Hock

20. 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)

21. Leaders …

HONOR THE USURPERS.

Saviors-in-Waiting

Disgruntled CustomersUpstart CompetitorsRogue EmployeesFringe Suppliers

Wayne Burkan, Wide Angle Vision

22. Leaders Make [Lotsa] Mistakes

– and MAKE NO BONES ABOUT IT!

“Fail faster.

Succeed sooner.”

David Kelley/IDEO

23. Leaders Make …

BIG MISTAKES!

“Reward excellent failures.

Punish mediocre successes.”Phil Daniels, Sydney exec

Create.

24. Leaders Know that

THERE’S MORE TO LIFE THAN “LINE

EXTENSIONS.” Leaders

Love to CREATE NEW MARKETS.

“Acquisitions are about buying market

share. Our challenge is to create markets.

There is a big difference.”

Peter Job, CEO, Reuters

25. Leaders … Make Their Mark /

Leaders … Do Stuff That Matters

“I never, ever thought of myself as a businessman. I was interested in

creating things I would be proud

of.” —Richard Branson

“Management has a lot to do with answers. Leadership is a function

of questions. And the first

question for a leader always is:

‘Who do we intend to be?’

Not ‘What are we going to do?’ but ‘Who do we intend to be?’”

—Max De Pree, Herman Miller

26. Leaders Push Their

Organizations W-a-y Up the Value-added/

Intellectual Capital Chain

27. Leaders

LOVE the New Technology!

28. Needed? Type IV Leadership: Technology

Dreamer-True Believer

The Golden Leadership QUADRANGLE: (1) Talent

Fanatic … (2) Creator-Visionary …

(3) Inspired Profit Mechanic … (4)

Technology Dreamer-True Believer

Talent.

29. When It Comes

to TALENT … Leaders Always Go

Berserk!

30. Leaders Don’t Create “Followers”:

THEY CREATE LEADERS!

“I start with the premise that the

function of leadership is to produce more

leaders, not more followers.” —Ralph Nader

31. Leaders “Win Followers

Over”

PJ: “Coaching is winning players over.”

Passion.

32. Leaders …

“Sell”

PASSION!

G.H.: “Create a ‘cause,’ not a ‘business.’ ”

33. Leaders Know: ENTHUSIASM

BEGETS ENTHUSIASM!

“Nothing is so

contagious as

enthusiasm.”

—Samuel Taylor Coleridge

BZ: “I am a … Dispenser of Enthusiasm!

”

34. Leaders Are …

in a Hurry

“We don’t sell insurance

anymore. We sell speed.”

Peter Lewis, Progressive

35. Leaders

Focus on the

SOFT STUFF!

“Soft” Is

“Hard”- ISOE

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.]

The “Job” of

Leading.

36. 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.”)

37. Leaders

LOVE “POLITICS.”

TP: If you don’t LOVE POLITICS … find another life. (Don’t

pretend you’re a “leader.”)

38. But … Leaders Also

Break a Lot of China

39. 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

40. Leaders Say

“Thank You.”

“The two most powerful

things in existence: a kind word and a

thoughtful gesture.”

Ken Langone, CEO, Invemed Associates [from Ronna Lichtenberg, It’s Not Business, It’s Personal]

41. Leaders Are …

Curious.

The Three Most Important Letters …

WHY?

42. Leadership Is a …

Performance.

“It is necessary for the President to be

the nation’s No. 1 actor.”

FDR

43. Leaders …

Are The Brand

“You must be the change you

wish to see in the world.”

Gandhi

44. 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

Leader Job 1

Paint Portraits of

Excellence!

Introspection.

45. Leaders …

Enjoy Leading.

46. Leaders …

KNOW THEMSELVES.

Individuals (would-be leaders) cannot engage in a

liberating mutual discovery process unless they are comfortable with their

own skin. (“Leaders” who are not comfortable

with themselves become petty control freaks.)

47. But …

Leaders have MENTORS.

The Word According to TP: Upon having the Leadership

Mantle placed upon one’s head, he/she shall never

hear the unvarnished

truth again!* (*Therefore, she/he needs

one faithful compatriot to lay it on with no jelly.)

48. Leaders … Take Breaks.

The End Game.

49. Leaders ??

?:

“Leadership is the PROCESS of

ENGAGING PEOPLE in CREATING a

LEGACY of EXCELLENCE.”

“LEADERS NEED TO

BE THE ROCK OF GIBRALTAR ON

ROLLER BLADES”

50. Leaders …

Go for Broke

The greatest dangerfor most of us

is not that our aim istoo high

and we miss it,but that it is

too lowand we reach it.

Michelangelo

“You can’t behave in a calm, rational manner. You’ve got to be out there on the lunatic fringe.”

— Jack Welch