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The will to succeed and the desire to do things that advance the interest of the organization aren't just motivated by recognition from above; they are integral to a culture of sacrifice and service, in which protection comes from all levels of the organization.

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Exceptional organizations all have cultures in which the leaders provide cover from above and the people on the ground look out for one another. This is the reason they are willing to push hard and take the kinds of risks they do. And the way any organization can achieve this is with empathy.

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What happens when the leaders of an organization listen to the people who work there? Without coercion, pressure or force, the people naturally work together to help each other and advance the company.  Working with a sense of obligation is replaced by working with a sense of pride.  Coming to work for the company is replaced by coming to work for each other.  Work is no longer a place to dread; it is a place to feel valued.

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Without the protection of our leaders, everyone outside the inner circle is forced to work alone or in small tribes to advance their own interests.  In doing so, silos for, politics entrench, mistakes are covered up instead of exposed, the spread of information slows and unease replaces any sense of cooperation and security.
Strong leaders extend the Circle of Safety to include every single person who works for the organization. Self preservation is unnecessary and fiefdoms are less able to survive.

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Stress and anxiety at work have less to do with the work we do and more to do with weak management and leadership. A willingness to change jobs comes when we feel no loyalty to a company whose leaders offer us no sense of belonging or reason to stay beyond money and benefits.

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Social interaction is also important for the leaders of an organization.  Roaming the halls of the office and engaging with people beyond meetings really matters.

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It's not very motivating or helpful to be told that we will receive a performance bonus if we achieve "more". How much more? Give us something we can measure our progress toward, and we are more likely to achieve it. (This underscores the importance of the creation LSPI goals and the constant communication of those goals with EVERYONE in the school)

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A good vision statement explains, in specific terms, what the world would look like if everything we did was wildly successful.

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Those who work the hardest to help others succeed will be seen by the group as the "alpha" of the group. And being the alpha - the strong, supportive one of the group, the one willing to sacrifice time and energy so that others may gain - is a prerequisite for leadership.

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Faking it makes us feel phony, as if we are cheating. Status is biological - we have to earn it to feel it.

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"The cost of leadership is self-interest."
General George Flynn, USMC

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Leaders are the ones willing to sacrifice their own comfort for ours, even when they disagree with us. Trust is not simply a matter of shared opinions. Trust is a biological reaction to the belief that someone has our well-being at heart. Leaders are the ones who are willing to give up something their own for us. Their time, their energy, their money, maybe even the food off of their plate. When it matters, leaders choose to eat last.

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What makes a good leader is that they eschew the spotlight in favor of spending time and energy to do what they need to do to support and protect their people.

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If we get the environment right, if we create organizational cultures that work to the natural inclinations of the human animal, the result will be an entire group of motivated people.

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That's what trust is. We don't trust people to obey the rules, we trust that they know when to break them. The rules are there for normal operations. The rules are designed to avoid danger and help ensure things go smoothly. And though there are guidelines for how to deal with emergencies, at the end of the day, we trust the expertise of a few special people to know when to break the rules.

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Organizations that offer people the opportunity to fully commit work tirelessly to train their people. This goes beyond how to prepare a PowerPoint; these organizations offer endless opportunities for self-improvement.

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The responsibility of leaders is to teach their people the rules, train them to gain competency and build their confidence. At that point, leadership must step back and trust their people know what they are doing and will do what needs to be done. In strong organizations, people will break the rules because it is the right thing to do for others.

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If good people are asked to work in a bad culture, one in which leaders do not relinquish control, then the odds of something bad happening go up. People will be more worried about following the rules out of fear of getting in trouble or losing their jobs than about doing what needs to be done.

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What too many leaders of organizations fail to appreciate is that it's not the people that are the problem. The people are fine. Rather, it's the environment in which the people operate that's the problem. Get that right and things just go.

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It's not how smart the people in the organization are; it's how well

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A leader who presides over a weak culture does not invest in programs to build the confidence of their people so that they will do the right thing. Instead, command and control perpetuates a system in which people will more likely do the thing that's right for them. Uncertainty, silos and politics increase our stress and hurt our ability to form relationships to the point where self-preservation become our primary focus.

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When we opt to stay above the clouds, relying only on information fed to us instead of going down to see for ourselves, not only is it harder to make the right moral decisions, it makes it even harder to take responsibility when we fail to do so

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When a leader is able to personally know everyone in the group, the responsibility for their care becomes personal. The leader starts to see those for whom they are responsible as if they were their own family, Likewise, those in the group start to express ownership of their leader.

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Real, live human interaction is how we feel a part of something, develop a trust and have the capacity to feel for others. It is how we innovate.

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When we are able to physically see the positive impact of the decisions we make pr the work we do, not only do we feel that our work was worth it, but it also inspires us to work harder.

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What produces loyalty, that irrational willingness to commit to the organization even when offered more money elsewhere, is the feeling that the leaders of the company would be willing, when it matters, to sacrifice their time and energy to help us. We will judge a boss who spends time after hours to help us as more valuable than a boss who simply gives us a bonus when we hit a target.

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When a culture changes from a place where people love to work into a place where they go to work simply to take something fro themselves, the finger gets pointed at the people that run the organization. People will respond to the environment in which they operate. It is the leaders who decide what kind of environment they want to build.

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3M has succeeded not because they have hired the best and the brightest, but because they have a corporate culture that encourages and rewards people for helping each other and sharing everything they learn. They work very hard to foster collaboration. When people trust and share their successes and failures, what they know and what they don't know, the result is innovation. It's just natural.

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"Those at the top have all the authority and none of the information.  Those at the bottom have all the information and none of the authority.  not until those without the information relinquish their control can an organization run better, smoother and faster and reach its maximum potential."
Captain David Marquet
United States Navy

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It's a leader's job to take responsibility for the success of each member of his crew. It's the leader's job to ensure that they are well trained and feel confident to perform their duties. To give them responsibility and hold them accountable to advance the mission. If the captain provides direction and protection, the crew will do what needs to be done to advance the mission.

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The best leaders share what they know, ask knowledgeable people for help performing their duties and make introductions to create new relationships within their networks.

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Leadership is about integrity, honesty and accountability. ALL components of trust. Leadership comes from telling us not what we want to hear, but rather what we need to hear. To be a true leader, to engender deep trust and loyalty, starts with telling the truth.

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Building trust requires nothing more than telling the truth.

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When we are disconnected form the people with whom we work, we spend more time focused on our own needs rather than the needs of the people for whom we are supposed to be responsible.

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Cooperation doesn't mean agreement.  It means working together to advance the greater good, to serve those who rely on our protection, not to rack up wins to serve ourselves.

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When a leader has the humility to distribute power across the organization, the strength of the organization becomes less dependent on one person thus better able to survive. In this model, instead of trying to command and control everything, the leaders devote all of their energy to training, building and protecting their people so that the people can command and control any situation themselves. This the best way to protect the legacy of the leader and extend the success of the organization many years after the leader departs.

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Good leadership is like exercise. We do not see any improvements to our bodies with day to day comparisons. It's only when we compare pictures of ourselves over a period of weeks or months that we can see a stark difference. The impact of leadership is also best judged over time.

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Positively affirming talents and encouraging attempts is indeed good for people. Telling them that they are great at everything is not better. Giving awards is good; giving out awards to everyone who participates is not necessarily better

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Too many mission and vision statements talk about being the best, the biggest or most respected - all goals that are self-centered and offer zero contribution to the world. How are Millennials ever to live their Why if their organizations don't have a sense of Why themselves?

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Empathy is no something we give to the nameless, faceless people we aim to serve, nor is it something we offer to teachers and students from 9-5. It is a second by second, minute by minute service that we owe everyone if we want to call ourselves a leader.

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Leadership is not a license to do less; it is a responsibility to do more. Leadership takes work, time and energy. The effects are not always easily measured and are not always immediate. Leadership is ALWAYS a commitment to human beings.

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Let us all be the leaders we wish we had.

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If you don't have the right leaders for the environment, then it is incumbent to move quickly and make the necessary changes. You must also begin now to cultivate the leaders of the future, testing and evaluating people for their ability to execute in the face of new challenges and circumstances.

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Now, more than ever before, leaders need to design flexible operating plans.

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To execute well, there must be accountability, clear goals, accurate methods to measure performance, and the right rewards for people who perform.

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Leaders should not seek change for change's sake, but they and everyone else in the organization need to be prepared to change quickly when conditions dictate a need to change.

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JP Morgan:                  Succesful Approach to Execution

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JP Morgan:                  Succesful Approach to Execution

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Each division was ordered to benchmark itself against the best of its competitors

People were carefully evaluated and the best were selected to run each division

Heavy investment made into information technology (Analogous to education's investment in quality, research-based instructional strategies)

Rigorous compensation policies  were established to ensure that real gains in salary would occur if the enterprise as a whole did well (this is why the WSA is included in the individual teacher "merit pay" qualifications for GCPS)

The CEO focused on listening to people, gathering intelligence and then acting upon what he learned

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Knowing your people is just as important as knowing your business in these perilous times. Knowing your people obviously requires rigorous evaluation against clear goals and candid, thorough feedback. But it also requires you to become a better listener, seeking people's opinion and ideas even when they may not be as forceful in making their points or arguments as others.

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Knowing your people is not enough.  They need to know you.  It is absolutely critical that you as a leader are accessible, that you project a sense of confidence tempered by concern, that you share as much undistorted and unfiltered information as you can, and that you act decisively.

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Choosing the wrong goals can be disastrous. All too often the wrong goals are set because the leader isn't realistic about the ability of the people to achieve them.

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Follow-through is a constant and sequential part of execution. It ensures that you have established closure in the dialogue about who will be responsible for what and the specific milestones for each measurement.

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For follow-through to serve its function, action must follow analysis. Knowledge without courage isn't effective.

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To properly reward the doers, you must correctly define what a doer is. This is central to the idea of execution. Simply put, a doer is a person who gets things done. Doing is meeting goals, some short-term and some long-term.

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Even in tough times you can find ways to provide education and training as an investment in the company's future.

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Be sure you are looking for the qualities that matter amid the current turmoil: energy, courage, honesty, integrity and perseverance. You need people who can roll with the punches, not people who are whiners and naysayers. You also need to rethink which people are more likely to rise to the top in the new environment as your organization's strategy evolves

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You have to rely on yourself to contain your own ego and recognize your inevitable blind spots. Be particularly cautious about losing your ability to listen. Not only do you need expertise from both within and outside the company to shore up your blind spots and weaknesses, but also a pipeline to people willing and able to bring you diverse views and bad news. Above all, you need to be able to recognize when you're part of the problem

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There are several characteristics that will differentiate good leaders going forward. They will have a commanding knowledge of the world around them. They will never stop learning. They will be extremely flexible and quick to adapt to changing conditions. But perhaps most important of all, they will lead in a positive and uplifting way that gives confidence to those who follow.

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Execution is THE great unaddressed issue in the business world today. Its absence is the single biggest obstacle to success and the cause of most of the disappointments that are mistakenly attributed to other causes.

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People think of execution as the tactical side of business, something leaders delegate while they focus on the perceived bigger issues.  This idea is completely wrong.  Execution is not just tactics - it is a discipline and a system.  It has to be built into the company' strategy, its goals and its culture.  The leader of the organization must be deeply engaged in it.

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Many leaders fall victim to the gap between promises they've made and results their organization delivered. They frequently tell us they have a problem with accountability - people aren't doing the things they are supposed to do to implement a plan. They desperately want to make changes, but what do they need to change? They don't know.

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Execution is a specific set of behaviors and techniques that companies need to master in order to have competitive advantage.  It is a discipline of its own.  In big companies and small ones, it is the critical discipline for success  now.

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You can't craft a worthwhile strategy if you don't at the same time make sure your organization has or can get what is required to execute the strategy, including the right resources and the right people.

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The main requirement is that you as a leader have to be deeply and passionately engaged in your organization and honest about its realities with others and yourself.

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When companies fail to deliver on their promises, the most frequent explanation is that the CEO's strategy was wrong. But strategy itself is not often the cause. Strategies often fail because they aren't executed well. Either the organization is incapable of making them happen, or the leaders misjudge the challenges their companies face, or BOTH.

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The gap between promises and results is widespread and clear. The gap nobody knows is the gap between what a company's leaders want to achieve and the ability of their organization to achieve it.

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If you don't know how to execute, the whole of your effort as a leader will always be less than the sum of its parts.

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Execution is a discipline, and integral to strategy.

Execution is the major job of the business leader.

Execution must be a core element of an organization's culture.

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Execution is a systematic process of rigorously discussing hows and whats, questioning, tenaciously following through and ensuring accountability. It includes making assumptions about the educational environment, assessing the organization's capabilities, lining strategy to operations and the people who are going to implement the strategy, synchronizing those people and their various disciplines, and linking rewards to outcomes.

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You need robust dialogue to surface the realities of the business. You need accountability for results - discussed openly and agreed to by those responsible - to get things done and reward the best performers. You need follow-through to ensure plans are on track.

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An organization can execute only if the leader's heart and soul are immersed in the company. The leader has to be engaged personally and deeply in the company. Execution requires a comprehensive understanding of a business, its people and its environment. The leader is the only person in a position to achieve that understanding. And only the leader can make execution happen, through his or her deep personal involvement in the substance and even the details of execution.

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The leader who executes assembles an architecture of execution. He puts in place a culture and processes for executing, promoting people who get things done more quickly and giving them greater rewards. His personal involvement in that architecture is to assign tasks and then follow up. This means making sure that people understand the priorities and asking incisive questions.

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Communication can be mere boilerplate, or it can mean something. What counts is the substance of the communication and the nature of the person doing the communicating - including his or her ability to listen as well as talk.

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Execution has to be embedded in the rewards systems and in the norms of behavior that everyone practices.

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Leaders who execute look for deviations from desired managerial tolerances - the gap between the desired and actual outcome in everything from (test scores) to the selection of people for promotions. Then they move to close the gap and raise the bar still higher across the whole organization.

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Execution has to be part of an organization's culture, driving the behavior of all leaders at all levels.

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If we chew out our direct reports for not meeting their goals but don't ask "Why?" they make them, improvements and growth cannot occur. Focus on the cause - you can't fix a problem by looking only at the outcome.

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While stretch goals can be useful in forcing people to break old rules and do things better, they are worse than useless if they're totally unrealistic, or if the people who have to meet them aren't given the chance to debate them beforehand and take ownership of them.

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Especially when an organization is making major changes, the right people have to be in the critical jobs, and the core processes must be strong enough to ensure that resistance is dissolved and plans get executed.

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1. Know your people and your business

2. Insist on realism

3. Set clear goals and priorities

4. Follow through

5. Reward the doers

6. Expand people's capabilities

7. Know yourself

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When you probe, you learn things and your people learn things. Everybody gains from the dialogue. And you dignify the leadership at the plant level by allowing them to expound on the business.

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The key word is "consistent". Leaders who are connected have distilled the challenges facing the business unit into a half dozen or fewer fundamental issues. These challenges do not change much over short periods of time.

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Being present allows you, as the leader, to connect personally with your people, and personal connections help you build your intuitive feel for the business as well as for the people running the business. They also help personalize the mission you're asking people to perform.

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When introducing a new initiative, the leader's personal involvement, understanding, and commitment are necessary to overcome passive, and in some cases active, resistance

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Embracing realism means always taking a realistic view of your company and comparing it with other companies. You're always keeping an eye on what's happening in companies around the world, and you're measuring your own progress, not internally, but externally.

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Leaders who execute focus on a very few clear priorities that everyone can grasp. Focusing on three or four priorities will produce the best results from the resources at hand. People in contemporary organizations need a small number of clear priorities to execute well.

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One thing you'll notice about leaders who execute is that they speak simply and directly. They talk plainly and forthrightly about what's on their minds. They know how to simplify things so that others can understand them, evaluate them, and act on them, so that what they say becomes common sense.

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You have to make it clear to everyone that rewards and respect are based on performance.

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As a leader, you've acquired a lot of knowledge and experience - even wisdom - along the way. One of the most important parts of your job is passing it on to the next generation of leaders. This is how you expand the capabilities of everyone else in your organization, individually and collectively. It's how you will get results today and leave a legacy that you can take pride in when you move on.

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It's the difference between giving an order and teaching people how to get things done. Good leaders regard every encounter as an opportunity to coach.

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The most effective way to coach is to observe a person in action and then provide specific useful feedback. The feedback should point out examples of behavior and performance that are good or that need to be changed.

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The skill of the coach is the art of questioning. Asking incisive questions forces people to think, to discover, to search.

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Sometimes people fix things when they are coached and sometimes, they don't. If they don't, you have to get rid of them, because ultimately it will affect results. It isn't just numbers; it's behavior.

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It takes emotional fortitude to be open to whatever information you need, whether it's what you'd like to hear or not. Emotional fortitude gives you the courage to accept points of view that are opposite of yours and deal with conflict, and the confidence to encourage and accept challenges in group settings. It enables you to accept and deal with your own weaknesses, be firm with people who aren't performing, and to handle the ambiguity inherent in a fast-moving, complex organization.

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Psychologists know that some people are limited, even crippled, by emotional blockages that prevent them from doing things that leadership requires. Such blockages may lead them to avoid unpleasant situations by ducking conflict, procrastinating on decisions, or delegating with no follow-through. On the darker side, they may drive the leader to humiliate others, draining energy and sowing distrust.