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Servant leaders are a revolutionary bunch–they take the traditional power leadership model and turn it completely upside down. This new hierarchy puts the people–or employees, in a business context–at the very top, and the leader at the bottom, charged wi

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Leadership doesn't come easily to first-timers. I should know: I was one.

When you think about leading a company, a lot of people tend to think about the glamorous parts of the job. They often imagine leaders shaking hands at fancy conference tables, giving passionate keynote speeches, and hanging out with the frontline employees (because they're so down to earth). While victories and fun times can certainly be part of the deal, leadership also has another side - and that's where the real leaders shine.

Leaders are responsible for everything that happens under their watch, good and bad. That includes the reputation of their brands, their office cultures, their turnover rates, and more. The best leaders take accountability as often as they can, while questionable leaders look for someone else to blame when things go wrong.

As you guide your company through its ups and downs, remember these three truths about leadership:
1. You are responsible for the well-being of your employees.
Company leaders are responsible for more than financial decisions and business growth: They are also in charge of employee morale, performance, and job security. The stress of that responsibility can feel overwhelming, but leading a team successfully is one of the most rewarding parts of the job.

You want to lead the company well because all the people who work there depend on the organization for their livelihood. You aren't just growing for profit's sake - you're working to help keep families housed and bills paid. Plus, you don't want your workplace to feel like "just a place to work." Employees deserve to feel like the time they dedicate to your organization is worthwhile, not just because of the money they make but because of the satisfaction they feel.

The people working for you and driving your company forward deserve all the respect you can give them. Great leaders remember that they are not the monarchs of their companies but the principal servants who are there to help everyone as best they can.
2. You must actively build and manage your brand.
In the age of content, personal brands are more important than ever. Company leaders cannot hide quietly and expect to make a trustworthy name for themselves: They must use content to build their thought leadership, establish themselves as industry experts, and lend credibility to the companies they run.

That doesn't mean CEOs of tech companies need to be the best programmers in the office. I lead a content company, but I'm far from the best writer or editor on the staff. Building a brand simply means that leaders must make their voices public.

Industry trends, new technologies, and public policies shift the directions of companies every day. If business leaders do not participate in those conversations, people will begin to think that their companies might not be as impactful as they claim to be.

Create and share content under your own name, not just your company's, to help people connect to your brand. It sounds counterintuitive, but the more people can relate to you as a person, the more likely they are to think positively of your organization. That positive sentiment can lead to better recruitment, boosts to marketing and sales, personal speaking opportunities, new partnerships - the list goes on.
3. Your example matters.
Being a leader of a company is kind of like being a celebrity hounded by paparazzi. Your team is always watching, and if you don't embody the values and mission you set for your employees, people won't take you seriously.

When you treat others carelessly, employees notice. On the other hand, when you offer "unlimited" vacation days but never take a day off yourself, people neglect to use their benefits for fear of appearing unmotivated. You want your employees to be balanced, productive, happy people - and to help them achieve that, you have to set the example and embody those qualities yourself.

For example, my second daughter was born right around the time my company set a new paternity leave policy. While it was hard for me to take so much time off, I knew that if I didn't, I'd be sending the wrong message and making it harder for others to feel supported in taking their own paternity leave. As a leader, you have to set the right example for the rest of the team.

Leadership in real life doesn't look like it does on Instagram. It's less about the #hustle and #grind than it is about people, respect, and commitment to developing a better brand. Hopefully, these tips will help you avoid some of the mistakes most leaders get to learn from on the job.

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3 Lessons That Will Transform Your Leadership Philosophy

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Leadership doesn't come easily to first-timers. I should know: I was one. When you think about leading a company, a lot of people tend to think about the glamorous parts of the job. They often imagine leaders shaking hands at fancy conference tables, giving passionate keynote speeches, and hanging out with the frontline employees (because they're so down to earth).

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Start with 1,435 good companies. Examine their performance over 40 years. Find the 11 companies that became great. Now here's how you can do it too. Lessons on eggs, flywheels, hedgehogs, buses, and other essentials of business that can help you transform your company.

I want to give you a lobotomy about change. I want you to forget everything you've ever learned about what it takes to create great results. I want you to realize that nearly all operating prescriptions for creating large-scale corporate change are nothing but myths.

The Myth of the Change Program: This approach comes with the launch event, the tag line, and the cascading activities.

The Myth of the Burning Platform: This one says that change starts only when there's a crisis that persuades "unmotivated" employees to accept the need for change.

The Myth of Stock Options: Stock options, high salaries, and bonuses are incentives that grease the wheels of change.

The Myth of Fear-Driven Change: The fear of being left behind, the fear of watching others win, the fear of presiding over monumental failure—all are drivers of change, we're told.

The Myth of Acquisitions: You can buy your way to growth, so it figures that you can buy your way to greatness.

The Myth of Technology-Driven Change: The breakthrough that you're looking for can be achieved by using technology to leapfrog the competition.

The Myth of Revolution: Big change has to be wrenching, extreme, painful—one big, discontinuous, shattering break.

Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Totally wrong.

Here are the facts of life about these and other change myths. Companies that make the change from good to great have no name for their transformation—and absolutely no program. They neither rant nor rave about a crisis—and they don't manufacture one where none exists. They don't "motivate" people—their people are self-motivated. There's no evidence of a connection between money and change mastery. And fear doesn't drive change—but it does perpetuate mediocrity. Nor can acquisitions provide a stimulus for greatness: Two mediocrities never make one great company. Technology is certainly important—but it comes into play only after change has already begun. And as for the final myth, dramatic results do not come from dramatic process—not if you want them to last, anyway. A serious revolution, one that feels like a revolution to those going through it, is highly unlikely to bring about a sustainable leap from being good to being great.

These myths became clear as my research team and I completed a five-year project to determine what it takes to change a good company into a great one. We systematically scoured a list of 1,435 established companies to find every extraordinary case that made a leap from no-better-than-average results to great results. How great? After the leap, a company had to generate cumulative stock returns that exceeded the general stock market by at least three times over 15 years—and it had to be a leap independent of its industry. In fact, the 11 good-to-great companies that we found averaged returns 6.9 times greater than the market's—more than twice the performance rate of General Electric under the legendary Jack Welch.

The surprising good-to-great list included such unheralded companies as Abbott Laboratories (3.98 times the market), Fannie Mae (7.56 times the market), Kimberly-Clark Corp.(3.42 times the market), Nucor Corp. (5.16 times the market), and Wells Fargo (3.99 times the market). One such surprise, the Kroger Co.—a grocery chain—bumped along as a totally average performer for 80 years and then somehow broke free of its mediocrity to beat the stock market by 4.16 times over the next 15 years. And it didn't stop there. From 1973 to 1998, Kroger outperformed the market by 10 times.

In each of these dramatic, remarkable, good-to-great corporate transformations, we found the same thing: There was no miracle moment. Instead, a down-to-earth, pragmatic, committed-to-excellence process—a framework—kept each company, its leaders, and its people on track for the long haul. In each case, it was the triumph of the Flywheel Effect over the Doom Loop, the victory of steadfast discipline over the quick fix. And the real kicker: The comparison companies in our study—firms with virtually identical opportunities during the pivotal years—did buy into the change myths described above—and failed to make the leap from good to great.

How change doesn't happen

Picture an egg. Day after day, it sits there. No one pays attention to it. No one notices it. Certainly no one takes a picture of it or puts it on the cover of a celebrity-focused business magazine. Then one day, the shell cracks and out jumps a chicken.

All of a sudden, the major magazines and newspapers jump on the story: "Stunning Turnaround at Egg!" and "The Chick Who Led the Breakthrough at Egg!" From the outside, the story always reads like an overnight sensation—as if the egg had suddenly and radically altered itself into a chicken.

Now picture the egg from the chicken's point of view.

While the outside world was ignoring this seemingly dormant egg, the chicken within was evolving, growing, developing—changing. From the chicken's point of view, the moment of breakthrough, of cracking the egg, was simply one more step in a long chain of steps that had led to that moment. Granted, it was a big step—but it was hardly the radical transformation that it looked like from the outside.

It's a silly analogy, but then our conventional way of looking at change is no less silly. Everyone looks for the "miracle moment" when "change happens." But ask the good-to-great executives when change happened. They cannot pinpoint a single key event that exemplified their successful transition.

Take Walgreens. For more than 40 years, Walgreens was no more than an average company, tracking the general market. Then in 1975 (out of the blue!) Walgreens began to climb. And climb. And climb. It just kept climbing. From December 31, 1975, to January 1, 2000, $1 invested in Walgreens beat $1 invested in Intel by nearly two times, General Electric by nearly five times, and Coca-Cola by nearly eight times. It beat the general stock market by more than 15 times.

I asked a key Walgreens executive to pinpoint when the good-to-great transformation happened. His answer: "Sometime between 1971 and 1980." (Well, that certainly narrows it down!)

Walgreens's experience is the norm for good-to-great performers. Leaders at Abbott said, "It wasn't a blinding flash or sudden revelation from above." From Kimberly-Clark: "These things don't happen overnight. They grow." From Wells Fargo: "It wasn't a single switch that was thrown at one time."

We keep looking for change in the wrong places, asking the wrong questions, and making the wrong assumptions. There's even a tendency to blame Wall Street for the "instant results" approach to change. But the companies that made the jump from good to great did so using Wall Street's own tough metric of success: a sustained leap in their stock-market performance. Wall Street turns out to be just another myth—an excuse for not doing what really works. The data doesn't lie.

How change does happen

Now picture a huge, heavy flywheel. It's a massive, metal disk mounted horizontally on an axle. It's about 100 feet in diameter, 10 feet thick, and it weighs about 25 tons. That flywheel is your company. Your job is to get that flywheel to move as fast as possible, because momentum—mass times velocity—is what will generate superior economic results over time.

Right now, the flywheel is at a standstill. To get it moving, you make a tremendous effort. You push with all your might, and finally you get the flywheel to inch forward. After two or three days of sustained effort, you get the flywheel to complete one entire turn. You keep pushing, and the flywheel begins to move a bit faster. It takes a lot of work, but at last the flywheel makes a second rotation. You keep pushing steadily. It makes three turns, four turns, five, six. With each turn, it moves faster, and then—at some point, you can''t say exactly when—you break through. The momentum of the heavy wheel kicks in your favor. It spins faster and faster, with its own weight propelling it. You aren't pushing any harder, but the flywheel is accelerating, its momentum building, its speed increasing.

This is the Flywheel Effect. It's what it feels like when you're inside a company that makes the transition from good to great. Take Kroger, for example. How do you get a company with more than 50,000 people to embrace a new strategy that will eventually change every aspect of every grocery store? You don't. At least not with one big change program.

Instead, you put your shoulder to the flywheel. That's what Jim Herring, the leader who initiated the transformation of Kroger, told us. He stayed away from change programs and motivational stunts. He and his team began turning the flywheel gradually, consistently—building tangible evidence that their plans made sense and would deliver results.

"We presented what we were doing in such a way that people saw our accomplishments,"Herring says. "We tried to bring our plans to successful conclusions step by step, so that the mass of people would gain confidence from the successes, not just the words."

Think about it for one minute. Why do most overhyped change programs ultimately fail? Because they lack accountability, they fail to achieve credibility, and they have no authenticity. It's the opposite of the Flywheel Effect; it's the Doom Loop.

Companies that fall into the Doom Loop genuinely want to effect change—but they lack the quiet discipline that produces the Flywheel Effect. Instead, they launch change programs with huge fanfare, hoping to "enlist the troops." They start down one path, only to change direction. After years of lurching back and forth, these companies discover that they've failed to build any sustained momentum. Instead of turning the flywheel, they've fallen into a Doom Loop: Disappointing results lead to reaction without understanding, which leads to a new direction—a new leader, a new program—which leads to no momentum, which leads to disappointing results. It's a steady, downward spiral. Those who have experienced a Doom Loop know how it drains the spirit right out of a company.

Consider the Warner-Lambert Co.—the company that we compared directly with Gillette—in the early 1980s. In 1979, Warner-Lambert told Business Week that it aimed to be a leading consumer-products company. One year later, it did an abrupt about-face and turned its sights on healthcare. In 1981, the company reversed course again and returned to diversification and consumer goods. Then in 1987, Warner-Lambert made another U-turn, away from consumer goods, and announced that it wanted to compete with Merck. Then in the early 1990s, the company responded to government announcements of pending healthcare reform and reembraced diversification and consumer brands.

Between 1979 and 1998, Warner-Lambert underwent three major restructurings—one per CEO. Each new CEO arrived with his own program; each CEO halted the momentum of his predecessor. With each turn of the Doom Loop, the company spiraled further downward, until it was swallowed by Pfizer in 2000.

In contrast, why does the Flywheel Effect work? Because more than anything else, real people in real companies want to be part of a winning team. They want to contribute to producing real results. They want to feel the excitement and the satisfaction of being part of something that just flat-out works. When people begin to feel the magic of momentum—when they begin to see tangible results and can feel the flywheel start to build speed—that's when they line up, throw their shoulders to the wheel, and push.

And that's how change really happens.

Disciplined people: "Who" before "what"

You are a bus driver. The bus, your company, is at a standstill, and it's your job to get it going. You have to decide where you're going, how you're going to get there, and who's going with you.

Most people assume that great bus drivers (read: business leaders) immediately start the journey by announcing to the people on the bus where they're going—by setting a new direction or by articulating a fresh corporate vision.

In fact, leaders of companies that go from good to great start not with "where" but with "who." They start by getting the right people on the bus, the wrong people off the bus, and the right people in the right seats. And they stick with that discipline—first the people, then the direction—no matter how dire the circumstances. Take David Maxwell's bus ride. When he became CEO of Fannie Mae in 1981, the company was losing $1 million every business day, with $56 billion worth of mortgage loans underwater. The board desperately wanted to know what Maxwell was going to do to rescue the company.

Maxwell responded to the "what" question the same way that all good-to-great leaders do: He told them, That's the wrong first question. To decide where to drive the bus before you have the right people on the bus, and the wrong people off the bus, is absolutely the wrong approach.

Maxwell told his management team that there would only be seats on the bus for A-level people who were willing to put out A-plus effort. He interviewed every member of the team. He told them all the same thing: It was going to be a tough ride, a very demanding trip. If they didn't want to go, fine; just say so. Now's the time to get off the bus, he said. No questions asked, no recriminations. In all, 14 of 26 executives got off the bus. They were replaced by some of the best, smartest, and hardest-working executives in the world of finance.

With the right people on the bus, in the right seats, Maxwell then turned his full attention to the "what" question. He and his team took Fannie Mae from losing $1 million a day at the start of his tenure to earning $4 million a day at the end. Even after Maxwell left in 1991, his great team continued to drive the flywheel—turn upon turn—and Fannie Mae generated cumulative stock returns nearly eight times better than the general market from 1984 to 1999.

When it comes to getting started, good-to-great leaders understand three simple truths. First, if you begin with "who," you can more easily adapt to a fast-changing world. If people get on your bus because of where they think it's going, you'll be in trouble when you get 10 miles down the road and discover that you need to change direction because the world has changed. But if people board the bus principally because of all the other great people on the bus, you'll be much faster and smarter in responding to changing conditions. Second, if you have the right people on your bus, you don't need to worry about motivating them. The right people are self-motivated: Nothing beats being part of a team that is expected to produce great results. And third, if you have the wrong people on the bus, nothing else matters. You may be headed in the right direction, but you still won't achieve greatness. Great vision with mediocre people still produces mediocre results.

Disciplined thought: Fox or hedgehog?

Picture two animals: a fox and a hedgehog. Which are you? An ancient Greek parable distinguishes between foxes, which know many small things, and hedgehogs, which know one big thing. All good-to-great leaders, it turns out, are hedgehogs. They know how to simplify a complex world into a single, organizing idea—the kind of basic principle that unifies, organizes, and guides all decisions. That's not to say hedgehogs are simplistic. Like great thinkers, who take complexities and boil them down into simple, yet profound, ideas (Adam Smith and the invisible hand, Darwin and evolution), leaders of good-to-great companies develop a Hedgehog Concept that is simple but that reflects penetrating insight and deep understanding.

What does it take to come up with a Hedgehog Concept for your company? Start by confronting the brutal facts. One good-to-great CEO began by asking, "Why have we sucked for 100 years?" That's brutal—and it's precisely the type of disciplined question necessary to ignite a transformation. The management climate during a leap from good to great is like a searing scientific debate—with smart, tough-minded people examining hard facts and debating what those facts mean. The point isn't to win the debate, but rather to come up with the best answers—and, ultimately, to lock onto a Hedgehog Concept that works.

You'll know that you're getting closer to your Hedgehog Concept when you align three intersecting circles that represent three pivotal questions: What can we be the best in the world at? (And equally important—what can we not be the best at?) What is the economic denominator that best drives our economic engine (profit or cash flow per "x")? And what are our core people deeply passionate about? Answer those three questions honestly, facing the brutal facts without blinking, and you'll begin to see your Hedgehog Concept emerge.

For example, before Wells Fargo understood its Hedgehog Concept, its leaders had tried to make it a global bank: It operated like a mini-Citicorp—and a mediocre one at that.

Then the Wells Fargo team asked itself, "What can we potentially do better than any other company?" The brutal fact was that Wells Fargo would never be the best global bank in the world—and so the leadership team pulled the plug on the vast majority of the bank's international operations. When the team asked the question about the bank's economic engine, Wells Fargo's leaders confronted a second brutal fact: In a deregulated world, commercial banking would be a commodity. The essential economic driver would no longer be profit per loan, but profit per employee. The bank switched its operations to become a pioneering leader in electronic banking and to open utilitarian branches run by small crews of superb people. Profit per employee skyrocketed. Finally, when it came to passion, members of the Wells Fargo team all agreed: The mindless waste and self-awarded perks of traditional banking culture were revolting. They proudly saw themselves as stoic Spartans in an industry that had been dominated by the wasteful, elitist culture of banking. The Wells Fargo team eventually translated the three circles into a simple, crystalline Hedgehog Concept: Run a bank like a business, with a focus on the western United States, and consistently increase profit per employee. "Run it like a business" and "run it like you own it" became mantras; simplicity and focus made all the difference. With fanatical adherence to that simple idea, Wells Fargo made the leap from good results to superior results.

In the journey from good to great, defining your Hedgehog Concept is an essential element. But insight and understanding don't happen overnight—or after one off-site. On average, it took four years for the good-to-great companies to crystallize their Hedgehog Concepts. It was an inherently iterative process—consisting of piercing questions, vigorous debate, resolute action, and autopsies without blame—a cycle repeated over and over by the right people, infused with the brutal facts, and guided by the three circles. This is the chicken inside the egg.

Disciplined action: The "stop doing" list

Take a look at your desk. If you're like most hard-charging leaders, you've got a well-articulated to-do list. Now take another look: Where's your stop-doing list? We've all been told that leaders make things happen—and that's true: Pushing that flywheel takes a lot of concerted effort. But it's also true that good-to-great leaders distinguish themselves by their unyielding discipline to stop doing anything and everything that doesn't fit tightly within their Hedgehog Concept.

When Darwin Smith and his management team crystallized the Hedgehog Concept for Kimberly-Clark, they faced a dilemma. On one hand, they understood that the best path to greatness lay in the consumer business, where the company had demonstrated a best-in-the-world capability in its building of the Kleenex brand. On the other hand, the vast majority of Kimberly-Clark's revenue lay in traditional coated-paper mills, turning out paper for magazines and writing pads—which had been the core business of the company for 100 years. Even the company's namesake town—Kimberly, Wisconsin—was built around a Kimberly-Clark paper mill.

Yet the brutal truth remained: The consumer business was the one arena that best met the three-circle test. If Kimberly-Clark remained principally a paper-mill business, it would retain a secure position as a good company. But its only shot at becoming a great company was to become the best paper-based consumer company—if it could take on such companies as Procter & Gamble and Scott Paper Co. and beat them. That meant it would have to "stop doing" paper mills.

So, in what one director called "the gutsiest decision I've ever seen a CEO make," Darwin Smith sold the mills. He even sold the mill in Kimberly, Wisconsin. Then he threw all the money into a war chest for an epic battle with Procter & Gamble and Scott Paper. Wall Street analysts derided the move, and the business press called it stupid. But Smith did not waver.

Twenty-five years later, Kimberly-Clark emerged from the fray as the number-one paper-based consumer-products company in the world, beating P&G in six of eight categories and owning its former archrival Scott Paper outright. For the shareholder, Kimberly-Clark under Darwin Smith beat the market by four times, easily outperforming such great companies as Coca-Cola, General Electric, Hewlett-Packard, and 3M.

In deciding what not to do, Smith gave the flywheel a gigantic push—but it was only one push. After selling the mills, Kimberly-Clark's full transformation required thousands of additional pushes, big and small, accumulated one after another. It took years to gain enough momentum for the press to herald Kimberly-Clark's shift from good to great. One magazine wrote, "When ... Kimberly-Clark decided to go head to head against P&G ... this magazine predicted disaster. What a dumb idea. As it turns out, it wasn't a dumb idea. It was a smart idea." The amount of time between the two articles: 21 years.

Now it begins

Our study of what it takes to turn good into great required five years—and 10.5 person-years—and amounted to our own flywheel effort. Looking back on our research, what's most striking to me about our findings is the absence of a magic moment in any of the good-to-great companies—or in our own journey to understanding. The real path to greatness, it turns out, requires simplicity and diligence. It requires clarity, not instant illumination. It demands each of us to focus on what is vital—and to eliminate all of the extraneous distractions.

After five years of research, I'm absolutely convinced that if we just focus our attention on the right things—and stop doing the senseless things that consume so much time and energy—we can create a powerful Flywheel Effect without increasing the number of hours we work.

I'm also convinced that the good-to-great findings apply broadly—not just to CEOs but also to you and me in whatever work we're engaged in, including the work of our own lives. For many people, the first question that occurs is, "But how do I persuade my CEO to get it?" My answer: Don't worry about that. Focus instead on results—on subverting mediocrity by creating a Flywheel Effect within your own span of responsibility. So long as we can choose the people we want to put on our own minibus, each of us can create a pocket of greatness. Each of us can take our own area of work and influence and can concentrate on moving it from good to great. It doesn't really matter whether all the CEOs get it. It only matters that you and I do. Now, it's time to get to work.

Jim Collins wrote the essay "Built to Flip" in the March 2000 issue of Fast Company. His new book, Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap ... And Others Don't, will be available in October.

Sidebar: Separating the good from the great

Can a good company become a great company? How? It took Jim Collins and his team of researchers five years to come up with the answers: 11 companies made the leap from good to great and then sustained those results for at least 15 years. How great was great? The good-to-great companies averaged cumulative stock returns 6.9 times the general market in the 15 years after their transition points. The actual screening-and-selection process was a rigorous one. The criteria were:

1. The company had to show a pattern of good performance, punctuated by a transition point, after which it shifted to great performance. "Great performance" was defined as a cumulative total stock return of at least three times the general market for the period from the transition point through 15 years.

2. The transition from good to great had to be company specific, not an industrywide event.

3. The company had to be an established and ongoing enterprise—not a startup. It had to have been in business for at least 25 years prior to its transition, and it had to have been publicly traded with stock-return data available for at least 10 years prior to its transition.

4. The transition point had to occur before 1985 to give the team enough data to assess the sustainability of the transition.

5. Whatever the year of transition, the company had to be a significant, ongoing, stand-alone company.

6. At the time of its selection, the company still had to show an upward trend.

The study began with a field of 1,435 companies and emerged with a list of 11 good-to-great companies: Abbott Laboratories, Circuit City, Fannie Mae, Gillette Co., Kimberly-Clark Corp., the Kroger Co., Nucor Corp., Philip Morris Cos. Inc., Pitney Bowes Inc., Walgreens, and Wells Fargo.

The next step in the study was to isolate what it took to make the change. At this point, each of the 11 good-to-great companies was paired with a comparison company—a company with similar attributes that could have made the transition, but didn't.

Then the research began. Collins and his team reviewed books, articles, case studies, and annual reports covering each company; examined financial analyses for each company, totaling 980 combined years of data; conducted 84 interviews with senior managers and board members of the companies; scrutinized the personal and professional records of 56 CEOs; analyzed compensation plans for the companies; and reviewed layoffs, corporate ownership, "media hype," and the role of technology for the companies. The findings are contained in Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap ... And Others Don't (HarperBusiness, 2001).

Sidebar: Great answers to good questions

Fast Company:

The CEOs who took their companies from good to great were largely anonymous. Is that an accident?

Jim Collins: There is a direct relationship between the absence of celebrity and the presence of good-to-great results. Why? First, when you have a celebrity, the company turns into "the one genius with 1,000 helpers." It creates a sense that the whole thing is really about the CEO. At a deeper level, we found that for leaders to make something great, their ambition has to be for the greatness of the work and the company, rather than for themselves. That doesn't mean that they don't have an ego. It means that at each decision point—at each of the critical junctures when Choice A would favor their ego and Choice B would favor the company and the work—time and again the good-to-great leaders pick Choice B. Celebrity CEOs, at those same decision points, are more likely to favor self and ego over company and work.

FC: Like the anonymous CEOs, most of the good-to-great companies are unheralded. What does that tell us?

JC: The truth is, few people are working on the most glamorous things in the world. Most of them are doing real work—which means that most of the time they're doing a heck of a lot of drudgery with only a few moments of excitement. The real work of the economy gets done by people who make cars, who sell real estate, and who run grocery stores or banks. One of the great findings of this study is that you can be in a great company and be doing it in steel, in drug stores, or in grocery stores. No one has the right to whine about their company, their industry, or the kind of business that they're in—ever again.

FC: Let's say that I'm not running a company. How do the good-to-great lessons apply to me?

JC: The basic message is this: Build your own flywheel. You can do it. You can start to build momentum in something for which you've got responsibility. You can build a great department. You can build a great church community. You can take every one of these ideas and apply them to your own work or your own life.

FC: What does your research suggest about the best way to respond to the current economic slowdown?

JC: If I were running a company today, I would have one priority above all others: to acquire as many of the best people as I could. I'd put off everything else to fill my bus. Because things are going to come back. My flywheel is going to start to turn. And the single biggest constraint on the success of my organization is the ability to get and to hang on to enough of the right people.

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Start with 1,435 good companies. Examine their performance over 40 years. Find the 11 companies that became great. Now here's how you can do it too. Lessons on eggs, flywheels, hedgehogs, buses, and other essentials of business that can help you transform your company. I want to give you a lobotomy about change.

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The 25 Best Leadership Books of All-Time | Soundview Magazine

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In case you don't know, Soundview identifies, selects, and summarizes the best business books that are published every year. And, since we've been doing this for the past 41 years, we've seen A LOT of leadership books filter through our offices. Literally thousands ...

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Essential Information

Student activities coordinators assist student leaders to plan and organize events, activities and programs. Although some jobs require just an associate's degree, most student activities coordinators at large schools hold a bachelor's or master's degree and have experience in student service programs. Necessary skills for these jobs usually include event planning, public relations, budgeting and marketing.

Required Education
Bachelor's or master's degree in student affairs or a related area

Projected Job Growth (2018-2028)*

6% for public relations specialists; 7% for meeting, convention and event planners

Median Salary (2018)*

$60,000 for public relations specialists; $49,370 for meeting, convention and event planners

Source: * U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

Student Activities Coordinator Job Description

Student activities coordinators plan and monitor student activities and programs. They generally work at universities in the department of student affairs or student services. They act as liaisons between students, administrative staff, faculty, vendors and community members to facilitate the success of student programs.

Coordinators are typically outgoing individuals who promote and mentor student leaders. They must be comfortable working with students from a variety of social and economic backgrounds. They may also be required to work evenings or weekends in order to attend extracurricular student events.

Coordinators need budgeting and organizational skills in order to ensure student events are held in accordance with university standards and policies. They often assist with special events like homecoming, student registration, orientation and health fairs. Their job duties include:

Budget planning

Accounting

Creating student guidelines

Scheduling events

Attending student meetings and social events

Marketing

Student recruitment

Program development and evaluation

Coordinating use of facilities and equipment

Ensuring standards

Supervising student workers

Student Activities Coordinator Requirements

Student activities coordinator requirements vary. Some community colleges require an associate degree or demonstrated experience in event and budget planning. However, most university jobs require a bachelor's or master's degree in student personnel, student affairs, counseling or another related major.

Undergraduate students should acquire experience in student government and organized student activities as well as working as an academic and financial aid advisor to gain an advantage when applying to graduate programs. Graduate students must complete an internship at a college or some other educational or counseling institution. Graduate student coursework includes:

College standards

Student development

Diversity

Leadership

Educational research

History of higher education

Counseling techniques

Legal issues

College administration

Career Info

Although the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics does not carry info on student activities coordinators, it does on similar professionals like public relations specialists as well as meeting, convention and event planners. Public relations specialists can expect to see a 6% increase in employment opportunities from 2018-2028. Meeting, convention and event planners can expect a 7% increase in jobs.

Student activities coordinators have many different responsibilities, including developing and coordinating programs and activities. This position requires knowledge of budgeting and accounting, the ability to network and connect with students, attend events, and coordinate facility usage among other skills. Usually these professionals have a bachelor's degree or higher.

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student activities coordinator: job description and requirements

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Student Activities Coordinator: Job Description and Requirements

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Student activities coordinators assist student leaders to plan and organize events, activities and programs. Although some jobs require just an associate's degree, most student activities coordinators at large schools hold a bachelor's or master's degree and have experience in student service programs. Necessary skills for these jobs usually include event planning, public relations, budgeting and marketing.

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Once you have posted an open position on the SEO Jobs Database, students who are interested will contact you by email through our online system with their resume attached. Please review each resume and plan to interview 2-3 students who meet the position's qualifications and needs. While selecting the right candidate is the primary purpose behind the interview, keep in mind that the interview process is an important learning opportunity for your student candidates. It will provide them with experience, confidence, and will be an important step in obtaining post-graduate employment.

Preparation

Develop a list of questions that may be asked of all qualified candidates. You may choose to ask open-ended behavioral questions (Tell me about a time when...) or closed questions which require just a 'yes' or 'no' answer (Can you edit photos for web publication?).

Be specific with your questions and don't make assumptions about a student's ability or skills.

Ask questions that will gauge how well a student will fit with the organizational culture such as "Do you prefer working independently or in a team?" and "What did you like most/least about your last job or volunteering position?"

Keep in mind that some students will have no work experience. In these instances, ask questions from which you can glean work-related information based on the student's extracurricular. If s/he was part of a science bowl team, ask about a time when they had to take a leadership role. If they volunteered at the school theatre on the weekends, ask about a time when they had to deal with a challenging customer.

Remember that employers are legally prohibited from asking questions related to any protected class (e.g. race/ethnicity/nationality, sex/gender/sexual orientation, marital/family status, disability, or religion). A seemingly innocent question such as "Tell me about your name" can be construed as discriminatory so be sure to keep your questions job-related.

The Interview

Many students are nervous when interviewing for a position. Devote a few moments at the top to put the applicant at ease with some small talk. Questions such as "Tell me about yourself" or "What year are you and what are your aspirations after graduation" are good ways to break the ice. Some students will arrive dressed professionally while others will wear more casual clothing. Don't let this deter you from hiring the candidate that will be the best fit. Give students the benefit of the doubt when it comes to their attire.

After some small talk provide some information on the department, essential job functions, dress code, your supervisory style, and any other factors you deem important. Be clear about expectations and confirm the student's understanding. Some typically discussed factors are:

Work schedule

Rate of pay

Training to be provided

Employment period, anticipated start and end dates

Federal work study program eligibility

Personal conduct

Description of job responsibilities (beyond the ad)

Hiring decision timeline

Ask your interview questions and try to make it more of a conversation. Listening to their responses and following-up with a relevant question is any easy way to guide the interview toward a conversation. After you have obtained the basic information needed further questions may be necessary to ascertain specific skill levels (beginner or intermediate excel level, advanced Photoshop or just the basics?).

Always be sure to avoid discriminatory questions such as "Do you think a skinny guy like you can lift 75 lbs.?" or "Will your disability prevent you from doing a key part of the job?" Think about your intent and rephrase your question in a legal way such as "This job requires the ability to regularly lift boxes of up to 75 lbs in weight. Are you able to do this?" And finally, keep politics and religion out of the interview. If a student is wearing a political button or piece of clothing which is not appropriate for the workplace be sure to bring it up in relation to the job dress code.

Finish off by asking the student if s/he has any questions. Thank the student for their time and reconfirm the hiring decision time line.

Helpful Interviewing and Evaluation Documents

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Once you have posted an open position on the SEO Jobs Database, students who are interested will contact you by email through our online system with their resume attached. Please review each resume and plan to interview 2-3 students who meet the position's qualifications and needs.

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When Jennine Capó Crucet went to Georgia Southern University on Wednesday to discuss her book with freshmen, the topic of race was almost certain to come up. Her 2015 novel, Make Your Home Among Strangers, tells of the challenges a young Latina faces while navigating life at a majority-white college. For students in Georgia Southern's "First-Year Experience" class, it was required reading.

But during a question-and-answer session after Crucet's talk on the Statesboro campus, a vocal group of students at the majority-white university objected to her comments about white privilege. Shortly after the event, a group gathered around a grill and burned a copy of Crucet's book.

Late Wednesday night, Crucet posted a since-deleted video of the book-burning on Twitter, writing, "This is where we are, America."

The author, an associate professor of English at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, was also slated to speak Thursday at Georgia Southern's Armstrong campus, but the event was canceled due to what the university called "unforeseen circumstances." On Twitter, Crucet said the cancellation resulted from the university's inability to guarantee the safety of her or the students due to the state's open-carry gun law. The university said the event had been "canceled at the request of the author's representative."

Crucet did not respond to The Chronicle's request for comment, though she later issued a statement describing her experience of the events.

The university removed its video of Crucet's talk from the internet, according to Georgia Southern's student newspaper, The George-Anne. The newspaper reported that students began challenging the author after her comments about white privilege.

"I noticed that you made a lot of generalizations about the majority of white people being privileged," one student reportedly told Crucet. "What makes you believe that it's OK to come to a college campus like this when we are supposed to be promoting diversity on this campus, which is what we're taught? I don't understand what the purpose of this was."

Crucet told the student she had come to the campus because she was invited.

"And I talked about white privilege because it's a real thing that you are actually benefiting from right now in even asking this question," she said.

"I talked about white privilege because it's a real thing that you are actually benefiting from right now in even asking this question."

The fallout from the Q&A later spilled onto social media, where Crucet tweeted about the "aggressive and ignorant" comments that had been made. In response, some students accused Crucet of "dissing white people" while others lambasted their white classmates for burning a book written by a woman of color.

One student, who has since deleted her Twitter account, ripped the pages out of her copy of the book and sent a photo of it to Crucet.

"Work on your ignorance and racism towards white people," she tweeted, according to a screenshot.

"Nobody cared about your s----y book," another student tweeted. "It was your racist speech and rude Q&A. You spent an hour of our time promoting racism. If Twitter heard what you actually said during that speech, they would NOT have your back right now."

In response to a question from The Chronicle, the university said in an emailed statement that it was "not planning any actions against the students involved."

"While it's within the students' First Amendment rights, book-burning does not align with Georgia Southern's values, nor does it encourage the civil discourse and debate of ideas," the statement said.

"We have to make sure that we don't push these things under the rug. Because if we don't either act about it, or speak about it, or do something, it's almost like we're condoning it."

Jalon Ross, a Georgia Southern senior and peer-leader supervisor who teaches one of the first-year courses, said in a video posted on Twitter that Kyle Marrero, the institution's president, also had told him the students would not face consequences for the book-burning.

Ross said Marrero had told him that if the books had been burned on the ground, rather than on a grill, the culprits would have been punished.

"When I heard this from President Marrero, I expressed my concern," Ross said in the video. "And I told him that, as a school, we have to make sure that we don't push these things under the rug. Because if we don't either act about it, or speak about it, or do something, it's almost like we're condoning it."

In a statement posted to social media, Russell Willerton, chairman of Georgia Southern's department of writing and linguistics, said the department was "dismayed and disappointed" by the students' "destructive and threatening" actions.

"Our department values stories and how they reflect parts of the human experience," he wrote. "We also value discussion and debate of important issues from all sides and perspectives."

Lauren Fisher is an editorial intern at The Chronicle. Follow her on Twitter @lauren__fisher, or email her at lfisher@chronicle.com.

Update (10/14/2019, 5:23 p.m.): This article has been updated to remove a sentence stating that students showed up outside Crucet's hotel. Conflicting accounts of the incident make it unclear whether or not students visited the hotel.

Update (10/12/2019, 5:05 p.m.): This article has been updated with a link to a statement by Crucet.

Clarification (10/11/2019, 5:12 p.m.): This article has been updated with Georgia Southern's emailed response to The Chronicle 's questions. An earlier version of the article stated that the university did not respond. A university spokesman said the email was sent on Thursday night. The reporter did not receive it.

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'This Is Where We Are, America': After a Latina Author Talks About Race at Georgia Southern U., Students Burn Her Book

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When Jennine Capó Crucet went to Georgia Southern University on Wednesday to discuss her book with freshmen, the topic of race was almost certain to come up. Her 2015 novel, Make Your Home Among Strangers, tells of the challenges a young Latina faces while navigating life at a majority-white college.

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What is Transformational Leadership? How New Ideas Produce Impressive Results

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Transformational leadership inspires people to achieve unexpected or remarkable results. It gives workers autonomy over specific jobs and authority to make decisions.

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It's not crazy to think that you'll become a leader in some capacity within your lifetime, whether a middle manager, senior director, or even a CEO. This advance is likely to be accompanied by the following: a bump in salary, a title change, and most importantly, increased responsibility.

People often forget about that last part when they're dreaming of titles. But let me tell you, it isn't easy. Leading others is a big undertaking in which you need to be able to manage not only your own tasks, but your employees' workloads and goals, as well as the team dynamic, too. With so many things to keep track of, it's easy to become one of those bosses no one can stand. (And I know that in your head you're picturing one of those people right now and getting annoyed.)

According to Dr. Travis Bradberry, President at TalentSmart and co-author of Emotional Intelligence 2.0, being managed by someone who really isn't good at it can be a deal breaker. Says Bradberry, "Managers tend to blame their turnover problems on everything under the sun, while ignoring the crux of the matter: people don't leave jobs; they leave managers."

So if you'd like to steer clear of your employees calling it quits because of you, try to avoid the following management styles.

1. The Know-it-All

Yes, you were chosen for a reason. But that reason is not because you know everything about everything. No matter what your title is, there's always something to learn. Especially from your own team who works day in and day out on your part of the business. They're likely to have smart and innovative solutions and ideas-possibly to problems you're not even aware exist.

"Being the best isn't about knowing the most. Being the best is about confidently admitting you don't know it all, while embracing every opportunity to learn and grow from the wisdom of others. Have confidence in your ability to learn, not in the amount of information you already know. Always remember that wisdom comes from gaining knowledge and experience over the course of time-not a day or a week-but over a lifetime, so never stop learning," says Amy Rees Anderson, Managing Partner of REES Capital.

When someone you manage (or anyone, really) has a better idea than you or knows something you don't, that's not a bad thing. It actually makes your job easier, because you don't have to have all the answers.

2. The Micromanager

Managing people can be daunting-the performance of your team reflects directly back on you. And this may tempt you to hold their hands every single step of the way to ensure the job is done right.

But this is a major productivity roadblock. When you spend a good portion of your time breathing down their necks, you're limiting the amount of time you can dedicate to your own work. Not to mention, it also puts you at risk for losing track of the big picture.

As Eytan Dallal, Vice President of IT at Land of Lincoln Health explains, "Managers should delegate and manage from a distance. Employees should be held accountable for their decisions and work product, and need to be empowered with the ability to own their decisions and take risks. Most importantly, employees need managers to stand behind them, not on top of them."

That means that if you insist on standing on top of them, you're likely stifling their creativity, making them feel incompetent, and just plain bugging the crap out of them. None of this is fun-and you'll just end up with a bunch of annoyed and disengaged individuals.

3. The Absentee Boss

Sure, managers should manage from a distance, as Dallal said, but that doesn't mean you should disappear completely.

It may be nice at first to have a boss who never checks in, but after a while, having a supervisor who is never seen nor heard gets old. Employees want and deserve a certain degree of autonomy, yes, but they also want and need guidance, feedback, and validation that they are on the correct path.

Being MIA can only really result in one of two situations-your employees feel unsupported and don't know where to go, so they halt progress and do nothing. Or, they decide to move forward sans your input, everything goes haywire, and you have no way to explain it to your boss. Neither is good.

4. The Self-Server

Self-serving leaders will do whatever it takes to make themselves shining stars in their own boss' eyes. And they don't really care if they have to use someone else to do it.

The employees being used, however, will most definitely care and will start to resent you. Furthermore, they're likely to stop offering up ideas or working any harder than necessary. After all, where has it gotten them so far?

The worst part about managers with a self-serving agenda? Not only will they take all the credit for the good things that happen, but they'll deny, deny, deny, and point fingers at others-including their own team-when goals aren't met.

5. The Best Friend

When you spend five days of the week working closely with others, it can be easy to develop a bond with them. But becoming besties with your direct reports is a tricky situation to put yourself in.

It could cause you to give someone a pass where you wouldn't normally ("Oh, you forgot to submit the application for the grant on time? No biggie! We'll try again next year"), or not provide him with 100% honest feedback in fear of hurting his feelings.

While your employees may appreciate it in the moment (after all, you're a cool, chill, laidback boss!), they most likely won't in the long run, as your failure to provide them with constructive criticism limits growth. Not to mention, when they know every intimate detail about your personal life, they'll find it harder to respect you as a leader.

This doesn't mean you can't be friends with the people you work with; you just need to redefine what this type of friendship means. As Kristi Hedge, Principal of The Hedges Company, Managing Partner of Element North, and author of The Power of Presence: Unlock Your Potential to Influence and Engage Others, says, "You have those lifelong friends that let you cry on their shoulder, and you have business friends who you laugh and commiserate with over workplace follies. Both are equally legitimate friendships - the relationship dynamics are just a little bit different."

When you get a chance to lead others, pat yourself on the back-you worked hard and you deserve it. Though it may be intimidating, you have it in you to be a great boss. Remember: The main part of your newly acquired duties is not simply making sure your team hits goals, but how you get those people to accomplish that. By just avoiding the leadership styles described above, you'll be well on your way to getting there.

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5 Leadership Styles Good Bosses Avoid Like the Plague

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It's not crazy to think that you'll become a leader in some capacity within your lifetime, whether a middle manager, senior director, or even a CEO. This advance is likely to be accompanied by the following: a bump in salary, a title change, and most importantly, increased responsibility.

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While servant leadership is a timeless concept, the phrase "servant leadership" was coined by Robert K. Greenleaf in The Servant as Leader, an essay that he first published in 1970. In that essay, Greenleaf said:

"The servant-leader is servant first... It begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first. Then conscious choice brings one to aspire to lead. That person is sharply different from one who is leader first, perhaps because of the need to assuage an unusual power drive or to acquire material possessions...The leader-first and the servant-first are two extreme types. Between them there are shadings and blends that are part of the infinite variety of human nature.

"The difference manifests itself in the care taken by the servant-first to make sure that other people's highest priority needs are being served. The best test, and difficult to administer, is: Do those served grow as persons? Do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more autonomous, more likely themselves to become servants? And, what is the effect on the least privileged in society? Will they benefit or at least not be further deprived?"

A servant-leader focuses primarily on the growth and well-being of people and the communities to which they belong. While traditional leadership generally involves the accumulation and exercise of power by one at the "top of the pyramid," servant leadership is different. The servant-leader shares power, puts the needs of others first and helps people develop and perform as highly as possible.

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What is Servant Leadership? - Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership

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While servant leadership is a timeless concept, the phrase "servant leadership" was coined by Robert K. Greenleaf in The Servant as Leader, an essay that he first published in 1970. In that essay, Greenleaf said: "The servant-leader is servant first... It begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first.

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6 Steps to Improve Your Emotional Intelligence | Ramona Hacker | TEDxTUM

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Lorraine is a Chartered Psychologist and Principal Lecturer (Student & Staff Development) at the University of Central Lancashire. She is also an HEA Principal Fellow.. She has a BA in Social Psychology from the University of Sussex and an MSc in Occupational/Organisational Psychology from the University of Manchester. She undertook a PGCE and qualified as a teacher in 2004. In 2005 she joined what was the Centre for Employability at the University of Central Lancashire (UCLan). Recognising the need for a clear, practical model of graduate employability, she designed and published the CareerEDGE model and later developed the Employability Development Profile, both of which are in use in many universities nationally and internationally. She has particular expertise in the subject of Emotional Intelligence and the role this plays in graduate employability, which was the subject of her PhD research. This also involved the successful design, delivery and evaluation of a taught module of Emotional Intelligence, details of which have been published in the journal Learning and Individual Differences.
Ten years ago, the article that introduced the CareerEDGE model of graduate employability was published. At that time, Emotional Intelligence (EI) within an employability model seemed quite daring! I was expecting to receive a degree of negativity from the academic community. I'm pleased to report that this has never happened. In fact, the inclusion of EI as an essential aspect of employability development has received nothing but positive feedback.

EI is concerned with the ability to perceive, understand and manage emotion, both in ourselves and others. I've written elsewhere about why it's important that we ensure our students are aware of EI. We also need to give them opportunities to develop EI so that they achieve their aspirations for the future, particularly in relation to work. Empirical research demonstrates that higher levels of EI are related to better workplace performance, engagement, decision making, stress resilience, conflict management, team working and leadership. Providing students with EI training can result in more positive outcomes in a job recruitment situation. Interestingly, a recent study has found that students with higher levels of EI go on to earn better salaries ten to twelve years after graduation.

We can teach our students to be more emotionally intelligent. It has been shown we can do this through taught modules or through other curriculum related activities, such as interdisciplinary project work.

EI is vital whilst our students are with us as research shows it can be essential for academic success. One benefit of having a good level of emotion perception and regulation ability is that it helps students to recognise their own anxiety about an academic task, for example, an exam or presentation. As a result, they can choose and use effective strategies to manage these emotions and deal with the situation.

The time young people enter HE coincides with a period of huge change in their lives, both physical and psychosocial. Importantly, having good levels of EI helps them to deal with many of the challenges facing them, for example, making and keeping healthy relationships (both friendship and intimate). Additionally, they will be better equipped to develop a good attitude to their studies and good relationships with their tutors. They will be able to draw on these healthy relationships for support during the inevitable tricky periods experienced during any normal HE journey.

Raising awareness of EI and providing opportunities for our students to develop it is important for all of us. Let's remember, these are our potential future leaders, both in workplaces and society in general. In addition to 'love sweet love'* what the world needs now is more emotionally intelligent leaders!

*apologies to Hal David and Burt Bacharach
Lorraine's new book, An Introduction to Emotional Intelligence, has just been published (July 2018).

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Why we need Emotional Intelligence in Higher Education

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Ten years ago, the article that introduced the CareerEDGE model of graduate employability was published. At that time, Emotional Intelligence (EI) within an employability model seemed quite daring! Dr Lorraine Dacre Pool was expecting to receive a degree of negativity from the academic community. She's pleased to report that this has never happened.