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100 Great Leadership Ideas: From Successful Leaders and Managers Around the World
It is very easy to be a successful leader. All you need is the charisma of a hero; the wisdom of a philosopher; the vision of a seer; the interpersonal skills of a diplomat; the memory of an elephant; the stamina and fitness of an athlete; the integrity of a judge; the presentation skills of an actor; the humility of a saint; the confidence of a politician . . . One way to find out the secret of successful leadership is to ask great leaders what they think are the most important things that they do in their own life that have led to their success. 100 Great Leadership Ideas analyses the writings, interviews and published statements of over 130 famous leaders to see what they believe are the most aspects of their leadership leaders such as Jack Welch, Louis Gerstner, Richard Branson, Lee Iacocca, Mukesh Ambani, Irene Rosenfeld, Alan Sugar, Steve Jobs, Anne Mulcahy, Bill Gates, Bhaskar Bhat, David Packard, Andrea Jung, John Chen, Andrew Grove, Fred Smith, Nancy Snyder, Narayana Murthy, Reuben Mark and Wu Xiaobing, to name a few. Each of the 100 ideas is simply and compellingly presented and followed by a concise summation of how these ideas can be applied in practice. Every successful leader needs good ideas. This book reveals what today's great leaders believe are the most important 100 leadership ideas.
224 pages, Kindle Edition
First published August 1, 2010
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May 10, 2023
Possibly one of the best ways to know about skills needed to be a successful leader is by taking inputs from those leaders who are already successful. Therefore the author dives into the writings, interviews and published material on 130 leaders to find out what they believe to be the most important aspect of successful leadership. The organizations covered are virtually a list of who’s who in the business world – Abbott, Air Asia, Apple, Avon, BBC, Body Shop, Citicorp, Colgate Palmolive, Daimler AG, Ford, GE, Glaxosmithkline, Google, Grameen Bank, HP, IBM, ICI, Infosys, J&J, Lenovo, Marico Industries, Marks & Spencer, Mars Inc., Microsoft, Pepsico, Philips, Reliance, Shell, Southwest Airlines, Sun Microsystems, Target, Titan, Virgin, Whirlpool, Wipro, Yahoo, 3M,........
One of the most fundamental ideas in the book is differentiating between management and leadership while at the same time explaining their interplay. Management without Leadership is very unlikely to achieve change while leadership without management is likely to produce chaos.
The author believes that despite all the individual brilliance, a modern leader’s lexicon has to have words like consensual, collaborative, empowering, devolved, consultative and inspirational – if the organization has to survive and grow.
The 100 ides are grouped into eight parts with each part covering a core message and ultimately leading you as the leader to have an everlasting impact on the outer world.
Part I talks about ‘Vision, Mission, Values, Change’. The easiest way to understand the terms is from the statement, “Vision is about the relatively distant future while mission is about the present”’. On Values, a statement by Subroto Bagchi (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subroto...) is worth revisiting again & again, “We certainly believe that value alignment precedes competence..........if values are in place, competence can always be developed”. On ‘ideating versus doing’, the views of Louis Gerstner (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lou_Ger...) – “Execution – getting the task done, making it happen – is the most unappreciated skill of an effective business leader” makes lot of sense. On seeking out change, Richard Branson’s statement, “.......A defensive, conservative, cautious mindset – a natural enough reaction when things get tough – can kill you stone dead in a competitive marketplace......” needs to be remembered, especially by organizations doing well currently.
Part II of the book on leader and his top team explains the relevance of accepting one’s weaknesses and then having a team that compensates for the same; thus promoting a team with complementary skills – not having clones of the leader in the team. Leaders (unlike Managers) need not take the current management structure as sacrosanct. Traditional “Command and Control” model may not be the best for new gen who believes in “Collaboration”. This is needed to get a buy-in from new generation colleagues and thus improve results.
Successful delegation is a great skill and a leader to succeed needs to master the same. Next step in delegating the process is devolving actual decision making to the level closest to the customer. Leaders need to be aware of the difference between leadership (efficacy) and management (efficiency) in their roles and encourage senior colleagues to become “leader-manager”.
Part III deals with the leader and his whole team. The core idea being that while the leader must set the core vision – how best to achieve that vision should be decided with the help of collective intelligence of the organization. The broader the collective, the better it is. Resources should follow people’s choices, making the buy-in better. Leader needs to be fair and also should be seen as fair. Communication – all of the time including in crisis and in simple language is very important. For the modern leader, achieving the right balance between distance (to be able to see the bigger picture) and closeness (to get a good grasp on what is actually happening) is a key skill.
Leaders need to encourage candour and also real debate (open & non judgemental). Hard questions need to be asked and answers found. To motivate & inspire people, leaders need to engage their emotions – thru compelling story telling. Thus communication, engagement, devolution, honest relationship and empowerment are important leadership ideas covered in Part III.
Out of the twenty chapters in Part IV – You and the Organization – most significant in my opinion are, “Be Meritocratic”, “Cut down on meetings”, “Drive the culture right thru the organization”, “Harness the intelligence of the organization”, “March towards the sound of the guns”, “Not everything is measurable” and “Respect the culture you inherit”.
How well the strategy is implemented is probably more significant that the originality or detail of the strategy itself – considering that all strategies can be copied while implementation is almost impossible to imitate fully. Organizations have to take care of both market changes and competition – to survive. Modern organizations need to be not only more efficient but also more creative – to succeed. In “Practice Democracy”, the author mentions that the real challenge for leaders is to set up structures that allow the organizations to thrive with their less-than-perfect leadership as contrary to popular belief there is nothing like a perfect leader. The organization should be guided by the leader, not controlled.
Part V has eight leadership ideas on Personal Qualities that a leader needs to have or develop. Modern leaders need to be “authentic” and need not wear “mask of leadership” all the time. “Making decisions” is the defining aspect of leadership. As famously stated by George S. Patton (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_...) , “A good plan, violently executed now, is better than a perfect plan next week”. The author points out that at leadership level, the skill sets are considered as given and it is the “Personal Qualities” and “Personal Behavior” (covered in Part VI) that differentiates one leader from the other. Your team cannot be impressed by you if they cannot relate to you as a person.
Part VI on Personal Behavior covers nine leadership ideas – follow your instincts (gut feeling tempered by huge amount of experience), art of active listening, saying sorry (owning up mistakes), setting a good example (for both relatively unimportant and serious issues), sticking to the strategy/ values/ vision. Insensitivity of the leader hurts the organization and also the leader in the long run.
Part VII includes fifteen topics on Personal Development. To avoid getting distracted, leaders have to identify the most important 2-3 goals crucial for organization’s survival itself. Thereafter they have to ensure that everyone down the line prioritizes their work around these goals. Simple actions like getting a good personal assistant will help the leader focus on core issues rather than spending energy & time on routine issues. Leaders need to learn from professional athletes and build time to recharge in the routine. Once having built up a sense of direction, leaders need to build up a sense of urgency. Maintaining Physical fitness to be more effective and stress free is an essential requirement from today’s leaders. Leaders need not be a “know-all” but should attempt to know all that he could. A new leader needs to go for “quick wins” without being obsessive about it. Recognizing people and remembering their name is important for a leader as it makes people feel valued and appreciated. If the situation demands, leader should be open to “re-invent” himself and his team. Finally, the leader needs to be ruthless in saying “no” to distractions.
Part VIII covers You and the outside world with final eight of the leadership ideas. Instead of assuming in a crisis that things will turn out well, leaders need to assume the worst and act accordingly. Leaders need to cast the net wider & wider to attract and encourage talent. Finding & retaining right people for the right job is the defining issue of 21st century business. Business has to be always done ethically – this has practical imperative for the organization. Leaders also need to think beyond their organization – the whole industry and even the society – and should be ready to contribute and lead. Leaders should always be on the lookout for partnerships – anyone that can help the organization deliver some aspect of current service (or product) in a better way. Finally an organization should aim to make a contribution to the society, making money is a by-product.
At the end of the day, the reader will benefit only if he/she considers it as a workbook. The book gives 100 great leadership ideas from a broad spectrum of companies and organizations. After describing the idea in some detail, mostly thru quotes from the initiator/ originator of that idea, the author also suggests how to implement the same in your organization. As mentioned in many points in the book, implementation is the key, a great idea alone won’t help.
One of the most fundamental ideas in the book is differentiating between management and leadership while at the same time explaining their interplay. Management without Leadership is very unlikely to achieve change while leadership without management is likely to produce chaos.
The author believes that despite all the individual brilliance, a modern leader’s lexicon has to have words like consensual, collaborative, empowering, devolved, consultative and inspirational – if the organization has to survive and grow.
The 100 ides are grouped into eight parts with each part covering a core message and ultimately leading you as the leader to have an everlasting impact on the outer world.
Part I talks about ‘Vision, Mission, Values, Change’. The easiest way to understand the terms is from the statement, “Vision is about the relatively distant future while mission is about the present”’. On Values, a statement by Subroto Bagchi (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subroto...) is worth revisiting again & again, “We certainly believe that value alignment precedes competence..........if values are in place, competence can always be developed”. On ‘ideating versus doing’, the views of Louis Gerstner (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lou_Ger...) – “Execution – getting the task done, making it happen – is the most unappreciated skill of an effective business leader” makes lot of sense. On seeking out change, Richard Branson’s statement, “.......A defensive, conservative, cautious mindset – a natural enough reaction when things get tough – can kill you stone dead in a competitive marketplace......” needs to be remembered, especially by organizations doing well currently.
Part II of the book on leader and his top team explains the relevance of accepting one’s weaknesses and then having a team that compensates for the same; thus promoting a team with complementary skills – not having clones of the leader in the team. Leaders (unlike Managers) need not take the current management structure as sacrosanct. Traditional “Command and Control” model may not be the best for new gen who believes in “Collaboration”. This is needed to get a buy-in from new generation colleagues and thus improve results.
Successful delegation is a great skill and a leader to succeed needs to master the same. Next step in delegating the process is devolving actual decision making to the level closest to the customer. Leaders need to be aware of the difference between leadership (efficacy) and management (efficiency) in their roles and encourage senior colleagues to become “leader-manager”.
Part III deals with the leader and his whole team. The core idea being that while the leader must set the core vision – how best to achieve that vision should be decided with the help of collective intelligence of the organization. The broader the collective, the better it is. Resources should follow people’s choices, making the buy-in better. Leader needs to be fair and also should be seen as fair. Communication – all of the time including in crisis and in simple language is very important. For the modern leader, achieving the right balance between distance (to be able to see the bigger picture) and closeness (to get a good grasp on what is actually happening) is a key skill.
Leaders need to encourage candour and also real debate (open & non judgemental). Hard questions need to be asked and answers found. To motivate & inspire people, leaders need to engage their emotions – thru compelling story telling. Thus communication, engagement, devolution, honest relationship and empowerment are important leadership ideas covered in Part III.
Out of the twenty chapters in Part IV – You and the Organization – most significant in my opinion are, “Be Meritocratic”, “Cut down on meetings”, “Drive the culture right thru the organization”, “Harness the intelligence of the organization”, “March towards the sound of the guns”, “Not everything is measurable” and “Respect the culture you inherit”.
How well the strategy is implemented is probably more significant that the originality or detail of the strategy itself – considering that all strategies can be copied while implementation is almost impossible to imitate fully. Organizations have to take care of both market changes and competition – to survive. Modern organizations need to be not only more efficient but also more creative – to succeed. In “Practice Democracy”, the author mentions that the real challenge for leaders is to set up structures that allow the organizations to thrive with their less-than-perfect leadership as contrary to popular belief there is nothing like a perfect leader. The organization should be guided by the leader, not controlled.
Part V has eight leadership ideas on Personal Qualities that a leader needs to have or develop. Modern leaders need to be “authentic” and need not wear “mask of leadership” all the time. “Making decisions” is the defining aspect of leadership. As famously stated by George S. Patton (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_...) , “A good plan, violently executed now, is better than a perfect plan next week”. The author points out that at leadership level, the skill sets are considered as given and it is the “Personal Qualities” and “Personal Behavior” (covered in Part VI) that differentiates one leader from the other. Your team cannot be impressed by you if they cannot relate to you as a person.
Part VI on Personal Behavior covers nine leadership ideas – follow your instincts (gut feeling tempered by huge amount of experience), art of active listening, saying sorry (owning up mistakes), setting a good example (for both relatively unimportant and serious issues), sticking to the strategy/ values/ vision. Insensitivity of the leader hurts the organization and also the leader in the long run.
Part VII includes fifteen topics on Personal Development. To avoid getting distracted, leaders have to identify the most important 2-3 goals crucial for organization’s survival itself. Thereafter they have to ensure that everyone down the line prioritizes their work around these goals. Simple actions like getting a good personal assistant will help the leader focus on core issues rather than spending energy & time on routine issues. Leaders need to learn from professional athletes and build time to recharge in the routine. Once having built up a sense of direction, leaders need to build up a sense of urgency. Maintaining Physical fitness to be more effective and stress free is an essential requirement from today’s leaders. Leaders need not be a “know-all” but should attempt to know all that he could. A new leader needs to go for “quick wins” without being obsessive about it. Recognizing people and remembering their name is important for a leader as it makes people feel valued and appreciated. If the situation demands, leader should be open to “re-invent” himself and his team. Finally, the leader needs to be ruthless in saying “no” to distractions.
Part VIII covers You and the outside world with final eight of the leadership ideas. Instead of assuming in a crisis that things will turn out well, leaders need to assume the worst and act accordingly. Leaders need to cast the net wider & wider to attract and encourage talent. Finding & retaining right people for the right job is the defining issue of 21st century business. Business has to be always done ethically – this has practical imperative for the organization. Leaders also need to think beyond their organization – the whole industry and even the society – and should be ready to contribute and lead. Leaders should always be on the lookout for partnerships – anyone that can help the organization deliver some aspect of current service (or product) in a better way. Finally an organization should aim to make a contribution to the society, making money is a by-product.
At the end of the day, the reader will benefit only if he/she considers it as a workbook. The book gives 100 great leadership ideas from a broad spectrum of companies and organizations. After describing the idea in some detail, mostly thru quotes from the initiator/ originator of that idea, the author also suggests how to implement the same in your organization. As mentioned in many points in the book, implementation is the key, a great idea alone won’t help.
June 28, 2019
A collection of leadership experience from people who have gone through the process of building and rebuilding companies.
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