Establish, Believe In, and Communicate Your Philosophy - Pete Carroll - Win Forever

When the leader is clear and consistent about his philosophy's core values, it frees everyone up to do their best.  It frees top leadership to treat its middle managers in a whole new way.  When everyone understands the vision, the goals, and the overall system, they don't need the top boss always telling them what to do.  They can figure it out for themselves.  And for the middle managers, the is means that instead of being mere instruments for relaying instructions delivered from on high, they can get creative and share their own ideas.  Once they have the chance to find their own voices, their identity is now at the forefront.  The door then opens to competing not merely for the next promotion but to maximize their own potential.  Imagine how much energy this generates.  When everyone gets to contribute his maximum effort, it is transformative for the whole organization.

Taken from Win Forever by Pete Carroll

'Three Rules' - Pete Carroll - Win Forever

The following article was taken from Pete Carroll's book, Win Forever.  

At USC  Pete Carroll introduced "Three Rules," which became foundational elements for our program.

Rule 1:  Always protect the team

Rule 2:  No whining, No complaining, No Excuses

Rule 3:  Be Early

Rule 1: Protecting the Team

This rule is about each individuals conscience and it holds everybody in the program accountable to the program and to each other.  Every decision is important and every decision can either hurt or help you, your teammates, and the team.

Rule 2:  You Either Do or You Don't - There Are No Excuses

Self-talk can be powerful and ultimately can create anticipated outcomes.  The language of the culture reflects the attitude of the culture.  If you're a culture of complaining and excuses, your actions and performance will reflect it.

Rule 3:  Being Early Requires Being Prepared

Being early is all about being disciplined, being prepared, being organized, and showing respect.  To be early, you must have your priorities in order and you must be organized to the point where you have a plan and can execute it effectively.  

Part of teaching players to execute on the field is teaching them to execute off the field as well.  Limiting themselves to three rules was a very conscious choice.  It started with a player's conscience and holding him accountable, it dealt with his language and self-talk, and ended with the discipline and respect it took to do things right.

Sharon Sloane of Will Interactive: See Yourself as Others See You

This article is an excerpt of an interview with Sharon Sloane, C.E.O. of Will Interactive, was conducted and condensed by Adam Bryant.

In the interview, she talks about the importance of:

-  Understanding what makes the people you work with tick
-  Being able to walk in other people's shoes
-  Seeing yourself through the eyes of others
-  Looking for ‘Beam Holders’
-  Finding your passion and following it
-  Being patient and earning your stripes
-  Examined experience is the best teacher
-  The importance of daily reflection

You can find the complete article at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/03/business/corner-office-sharon-sloane-of-will-interactive-see-yourself-as-others-see-you.html

In approaching difficult conversations, 

a chief executive says, “you’ve got to 

get ‘on the balcony’ — you have to take 

yourself out of the situation and look at

 it as if you’re viewing other people 

playing your role.”

Tell me about your leadership style.

One approach, which my father taught me, is what’s called the “platinum rule.” It means, do unto others as they would have you do unto them. It recognizes that not everybody is motivated by the same thing. You can’t necessarily fulfill everyone’s wishes, but it’s crucial to understand what makes them tick.

Given your background in counseling, do you have good techniques for having difficult conversations?

I’ve learned that you’ve got to get “on the balcony” — you have to take yourself out of the situation and look at it as if you’re viewing other people playing your role. You have to be able to walk in someone else’s shoes and really empathize with them. But it’s also just as important to see yourself as others see you. If you can do that, it gives you a 360-degree view, and then you have more understanding. It doesn’t make a hard job easier, but it gives you a framework.

How do you hire? What are you looking for?

We really look for “beam holders.”

Please explain.

A beam holder is someone who feels personally responsible for the welfare and growth of the company and will do whatever it takes. If things are falling apart in another department, they’ll reach out to help hold up the ceiling.

It also means that I’d be looking for you to go the extra mile. That doesn’t necessarily mean working 80 hours a week. It means that I want to be able to talk with you and have you talk with me about everything that’s really important here, even if the work we’re talking about is not your responsibility, because I want you to be personally invested in our success. If that means answering emails on the weekend, then I know you’re going to do that. I’m not going to abuse it, but you’re going to be there for me, and by the same token, I’m going to be there for you.

We also give what we call mission-type orders here. I will be very clear with what the goal is, what the objective is. Then I’m basically going to give you the latitude to do it. If you need my help or have a problem, come see me. Otherwise, I bless you. So I look for people who can take mission-type orders and succeed.

I’ll also ask what’s important in your life. People certainly can prepare for that, but it’s also the way they answer it. I’m pretty good at picking up the memorized scripts. That’s part of my background.

What advice would you give to graduating college students?

Try to find your passion and follow it, because I feel really sorry for people who dread going to work every day. Another thing is to be patient. You have to earn your stripes. I think there is a tendency, especially with this younger generation, that if they are bright, they think they’re going to burst onto the scene. It takes time.

The third thing is that you’re going to have some failures and defeats. Learn from them. My favorite expression is, examined experience is the best teacher.

I do something every day that I call “chair time.” It’s my time at home at the end of the day. I just sit quietly, turn my phone off, and I let the day wash over me. What really happened today? Sometimes it’s realizing that maybe something was said that I didn’t really pick up on, or connecting a couple of dots.

My mother used to do that, too. I remember she would sometimes be sitting in the living room after a busy day. I’d say, “Mom, are you O.K.?” She’d say: “I’m fine. I’m just thinking about the day.” We have to be comfortable with silence, and I don’t think a lot of people are.

Twice a week, Adam Bryant talks with top executives about the challenges of leading and managing.

Kevin Tracey, on Putting It Together (After Taking It Apart)

The following quotes are from an interview with Dr. Kevin J. Tracey, president and CEO of the Feinstein Institute for Medical Research of the North Shore-LIJ Health System and was conducted by Adam Bryant.

Get the entire interview at:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/06/business/corner-office-kevin-tracey-on-putting-it-together-after-taking-it-apart.html?_r=0

But I do think that kids today are growing up with computers and technology that don’t need to be fixed or can’t be fixed, and they’re missing out on something.  I think you have to take apart something.

I also think you want to figure out how things work, because that gives you the power to innovate. Innovation has to start with creativity, and creativity means making something. The best way to make something, if you don’t know how to do it, is to take something else apart.

…

But I think that when your mother dies when you’re young, you approach life differently. You realize nothing’s guaranteed to last forever. So you make decisions about what you want to do each day, and what you want to accomplish, and what you hope to accomplish long term. That opened my mind to try to understand: “Well, how can I be more organized? How can I plan?”

You spent a lot of time in operating rooms. Any leadership lessons from that?

I’ve seen the best of management and the absolute worst of management.

The worst is when the team fears the leader, so when someone sees something going wrong, they’re afraid to point it out. I’ve also seen the best. It’s about clearly stating the purpose and asking people how they’re doing and really listening if someone needs something different that day. If the operating team can accommodate the needs of that person without deviating from the plan, that person will be a better member of the team.

How do you hire?

My favorite question is, “What do you want to do?” If you don’t know what you want to do, you’re letting chance dictate your future. Then I look for patterns in their life that show they’ve conceived of a plan in the past and accomplished it.

At least three things are required to come up with a plan and accomplish it. There has to be some element of creativity and self-analysis, which is really important. There has to be some element of operational capacity. And there has to be persistence, because anything worth doing in life requires persistence. You can weed out a lot of people by listening carefully to the stories they tell around this theme, and then looking at the résumé.

The other theme I ask about is, “What did you do on your previous jobs?” If they say, “I did research,” I’ll ask: “Where? What time did you get to the lab? What did you do at the lab bench?” If there’s a red flag, it will almost always come when someone can’t explain what they did.

That happens?

Absolutely. I think some people can actually go through a lot of jobs, doing a lot of tasks, without thinking about them and really not having any insight into what they’re doing. But creative people and innovative people will tell you every detail about what they did, because they found a way to do them better.

If you can’t glean the sense of accomplishment, pride and operational excellence from them describing previous jobs, it’s not going to start when they show up at a new place.