In 35+ years of building companies and organizations in multiple industries, I’ve concluded most leadership books are great examples of survivorship bias. I’ve learned a lot from many of these books. But none of them really clued me into the secret of what distinguishes teams that consistently deliver outsized results from teams that are just mediocre.
So what’s the secret?
Principles.
Principled leaders have a set of strongly held beliefs in the how (vs the what, why, when, or who) and strive to live those principles.
Even better, organizations that have a written-down set of rules for the how, combined with mechanisms that reinforce the living of those principles, the org sings.
It doesn’t even matter what the principles are. What matters is the org is principled.
If you want your org the consistently deliver outsized results develop these skills:
- Skills for figuring out which principles are the right principles.
- Skills for writing down principles in ways that resonate and create clarity.
- Skills for creating mechanisms and plans that encourage everyone in the org to continuously work at living the principles.
- Skills for remembering that principle is spelled p-r-i-n-c-i-p-l-e and not p-r-i-n-c-i-p-a-l and the word principle is synonymous with tenet (and that is spelled t-e-n-e-t and not t-e-n-a-n-t).
I have mastered1 these skills and love teaching them to others. I’m available to help you and/or your entire organization; see www.kindel.com.
1 Sometimes I still spell tenet tenent. Oops.
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