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Years ago, I met a six-year-old who would become one of my greatest teachers. “Melissa” showed me what real leadership is all about.

Back then, I volunteered at a rehabilitation facility in Morristown, NJ, assisting a gifted physical therapist in a heated pool while she used the warm water to stretch the muscles of children challenged with cerebral palsy and other muscular disorders. When Melissa arrived for the last session of the day, I remember her waiting patiently for her turn in the pool. Her calm demeanor and watchful eyes caught my attention. She remained still as she seemed to be quietly taking everything in. But when we got her in the pool, her energy shifted at the same time as her smile lit up the room.

When we started the session, she displayed a discipline and focus on her task that matched any of the best leaders I had ever known. She had clarity about her one goal—she wanted to extend both arms together to enable her hands to grasp a small sponge basketball, drop it in a floating net, and score two points. At first, both of her hands were rigidly held close to her shoulders. During her first session, we were able to get just one arm to relax—and it moved only a few inches. She was determined, but patient. Melissa gave it 100%, but this was going to be a long process.

In subsequent weeks, I looked forward to Melissa’s session. Of our many times in the pool together, I particularly remember the impact she had on me when she spoke. Her words were always positive, and she seemed to use them to help create her future.

I also remember how others were affected by Melissa. We all watched as Melissa entered the water with that same enthusiasm every time. Staff would stop to peek in to see her progress. Her passion and zest were contagious—she influenced everyone around her.

It took Melissa nearly six months to reach her goal. When she finally succeeded, she let out a cry of joy that I can still hear to this day. She reminded me that those with disabilities have amazing abilities to share with those of us whose challenges aren’t as visible. She is what I refer to as a Chief.

Melissa served as a role model in so many ways. She sure helped me, even when I started with the belief that I was there to serve her. She reminded me that real power has nothing to do with your title or position. It’s focused on influence, clarity, energy, confidence, and impact.

In the second edition of Be Chief: It’s a Choice, Not a Title, I share tips and tools to help anyone understand, measure, increase, and spread real power. And in Melissa’s honor, I’m donating 100% of the author proceeds to Easterseals in support of their mission to help everyone become Chiefs.

How does an entrepreneur increase their power? If you believe, as some do, that power is all about title, position, authority, control, and supremacy, you’ll find it a challenge.

Entrepreneurs can give themselves any title or position they want. They have complete authority to do whatever they want whenever they want, and they have ultimate control.

Ask any successful entrepreneur how much time they spend thinking about this type of power and they will laugh. Because the answer is zero.

But ask these successful business people about the importance of energy, clarity, confidence, impact, and influence, and you’ll get a very different response. Entrepreneurs know their success is almost totally dependent on this definition of power.

In my work with many great entrepreneurs, we focus on how they can be powerful by increasing their:

• Clarity with simple choices around discipline.
• Influence with simple choices around supporting others.
• Impact with simple choices around creativity.
• Energy with simple choices around self-understanding and insight.
• Confidence with simple choices around values.

Successful entrepreneurs are optimizers. They don’t have time to waste.

Entrepreneurs starting out don’t have the benefit of cadres of help. They need to be as powerful as possible.

How about you?

The NeuroLeadership Institute (NLI) is a leading global research organization and a pioneer of bringing neuroscience to leadership. NLI advocates “using hard science to transform leadership effectiveness.” In my words, they make organizations more powerful. Neuroscience can help you build a powerful team, too.

Listening to Joe Wittinghill, GM Talent, Learning and Insights at Microsoft will give you a glimpse of the organization-wide impact that other companies including Amazon, Apple, Cisco, Disney, Marriott, Prudential, United Technologies, KPMG, and Travelers are seeing as members. These organizations rely on NLI not only to supply great research, but also to apply key findings to create powerful organizations.

They apply research in three key areas to help companies answer important questions:

Performance Management

• What truly motivates people?
• What drives better conversations?
• How does ‘no ratings’ really work?
• How do we fix feedback?

NLI advocates the importance of focusing on a growth mindset, which emphasizes progress over time as opposed to a fixed mindset, which is primarily/totally focused on a final result. Their research also indicates that intelligence (and power) can be expanded over time and refutes the view that intelligence is static.

Diversity and Inclusion

• Why are diverse and inclusive organizations smarter?
• How can we reduce bias?
• What truly lifts inclusion?
• How do we hire “the right fit”?

NLI also advocates that bias is natural, normal, and part of the non-conscious. To mitigate bias in decision making, research shows it is important to not only create awareness, but also to label biases when they surface and develop behavioral habits to offset them, particularly given their non-conscious nature. Teams become more powerful with varied behavior.

Leadership and Change

• What is the science of behavior change?
• How do we foster a growth mindset in everyone?
• How do we drive effective learning at scale?
• How do we fix leadership development?

Finally, NLI advocates fostering a toward/reward state of mind versus an away/threat state – something that is essential to motivating others and creating psychological safety. In other words, the strategy of managing by “FUD” (fear, uncertainty, and doubt) is demotivating and not effective in helping an organization grow.

Truly powerful organizations manage human capital with the same rigor and intensity that they manage financial capital. These organizations understand that the “softer side” of people management is really the “hard stuff” that matters most. Companies that rely on hard science to optimize their human capital will continue to lead the rest.

 

“Never give up.” “Persistence alone is omnipotent.” “When the going gets tough… ” and so on and so on. Our culture is awash in historical reminders to keep our “nose to the grindstone” until the job gets done. We’ve gotten good at the hustle. But the truth is that our culture doesn’t know when to quit.

What if the best decision is to give up? In his book, The Dip: A Little Book That Teaches You When to Quit, Seth Godin reminds us of the strategies that can help us stop working in a dead-end job or project. There are times when it’s best to cut your losses.

The business world understands how the law of diminishing returns works; at some point additional investments of time, money, and resources are not justified by the return. The best strategy in many cases is simply to stop.

But how will you know when to quit?  The answer is to focus on two costs, and ignore a third.

Opportunity Costs

In The Dip, Godin suggests it is time for “strategic quitting” when the opportunity costs are greater than the benefits of continuing on your current path. An opportunity cost is a big deal. But what is it?

An opportunity cost is the value of what you’d lose by not pursuing a better alternative. As I shared in my  TED talk, I decided to quit my job as President of Global Services at AT&T when it became clear that the benefit of staying wasn’t as high as the benefit of doing something else. The result of leaving in fact became the opportunity to run an internet startup that gave me a very different set of skills and experience that are critical to my current role today.

Figuring out what you could do at any point isn’t easy, but it’s crucial.

Personal Costs

Sometimes, we wrap too much of our own ego into a project to be able to step back and say with conviction, “It’s time to quit.” But, according to research from Northwestern University cited in a recent New York Times article: “When we discard unrealistic goals and switch to alternate goals we’re happier, physically healthier, and less stressed.”

That means separating failure from your sense of self-worth and viewing it as a needed stepping stone to success. Such a perspective can help you calculate personal costs you’ve already invested into a project.

Sunk Costs

While opportunity and personal costs are often difficult to quantify, it’s a third set of costs – sunk costs – that are the easiest to quantify and, as a result, often become the biggest problems.

As people get overly invested in the decisions they’ve made in the past, sunk costs from the past loom larger than they should as we look forward. The best advice I can offer regarding sunk costs is, ignore them.

Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.” Translation: Know when to cut your losses and go build something better.

The biggest opportunity for growth in any organization is to harness the power in its people.

Here are 12 tips that any leader (I call leaders ‘Chiefs’) can use to increase the value of any team meeting. All team members are Chiefs, and when they are treated as such, the potential within the team is amplified. Here’s how to concentrate that power:

Diversify – Chiefs with different backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives working together deliver the most value. Could your teams be more diverse?

Balance – Gender-balance increases the chances that a group will produce optimal decisions. Where is the balance in your organization?

Decentralize – Empowering teams that are closer to the issues to actually make decisions, as opposed to recommendations, will increase the energy in a meeting. Who makes decisions in your organization?

Organize – Establishing clear objectives with adequate time for thoughtful input from all participants will produce expansive and productive discussions. How organized are your strategies? Do all participants have time to give input?

Educate – Make sure new employees and extended team members (customers, vendors, strategic partners, and other guests) understand expectations about how your organization conducts meetings when they are asked to participate. Do you make it easy for newcomers to fit in?

Communicate – Acknowledge that a transfer of knowledge requires active participation from both the speaker and the listeners. Does everyone both listen and speak in your organization?

Accommodate – Group chats alone may inhibit great input from introverts. Do you get one-on-one input from introverted team members?

Integrate – Assimilating different perspectives to find common ground can move a group forward in their work together.

Mediate – Recognize when tensions arise and deal with them directly. Do tensions ever get ignored among your team members?

Document – Capture and distribute the action items and agreements from a session to ensure accuracy. How well do you document your plans and intentions?

Recognize – Bring attention to, and show appreciation for, individuals who go above and beyond in their support for and contribution to the team. Who do you recognize, why do you recognize them, and how?

Evaluate – Regularly assess not only the quality of the output of a meeting but also whether or not improvements can be made in the governance of the meeting. How can your meetings get better for all involved?

In my experience working in different industries with groups of different sizes, these simple habits contribute greatly to unlocking the potential for All-In teams and creating a powerful organization.

 

The term Commanding Officer (CO) has long been associated with military hierarchy. At the top of the military ladder is the position of Commander in Chief. Commanders at each level are often referred to as the “superior” of levels below.

In my experience dealing with the best and the brightest who serve our country, very few commanders see themselves as superior.

In fact, effective COs celebrate the equality of those in their charge. They know success comes when everyone feels empowered to lead and take their share of responsibility. Further, they believe in humility, respect, empathy, and integrity every bit as much as discipline. The same is true in business.

A Chief Operating Officer (COO) could be viewed as the business equivalent of the military CO. In some companies, the COO is the individual in charge. But the best COOs (and CEOs) also know they need to create a culture where everyone shares the attributes of a strong COO.

If you don’t have a Chief or a commander title, you can choose to act like a COO or a CO no matter where you are on the ladder. Here is what great COOs and COs do, according to four Chiefs, Alexander Tuff, Ryan Caldbeck, Jeremy Bromberg, and Mark Hamade.

1. Ask good questions
2. Be transparent and open
3. Strive for alignment with effective communication
4. Be a life-long learner
5. Surround yourself with life-long learners
6. Plan the work and work the plan
7. Improve everything you touch
8. Focus on details
9. Control your ego
10. Be data driven
11. Lead by supporting
12. Keep your cool
13. Prioritize
14. Be resourceful
15. Be practical
16. Be unassuming
17. Be a great listener
18. Be a free thinker
19. Be a clear communicator
20. Be strong with numbers (analysis, metrics) and letters (writing)
21. Have an appropriate sense of urgency
22. Develop a great eye for detail
23. Be passionate about company success, and know that personal success is an outcome of company success, not the other way around
24. Advocate for employees at all levels
25. Advocate for good ideas, regardless of where they come from
26. Be energetic, even if quietly
27. Be a master integrator
28. Champion continuous improvement in everything
29. Don’t let allow perfect to get in the way of progress
30. Be a team player
31. Build trust

Their advice is spot on, and in line with everything I know and teach about being Chief. Who needs the title anyway?

 

Power is a noun with four primary definitions: Ability, influence, energy and positional authority. The biggest problem in business today is that too often we ignore the first three definitions due to our preoccupation with the fourth, positional authority.

We look to the top of an organization chart to learn where the power lies in any team or group. The first time this mistake became clear to me was over 30 years ago. It has stuck with me ever since.

Shortly after I was named Director of Marketing for Unisys’ State Government unit, I traveled to meet District Manager Richard Gaddy and his very successful team in Florida. Richard’s team had done a masterful job over many years working with varied departments in Florida’s State Government to earn a reputation of trusted advisor.

On the first day of my visit, Richard set up review sessions for me with each of his sales managers to talk about their sales teams, followed by individual meetings with each sales representative. With one exception, I met every sales leader in the group that first day. Richard told me, with a smile, that I would meet the last member of his team the next day when I was scheduled to visit one of the largest customers in the district.

I asked Richard if he would be attending the meeting with us. He said, “No, Mike can handle it with you.” When I asked if I could get a briefing ahead of time Richard said, “Mike is at the customer site today but left this account plan for you to review,” as he handed me a thick packet of information.

That night I read the detailed account plan and was very impressed. It provided a thorough update on everything I needed to know including people, history, applications, opportunities, threats, and current priorities. It clearly laid out who we would meet with the next day, likely issues that would be raised, and our responses. The document blew me away. I went to bed looking forward to our morning meeting.

The next day at 8:00 a.m. sharp, a car pulled up to the circular driveway outside the front door of my hotel and out jumped Mike Willenborg. A big smile on his face, Mike extended his hand and said, “Good morning Rick!” with such gusto that I am sure every bellman within 30 yards jumped. I was beaming as I headed for the passenger’s seat.

Mike immediately went on the offensive. “How did yesterday go?” he asked as we settled in for our ride to the customer site. He was questioning me to assess my priorities and reactions to a cast of characters he knew well. Though we had met only minutes before, our conversation was lively and rather meaningful thanks to the way Mike was using open-ended questions to learn more about the latest executive who would soon be introduced to his means of livelihood. He asked if I had any questions about the briefing package he had prepared. His line of questioning was meant to ensure I was ready. But it was clear he had done his homework on me too.

During the next 30 minutes, he made reference to everything from my education and prior assignments to my volunteer work. And as we went back and forth during the drive, Mike’s enthusiasm for his customer and his role in helping his customer succeed came through like a bright light.

“Did you know that we have been identified as one of the top departments in the State for consistently delivering on our plans and staying under our budget projections? And we have been asked to present again this year at the national conference to highlight our best practices for using technology? We’re on a roll!” Mike’s enthusiasm was palpable.

He loved what he was doing, that was clear. And I could feel my normally high morning energy level surge even higher to match his.

The customer meetings were successful. Perhaps from Mike’s perspective, another suit from headquarters had been successfully introduced to his client and had not made a mess of things. From my perspective I knew I had been given a gift. I had felt the power of someone who was all-in.

The day after I arrived back at the home office I called Richard to talk about the visit. He picked up the phone and we talked about how the customer visit went but the subject quickly shifted to Mike.

Richard laughed when I described the impact my encounter with Mike had on me. He said, “Welcome to the club.” He told me many others had the same reaction to Mike. “He lifts everyone in the office,” Richard said.

“About a month ago I asked each sales manager to nominate a member of their team for a District Sales Council,” Richard told me. “I wanted us to do a better job sharing best practices across teams. Mike’s manager sent Mike and we are still talking about what happened. It was like Mike lit a fuse under his peers. Not only did they share best practices between each other, but they decided to reach out to other districts as well. And I credit Mike. He started a chain reaction. It was great.”

The truth was it didn’t matter that the organization chart showed that Mike sat three levels down from where I sat. In this case, Mike had the power. His ability, energy, and influence showed it.

Since that memorable event, I’ve seen many other extroverts like Mike—and just as many introverts—demonstrate enthusiasm and confidence from connecting what they do to who they are, each in their own unique way. I refer to these powerful leaders as Chiefs.

What could happen if your organization recognized where true power comes from?