chic-fil-a leadercast soledad o’brien

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Below are my take aways from listening to CNN Anchor and and author Soledad O’Brien.

Leadership is about justice about standing up for people who can’t stand up for themselves
Leadership is about leading to a preferred future
Leadership is about departing from the script, blunt confrontation, and a commitment to lasting change that takes time to realize
Leaders don’t shut out people they disagree with. That’s not being a leader, that’s being an obstacle.

Posted in Leadership

chic-fil-a leadercast john maxwell

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Below are my notes and take aways from John Maxwell’s presentation at this year’s Chic-fil-A Leadercast.

What is your personal growth plan?
Transformation never happens in the organization without transformation first happening within the heart of the leader.
Make a few decisions and manage them daily

Personal growth doesn’t happen on accident, it’s not an automatic process
“You make the choice and then the choice you make makes you.” John Wooden
The choices you make now determine who you are going to be the rest of your life
People always want to change their circumstances, but they never want to change their lives…everything gets better when we get better
The secret of growing intentionally is doing it every day
The secret of your success is determined by your daily agenda
You’re either repairing or preparing
Your personal growth plan has to be simple, applicable, tangible, something I can do every day

I have to know me, to grow me
Requirement: what’s required of me, what do I have to do?
Return: what gives me the greatest return? What do I do well? Put your personal growth development towards your strengths, not your weaknesses.
Reward: what gives me the greatest rewards? When I do it, it is satisfying and brings me life.

We grow when we get around the right people, the right place, the right environment for our growth.

A place where others are ahead of me
A place where I am continually challenged
A place where my focus is forward
A place where the atmosphere is affirming
A place where I am often out of my comfort zone and I’m in over my head (if you’re out of your comfort zone you’ll swim, if you’re out of your comfort zone and out of
A place where I wake up and I’m excited
A place where failure is not my enemy
A place where everyone is growing
A place where others are willing to change
A place where growth is modeled and expected

Posted in Leadership

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Here are my notes and take aways from Marcus Buckingham’s presentation at this year’s Chic-fil-A Leadercast! Enjoy!

Authenticity is your most valuable commodity as a leader
Before you deliver content to people you have to know people (Custom marketing and content i.e. Facebook, Netflix, and The New York Times)
Most leadership development programs are formulaic as opposed to algorithmic. They operate on the premise that there is a perfect leader out there and we’re all supposed to look like that.
Leadership by it’s very nature is idiosyncratic all great leaders are not the same
You can teach concepts and transfer principles to all leaders in your organization
Catch excellence and reflect it back…many people miss the concept or principle and instead adopt the practice…practice without principle is dangerous
The techniques of one leader are not easily transferred from one leader to the next because it often comes off as inauthentic

Advisor: What is the best thing to do?
Connector: Joining the best in other people together.
Creators: what do I understand? They need quite, time, and process.
Equalizer: What is the right thing to do? Not just relationship but responsibility. You want to make it right. You do what you say you’re going to do.
Influencer: Every conversation is a sale. Try to move others towards your agenda.
Pioneer: What’s new, what’s next?
Provider: No person gets left behind. Are you okay, care about others, shepherd.
Stimulators: Raise the energy in the room
Teacher: How can I learn, I can they learn, no one is ever finished

There is no perfect leadership profile only perfect practices that fit you profile
Your challenge as a leader is to take what is unique about yourself and make it useful to others

Posted in Leadership

Monday, May 7, 2012

These are my notes and take aways from John Maxwell’s interview of Angela Ahrendts, the CEO of Burberry.

Culture trumps vision
Trust is needed to make change
The task of leadership is to create culture
Building a culture of mission focus keeps ego at bay
Intuition is the greatest output of trust and strong culture
Burberry values feeling over knowing
“I grew up in a physical world speaking English, but my kids are growing up in a digital world speaking social”
Building a culture of trust frees people to act on their leadership intuition which results in innovation and the ability to move at a fast pace

Posted in Leadership

Monday, May 7, 2012

Here are my notes and take aways from Urban Meyer & Tim Tebow at Chic-fil-A Leadercast.

Urban Meyer saw leadership in Tim when he took over a baseball game as a right fielder. You can exercise leadership from any position that you play.
Leadership is the ability to influence somebody…it may not be 100 people, but it’s probably one…it could be your son or your daughter.
Great leaders are: 1) Selfless, 2) Have a tremendous Work Ethic, and have a 3) Competitive Edge
Leaders raise the level of play of people around them
How do you handle criticism as a leader? Faith & Family…mission focus…criticism gets our attention to drift off the mission
You can’t control what people think about you so don’t waste your time thinking about it. Don’t spend your energy there
If you have a platform you’re a role model