#56: Back to Basics: What is Leadership?

Sri distinguishes leadership from, well, other things. 


notes

• Related episodes:  #48: Leader as Therapist

Intro and/or outro music in most episodes is by Paul Sridhar ( Spotify ). 

Connect with Sri on Instagram: @sri_the_warrior_poet  + @sri_actually 

Disclaimer: Any audio clips are included with every intent and steps taken to abide by Fair Use and serve the purpose(s) of illustration, education, augmentation, or promotion of source content.

Connect with Sri on Instagram: @sri_the_warrior_poet + @sri_actually

Intro and/or outro music in most episodes is by Paul Sridhar ( Spotify ).

Disclaimer: Any audio clips are included with every intent and steps taken to abide by Fair Use and serve the purpose(s) of illustration, education, augmentation, or promotion of source content.

Transcript

Andrew Sridhar: 0:15

Hey, folks, welcome to the Warrior Poet, I thought we would get back to basics today. I remember hearing a while ago, early in my career, a colleague from another part of the organization coming to me and saying, Oh, you work for Bob. And, of course, Bob is not his or her real name. Oh, you work for Bob. I've worked with him before. He's a great leader. How many times do people in the workplace confuse great leadership with other elements of performance or other elements of being part of a team or even being at a certain level above that team, essentially, quote, unquote, leading that team. Of course, we know here in the Warrior Poet that leadership doesn't always equal management and vice versa. Of course, there are probably other things that people confuse for leadership, as well. I find the biggest mistake people make is confusing results with leadership. And, of course, as Jeff Bezos and Amazon say, leaders do deliver results. But there are times where someone is a leader, maybe even a great leader, and they're not actually delivering results. If you are a military unit, in a route, if everyone gets killed, there may have been some really great leaders through that experience, is that the result that commanders want to know, surely isn't the result that any of those troops who got killed wanted. But there may actually have been some great leadership there on the ground. In those last moments, as sad as that would be. Now, results can be an indicator that you have a good leader. And of course, over a period of time, you would want to see, after enough reps by that person who's extensively playing that leadership role, you would want to see results, because that is the mission of the organization. That's what that person and their team, and collaborators are being paid to do. So after so much time, if they're not actually delivering results, then maybe they aren't a good leader. Of course, that probably still isn't always the case. But it may be a proxy that tells you that something is amiss in their leadership style. Other indicators, that someone may not be a good leader include attrition, there's a lot of attrition on that team, or on the teams that they collaborate with, over a period of time, that is a good indicator that that person isn't a good leader, there are what you call flamers. In the Navy, those would be captains who just spout flame from their mouth all the time. And they're often dreaded. Of course, there are many stories of captains such as Captain Ahab, who are of that sort, who actually may be argued leaders in the end. But let's just set that aside for a second in the private sector. And even in the public sector, outside of the military, people have the right to leave, and they do if they are not treated in the right manner. Or if the trade offs aren't there. Steve Jobs, of course, is famous for also being a bit of a jerk as a leader. But he obviously made up for it in many ways. And the anecdotes go beyond just people's paychecks right and the stock price. People clearly who stuck with him were devoted to him because of other attributes of leadership. So let's get into that. If leadership isn't just results, then what is it? A leader should inspire and motivate people to do hard things. Oftentimes, that inspiration, motivation will even lead to people doing things above and beyond themselves, things that they didn't even think were possible things that involve self sacrifice. A leader himself is ultimately selfless. That doesn't mean that he can't have she can't have things that they are pursuing, that aren't selfless, such as money. startup entrepreneur can be a leader, even while he is trying to get rich. But that's self Listen, this should play out in devotion to the team, devotion to customers devotion to societal impact. A leader can be a coach, a leader can educate a leader can be a therapist, we had an episode even titled leader as therapist, I'll link to it in the show notes. A leader can sometimes pitch in on tasks that are, quote unquote, below what others might interpret as that leaders job in the military, every leader should be able to do the job of his people, when in a combat situation. Now, obviously, there are layers of specialty in the military and in any private corporation. So that's a tall order. But at the basic level, right, if you have weapon systems that need to be used, and you're out in some sort of land operation, everyone should be able to use the turret on top of the Humvees and each other's weapons. Everyone should be able to navigate, everyone should be able to use explosives if you need to. So, a leader may jump in and do some things from time to time in urgent situations that are what might be considered as manual labor or menial tasks. A leader should hold people accountable demand, the highest standards, the system, the highest standards is the Amazon language. For that leadership principle a leader should challenge assumptions. The most famous way to do that is to ask the dumb questions that no one else will ask. Sometimes people coucher says the questions other people are afraid to ask now that's part of it. Of course, what I like doing is asking questions that appear dumb, and I enjoy asking them in a dumb manner. But hopefully, the ensuing discussion will reveal that those questions maybe weren't so dumb, after all, of course, I do have truly dumb questions often to leadership set the example a leader should make decisions, and hopefully have a high batting average with those decisions. It doesn't have to be all of those things. And I bet many of you have things that I left off the list. So please hit me up. Let me know what I missed. I may put this in a blog post at some point. But ultimately, if you could sum it up, and I had a seal, brother of mine, who I shared a trailer with, in Baghdad, Iraq, who framed it nicely for me, its vision and guts. And I always tack on the ability to communicate that and articulate that and operationalize that into a plan. And execution of vision and guts are the big things though, those are the things that aren't commodities. There's lots of people out there who can execute the plans of others. There's lots of people who are great speakers, maybe less of them. But it's the vision and the courage, the guts, that really distinguish a leader, from a bureaucrat from a cog in the machine who may get paid more than everyone else, but ultimately, is just executing tasks in the system that are assigned by others. Maybe they parse those out into sub categories, but they're not actually providing strategic direction. They're not motivating people. And they don't have the courage to make decisions, to challenge their leadership to challenge their people. disappoint people, a lot of times, people are stuck in analysis paralysis, because they're just afraid of disappointing people. And, of course, the alternative is far worse, where they're merely afraid of taking risks themselves, risking their paycheck, risking their job, risking their reputation in the eyes of some other approval authority, whoever that might be. It could be their boss could be investors, it could be their parents. The US Marines have on their performance evaluations, a category for courage. I'm not sure if there's one for Visionaire, but if you remember nothing else. Leadership is vision and guts. I will add a few things on to vision and guts. There's a certain passion. Like I said selflessness, submission or orientation that true leaders have, that others don't. The others might just be owners. They might be bureaucrats, they might be risk enforcers, compliance officers, managers, higher in the food chain. But they may not be leaders again if they're not selfless. Meanwhile, real leaders often have bias for action. That's a common phrase in Corp speak. Now, it is also one of the Amazon leadership principles. If those vision and guts aspects though, and that ability to communicate and articulate and operationalize all that into a plan, if those things are there, the bias for action will usually be there. The biggest thing that remains is ownership. I like to tell people on my teams, if you get the ownership, right, a lot of other things will fall into place. And I wouldn't say it's necessarily the vision and guts are going to fall out of that. But most of those other things that are corporate leadership principles that are held dear, that are maybe operational practices that are product management, usually those things will just come out in the wash, if you have high ownership. Now, I will say that, along with the courage, the guts, all these other things, that you can easily tell someone who is not a leader. This isn't the only way. But you can tell if they don't decide if they are not making decisions. If someone is not making good decisions. Ultimately, they are not a leader. And, sadly, so many people who are managers and who call themselves leaders at all elements of organizations, in all industries, ultimately, aren't actually leaders. It's not enough to hire lots of good people, with the budgets that you have been given by investors or the board or the CEO. And claim credit for those results and call yourself a leader. That's not enough. You're not a glorified recruiter, as a leader. Leaders might recruit. But a recruiter is not necessarily a leader, you ultimately need to grow a spine and set a strategic direction and lead the way. This is that time of the program where we go into the minutiae, we're gonna get all the way wet. There's just one footnote for today, the first thing that I thought of in terms of a song that could go along with the content of this episode, and by the way, I'm looking for opportunities to re introduce to reinvigorate the podcast with music, we had a lot of episodes that do feature songs, and I just love music. I know a lot of you do as well. And I find it particularly poignant when those songs relate to the content. Unfortunately, or Fortunately, the song that came to mind was the one that the lion in The Wizard of Oz sings, I think, toward the end, maybe middle toward the end of the lion is the one who doesn't have courage, right? attend man doesn't have a heart. scarecrow doesn't have a brain. I can't remember. And Dorothy, is it. Dorothy and Toto just want to get home? I think I might be forgetting a fourth character. I hope not. I found that that's the song that lion sings in there is actually kind of hilarious, I need to re watch that movie. Because I think there's a lot of comedy in there that you just don't appreciate as a kid because as a kid, it's just very bizarre. And there are some kind of, there's some dark kind of undertones to the whole thing. And those who are of perhaps an older generation who grew up watching this and were teenagers, and certain points in let's call it the you know, late 80s 90s 2000s are probably familiar with the fact that I think the deal is you can watch the Wizard of Oz with Pink Floyd dark side of the moon or something like that. And then there's some scenes supposedly, were there there's someone who's hung themselves. I hope I'm not confusing this with Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I think there's there's some suppose it seems like that in there as well. One of the interesting things that I saw by actually is wearing a bow in the movie, at least in the king of the forest scene, but maybe throughout the whole thing he's got like a red bow at the top, maybe supposed to be striking some sort of like, Ferdinand The, the ox friendly bull. Yeah, for the friendly bull sort of situation there. where he's a little effeminate, perhaps, there are also some hilarious lyrics in the song. Such as my tail would lash I'd show compassion. It's like, he's a teenager texting in the 2000 teens, 2020 2021 wherever we are. Now. Meanwhile, Lyon has some amazing vibrato kind of really over the top vibrato, starting almost from the very beginning, the first line of the song. Another line that is amazing is Dorothy Asim, kind of they all chime in at certain parts. And she's like, like he's saying all the animals he wouldn't be afraid of. And she goes, I'm not even a hippopotamus. And the lion responds, I trash him. From top to bottom is finally 10 man shops a flowerpot at some point with his silver axe. And somehow, really, magically, with that one shop comes up with a crown that he puts on top of the lion's head in a lopsided manner. Perhaps that's sort of a King Lear reference. Which, by the way, I love the line in the departed, where jack nicholson says heavy lies the crown, or something like that. It's a It's amazing. Anyway, don't be a lion with a bow in his or her hair. Wearing a lopsided crown. When at the end of the song, yes asks the group of his small audience The Tin Man, Scarecrow and Dorothy what have all of them got that I don't. And they all reply, courage. And he goes, You can say that again. Till next time,

Lion from Wizard of Oz: 17:25

...he'll announce is that what I was good at? Got my brain. I could barely hear my heart beating in another hour of forest, long live the king. If I were King, not queen. Not my rose. Would it be certain or not a cotton or not? I command our our as I click my heel, all the threes would kneel in the mountains. And the battle would take we respect. The chipmunks genuflect to me,

Andrew Sridhar: 18:50

The Warrior Poet is a property of Rainiac Productions. If you'd like more Warrior Poet, there's more great content on Instagram. Follow@sri_the_warrior_poet on Instagram. That's@sri,_the_warrior_poet. You can also get to know me on a personal level by following@sri_actually on Instagram as well. The Warrior Poet is produced by Laddy, with special contributions by Spoonman, and me, Sri.

Lion from Wizard of Oz: 19:51

not If you're a king, you wouldn't be afraid of anything. Nobody know. Not even a rhinoceros. imposters. Why I come from top to bottom? Supposing you met an elephant. elephant. What about or a Brontosaurus? I'd show him was king. Boris. Wow How? What makes a king out of a slave? coverage? Is the flag on the mass away? What makes the elephant charges in the misty Mr. dusky dusk must spread. God is musk. What makes the Sphinx the seventh wonder? What makes the dawn