¶ Bo’s Lasting Lessons: The Legendary Coach Teaches the Timeless Fundamentals of Leadership,
¶ Bo Schembechler and John Bacon, Business Plus, 2007
¶ Prepare to Lead
o You Better Start with Your Heart
o Seek Mentors, Not Money
o Wait for the Right
§ P. 20 In his interview with
¶ Take Charge
o Throw a Bucket of Cold Water
§ P. 27 “…whatever your philosophy, whatever your standards, whatever your expectations, you establish those on Day One. Don’t waste a second. You can always soften up if you need to, but you can’t get tougher later on. It’s a lot better to throw a bucket of cold water on them on your first day, than it is to try to coax them into the cold water, toe by toe.”
o Respect Your History
§ P. 50 “The history of your organization is one of your greatest strengths, and if you’re new to the organization, it’s your job to learn it, to respect it, and to teach it to the people coming up in your company.”
§ P. 54m “When you are the leader, you are the organization.”
o Do the Right Thing, Always
o Lay Down Your Laws
§ p.65 “First, if you don’t have anything important to say, don’t schedule a meeting for the heck of it… The person who knows how to run a meeting will get twice as much out of his people, because when the meeting’s over, they’ll be ready to act on the message. The most important meeting you will ever have with your people is your first one- because it is vital that everyone knows exactly what your values are, from Day One. In this first meeting you need to establish who you are, what you’re going to do, and how you plan on doing it.”
· He says that people can’t ever say they weren’t told, even if it was in a two hour meeting. This is bogus because he is not paying attention to what we know about most modern adults that their memories aren’t trained to remember everything said in a two-hour meeting.
o Set Goals That Get Results
§ P. 80 “ The seniors set the goals for the team- because it is their team.”
§ P.85 “If you’re going to lead, you need to make goals. And those goals can’t come from the top down, they’ve got to come from the people who are responsible for achieving them. Your job is to help them get there, and remind them every day what their goals are, and what they have to do to make their dreams come true.”
¶ Build Your Team
o Hire People Who Want to Work for You
o Get the Most Out of Your Staff
§ P.98 “…after you hear what they have to say, you’ve got to make the final call.”
§ P.100 “If you didn’t want their opinions, you shouldn’t have hired them. And if all their opinions are the same as yours, you don’t need them.”
§ P. 104, “ If you’re the top guy, and you want to be loved every minute of every day, get a dog.” Truman
§ P.106 “In the long run, you cannot win consistently in any field if you let someone else make the important decisions for you. You cannot delegate important decisions… that’s the price of leadership.”
o Develop Leaders Underneath You
§ P. 121 “Only a weak leader is threatened by strong leaders underneath him.”
o Scuttle the Star System
§ P.122 “ You’ve got to keep your stars in line, the guys in the middle motivated, and the people at the bottom contributing to the success of the team.”
§ 123, “If it’s not equal, it’s not fair, and everyone on your team already knows it.”
o Motivate the Middle Man
§ 128, “I think letting people go is usually a bad idea. It eats up too much time, energy and morale. That’s why I’d much rather teach than fire them…It’s you job, as a leader, to make those people who do more than they thought they could- maybe more than you thought they could- and put them in the best possible position to help the team.”
§ 131, “You’re not going to yell your way to the top of your profession. If your people are going to perform their absolute best, you need to give them the tools to do so.”
o Give ‘Em a Chance
§ 138 “… if you have more than two people in your organization, you’re going to have an upper, middle, and lower level of talent.”
§ 141, “If you don’t tell them why, they’ll feel abandoned, and start coming up with all kinds of crazy conspiracy theories.”
o Give Everyone a Role, and Make It Important
o If You Must Fire, Fire Fast
§ 161, “Only a tyrant likes to fire people.”
o Promote the Will to Prepare
§ 169 “If you’re a leader, your ultimate responsibility is the training of your people, because every job requires training. If you can think of one that doesn’t- well, jeez Louise, then why should you hire someone to do it? It it’s a job worth paying someone, it’s a job worth training… You need to plan your training with the end product in mind.”
§ 170 “Next, you need to design your training as close to the real thing as possible… Why should I, your customer, be responsible for training your employee, and suffer through all their mistakes?”
o Listen Before You Lead
§ 179, “You can NOT be a leader unless you like people! You’ve got to spend time with them, so you know them. You’ve got to be interested in who they are, what they do away from the job, and how they think.”
§ 181, “… if one of your people comes to you with a good idea- or a personal problem- and it just goes in one ear and out the other, YOU WILL FAIL.”
o Don’t Sleep on It, and Don’t Hold Grudges
¶ Meet the Moment of Truth
o Break ‘Em Down and Build ‘Em Up
o Emphasize Execution, Not Innovation
o Scrap Your Script
o Make Adjustments on Facts, Not Pride
o Turn Mistakes into Momentum
o Stay Focused Under Fire
¶ Face the Facts and Ignore the Rest
o Rebuild with Basics
o Ignore Your Critics
o Loyalty Counts
o Know When to Leave, and How
o If I Could Have One More Week
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