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Ordinary People can do Extraordinary Things

Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live the world they've been given than to explore the power they have to change it.

Muhammad Ali

When I speak to groups in companies or at conferences about the work I have done, I tell the audience that ordinary people, led well, can achieve extraordinary things. I know this is true, because I have seen it happen, over and over again, throughout my career. I have been privileged to see teams that I have led do things and achieve business results that, at the beginning, no one believed were possible.

Afterwards, when the audience asks questions, one of the most frequent is: “what should I do to motivate people?” I used to get confused by the question, because often they wanted to know about prizes, incentives and bonuses, and that wasn't what I was talking about. Then I realized: they could ask a question that sounds similar, but is entirely different. What should I do to inspire people?

The answer to this question is what this book is about, because that's what I have tried to do, every day, for the last 25 years. I can't tell you how to motivate other people, because that's their internal emotion. What I hope you will do is to learn to inspire them to find their own motivation. They will do extraordinary things that transform their work and their lives, things they didn't think were possible. They will feel the thrill of success, creativity and the satisfaction of trust and integrity. In turn, they will hopefully inspire the people around them, and the next generation of leaders that will follow. That's how great businesses are built.

You can do all this.

You cannot, however, do it if you do not give them a dream to commit to, if you fail to explain to them what you are going to do and listen to their ideas, or if you fail to build a culture that will encourage and support them to fly. Weak leaders lie, bully and rely on financial incentives. They hide the truth and look for scapegoats. They overvalue themselves and undervalue team members based on status, rather than contribution. And then they look for ways to “motivate” their unhappy teams to do jobs that they find meaningless. Unfortunately, many of these leaders are then sent, or even promoted, to poison another group.

Every success that I have been involved with happened because the people who created it, whether they were cleaners, managers or owners, were inspired to find their own motivation. It comes from inside, it encourages you to be the best you can be, and it will help you take responsibility for your own goals. When your teams find it and start to create their own magic, it can be the best feeling in the world.

For 25 years I have been helping to inspire the people around me to do things they never thought possible. Along the way they have achieved results that exceeded my ambitions for them. They have amazed themselves at what became possible. They have transformed their jobs, their lives and the lives of their families.

If you know how to inspire those around you, they stop trying to chase immediate rewards, and they start thinking about building something that lasts, making meaningful changes to the lives of their customers, their colleagues and themselves. They want to achieve deeper, more satisfying goals. Motivation lasts as long as the incentive does. Inspiration lasts a lifetime, and beyond.

You can be a Leader

This book is my way to pass on what I have learned – often the hard way – and help you to do the same for other people. I made plenty of mistakes along the way, and I will tell you about some of them, too, because I learned as much from the low points – and there have been terrible lows – as from the highs. Also, I have worked and travelled with some remarkable leaders who have helped me to achieve things that I did not think were possible. This book has many lessons that I learned from them too.

I hope that you are reading this book because you want to be an inspirational leader. The team you lead may be large, spread over many countries, or it may be small and local – it doesn't matter. I have learnt that there's no team or task too small or too big to think about in this way.

I learned leadership on the job, as you will have to. But the methods I used are, mostly, the same things I have applied throughout my career to turnarounds, startups and adventures. I'll describe a number of real situations and examples in this book, when I believe they help to understand how I think about leadership, and what has worked for me.

How will we do this? The book is based on methods that I have applied over and over again, in large blue-chip brand names like Porsche and BMW, but also helping extraordinary small startup businesses realize their dreams. When my son and I walked together to the North and South Poles to help fund the construction of a leukaemia treatment unit, we used these ideas.

There are three parts of the process, and three parts to the book. If you want to be an inspiring leader, I am going to ask you to Commit, to Connect and to Create.

Commit

Every successful businessperson is a dreamer. So the first step to your team achieving extraordinary things is when together you commit to making that dream real. You cannot be an inspiring leader unless you commit absolutely, and can share that commitment. You are not saying you'll do the job, you are making a decision to achieve a goal. When you make the decision, you do it absolutely, with determination, with passion and with conviction.

We've all made a vague, spontaneous commitment in a conversation, a meeting or in a bar. Maybe we believed it for a moment, but by the time the words are out of our mouths we know, deep inside, that we don't seriously intend to keep to it. The commitment I'm talking about here is not a spontaneous thing. It comes with integrity. It is what you are.

You dare to dream You change the definition of success by creating an inspiring vision of what it could look like.

You build belief You can change ambition to grow by 3 % into a vision of 30 % or 300 % by inspiring your team with your vision. You issue an invitation to the team to forget the numbers and to share an exciting journey to success.

You challenge: how good do you want to be? No matter what the situation is, you switch on positive feelings by exciting unfulfilled team members with the possibilities of what the team can achieve.

You make the impossible possible You create a powerful shared process by using discipline and teamwork. Most limitations are self-imposed, so take them away.

You confront the F word You conquer fear to kickstart change by identifying and beating the mental blocks that hold back the team.

Connect

Connecting is about helping everybody in the business discover and value their role in creating change. They might not be used to thinking that they can do this, or even that any change at all is a good idea. But we know, and I have experienced, the difference that this connection can make to a team. Not least because it makes it possible for you to plan and to share ownership of the plan with the team.

You begin at the end You connect your vision to how you behave as a team by describing success in 360 degrees.

You make a simple plan You focus on the projects and priorities that will make your vision real and instil urgency by creating a 1,000-day plan.

You don't need to be a genius because you make a genius You uncover creativity that your team didn't know they had by creating ways for bright ideas to flourish.

You become better first, then bigger You inspire a world-class team by emphasizing quality, not profit.

You are in command, and out of control You lead and inspire without micromanaging by trusting your sense of shared purpose.

Create

Teams create magic when they are challenged, united and happy in their work, whatever the scale of the task. To do this, you have to build a culture of continuous change and innovation, at every level, and sustain it.

You have fun You build a culture in which people enjoy what they do by emphasizing integrity, fairness and achievement.

You understand that no one is an “only a …” You avoid stifling hierarchy and damaging cliques by valuing everyone's contribution.

You catch in, and don't catch out You inspire positivity, learning and can-do attitude by praising achievement rather than hunting for scapegoats.

You sustain success You create change that lasts, and enjoy your achievement by building for the long term.

Leadership is About Learning

If you want to lead, you will make mistakes. This is normal, we have all done it. What matters is that you listen to those around you, and learn from them – even if you hear things that you might not like. None of this works without a principle that I call OVT: One Version of the Truth.

OVT does not mean, however, that your opinion as leader must be that version of the truth.

I have tried to be as honest as possible in this book, about mistakes as well as successes. But everyone sees the world through their eyes, and sometimes we forget the bad times. So, in writing this book, I called up some of my colleagues from the past. I asked them what they remembered about the work we did together. Was it how I remembered it? There was one condition: be honest. Some of what they told me is quoted in the book, but their influence runs through every page of it.

I have also gone back into my notebooks. I have kept a notebook of my work for every leadership job I have attempted. When I wrote them I tried to be honest, and capture my feelings, fears and ideas. Looking back at them now, I can remember the moments, and how it felt. They are not just a record, they are something I learned from, and a reminder every day of both the good and the bad parts. I'd recommend that you do the same, but with the same rule for yourself that you use with others: be honest.

Using your honesty and these principles, you can inspire yourself, and the people around you, to achieve extraordinary things together. When you inspire your team with your leadership, ordinary people can do extraordinary things. I've seen it happen, and this book will show you how.