The 4E’s of Leadership: Still the Best Management Model
Long before The Unforced Error, there was one of the best management models I have ever learned. In fact, it was the subject of an entire book entitled JACK WELCH AND THE 4E’S OF LEADERSHIP and it turned out to be one of those quiet classics that still sells today—five years after its original publication.
That’s because this management model is timeless and works in any kind of organization, of any size. It’s also a simple model that anyone could grasp quickly (although the detail in my book helps to make this model operational in no time). First let’s define the 4E’s:
Energy: People with energy go 75-miles-per-hour in a 55-mile-per-hour world. People rich in this “E” jump out of bed in the morning ready to take on all challengers. They need no caffeine to operate at peak performance.
Energize: Energizers articulate a vision and then get others to turn that vision into a reality. They spark others to perform. They take the blame when things go wrong but give others the credit when things go well.
Edge: People with Edge know how to make tough decisions. They know when to say yes and when to say no. They avoid the maybes. These solid decision-makers are more valuable than ever due to the turbulent times in which we do business.
Execute: At first there were only the three “Es” above. But GE discovered that some managers who were rich in the E’s above still did not make their financial targets. That’s when the fourth “E” was added. Managers who possess this “E” get things done. They make all of their commitments and make their numbers.
Those are the E’s. If you are an employee or a manager, you should work toward improving your “E” quotient. If you are a hiring manager, look for people who have these traits. If you want to learn how to put them to work in your organization—and you will forgive the self-promotion—get your hands on the only book that explains how to implement this model step-by-step—Jack Welch and the 4E’s of Leadership.
Identify those Who Control Your Destiny
Who really controls your future? If you work in a large organization, can you really be sure that it is your boss? Maybe it isn’t. Maybe it’s your boss’s boss, or your boss’s boss’s boss? I have worked in large companies and learned only after several years that it was my boss’s boss that called all the shots. My boss would take every key decision to his boss, and she would make the final call. But because all of this was happening behind-the-scenes, I was in the dark for a very long time about what was really happening.
And sometimes the answer to “who controls my future?” cannot be found by searching straight up the corporate hierarchy. Perhaps your boss seeks out the opinions of your peers to learn about you and and “dirt” related to your performance. This is definitely unprofessional at best, and a bit sick at worst. As I describe in The Unforced Error, the most effective managers search out and build on his people’s strengths. The manager that does the opposite, by trying to sniff out anything negative about you, is insecure and immature and does not deserve the position that he has been entrusted with. If you learn that your boss is engaging in that type of activity, discreetly update your resume and try to find another job (perhape when the job market is stronger). Otherwise, you may get sucked up into a dysfunctional situation that leaves you hating your job.
Make Sure to See the Whole Court
Continuing with the tennis analogy employed in THE UNFORCED ERROR, as in tennis, people in business need to be sure they have a clear view of the court at all times.
When I say the whole court, I mean the entire playing field that serves as the backdrop to our jobs and careers. When I go out and speak to groups, I warn them about getting tunnel vision or “cubicle vision.” I tell them that it is not enough just to see what is going on in their own departments. They need to see what is going on with their unit, different parts of the company, competitors, the operating environment, etc. Only then can you get a clear picture of how well you and your company are doing, and more important, only then can you take meaningful steps to make things better. In these very tough times, with a national unemployment rate hovering at about ten percent, few of us can ill-afford to be caught off guard by a situation that we simply did not know about because we were too lazy to do our due diligence.
For example, say you work in the marketing department of a food and beverage company. You get good performance reviews, and morale in your department is fine. However, what you are not aware of is that parts of the sales department is in ruins. The company laid off 20 percent of the department because sales for the Eastern region fell off a cliff. As a result, the company is going to have to make job cuts across the board, which includes your department. Had you known, you might have stepped up your game knowing what was at stake; and you could have been better prepared to search for a new job knowing that yours was on the line. In this extreme scenario, you would have to be a real ostrich to get caught this much off guard. But this stuff happens every day in organizations.
Most other situations are a bit more subtle. For example, you may be a salesperson in that same company and not know that your biggest customer is in real trouble, endangering the business that you do with them. Their sales make up more than 15 percent of your [individual] total sales budget, so not knowing that they may shut down their doors could also cost you your job. That example isn’t all that subtle either, but you get the idea.
When things are as tough as they are now, with unemployment rates so high, you must constantly work without blinders. The risk for failing to do so is simply too high.
Protect Your Flanks
“Protect Your Flanks” is a chapter in my newly published THE UNFORCED ERROR. I gave it quite a lot of thought before I decided whether or not to feature it in the book, but in the end, felt it was too critical a topic to omit.
That’s because all organizations have some sort of office politics, no matter how much you (and I) might hate the thought. According to author and career expert Dr. Kathleen Reardon, people with “political savvy, agility in the use of power, and the ability to influence others will go further.”
That’s why it is so important to protect your flanks.
You need to use all of your contacts within the organization to be sure no one is bad mouthing you to your boss. I have seen this scenario play out countless times and it is never pretty. In fact, it’s downright unethical and even immoral. What right does one person have to play with your career and your livelihood? Yet it happens every day in almost all organizations of every size. You have to have enough contacts and be plugged in to the company grapevine or you risk having the rug pulled out from under you before you know that you’re standing on one. How do you do this?
Seek out people in the organization. If you do not make friends, at least make acquaintances. And don’t limit it to people in your own department or work area. It could be people in other departments that have the ear of your boss. Perhaps you made an enemy without even knowing it, or perhaps people are just jealous of your success. Regardless of the specific circumstances, you have to establish a friendly, informal network within the organization so that you are not the last to know that you are in the doghouse—and possibly on your way to the poorhouse if you get canned.
One other piece of advice is more straight forward. Talk to your boss on a regular basis. Ask her if there are things you can be doing to help her make her goals—and the goals of the division. And do not wait for a performance review to find out what things you can do to raise the level of your game. These informal conversations will provide ample opportunity for your boss to let you know if there is a problem or any other issue that may have a profound affect on your future.
Who You Fire Shapes the Team (Part of Series on Firing)
In recent postings I have discussed specifics of hiring and firing and making sure that you seek out strong subordinates. (If you missed any of those just scroll down).
While not firing under-performers soon enough is the most common unforced error relating to dismissing people there is another one: firing the wrong people. This happens all of the time, particularly in tough times with a near-ten percent unemployment rate. When budgets are tight, companies try to save money by trimming payrolls. When this happens, it is easy for the manager to surrender to the numbers and cut the most highly compensated employees. This can be a huge unforced error.
Circuit City provides a perfect example: In March of 2007, its CEO, Phil Schoonover fired 3,400 of its most seasoned and productive salespeople. The company was losing money and the CEO felt the best idea was to get his highest-paid salespeople off the payroll. That decision proved to be an unforced error of the worst kind. That’s because these were the company’s most talented and knowledgeable salespeople. Eighteen months later CEO Schoonover was out of a job and three months later Circuit City was in bankruptcy.
Building a first rate team is not just about choosing the right people to hire. It is also about choosing the right people to fire. And getting rid of the wrong people can be just as harmful as hiring the wrong ones. So when the time comes when someone has to go, do your due diligence and be sure to choose very carefully.
Seek Strong Subordinates
Many managers are afraid to hire people better than themselves. That’s a huge unforced error. As Jack Welch once said, “the smartest people in the world hire the smartest people in the world.”
If you hire weak perfomers, “Bs” and “Cs” rather than “A’s,” you are doing yourself and your organization a serious disservice. This is something that great business thinkers have understood for quite some time.
One of the most surprising things I learned about Peter Drucker was how he felt about Franklin Delano Roosevelt. While most historians and citizens from the era regarded FDR as a great leader, Drucker felt that our 32nd president was so insecure that he sought to “undercut” anyone he viewed as a threat. That convinced Drucker that FDR was a poor administrator and a weak leader in important areas.
Jim Collins, author of Good to Great, felt the same way about hiring. He said that management’s first priority is not coming up with the right strategy, but making sure that you have the right people “on the bus.” All else follows getting the right team on board first.
If you fear so much for your job that you would consider hiring a sub-par performer, then you have already lost. The most effective leaders know this in their bones, which is why they try to fill every position with strength. Focusing on strengths rather than weaknesses is a key theme in The Unforced Error. It is the responsibility of every manager to bring strength to his or her organization whether we are talking about products, ideas, or people—especially people.
101 Compelling Books to Ponder
Today I came across an interesting list that I think is worthy of at least a quick look. It can be found on an unusual site:
One of the most interesting things about the list of 101 books is that it includes both great classics as well as other lesser known books. On the classics side, they include—Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations, Amy Shlaes’ The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression, and Peters and Waterman’s In Search of Excellence.
Lesser know titles include: Suzy Welch’s 10/10/10, Seth Godin’s Tribes and W.J. King’s The Unwritten Laws of Business.
Lastly, they divide the list for reader’s ease of use, under these nine sub-categories (which all have links to Amazon): The Top Twenty, Management Skills, Effective Communication, Smart Investing, Professional Writing, Personal Finance, Negotiation, Innovation and Entrepreneurship.
Don’t Hire on Resume or CV
In the last post I talked about people you should not hire. Here we will do a 180 and talk about the people you should. Herb Kelleher, the founder of Southwest Airlines, was all about attitude and creating an organization that fostered a positive, upbeat atmosphere. He felt strongly that people could be trained, and urged managers to “hire good attitudes even when the people with bad attitudes have superior degrees, experience and expertise.” He also felt that people should be allowed to be themselves at work. No employee should ever have to put on a “work mask,” he once told me in a written interview.
Research and experience shows that Kelleher is right. Choosing someone because of an impressive resume over an individual with a winning attitude can be a huge unforced error.
How do you know how to spot someone with the right stuff?
I have always looked for people with character—individuals with the DNA that allows them to put the company above themselves. That’s often the difference between a good hire and a bad hire. People with personal goals often go the extra mile when the company needs them most.
There are other ways to discern the out-performers from the laggards. Trusting your gut is usually a good idea, especially if your gut has served you well in the past. Or, perhaps you have heard from multiple constituencies (e.g. customers, colleagues) that this individual is not a team player. If you need a formula to identify top notch people, consider one of my favorite Jack Welch management models. People with good attitudes are also more likely to have his “4E’s of Leadership.” What are the 4E’s?
Energy—people who go at 75 miles an hour all the time. Energize—are those managers that fire people up. Edge—managers with edge know how to make the tough decisions and avoid the maybes, and Execute—those managers who deliver results. Hire the people with the right attitude, people who score high on the E to the 4th scale, and you are far more likely to reap the benefits of a great manager or employee. Hire on the basis of resume—which reveals little about someone’s “E” quotient, and you may find yourself having to clean up a huge mess somewhere down the line.
Want to know more on what to do and what to avoid in the workplace? The Unforced Error, my new book, is now available at Amazon and at all good bookstores.
Fire Those Who Don’t Live Up to Expectations
In the last posting I discussed how hiring the wrong person is one of the greatest unforced errors a manager could make. Close behind that one is keeping the wrong person even though you know he is all wrong for your unit and/or company.
How do you know when someone doesn’t belong?
He may not live up to the rules of the organization, especially the unwritten ones. Or he or she may simply fight against every key management initiative. Or an employee may simply be over his or her head in their current position. In these unsettled times, with unemployment at about ten percent, there is no reason to keep someone who does not perform with distinction. In most industries, there are others on the bench and unemployment lines just waiting for a chance to show you what they can do. But that’s besides the point.
Jack Welch was roundly criticized because he eliminated the bottom ten percent of the GE workforce every year. Early on he was called Neutron Jack (for eliminating people but keeping the buildings standing) and far worse by those who felt the full impact of this particular leadership tenet. But, as Welch pointed out, the New York Yankees fire the weakest players every year, so why shouldn’t his company? After all, both want to win and ridding the organization of non-performers increases one’s chances of winning. My new book, published today, The Unforced Error, increases chances that you will be retained and promoted rather than fired or left to twist in the wind.
The key is to make sure that when you discover someone who does not fit your company, move quickly. One of the greatest confessions made of big time CEOs is that when it comes to important matters, they never moved quickly enough. There is a lesson there for all of us, particularly those procrastinators who can’t ever reach inside themselves and make the really tough decisions that need to be made.
A Person Could be the Biggest Unforced Error of All
Tennis players often get to choose their doubles partners. In the world of business, you can’t always choose the people you work with. As a new employee or manager, you are assigned to a particular team or unit. However, one of the big responsibilities that comes as you rise into the ranks of management is the authority to hire new teammates. And it is in this critical area that managers often make the biggest unforced errors of all.
The best managers understand this. Under Jack Welch, less than one percent of GE’s “A” [best] managers jumped ship, demonstrating how well GE hired and developed people under his leadership. The legendary CEO Alfred Sloan, who turned General Motors into the world power it became in the 1920’s, 30s, and 40’s, would spend hours interviewing potential managers for positions that seemed insignificant from his vantage point on the org chart. However, when Peter Drucker asked him why he spent four hours interviewing a manager for his Toledo plant, Sloan answered unflinchingly: if I don’t spend those four hours now, he said, I will have to spend 400 hours cleaning up the mess. And that’s time I do not have.
Hiring bad partners or colleagues is obviously not restricted to sports and business. In my new book, The Unforced Error, I use the example of Sarah Palin. At a time when the Republican candidate was five to seven points behind his Democratic challenger, McCain panicked. Even though his strongest case for voters was his experience—veteran senator, war hero, foreign policy experience—he abandoned all of that when he chose the inexperienced Alaskan governor, Sarah Palin, as his running mate. The junior senator from Illinois, in contrast, ran a near-error-free campaign. At first, Palin energized the base. However, when Katie Couric interviewed Palin in prime time, the Alaskan governor choked. Not being able to answer what magazines or newspapers she read was a huge unforced error that proved to the world that she was not ready for prime time. When she said she could see Russia from her living room as evidence of her foreign policy experience her fate was sealed. Soon after her numbers sank and along with it any chance for a Republican victory. While very few of us get to run for any office at that level, the story illustrates how choosing the right people is one of the most important decisions any manager ever makes.
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About Jeffrey
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As former Vice President and Publisher of McGraw-Hill's trade business books division, Jeffrey Krames has personally edited and published more than 275 business books, including many award-winning, best-selling titles on business luminaries that include Jack Welch, Michael Ovitz, Ross Perot, William Paley, Michael Dell, Bill Gates, Herb Kelleher and Lou Gerstner among others. Read more...
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The Unforced Error
Sneak Peek - Chapter One!
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