The Goal of This Post

This post is a synthesis from the book The Diary of a CEO, by Steven Bartlett, sharing some of the key lessons and wisdom around how to thrive in your personal and professional life.

I hope you enjoy it!

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1. Ask Who not How

• Default to asking, ‘Who is the best person that can do this for me?’
• Find out what you’ve got a natural ability for, the thing that you do best, and lean in to that.
• Business is all about people.
  • Hire the best individuals
  • Bind them with a culture that gets the best out of them.

Your ego will insist that you do. Your potential will insist that you delegate.

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2. Create a Cult Mentality

• If the culture is strong, new people will become like the culture.
• If the culture is weak, the culture will become like the new people.

Create a culture that is sustainable; where people are authentically engaged with a mission they care about; trusted with a high degree of autonomy; sufficiently challenged in their work; given a sense of forward motion and progress; and surrounded by a caring, supportive group of people that they love to work with and that provide them with ‘psychological safety’.

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3. The Three Bars for building great teams

• Never let individual players get in the way of the team ethos, culture or values.
• Culture and values determine a team’s success.
• The Three Bars: Fire, Hire, Train

‘The hardest thing I had to learn was to fire people. You must do it to protect the integrity of the company and the culture of the team.’ – Richard Branson

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4. Leverage the Power of Progress

• Inspiration and collective belief is the energy that all teams run on.
• To solve problems, encourage and celebrate small wins.
• Small wins are compact, tangible, upbeat, and noncontroversial.

To create the perspective of progress in teams:

1. Create Meaning.
   Make sure every team member feels the meaningful impact the work is having on the world.
   
2. Set Clear and actionable Goals.
   Lay out objectives clearly, so team members know exactly what they need to accomplish.
   
3. Provide Autonomy.
   Give team members space to take charge. Encourage them to map their own path by utilizing their skills and expertise.
   
4. Remove Friction.
   Proactively remove any obstacles, bureaucracy and sign-off processes that prevent the team from daily progress.

The most professionally rewarding feeling in the world is a sense of forward motion.

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5. You must be an Inconsistent Leader

• Comprehend the unique shape of each of your team members.
• ‘He had different ways of dealing with different players. He knew how to get the best out of everyone.’

For us as leaders, to become the complementary piece for each member of our team, we must be as inconsistent, emotionally variable and fluctuating as the people in our teams are.

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All content credit goes to the author(s). I’ve shared the bits I’ve enjoyed the most and found most useful.

Cheers ’til next time! Saludos!
Alberto