- Extraordinary leaders are monumentally better than merely good leaders.
- There are a number of competencies which extraordinary leaders possess.
- To be an extraordinary leader, you don't have to possess all of these competencies; you just have to be extraordinary at several of them.
- Key leadership competencies have complementary competencies which work extra well together (great technical aptitude goes well with the ability to express ones' self).
- Rather than focusing on our weaknesses, we should focus on making our good attributes extraordinary and improving the competencies which are complementary to our extraordinary ones.
There were some points in the book which really resonated with me. The one thing I didn't like was the seemingly exclusive approach to defining good leadership by surveys. How do we know if a leader is good? Because his people say he is. There were some attempts to show a few studies which indicated that extraordinary leaders are X% more effective, but at the end of the day it seemed like extraordinary leaders were always judged by the percentage of employees who rated them at Y% or higher in given competencies.
I tried to think of how else you might judge whether someone is an effective leader and found that it's a difficult challenge.
After just accepting the premise I ended up enjoying the book.
Sorry, haven't read that one. But I'd like to suggest something. Can you guys create a site like www.dailylit.com but with the Book of Mormon? I think it would be a big hit.
ReplyDeleteI'm a slacker in reading this book, I'm afraid. I lost it for a while, and haven't had time recently to read. :(
ReplyDeleteI've picked up the book again and am enjoying it. The central premise, that leaders can be made and aren't just "born," rings true.
ReplyDeleteAre the authors LDS? I noticed that their company is in Orem, UT, and one of my friends commented: "they must be LDS, who'd want to live in Orem, UT if they weren't!" Having lived in Orem, I understand the sentiment :)
ReplyDeleteI"m half way through the book and am very impressed with the overall premise, as well as the "take-aways", ideas that I can implement into my own life as a leader.
In their discussion about attitudes being affected by behaviors, one paragraph sounded like something right out of "Preach My Gospel", in that it wondered whether changing behaviors does change ones attitude, or is it the other way around, or is it a combination of both. I believe that as one changes their attitude, for instance, is "born again", and has a powerful conversion experience, their behaviors will change to conform to their new attitude. But, changing behaviors as one is being taught the gospel will also affect a change in attitude.