We Study Billionaires - The Investor’s Podcast Network - In-B-Tween : The 3 C's of Leadership (Investing Podcast)

Episode Date: June 17, 2015

In this 5 minute episode, Preston lay's out the 3 C's of leadership that he learned at the 101st Airborne Division. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://theinvestorspodcastnetwork.supportingcast.fm

Hey everyone, this is Preston and Stig, and this week we've got another in-between episode for you. This is in-between episode number two. And the title of this is the three Cs of leadership. So as a commander of an attack helicopter company with the 101st Airborne Division, I once had a former boss give me some of the best leadership advice I ever received. It's not all-encompassing, but it really hits the main points, and this is going to give you the 80% solution with leadership. So he told me once, quite simply, he said, Preston, if you pay attention to the three Cs, you'll do fairly well. So this is what the three Cs are. Number one, be calm. Have you ever noticed how much more you respect an opinion when it comes from a person

with a calm and patient demeanor? When a person is calm and people have a tendency to relate to that behavior with truth and stability, have you ever listened to a debate and seen one person acting very emotionally while the other person was completely calm? In that situation, it almost appears like the person who is calm is the one with more understanding and knowledge. Now, whether the calm person is more understanding or not, it's the perception that's really important in the short term. When leading a team or large organization, people are watching and listening very closely to what you do as a leader. They are much more likely to execute your intentions if they believe you know what you're doing. You see, leadership is about inspiration. It's so

much easier to inspire people when you have an approachable and calm demeanor because that represents the environment of trust and security. They immediately trust you. Scaring the pulp out of your employees might work in the short term, but everyone knows long-term leadership and retaining the talent within your organization is the true recipe for winning the marathon we call business. So that's the first C, be calm. The second C is be competent. Being calm only works if people actually think you are competent at what you do. So when a leader is competent, they not only know their own job, but they know their job of their superiors and their subordinates alike. This is vitally important for success because leaders need to understand

every facet of the responsibilities and actions. The competent leader is the one that's continually trying to learn new things. They understand that if they aren't flexible to change, they'll be forced to change. Jack Welch, the former CEO of General Ed. Patrick has famously said, an organization's ability to learn and translate that learning into action rapidly is the ultimate competitive advantage. If you're the type of leader that baths in stagnation, you're destined for mediocrity. The best leaders yearn for continual depth and breadth of knowledge, so get after it. Learn that new skill set and whatever you do, don't just sit there on idle as there are opportunities to expand your knowledge and understanding. So that's number two. That's the second C. Be competent. And for the last C, you've got to be consistent. Have you ever worked for a Mr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde kind of boss? You know the guy that's super happy one day and then just a crazy dictator the next day. This is the leader that lacks consistency. And at the core of an inconsistent leader, this fear and imbalance within the organization. The people that work around the inconsistent leader are fearful because they don't know which person they're going to get and what they're going to experience.

from day to day. Additionally, the subordinates are hesitant to speak their minds because they fear the repercussions of the disgruntled or unstable leader that might emerge at a moment's notice. Inconsistent leaders have subordinates that hide important information and critical operating facts from their purview, and that's really bad. When a leader has a common, consistent work environment, information flows through the ranks like a good, clean plumbing system. When leaders have an imbalance and inconsistent method for dealing with good and bad news, it puts it clogs in those arteries and creates a dysfunctional organization. So that's it. Those are the three Cs. You've got to be calm. You've got to be competent. And last, and very importantly, you've got to be

consistent. And I think if you hit those three things as a leader, you're going to find that you have so much more success. And you just focus on those simple tasks and maybe don't overcomplicate things as a leader and just keep it simple. So that's all we got for this in between the As you know, we try to cram a lifetime of experience into just five minutes. Preston and I hope you have a great rest of the week.