Level 5 Leadership

Key Points

What is Level 5 leadership?

What are the Characteristics of Level
5 leaders?
Can you learn to become level 5?
How To Go From Good to Great?

Leadership Pyramid

5Level 5 Executive
4Effective Leader
3Competent Manager
2Contributing Team Member
1Highly Capable Individual

The 5 Levels Of Leadership

Level 1 Highly Capable Individual: Makes productive

contributions through talent, knowledge, skills, and good
work habits
Level 2 Contributing Team Member: Contributes to the
achievement of group objectives; works effectively with
others in a group setting.
Level 3 Competent Manager: Organizes people and
resources toward effective and efficient pursuit of
predetermined objectives.
Level 4 Effective Leader: Catalyzes commitment to and
vigorous pursuit of a clear and compelling vision;
stimulates the group to high performance and standards.

Level 5

Level 5 Level 5 Executive: Builds enduring greatness

through a paradoxical combination of personal humility
plus professional will.

Set up successors for even greater success

Compelling modesty, self-effacing, understated
Look in mirror and take full responsibility for poor decisions
Many people have the potential to evolve into Level 5
Attribute success to other than themselves

Attitude of a Level 5 leader

"I want to look out from my

porch at one of the great
companies of the world and
be able to say: I used to
work there.

What Makes a Level 5 Leader?

Humility
Modesty
Willful
Humble
Fearless

Level 5 Leaders

Warren Buffett is a timeless Level 5 leader example.

He gives autonomy and praise to those surrounding him.
In 2008, although Berkshire stock lost 32% of its value, it
still beat the S&P 500. Instead of spinning this as a victory,
Buffett shouldered responsibility, saying, "I made some
errors of omission, sucking my thumb when new facts
came in that should have caused me to re-examine my
thinking and promptly take action."

Showtime Question

Obama: a Level 5 Leader?

Not Always About the Money

A level 5 leader isnt concerned about money
only. This leader is much more concerned with
the overall success of the company in the present
as well as in the future when they are gone.
They will do everything they can to make sure
the company will succeed later by appointing a
successor with their same characteristics.

When it is About the Money

When it is about the money youre probably

talking about a Level 4 Leader. This is somebody
who is not concerned with the future of the
company after theyre gone, but who just wants
to get paid.
They are all about the I and not about the
We.

Good to Great

Buildup

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Level 5 First Who Confront the Hedgehog Culture of Technology

Leadership Then What Brutal Facts Concept Discipline Accelerators
Disciplined People
Disciplined Thought
Disciplined Action

Flywheel

First Who ,Then What

Leaders began the transformation by first getting the right

people on the bus (and the wrong people off the bus).
Who questions came before what decisions - before vision,
strategy, organization structure, and tactics.
Put your best people on your best opportunities, not biggest
problems

Confront the Brutal Facts

Setting off on the path to greatness requires confronting the brutal

facts of current reality.

Must create a culture in which people have a tremendous

opportunity to be heard and, ultimately, for the truth to be heard.

Four basic practices:

Lead with questions, not answers

Engage in dialogue and debate, not coercion
Conduct autopsies, without blame
Build red flag mechanisms where information
cannot be ignored

Hedgehog Concept
Hedgehogs see what is essential, and ignore the
rest. Concentrates on one area which is the best
The Hedgehog Concept is a deep understanding of
three intersecting circles translated into a simple,
crystalline concept:

What you are deeply passionate about

What you can be best in the world at
What drives your economic engine

Hedgehog Concept
All Guided by
the Three Circles

Autopsies
& Analysis

Ask Questions

The
Council

Executive
Decisions

An Iterative
Process

Dialogue &
Debate

Culture of Discipline
Gives people freedom and responsibility
within framework of that system.
Stop doing lists are more important than
to do lists.
Anything that does not fit with our
Hedgehog Concept, we will not do.

Technology Accelerators
Good-to-greats used technology as an
accelerator of momentum, not a creator of it.
Technology by itself is never a root cause of
either greatness or decline.
Good-to-greats avoid technology fads and
bandwagons (others are using so I should do)

The Flywheel

There was no single defining action, no grand program, no one

killer innovation, no solitary lucky break, no miracle moment.

Like pushing on a giant, heavy flywheel, it takes a lot of effort

to get the thing moving at all, but . . .

With persistent pushing . . .

In a consistent direction . . .
Over a long period of time . . .
The flywheel builds momentum . . .

Eventually hitting a point of breakthrough.