The 12 Herculean Labors of Lean Leaders

Seemingly impossible tasks can be conquered when you fight like Hercules.

When we say that a task is Herculean, it means it is extremely difficult. Heracles was a Greek hero
(Hercules in the Roman version) who got into some trouble for killing a member of his family in a
fit of madness and was assigned a series of challenging tasks as penance. Sometimes we face
Herculean challenges as penance for far smaller crimes, or even for doing nothing wrong at all. In
fact, change agents and leaders learn that many times we are “punished” with seemingly impossible
tasks for trying to do the right thing, as is the case when we try to implement a lean culture.
Legend has it that for 12 years Heracles traveled all over the classical world to complete a dozen
incredible tasks given him by King Eurystheus. Following are the 12 Herculean Labors of Heracles
and what lean leaders can learn from them:

1. Slay the Nemean Lion

This monstrous lion had a hide that was too tough to pierce with arrows. So Heracles stunned it
with his club and strangled it with his bare hands. Then Heracles skinned the lion using the lion’s
own sharp claws and wore its hide, after which he posed for the photo shown above.
Like Heracles, lean leaders sometimes need to get their hands dirty and do the job themselves.
When everyone says, “Oh no, that problem is too difficult to solve,” pull out your club, stun it, and
rip off its hide with its own claws. The solution to the toughest problem lies within the problem
itself, if you change the way you look at it. If piercing doesn’t work, bash it. Once it’s stunned
(problem is contained), look for locally available solutions (claws). Then use the “lion hide” or war
stories of things you did yourself to gain credibility with people you are trying to teach and help
within your organization.

2. Conquer the Lernean Hydra

The hydra was a beast with nine snakey heads. Cut off one head, two would grow in its place.
Heracles overcame this problem by cheating. He sliced off all of the heads and then had his
companion Iolaus cauterize the wounds with a torch so the heads wouldn’t grow back. Then, as a
souvenir, Heracles dipped his arrows in the Hydra’s blood and made them into poison arrows.
The lean leader faces many hydras. Meeting after meeting, e-mail after e-mail, excuse after excuse,
report after report—oh, the list goes on. But learning from Heracles, we need to find a teammate
who can help us fix the problem by applying root cause countermeasures. “Stay there and hold the
torch until you’re sure the head isn’t growing back, while I go cut off the others.” The poison
arrows are a bonus: The next time someone gives the same excuse or calls for a useless meeting,
apply one of your proven countermeasures.
3. Capture the Cerynian Hind
The hind was a little deer with gold horns. Since it was loved by the goddess Artemis, Heracles
couldn’t simply club it and bring it back to the king without angering the goddess. Heracles
followed the hind for a whole year until he found a way to carry it away without hurting it.
Lean leaders need to capture people’s minds and hearts without hurting them by being too directive
or aggressive. This requires listening, observing, communicating, and waiting patiently for the right
moment. Many lean leaders have angered the goddess of the waste hunt by trying to carry people
along too fast.

4. Subdue the Erymanthian Boar

This deadly wild boar lived on Mount Erymanthus and terrorized the people there. So Heracles
chased it up the mountain and into a snowdrift, caught the boar, and took it back to King
Eurystheus. The king, who owned a jar large enough to hide it in for just such a terrifying occasion,
did so.
Change agents and lean leaders must bravely face the one thing or issue that everyone is afraid to
talk about. It could be a person who is essential to the team’s success, but whose behavior is eroding
morale. It could be simply to openly challenge the status quo and to get people thinking. Drive the
issue up the mountain (elevate it) because eventually the boar will run out of mountain to run up.
Lean leaders should first hide the jar so the CEO can’t hide from the issue.

5. Clean the Augean Stables

King Augeas owned a few thousand cows. Their stables needed cleaning after 30 years of use.
Heracles, recently back from chasing deer for one year, was given one day to clean this up. Using
natural forces to his benefit, Heracles bent two rivers and made them flow through the stable,
cleaning it right up.
Flow! Need we say more? Instead of shoveling the business equivalent of cow dung, the lean leader
must find a less wasteful way by harnessing the business equivalent of rivers. Whether it’s
information flow, physical work flow, or otherwise, lean leaders must design work in ways that get
dirty jobs done quickly with minimum effort, sustainably. Although patience is a virtue, this labor
teaches also that urgency is essential.

6. Silence the Stymphalian Birds

A flock of killer birds with razor-sharp claws and beaks lived around Lake Stymphalos. Heracles
first used a rattle to flush them out of their nests and then killed the birds with arrows tipped with
hydra-blood poison.
These birds are akin to the people who stand aloof in groups and cast barbs and criticisms on the
change effort. They have strength in numbers and the ability to stay out of reach. The lean leader
needs to find a solution for bringing these people around or containing them individually, not as a
faceless mass. The flock cannot be conquered. Whatever may be the change management equivalent
of the rattle that disperses the flock and the poison arrow that is a sure counter to each of these
deadly birds of prey, it is a Herculean task for a lean leader to find them.
7. Catch the Cretan Bull
This insane, fire-breathing bull was kept as a pet by King Minos of Crete. Heracles had little trouble
wrestling this mad beast to the ground and bringing it back to King Eurystheus, mission
accomplished. Not big on insane fire-breathing bulls, the king set it free to terrorize Greece.
The insane, fire-breathing pet project of the senior leader… woe be to the lean leader who must take
on this Herculean task. Who is wiser: the king who keeps the mad bull or the king who captures it
only to release it on his subjects? Some crazy pet projects need to be kept contained, or clubbed and
quietly choked like the lion. The tricky part of this Herculean task is for the lean leader to manage
the stakeholders, contain the mad bull-project, and protect the organization from its insanity.

8. Round up the Horses of Diomedes

The human flesh-eating horses of Diomedes were stopped when Heracles killed King Diomedes
and fed him to his horses, thus making them tame enough to take them back to King Eurystheus.
A herd of horses naturally follow its leader. If the leader feeds them flesh, they become flesh-eating
horses. Capture these horses and you have a herd of man-eating horses on your hands. This is
trouble, not a conquest. The Herculean labor of a lean leader is to see through an organization that
appears on the surface to be “hopeless” and identify the source of the corruption, eliminate that
practice, belief, person, or persons from the organization, and feed the people hope and truth rather
than fear and mistrust.

9. Bring the girdle of the Amazon Queen Hippolyte

What started out as a seemingly easy task for Heracles went quickly awry when Heracles visited the
land of the Amazons, where Queen Hippolyte agreed to give him the girdle in exchange for the
daughter of Eurystheus. But the goddess Hera spread the rumor that Heracles came to the Amazons
as an enemy, and he ended up taking the girdle by force.
The lean leader who doesn’t effectively manage all stakeholders can easily become victim of false
rumor and sabotage. This is especially true when venturing into a different business culture, such as
groups, physicians, design engineers, or executives. The strong lean leader may be able to take the
girdle by force once but won’t make any allies that way.

10. Steal the Cattle of Geryon

Geryon was a giant winged warrior with one head attached to three human bodies. His prized
possession was a herd of red cattle. A two-headed dog and a giant guarded this treasured herd.
Heracles killed these freaks and brought the cattle back to his taskmaster. Having plenty of practice
with poison arrows and monster-slaying at this point, the truly Herculean part of this task may have
been crossing the Libyan desert.
The lesson here for the lean leader is pretty straightforward: If, after a long journey, we are
confronted with a giant, a two-headed dog, and a three-bodied winged monster, all of which block
our path to treasure, we must strike them down. The lean leader must not hesitate after a long, tiring
journey across the change management equivalent of a hot, barren desert. Strike with vigor and
accumulate skill to overcome the two-headed dog of indecision, the last guardian of the treasure and
whatever other big freakish obstacle we may face.
11. Collect the Golden Apples of the Hesperides
The Hesperides were nymphs in whose garden these golden apples grew. The apples were protected
by the hundred-headed dragon Ladon. Heracles worked out a deal with the nymphs’ father, Atlas,
whereby Heracles would do Atlas’ job and hold up the earth for a time while Atlas fetched the
apples for him.
At times, the lean leader must take on the Herculean task of holding up the world while someone
else implements the changes required. This may mean that the lean leader must be capable and
prepared to step in as an interim manager and run the operation, either to stabilize a situation,
safeguard a customer during a massive change effort, or simply to free up a senior manager who can
personally lead the lean implementation while you run their operation.

12. Capture Cerberus

For his finale task, Heracles captured Cerberus the three-headed (sensing a theme?) guard dog of
the underworld... without the use of weapons. It was a simple matter of wrestling down the dog’s
heads until it agreed to go back with him to King Eurystheus who, mistaking it for an insane fire-
breathing bull, set it free again.
The lean leader must figuratively grab those doubters and naysayers who are of two minds about
lean: They understand that it is good, but also see that the organization is failing to properly address
risks. These doubters are guardians of the underworld who say “no” to people who wish to leave the
darkness. Wrestle with their heads without weapons, listening objectively, until they agree to come
out into the light to see your view. Then set them free.

Learning from the 10 labors plus two

The 12 labors of Heracles were originally assigned by King Eurystheus as the 10 labors. He added
on two more because he did not give Heracles credit for No. 2 and No. 5. He killed the hydra not
single-handedly, but with crucial help from his companion Iolaus. The stable-cleaning river method
was also nixed by the king. What we can learn from this as lean leaders is threefold: Take any help
you can get, even if it means you don’t always get credit for the task; sometimes it’s not lean but
luck or market conditions that saves you, so don’t fool yourself; and unintended consequences are
part of accomplishing the Herculean labors, including additional labors.
To all lean leaders and change agents out there who struggle with these 12 and other Herculean
labors, may all your lean improvement results be epic, your success stories be legendary, and may
all the challenges you overcome be monstrous.