Simon Sinek with Arthur Brooks: Leading with Purpose

Our country is facing a crisis of moral leadership. From political polarization to falling private-sector dynamism, a lack of inspirational leadership is slowing our progress and making it more difficult to lift up the vulnerable. Bestselling authors Simon Sinek, TED Celebrity and Optimist, and Arthur Brooks, president of the American Enterprise Institute, are among the country’s foremost leadership experts. Together, they will share the advice they offer leading policymakers and executives, and explain why uncovering our “why” is the key to greater effectiveness and personal happiness.

 

now my name is Joni I’m thinking about
your comment or your wife’s comment at
least we know he he’s not cheating there
statistics data shows us the 70% of
students are cheating now parents are
cheating they’re writing their papers
they’re editing their papers so much for
that parents are saying we we finished
our applications we did this we did that
this issue of integrity I think which
cuts through the why yeah how do you
apply the golden to issues
so for example if you’re running an
organization or I run a school and I see
integrity as a driving issue yeah that
impacts everything that this school is
doing and the leaders are not yeah
facing this how do you apply this to
issues yeah you want to take a crack
well I want to hear what you have to say
but I think it’s actually worth pointing
out that every single one of us can be
more honest give me more every single
one of us shades the truth all the time
and there are lots of reasons to do it
one of these to protect ourselves from
harm one of the reasons that we do it is
to get ahead and what it’s just to say
to protect your reputation and sometimes
is to protect other’s feelings those are
like kind of the three canonical reasons
for shading the truth right there’s a
lot of research on lying actually and
lying is common and is becoming more
common and particularly among young
people that we find the interesting and
the alarming thing as they tend to
justify lying as if they were protecting
others when in point of fact they are
protecting themselves so well here’s
what I recommended to all of us we’re
talking about cheating but thinking
about any dishonesty thinking about
something where you’re bending the rules
when you’ve done that why did you do
that and be honest with yourself even
before you’re honest with others never
shade the truth to protect yourself and
now here’s the gist goal go an hour
without doing it and then go a whole day
without doing it and you’re gonna pay a
cost by the way you’re gonna pay a cost
when somebody asks you a difficult
question and you don’t want to give the
answer and you pretend that you’re
protecting somebody’s feelings but
you’re actually trying to protect
yourself and your own reputation but the
dividends are huge with respect to your
own integrity because the smart person
who is more integrated is happier is
more joyful has clearer vision Simon
Simon what do you think of my answer so
it’s more about integrity
it goes to finite an infinite right
which is which is I’m playing by finite
rules my kid has to get into this school
my kid has to get this job my kid has to
get this my kid has to get that and I’ll
do whatever it takes to get them there
and that’s their playing by a plank
they’re living life and manage worse
they’re managing their kids lives based
on the finite rules and the problem is
there is no winning exactly and and that
we have this twisted concept in how
we’re managing our lives and helping our
kids in terms of wins and losses the
short term it’s the short term and and
and we said it’s pervasive it’s been
building and building since the 80s and
90s is pervasive to the point now it’s
affecting parenting exactly so so so so
bye so if somebody learns leadership at
work right and I did we I’m actually not
a business guy but but like during the
Great Depression the unemployment rate
was 25% during the last recession it was
9 or 10 right good stable unemployment
is 4 4 so what I hear is even when 25
percent I don’t have jobs 75 percent do
so if you want to get two people get
them at work and it’s too hard to go to
everybody’s home and say let’s learn
leadership but if I can get companies to
teach leadership lots of people who work
in companies are parents and you learn
skills like conflict resolution you
weren’t you learn things like effective
communication you learn things like
effective confrontation
these are all skills that are parenting
skills so the belief is that if we build
leaders in the most efficient way
possible which is at work they become
better parents that’s the belief we’re
not teaching leadership at all there’s a
book that just came out called the end
of loyalty where companies are no longer
loyal to people and people are no longer
loyal to companies everything is about
short term short term short term and
unfortunately that mentality now
pervades parenting so we have to do the
hard work we’ve probably lost a
generation but we have to do the hard
work of going back to what
– to be a parent which doesn’t mean
necessarily helping your kid get the job
at any expense or get into the school at
any cost we’ve run out of our formal
time but she’s gonna be outside is
actually yeah because your babysitter is
has to leave we go a little but we can’t
tell you what we’re gonna do we’re going
to retire to the festival but I want to
do one thing before we do I want to sum
up I want to sum up three big lessons
that we’ve learned here from talking to
Simon okay number one lesson number one

Simon Sinek: Why Leaders Eat Last

In this in-depth talk, ethnographer and leadership expert Simon Sinek reveals the hidden dynamics that inspire leadership and trust. In biological terms, leaders get the first pick of food and other spoils, but at a cost. When danger is present, the group expects the leader to mitigate all threats even at the expense of their personal well-being. Understanding this deep-seated expectation is the key difference between someone who is just an “authority” versus a true “leader.”

 

(3:33 min)

Who would risk their lives for others so that they may survive?

I asked Johnny Bravo, why would you risk your life so that others may survive.

Because they would have done it for me.

In the military, we give medals to people who are willing to sacrifice themselves so they other may gain.

In business we give bonuses to people who are willing to sacrifice others so that we many gain.

We have it backwards.

 

(25:34 min)

Leadership (Alpha) comes at a cost.  You see, we expect when danger threatens us from the outside.. we expect them to run towards the danger to protect us.  This is what it means to be a leader.  The cost of leadership is self-interest.  If your not willing to give up your perks when it matters, then you probably shouldn’t be promoted.   ..

.. Leadership comes at a cost.  You don’t get to do less work.  You have to do more work.  And the more work you have to do is put yourself at risk to look out for others.

That is the anthropological definition of what a leader is.

This is why we’re so offended by these banker boys who pay themselves astronomical salaries.  It has nothing to do with the number.

It has to do with the fact that they have violated a deep-seated social contract.

We know that they made all that money and allowed their people to be sacrificed.

In fact they may have sacrificed their people for the money.

If I told you that we’re going to give 150 million to Nelson Mandela would anyone have a problem with that? Nope. $250 million to mother Teresa, got an issue with it?

Its not the number.

We are deeply and viscerally offended that we allowed them to have this alpha position and they did not fulfill the responsibility of the alpha.  They are supposed to sacrifice themselves for us, never sacrifice us for themselves.. This is why we are angry and offended and don’t trust them.  They fail.

Most leaders don’t even know the game they are in – Simon Sinek at Live2Lead 2016

Trust and cooperation are not standard in our organizations and yet we know they should be. There are two attributes that every single leader has the opportunity to possess that will help them create the types of organizations we would be proud to call our own. Those two attributes are EMPATHY & PERSPECTIVE.

 

Maximizing shareholder value is like a coach prioritizing the fans over the players.