#MasterClass on #Leadership

Over the last few months, I have been intrigued and impressed by the concept of Master Class. The high-quality video classes are on a range of topics from photography, writing, food, science, business, sports, to creativity. What makes these classes special are that they are taught by renowned experts. It feels like these experts took the time to reflect and share their learnings. The format is great - easy to digest short (about ten-minutes) videos. I signed up for a few sessions on Leadership and as the year ends, I thought I’ll share my key takeaways:

Bob Igor: Business Strategy and Leadership

For about 15 years, Bob Igor was the CEO of the entertainment giant Walt Disney Co. Only after a year of his retirement, this year, the board brought him back. As a leader, Bob has delivered significant success and has truly kept the company evergreen and relevant as times have changed. Few takeaways from his class:?

• Use your time effectively: Have a daily routine. Prioritize quiet time every day. You need some quiet time to think where you are not bombarded by external forces, not doing email or watching TV. It is an energy producing exercise where thoughts are far more focused.
• Under his leadership, Disney bought 4 companies (Pixar, Lucas Films, Marvel, 21st century Fox) and successfully integrated them. His philosophy on managing integrations: assimilate the business fast, take care of the people, relationships can be repaired, be confident in your instincts, respect the value of culture

A few more tenets for success

• Be curious to be successful: Learn new things, have new experiences, visit new places, meet new people. When you are not curious, you don’t innovate
• Be Authentic: A very important quality of leadership. When you try to fake something even like fake optimism, it is visible
• Operate with Integrity: Set high standards for yourself. Warren Buffet says?when you make a hire, look for 3 qualities - brain, energy, and integrity
• Be Fair and Own your Mistakes: First be accessible, allow you team to express opinion, be empathetic. Give people a second chance for honest mistakes
• Be Decisive: Know when decisions have to be made and act quickly. Take the time to study the ramifications of a decision. Organization demands a decision to make it efficient. News travels fast, opinions can be formed quickly. Decisions can be made for you as the marketplace changes

Anna Wintour: Creativity and Leadership

Anna is the Editor-in-Chief of Vogue since 1988 and Global Chief Content Officer for Condé Nast since 2020. She shares her learnings and experiences from the fashion world:?

• A good team is everything! You want people whose views you respect. Build a team that stays with you and becomes second nature
• Invest in the right people. Someone who is a self-starter will be an ambassador for your business. Groom people who are loyal and passionate about the world
• Remember, micromanaging will suffocate everyone. Key is to keep the pace moving. When giving feedback, make it fast and direct. Be thoughtful about how you run meetings and why
• Listen to the inner voice and take the time to learn and gain experience. Always chose a boss, and not a job. Don’t exhaust your mentors

Geno Auriemma: Leading Winning Teams

?Geno is a Head coach for the University of Connecticut (UConn) women's basketball. He has led UConn to 17 undefeated conference seasons. He was also the head coach of the US Women’s National Basketball team and under his guidance, they won the World Champion twice and got two gold medals at the Olympics. Words of wisdom from him on leading winning teams:

• Leadership is about how you make people feel—about you, about the project or work you’re doing together, and especially about themselves. You can’t hold other people accountable unless you are delivering what you need to do
• Are you born as a leader? Perhaps not. You are born with character, then your environment adds to it. Your experience teaches you more and then you are tested on it when you get opportunities. As a good leader, you gotta be available for the people, be a good listener, be in the moment, and most importantly have their best interest at heart
• On being a good teammate: The greatest reward of being a teammate is that people respect you and the ones you respect want you on the team! A great teammate has a lot of friends

On building a team:

• ?You need someone who has the vision, and the skills you don’t have
• Give autonomy to your key people
• Make sure that they can communicate

How to sell goals to the team:

• Remind them that these are not New Year resolutions. They are meant to be achievable
• Everybody wants to win but not everybody wants to prepare to win
• Contrary to what you think, you are responsible for your success and your failure. It starts with you and ends with you. We are here to give you all the resources

On building trust: It takes time to build trust and you can lose it quickly. You want to build an army of trustworthy people. Lying to them, false hope, treating people differently is the easiest way to give up trust. Everyone doesn’t need to be treated equally but everyone needs to be treated fairly. Critique the action, not the person

?Howard Schultz: Business Leadership

Howard Schultz served as chairman and CEO of Starbucks from 1986 to 2000, from 2008 to 2017, and is now serving as the interim CEO. His philosophy of leadership: It is not about telling people what to do. It’s about setting up an environment for them to do the best work of their lives. Learnings from his session:

• People want to be around someone who has a strong set of values and who lives their values
• ?Being intellectually curious is an attribute that one must develop
• Find a mentor. Your expectations and relationship with mentor will evolve over a period
• As a leader, over invest in culture. Culture is for people and customer and if you truly want to determine the organizational culture, perform periodic culture audit, and bring in outsiders
• When building a team, hire for a value-based team. During the interview stage, get to know the individual. It shouldn’t be a judging process but more of a chat. Make sure that the person should not feel subordinate to you; focus on attracting the person to the company

That’s what I could cover this year. Let me know if you have a suggestion on a Master Class that you enjoyed.